Dec. 27, 2007
Washington Post editorial writer Ruth Marcus has written a column that says so much about what is wrong with today's parenting, that it is hard to believe. Of course, she doesn't intend to say it. But her response to her daughters' telling her that actress Jamie Lynn Spears is pregnant is, well, priceless. Jamie Lynn Spears is the 16-year-old sister of Britney. I only know this because my local newspaper has an article on Britney every single day, for some reason.
So anyway, Marcus' daughters, 10 and 12, tell her the latest news and Mom asks, "So what do you think the lesson is here?"
Her 10-year-old says it must be not to have sex until you get married. Oh, but no, that could not possibly be the lesson. Marcus even goes so far as to say - in her column - that abstinence before marriage would be a mistake. But she's not comfortable saying that to her children "because that conversation gets so complicated so quickly."
The reason for that is, she's wrong, of course. Historically, people have believed in abstinence before marriage. There are all kinds of practical reasons -- health, stability of family, importance of child-rearing.
Marcus says the Spears news is actually a welcome development because it reinforces to teen-agers the need to use birth control.
Gee, I'm sure that Jamie Lynn could've gotten access to birth control. But, as others have pointed out, teen-agers are about as good at remembering to take their birth control pills as they are at picking up their socks and doing all their chores.
Birth control hasn't done much to control unplanned pregnancy. In fact, out-of-wedlock births have increased dramatically since the U.S. Supreme Court in 1965 struck down state laws that made use of birth control by married couples illegal. The court made it legal for unmarried people to use contraception in 1972. In 1970, 10.7 percent of live births occurred to unmarried mothers; in 2001 33.5 percent of live births occurred to unmarried women, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Simply put, The Pill has given the illusion of removing the consequences of sex. And that leads to a statistic cited by Ms. Marcus: more than 60 percent of high school seniors report having had sex at least once.
Ms. Marcus thinks she'll take her older daughter to an edgy movie about a teen-ager getting pregnant in high school to teach her that "it can happen to you."
It certainly can, as long as parents are afraid to tell kids the truth. Sex should be reserved for marriage for your own physical and emotional health, and that of your children.
When my kids ask me, I'll tell them the truth. My husband and I lived together before we were married, and it's not the best way to start a marriage. We are fortunate that our marriage has lasted, and it has benefited a great deal from our conversion to Catholicism nine years ago. I will encourage my kids to take things in the right order and to make sure they know their own minds and hearts before they make such a commitment, because that is what sex is whether we acknowledge it or not.
A better take on the whole issue of sexual activity and teens can be found in an interview with Dr. Meg Meeker, who has written the books: "Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters: 10 Secrets Every Father Should Know" and "Epidemic: How Teen Sex is Killing our Kids." That interview can be found at zenit.org.
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Monday, November 19, 2007
Two and a Half Men?
Nov. 19, 2007
I wonder how many people read First Things and watch Two and a Half Men, an abysmal TV show that includes Charlie Sheen.
I read First Things and enjoy its take on religion and the public square. Until last night, I had never seen a full episode of TV show, which is about a recently divorced dad living with his chubby son and his ne'er-do-well brother (Sheen), who is also a womanizer and alcoholic.
But for some reason I sat through one-and-a-half episodes of Two and a Half Men, and it really made me wonder where all of the grown-ups have gone. I am incredibly out of touch, as this show is already in reruns. But the 12-year-old was delivering lines about the alcoholic uncle's girlfriend such as, "I'll bet she's dynamite in the sack" and "Lydia's a stone cold be-atch" to his father's dismay. The housekeeper's priceless line was "I'm glad I stopped coming to work high." I mean, come on.
And then I read in First Things a review of a book called Marriage and Caste in America: Separate and Unequal Families -- about how the escalation in divorce and out-of-wedlock births has affected the working class disproportionately, which I'm sure is true.
The statistics in the article and the TV show's inappropriate relationships between grown-ups and children just underscored for me how far from normal or healthy our culture has fallen.
In the book, author Kay S. Hymowitz says, "For the first time in history -- not just American history but the history of known human society -- people began to toy with the idea that children and marriage were really two discrete life phenomena."
A selfish idea indeed. We have already seen where it leads.
It seems to me that human beings, as creatures, become our worst selves when we refuse to relate to our Creator, who gave us life, the world and a few rules to follow in our own best interest. And in the cult of individuality that is America, it is a badge of honor for people to thumb their noses at any authority but their own. I really don't hold out a lot of hope that that state of affairs will change.
The only hope in Hymowitz' book is that she notes a small trend back to marriage-mindedness and state-at-home motherhood. But that is found only in the middle and upper classes. What about the rest of the children?
I wonder how many people read First Things and watch Two and a Half Men, an abysmal TV show that includes Charlie Sheen.
I read First Things and enjoy its take on religion and the public square. Until last night, I had never seen a full episode of TV show, which is about a recently divorced dad living with his chubby son and his ne'er-do-well brother (Sheen), who is also a womanizer and alcoholic.
But for some reason I sat through one-and-a-half episodes of Two and a Half Men, and it really made me wonder where all of the grown-ups have gone. I am incredibly out of touch, as this show is already in reruns. But the 12-year-old was delivering lines about the alcoholic uncle's girlfriend such as, "I'll bet she's dynamite in the sack" and "Lydia's a stone cold be-atch" to his father's dismay. The housekeeper's priceless line was "I'm glad I stopped coming to work high." I mean, come on.
And then I read in First Things a review of a book called Marriage and Caste in America: Separate and Unequal Families -- about how the escalation in divorce and out-of-wedlock births has affected the working class disproportionately, which I'm sure is true.
The statistics in the article and the TV show's inappropriate relationships between grown-ups and children just underscored for me how far from normal or healthy our culture has fallen.
In the book, author Kay S. Hymowitz says, "For the first time in history -- not just American history but the history of known human society -- people began to toy with the idea that children and marriage were really two discrete life phenomena."
A selfish idea indeed. We have already seen where it leads.
It seems to me that human beings, as creatures, become our worst selves when we refuse to relate to our Creator, who gave us life, the world and a few rules to follow in our own best interest. And in the cult of individuality that is America, it is a badge of honor for people to thumb their noses at any authority but their own. I really don't hold out a lot of hope that that state of affairs will change.
The only hope in Hymowitz' book is that she notes a small trend back to marriage-mindedness and state-at-home motherhood. But that is found only in the middle and upper classes. What about the rest of the children?
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