Preventing Teen Pregnancies
I admit it. I was a strong believer for many years that the only thing we needed to prevent teen pregnancy was to switch from sex education to abstinence only education. Unfortunately, as my vision is becoming more and more of a reality we’re seeing mixed results.
I still believe that abstinence is the answer and abstinence only should be taught in schools. However, I think there are other things we can do to help reduce teen pregnancy.
1. Establish a private fund to give partial college scholarships to students who have not had children.
2. Increased funding to churches to provide abstinence education.
3. Passing concealed carry laws to make it harder for teenaged boys to know if their girlfriend’s father is armed.
4. A universal curfew for all teens of 9:00
5. Fines for teens caught engaging on sexual behavior
6. Extending the Bush tax cuts to allow businesses to hire more teenagers
7. Auditing the abstinence education programs of schools with a high rate of teen pregnancy to make sure that they are teaching what they should
None of these steps alone will do much, but together this 7 point plan will help to make sure that this epidemic will end.
That's Right Nate 
i am a teen mother who works, graduated from high school and is now attending collage. I also earned a scholarship and my son is now two years old. I think your article is discriminating us teen mothers who actually are successful and take care of our children and don’t live on welfare. So give us some credit …….
erica
October 23, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Hey Erica–Good luck in collage. I really didn’t talk about life for teen mothers. I think a lot of us Republicans stop thinking about the whole motherhood thing after the baby is born, but I’m glad to hear you’re doing so well. People like you and Bristol deserve a lot of credit.
thatsrightnate
October 23, 2008 at 6:51 pm
nate, i wish to draw your attention to the unfortunate typo in your second sentence. “abstinence” should never contain the word “tit”. i’m sure you’ll agree.
p.s. erica, i think it’s admirable that you’re attending collage.
gina
October 24, 2008 at 7:25 am
Thanks for the save Gina.
thatsrightnate
October 24, 2008 at 7:33 am
Oh come on, you two! Give the girl a break. She misspelled “college” but she got “successful” right. And at least she doesn’t spell “abstinence” with a “tit”.
Lola
October 24, 2008 at 9:01 am
” If your a teenager and your in school, but its your last year, and also pregnat dose it affect your education at school”?
Ana
December 9, 2008 at 12:12 pm
Being pregnant is a lot of work. I don’t see how it can’t affect your education. On the other hand, it can be done.
thatsrightnate
December 9, 2008 at 5:38 pm
i think this article is complete bullshit. it’s descriminating. it makes me sick. how can you sit there and tell people what to do? and your ideas are WAY out of proportion. it will never be done!
I'm Me
December 14, 2008 at 12:37 pm
It probably won’t be done, which is a real shame, because it means that teenagers will continue breeding and producing even more teenagers, compounding the problem.
Don’t you Americans have some sort of segregated teenage summer camp system? Couldn’t that be expanded to a year-round thing? Between, say, the ages of 12 and 28 (ladies aged 21-28 could of course leave early if they are chosen by a Christian man of means).
Fraser
December 15, 2008 at 5:22 am
Thank you for that addendum Fraser
thatsrightnate
December 15, 2008 at 6:38 am
Fraser,
Don’t be misled. Nate is looking for a woman with means. He doesn’t really have means himself. IF he did, surely, he would repay his relatives for the $35 they lent him in July.
Steve
steve
December 15, 2008 at 7:23 am
I thought the storage industry was booming?
Fraser
December 16, 2008 at 1:55 am
Nate, are you having problems with your brother in law? As you know so much about Brazilian history, I decided to tell you a real life anecdote. This happened in 1961, before the military coup sponsored by the American government left us with a dictatorship that lasted 21 years. The president of Brazil was Jango, and his brother in law, Brizola, wanted to run for president as well. But there was a law that forbid politicians’ relatives to run for office. So Brizola launched a big campaign. His slogan was: “Cunhado não é parente, Brizola presidente” (a brother in law is not a relative, Brizola for president – but in Portuguese it rhymes). Anyway, I just thought you could ignore Steve, since he isn’t even your relative.
Lola
December 16, 2008 at 6:24 am
Thanks for the sage advice Lola. I will remember that.
thatsrightnate
December 16, 2008 at 8:07 am
Establish a scholarship fund for teen girls who haven’t been pregnant? Why not one for students who have? They obviously need more help getting through college and if they decide to take control of their future and try to be successful, they could use all the help they could get.
And a universal curfew of 9:00pm? That is ridiculous. That wouldn’t stop people. Teens are able to have sex at other hours of the day.
Fines for teens getting caught having sex? That won’t stop them. It will just make them upset, but not make them stop having sex. It’s just a waste of time on the state’s part.
