Category: Youth Culture

All week we’ve been talking about abstinence. “Just wait until marriage.”

That was a message easier said to my great grandpa and grandma. They were married before age 20. Rewind a couple years before that. Remember how old Laura Ingalls was on Little House on the Prairie? (Don’t tell me you don’t remember that TV show… or I’m feeling really old!) Yeah, Laura earned her teaching certificate at age 15, starting seeing the man she would eventually marry, then married him at age 18.

That’s quite a different portrait for the typical girl trying to earn her master’s degree today who statistically won’t marry until about age 30.  (poor Almanzo would have had to take 12 years of cold showers waiting for Laura today!)

When we ask our kids to “wait” … how long are we really asking them to wait?

Marriage consultant and author Stephanie Coontz talks about this in her article about the decline of Married-Couple Households:

The biggest reason married-couple households are now outnumbered by unmarried ones is the rising age at which people first marry. In 1960, the median age of marriage (with half of all individuals marrying before this age and half after) was 23 for men and 20 for women. Half of all women married before they left their teens! Today the median age of marriage is 27 for men and almost 26 for women. Among women who pursue graduate degrees, it is about 30.

I talked about this in an article almost six years ago in response to a Washington Post article where the author raised some really good questions about age (and drew some conclusions that I didn’t agree with). He pointed out the noticeable difficulty of abstinence with the average age of marriage rising. Author Philip D. Harvey argues:

The average age of marriage in the United States today is 27 for men and 26 for women.  The abstinence-only program therefore asks our young people to renounce sexual activity throughout much of the early part of adult life …

… I wonder if those who seriously advocate abstinence until marriage would prefer to see the marriage age come down…

…But in modern industrialized societies, where women have educational opportunities and more than half attend college, marriage in the teenage years will likely become increasingly rare.  If we agree, as I think most Americans do, that equal educational and occupational opportunities for women are a good thing, that our society is enhanced and enriched by these developments, then I think we must accept the fact that marriage in the middle or late twenties is the modern societal norm.  If that is so, the expectation of sexual abstinence until marriage is utterly unrealistic.

Philip poses a great question about the growing difficulty of what we’re asking kids to do.

This age of marriage changes regionally, even more so out of the U.S. In Denmark the average age of someone’s first marriage is 32.5 for men and 30.1 for women. But in Bangladesh it’s 21 for men and 16 for women. Maybe that’s what our kids need to do. Just move to Bangladesh!

In America the ages change as do the laws of when you can even marry. Most states allow males to marry at age 18 and females at 16 with parental consent. Exceptions include Hawaii, Missouri and Georgia where females only have to be 15 with parental consent (and Georgia allows 16 year old females to get married without parental consent if they are pregnant). There we go. If you can’t afford to go to Bangladesh, just move to Atlanta!

Regardless, the age is changing. About.com documents the exact change on this page:

Year — Men— Women
2003 — 27.1 — 25.3
2002 — 26.9 — 25.3
2001 — 26.9 — 25.1
2000 — 26.8 — 25.1
1999 — 26.9 — 25.1
1998 — 26.7 — 25.0
1997 — 26.8 — 25.0
1996 — 27.1 — 24.8
1995 — 26.9 — 24.5
1994 — 26.7 — 24.5
1993 — 26.5 — 24.5
1992 — 26.5 — 24.4
1991 — 26.3 — 24.1
1990 — 26.1 — 23.9

1989 — 26.2 — 23.8
1988 — 25.9 — 23.6
1987 — 25.8 — 23.6
1986 — 25.7 — 23.1
1985 — 25.5 — 23.3
1984 — 25.4 — 23.0
1983 — 25.4 — 22.8
1982 — 25.2 — 22.5
1981 — 24.8 — 22.3
1980 — 24.7 — 22.0

1979 — 24.4 — 22.1
1978 — 24.2 — 21.8
1977 — 24.0 — 21.6
1976 — 23.8 — 21.3
1975 — 23.5 — 21.1
1974 — 23.1 — 21.1
1973 — 23.2 — 21.0
1972 — 23.3 — 20.9
1971 — 23.1 — 20.9
1970 — 23.2 — 20.8

1969 — 23.2 — 20.8
1968 — 23.1 — 20.8
1967 — 23.1 — 20.6
1966 — 22.8 — 20.5
1965 — 22.8 — 20.6
1964 — 23.1 — 20.5
1963 — 22.8 — 20.5
1962 — 22.7 — 20.3
1961 — 22.8 — 20.3
1960 — 22.8 — 20.3

1959 — 22.5 — 20.2
1958 — 22.6 — 20.2
1957 — 22.6 — 20.3
1956 — 22.5 — 20.1
1955 — 22.6 — 20.2
1954 — 23.0 — 20.3
1953 — 22.8 — 20.2
1952 — 23.0 — 20.2
1951 — 22.9 — 20.4
1950 — 22.8 — 20.3

1949 — 22.7 — 20.3
1948 — 23.3 — 20.4
1947 — 23.7 — 20.5
1940 — 24.3 — 21.5

1930 — 24.3 — 21.3

1920 — 24.6 — 21.2

1910 — 25.1 — 21.6

1900 — 25.9 — 21.9

1890 — 26.1 — 22.0

So what is my 2 cents on all of this?

