Posted by
Richard A Panzer, Ph.D. on Thursday, September 10, 2009 12:00:00 AM
I hope many of you were able to listen to Miriam Grossman's debate with SIECUS (Sexuality Information & Education Council of the United States) VP Martha Kempner on the Michael Medved show on September 9, We owe Dr. Grossman a debt of gratitude for trying to wake up the American people about SIECUS' deceptive tactics to promote sexual rights to teens and even to pre-adolescents. During the debate Ms. Kempner claimed several times that SIECUS recommends abstinence as the best choice for teenagers and many parents may have been persuaded that it is a trustworthy organization.
But parents need to understand that the SIECUS DEFINITION OF ABSTINENCE is not what most parents think about when they hear the word. Reading from Ms. Kempner's
Talk about Sex booklet (page 56-57):
"If you are going to use abstinence as a method of birth control, it specifically means not having vaginal intercourse and avoiding any other behaviors where semen has a chance of entering the vagina. Abstinence can be 100% effective in preventing pregnancy when couples really avoid all of these behaviors all of the time. How effective abstinence is in preventing STDs depends on which sexual behaviors are avoided. To minimize the chance of passing or getting an STD, you should avoid any behavior that involves an exchange of body fluid (semen, vaginal fluid, blood) or contact with bumps or sores on the skin."
You can see that when SIECUS talks about abstinence they are really talking about "sexual behaviors that avoid the transmission of semen into the vagina." This is the "Outercourse" definition of abstinence.
Notice that the
Talk about Sex booklet states "How effective abstinence is in preventing STDs depends on which sexual behaviors are avoided. To minimize the chance of passing or getting an STD, you should avoid any behavior that involves an exchange of body fluid (semen, vaginal fluid, blood) or contact with bumps or sores on the skin."
You can see in this quote that the SIECUS definition of abstinence INCLUDES sexual behavior! That is why in a discussion about "abstinence" they feel the need to warn the "abstaining" students "to minimize the chance of passing or getting an STD, you should avoid any behavior that involves an exchange of body fluid (semen, vaginal fluid, blood) or contact with bumps or sores on the skin."
You can also see why SIECUS and other organizations advocating "Comprehensive" sex ed state that abstinence has failure rates!
Unfortunately, as pointed out by Janice Shaw Crouse in her Townhall Column, SIECUS' guidelines on sexuality education "provide the overall organizing framework of the topics and learning objectives" of the newly released UN Sexuality Guidelines, ensuring that the SIECUS ideology of free sex and sexual rights can be more quickly spread throughout the world using the resources of the United Nations.