And this 7 point plan of yours, yea it won’t stop the “epidemic” of teen pregnancy.
Get real.
This is reality.
-a 15 year old female.
Hailey
December 19, 2008 at 1:58 pm
This is a crazy idea it makes no sense
just as Hailey said nothing will stop TEENAGERS from having sex or doing sexual activities the best
thing to do is to promote condom usuage and birth control people going to have babies if they want to or want to have sex its not everyones decision to choose for them and as for the camp for girls to like the age of 28 thats ridiculous too !
come up with better ideas or mind your own business
Kayla
February 6, 2009 at 10:07 am
You just don’t seem to get it. A teenage girl is becoming pregnant every 26 seconds. We need to help her.
thatsrightnate
February 6, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Well i see no one has written on here in a while, but I am a 28 y/o mother of 5 children. I graduated high school after having 2, and nursing school after have 3 more, and have just finished with my bachelors degree, working on MA. I was 14 when I had my first child and lived on my own. it has been the hardest thing for me to go through. I think teen pregnancy should be stopped some how. I dont think anyone is mature enough to take care of a child at a young age, and most people that have had kids at a young age want to glamorize it when their mothers and grandmother’s cared for the baby while they finished school. I love my babies, but girls give me a break, you can’t tell me that your proud you had a baby as a teen, and in 10 years, I promise you’ll wish you’d have waited at one point or another.
lotakids
March 24, 2009 at 9:07 pm
Whenever I see a teenage mother it makes me sad. I want to reach out to these girls and ask them what they’re thinking. I really believe that there is no girl that I couldn’t turn off sex in just 5 or 10 minutes.
thatsrightnate
March 25, 2009 at 5:24 am
I’m 12 and I was raped… Is it my fault I got raped while knocked out and got pregnant? This makes me so mad, think about all those teens that got pregnant and DIDNT get an abortion and is going through raising them. Say it’s my fault but I’ll say it’s not.
Taylor
April 25, 2009 at 11:24 am
Taylor, it most certainly is not your fault. My article was only about consensual sex. What you suffered through was not. I’m sorry if I upset you.
thatsrightnate
April 25, 2009 at 1:23 pm
So I know this is an old article, but the whole Star Trek liberal conspiracy got me to reading some of your other articles. Spelling mistakes aside, I’m really saddened by this particular piece on teen pregnancy.
However good it might be to have abstinence until marriage upheld in our society, we have to admit that we live in a fallen and hurting world that doesn’t understand why this makes sense. If the teens you are talking to don’t an understanding of why this lifestyle choice makes sense and are bent on having sex, why deny them sex education that will help them make educated choices to know their bodies better, prevent unnecessary spread of disease, and prevent unplanned pregnancy? Yes this is not an ideal solution, but this is not an ideal world either.
I’m also upset by your comment about “a lot of us Republicans stop thinking about the whole motherhood thing after the baby is born, but I’m glad to hear you’re doing so well.” If you care so much before hand and are willing to picket and protest and write articles such as these, why stop caring when the baby is born, as if you have washed your hands of the mother who you said you were so sad about. Ask her what she is thinking then and then help her change a diaper or buy some groceries or do something useful. If we started caring better for teen mothers who have ended up here for preventable and sad reasons the cycle might actually have a chance to be broken rather than these women feeling abandoned and judged by people who said that they cared about them when they were pregnant.
clearly a liberal hippie who lives in Canada
May 19, 2009 at 8:51 am
I’m starting to think that this whole Blog is a joke, much in the vein of Stephen Colbert. I can’t help but laugh… Either these are the opinions of a sheltered close-minded dyed-in-the-wool right wing ultra conservative (who may or may not be 13 years old), or someone who is just trying to get people riled up (which you seem to be doing fairly well.) Though I know the former exists, I have a hard time believing it.
Comrade Canuck
May 19, 2009 at 9:57 am
So placing all of these laws and restrictions will make teens fall in line and listen to what mom and dad say? No I dont think so. That will create conflict between the two groups. And from conflict arises deviance, from there you just get more teens wanting to have sex so they can throw it in your face and show you they can do what they want with their own bodies.. How about educate them, tell them exactly what they are getting themselves into when they are having sex, then give them options. Birth control is here and readily available, and its also FREE and plan parent hood… along with condoms and the plan B pill. More education and less mistakes.
Emily.
September 17, 2009 at 12:33 am
Emily Peele, that had better not be you.
thatsrightnate
September 17, 2009 at 9:47 am
This tutorial for preventing teen pregnancy helps me a lot. This makes me think that having sex and being not pregnant will be okay if i only new this kind of education.
Micaela
December 19, 2009 at 10:11 am