Well, I don’t live in Georgia, but do the math. I was 37-years-old this year when I celebrated my 17th year wedding anniversary with my wife. (17 years and we still like each other.)

Hmmmmmmm.

Last week my wife and I watched a TV show where a student was expelled from school for protesting an abstinence assembly by playing George Michael’s song “I Want Your Sex” over a boombox. In this fictional prime time TV drama, the student and her lawyer preached that “abstinence sex education” was an oxy-moron. They jested that it was setting up kids for failure by telling them to not use condoms and not telling them the whole story.

This is not to far off from Planned Parenhood’s claim that  “…the national policy of promoting abstinence-only programs is a $1.5 billion failure, and teenage girls are paying the real price.”

I was frustrated watching the TV show. After all, I’ve seen good and bad abstinence education. At the beginning of this season of American Idol we saw two ludicrous examples. We saw a young girl contestant who claimed that she taught abstinence education. Simon skeptically asked her, “Go ahead and share a little bit of your pitch.”

She began her weak, inarticulate case that sounded something like, “uh… well you just shouldn’t. There is so much other stuff to do instead like sports. So don’t do it.”

A week later an awkward middle-aged man too old for the competition claimed that he had a song that kids needed to hear. This goofy little man began singing his rediculous song, “No sex allowed! I don’t want to be part of that crowd!” (Randy and Paula joined in, jesting)

Is this what the world thinks of the message of abstinence? A bunch of homely losers who can’t “get laid” anyway so we are telling others, “Just clench your knees together and everything will be alright!”

I don’t think that’s a true representation of abstinence education. But we would be ignorant to not search for answers to this epidemic. (yes… I call 1 in 4 teenage girls getting a disease an epidemic). After all, whether we agree with it or not… whether we like it or not… we’ve been teaching abstinence in schools and churches for the last few years, and the problem is not better.

Hence yesterday’s blog asking for answers.

The world’s answer is to swing the pendulum all the way back and claim, “Bush’s program isn’t working. So instead, let’s get excited about Trojan’s new ‘Evolve’ campaign: Use a condom every time.”

I don’t think that a false sense of security is the answer.

But the church seems to be saying that condoms are never the answer.

In yesterday’s blog someone had the guts to bring up that tough question in their comments. Randi asked:

“…if the statistics I’m reading are correct and 70% of teens DO have sex before they are 18, then at least 5 of the girls in my youth group are going to have sex before they are 18, and some of them might get STD’s or end up pregnant too.

That in mind, this is my question: is it inappropriate to discuss using condoms or other such things at church? I’m torn because on the one hand, I definitely DO NOT want to go there and then have the youth think that we are saying “Hey, if you use a condom, that’s a free pass to go have sex”

Randi asked the question that abstinence-education is being criticized for not asking. (and note: she just asked a question- that’s not a sin, you know!)

Chuck responded to this saying, “I think we need to talk about condom use. However, only from the standpoint of their unaffectiveness.”

“Pilgrim” responded like this: “It’s not only condoning, but capitulating to the lies of the culture that helped get us here! Would we tell teens that because they are already going to drink alcohol, they should choose a designated driver to cut down their chances of a DUI?”

Todd said this: “I agree with pilgrim. The Bible is so clear on this and honestly I get sick to my stomach when I see churches and pastors begin to compromise BIBLICAL STANDARDS for cultural opinions. There is just no place for it. Why stop at sex and drinking, what about cheating, drugs, murder…remember when sin was sin???”

Are they right?

In New York Times’ recent article about Harvard’s “Students of Virginity” (an excellent article that presents a case for a Harvard club that believes waiting is the answer) mentioned some sobering facts:

“…those who took virginity pledges preserved their technical virginity about 18 months longer than teenagers who didn’t pledge, yet they were six times more likely to engage in oral sex than virgins who hadn’t taken a pledge. They were also much less likely to use condoms during their first sexual experience or to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases.”

Fact: Kids who have taken abstinence pledges tend to be more in danger of teen pregnancy than those who haven’t.

I’m simply asking… how can we equip our kids NOT to fail?

And people are asking a good question: if a kid listens to the abstinence message and says, “Nope, I’m gonna have sex.” Should we say… “Well, still don’t buy a condom because that would just be admitting to the fact that you’re going to do it!”???

It’s hard for me to get excited about this when I know condoms aren’t the answer. But all facts considered… is Randi’s question bad?