Teaching Abstinence to Teens Won’t Work

Re “Frustration Voiced Over ‘Just Say No’ Sex Education Plan,” March 3: The Republicans and other religious fanatics never cease to amaze me. Abstinence has not worked in centuries and will not work now unless someone finds a way to neutralize Mother Nature.

Someone should inform the person with the Lamborghini analogy that if his son got the urge to drive it, he would, whether he leaves the keys or not. If the urge were great enough, he would even settle for a Geo. Just telling him “don’t” will not stop him, in either case.

Some Islamic countries have another cure. Stone the girl to death. Let’s try that, maybe.

Ronald E. Hohn

Los Angeles

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It seems as though the conservative agenda is racing, not creeping, back into national policymaking. The announcements that we will spend millions on teaching abstinence only and millions more promoting marriage as a way out of poverty are dangerous policies that miss the basic issues while offering a value-loaded quick fix to long-standing social issues. What happens to the millions who won’t reap the alleged benefits of these policies?

We know what happens to the teenager who practices abstinence and then one day makes a different choice. With little or no information on birth control, the consequences could be devastating and life changing.

And what about the millions of residents who can’t--or maybe make healthy choices not to--marry? Will the new policy now make gay marriages legal so that they too can benefit from the riches to be realized with a marriage certificate? And let’s not forget the millions of victims of domestic violence who may wish to terminate their marriages to protect themselves and their families.

Offering ill-conceived solutions to long-standing problems is not the answer; however, it seems that anything goes now under cover of the “axis of evil” rhetoric so prevalent in Washington at this time.

Henry Briggs

Huntington Beach