Republicans and Building Walls

Mark Obenshain, Steve Landes, and Chris Saxman recently gathered at Massanetta Springs to talk about legistlation that rebuilds "the walls of religion and morality that protect families" with the folks from the Valley Family Forum. Fittingly called "The Unveiling" this Republican Party pander-fest was filled with moral stances, perfect solutions, glad-hand clapping, and mutual adulation.

Building walls of religion and morality? What is that all about? Why is the Virginia Republican POLITICAL Party pandering to this blatantly religious, supposedly family-friendly, conservative, fundamentalist club of moralists? What has governance to do with building walls? What are they trying to protect us from? Just exactly WHO is outside the walls and why are they so dangerous?

Here's an example: Sen. Obenshain and the Valley Forum think that comprehensive sex education in public schools is "highly offensive" especially because his and the Valley Forum's preferred "abstinence-only" don't-teach-kids-about-sex education programs were recently cut from the state budget.

So they build a wall. Don’t teach kids about safe sex, or contraception. Teach them only that sometimes contraceptives don’t work and that having an abortion can kill you. Build the wall high and strong and call it “abstinence-only.” Now take a psuedo-moralistic stance and pronounce endlessly and loudly that if kids just don’t have sex, there won’t be any unplanned pregnancies, STD’s, and there won’t be any need for abortions! The PERFECT solution. Duh. How’s it working so far?

“Tobe Goldberg, a parent and member of the Human Sexuality Curriculum Advisory Committee in Maple Grove, Minn.., refutes this belief with the following fictional example of what she regards as short-sighted thinking: ''My son and I were walking along the street. He began crossing against the light. Since I know that what he doesn't know can't hurt him, I didn't say anything. I wish I could have him back now.''

On the other side of the wall are the hundreds of thousands of teens who get pregnant, or get an STD, or have an unwanted child because of their ignorance of effective birth control. In fact, recent declines in the sexual activity of teenagers closely follows the INCREASED use of effective contraception.

Outside the wall are all the teenagers who pledged abstinence in middle school or high school, but “slipped” and had sex anyway.

Outside the wall are half the kids who had an unplanned pregnancy because they failed to use birth control and the other half who tried to use a contraceptive but didn’t know how to use it effectively.

''There is nothing in any peer-reviewed scientific journal to suggest that teaching abstinence-only is effective in getting teens to delay sexual activity,'' said one expert, Cynthia Dailard, a lawyer and senior public policy associate at the Alan Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit organization devoted to advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights.

Ms. Dailard cited a recent study by the American Psychological Association, which found that more than 60 percent of college students who had pledged virginity during their middle or high school years had broken their vow to remain abstinent until marriage.

''Researchers have never measured the typical use-effectiveness of abstinence,'' she wrote. ''Therefore, it is not known how frequently abstinence fails in the real world or how effective it is compared with other contraceptive methods.''

So the Republicans build walls…. And moralize….. And the state gets governed how?