The Silent Epidemic

So, school this week started off alright on Monday. But, it went down hill quickly. I'll spare you the details from the trenches, but here are they highlights:

Sometime earlier in the week, during homeroom we learned that we had a previously unannounced "program" at 930. At the time, I thought they said Christmas program, so I thought I was just in for some more forced religiosity, which, by the by, I am no less comfortable with or desensitized to after one semester.

I had misheard. When I arrived, I discovered, from the folding board poster and the program guide My Fellow New Englander (MFNE) passed me in the stands, we were being graced with an Abstinence program: Think Before You Let It Go. Joy among joys. The host for this assembly was none other than one of our teachers dressed as Flavor Flav. Other highlights of the program were: 1) the long, long, long skit in which different students "role-played" situations in which they chose not to drink and have sex, but to study instead; 2) the poem delivered by a ninth-grader wearing a large wrapped gift costume (because I LOVE the idea that we should tell keep telling women that their virginity is a gift they should give to the man they wish to marry. I have NO problems with that metaphor AT ALL); 3) the cheerleaders doing a slow dance to some r&b song about sex; 4) the early head start program parading the children through the gym like some sort of perverse intimidation tactic (LOOK! BABIES! BE SCARED OF SEX! YOU'LL EXPLODE! AHHH!).

All of this was really just a nuisance. I'm used to my school wasting my time and the time of my students. But then MFNE showed me the pamphlet they were passing out which I had decided to ignore. Then, I was angry. Oh, so, angry.

"Condoms fail so often in preventing pregnancy (10%-36%) that doctors call them "antiquated birth control." Condoms fail even more often in trying to prevent STDs. * ... Condoms break, crack, slip, leak, can be applied too late, removed too early, deteriorate with time and heat, and FDA recommendations allow up to 4 defects per 1,000. Defect holes can be at least 50 times larger than the HIV virus."

WTF. As MFNE joked: Antiquated birth control? So, they want our kids to say, "no baby, condoms are antiquated birth control, I'll just pull out." I am still waiting for the reference list which I requested since the pamphlet, surprisingly, doesn't provide them. I would parse all of the misleading statements in the quotation above, but it actually makes me too blindingly angry to think about it. Instead, I'll link to these counter-facts from an organization more up my alley.

Also, on friday we had another surprise program, this one completely unannounced, in which the commander-in-chief guilt tripped the staff and the students into performing better and taking tests seriously. We then watched an "inspirational" video in which a white coach blindfolds a member of his lily-white team and provides him the opportunity to exceed expectations because he believed in himself. The whole video took a solid 7 minutes, full of dramatic music and skinny football players. How touching. I can't seem to find a copy of the video though. oh well.