State Film to Promote Chastity

I am not a pro-lifer, but I do object to your editorial. It seems to me that a good video promoting abstinence might help some teen-agers withstand the pressures for early sexual relations. Thirty-five thousand dollars to produce the video doesn’t seem unreasonable, given the total cost of sex education.

During my career as a public school administrator, I supported and encouraged sex-education programs, but not just to avoid teen-age pregnancies. We need to stop teen-age pregnancies, but sex education must be more than teaching girls how to avoid becoming pregnant. Students need to understand their bodies and how to make decisions about matters that will affect them the rest of their lives.

I’ll support your effort to get contraceptives into the hands of sexually active students, but don’t ridicule the efforts of others to give support to students who aren’t sexually active.

Many people in our society still believe abstinence is the safest and best way to prevent teen-age pregnancies. Why discourage giving that segment of our taxpayers some support in this position? I hope the Office of Family Planning in the Deukmejian Administration is attacking the problem from all directions.

KEITH B. WALTON

Whittier