by Nuri Rhines

Created on: September 25, 2010   Last Updated: September 26, 2010

Abstinence

Being a teenager in High School is hard and when you add a baby it only gets worse. Teenagers are not meant to be parents; I mean they can barely take care of themselves. Teenagers should refrain from sex until they are married to avoid the consequence of having a baby or getting a sexual disease. Lance Morrow’s article “Fifteen cheers for abstinence” advocates teen abstinence in a funny-realistic way.

In Morrow’s article, he begins by saying that in the 50s’ kids were not having sex. This right away makes the reader laugh because despite what the culture was like (conservative) teens were having sex, but it was just not publicized as much as it is in today’s society. “I offer fifteen cheers for abstinence,” Morrow writes. He then describes how the topic of sex should not be avoided but instead should make “a culture of abstinence.” In the article Morrow talks about health official Kay Coles James, who “attracted the usual supercilious ridicule by urging abstinence as a policy to reduce teenage pregnancy.” This policy will not work. Teens are going to have sex and urging an abstinence policy is not going to make teens not want to have sex. If anything it is going to make teens want to have sex even more because people are telling them not to; teens love to rebel against authority.

Morrow backs up my point by stating “Teenagers will no more abstain from sex than will the frisking neighborhood dogs.” Morrow then goes on to describe the people who say to just pass out condoms because the abstinence policy would just not work. Marrow calls this “ruthless” I agree with marrow because just giving them the impression that we really do not care what they are doing and by giving them condoms we are giving them permission to have sex. Marrow then talks about hormones and the effects of puberty. “You cannot light a candle in a high wind,” he says. Marrow talks about giving teens “shelter” by showing the “context of abstinence.” Marrow says that the way to describe abstinence to teens is by saying that if you do stupid things like “drugs and casual sex,” the more chance of you losing out, but if you “abstain, the more you gain.” Marrow describes abstinence as “security” which I really like. Teens need security to stay grounded and have good morals so that they will have a better chance of not making idiot decisions.

Marrow’s article not only backed up my thoughts on abstinence, but he also did it in a realistic and humorous way. “Pregnancy is a hundred percent avoidable.” (ABC Family- The Secret Life of an American Teenager show).             

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