It's hard to imagine that this is how Bristol Palin wanted her senior year of high school to turn out: She's five months pregnant, transferring to a new school away from all her friends, and the father of her baby has posted on his MySpace page that he's a "redneck" who is not interested in having kids.
Pregnancy, a baby, and now marriage probably weren't in her plans before prom. And yet, one night, like hundreds of thousands of other teen girls, she had unprotected sex with her boyfriend and took the risk of getting pregnant. But why? In an age when pregnancy information is a mouse-click away and condoms are available at every 7-11, why are so many teen girls still getting pregnant?
At Seventeen we hear all the time from girls who say that they just "ended up having sex" and weren't prepared with birth control. Or they say that they didn't insist on using condoms because they felt awkward and embarrassed. Instead of protecting themselves, they risk getting pregnant and risk a future that won't turn out the way they had planned.
In a Seventeen /The Candie's Foundation Teen Pregnancy Survey earlier this year a whopping 70% of girls say that having a plan for their future would help prevent unplanned pregnancy. So we ran a contest asking girls to share the dreams that were helping prevent their unplanned pregnancy--their Plan A.
The winning girls made videos about winning an academy award and being a boxer. But they might just as well have made it about one day being the highest ranking woman in the U.S. government.
No matter how you feel about her politics, Sarah Palin is a shining example of the potential and power of women. And in one hot moment with her boyfriend, her daughter gave away her power to make the decisions about how she wanted her future to play out.
It's our responsibility to feed teen girls' dreams for the future and encourage them to be proactive in their destiny so they stop letting unplanned pregnancy "just happen."
However, the lack of vision and goal-setting in today's youth is not limited to females, although girls' issues in this regard are more relevant here because they are the ones who become pregnant. I work in a large urban juvenile justice system, and it's heartbreaking to see young males who have no clue as to what they will do next week, much less the next 10-20-30 years of their lives. How will they support themselves, or these babies some of them make with their equally rudderless female peers?
BTW, if Bristol Palin and her "baby daddy" (recall the profane, functionally illiterate MySpace pages) were black, this election would be OVER. Do you think any unmarried teenage Obama daughters could blithely appear at campaign events heavy with child, and everyone would coo and fawn over them? Again, GAME OVER.
If the baby is her mom's----then she's got a hell of a good free babysitter! If it's Palin's, then this is obviously what the rest of her life will be about: taking care of children. Struggling against her lack of education.
So----do you know something I don't? Is she starting in senior year?
Aside from the candidate herself "saying" that her daughter is 5 months pregnant so it couldn't possibly be her baby, I haven't seen anything conclusively proving anything (and I'll bet there will be a "miscarriage" before the kids get married). I've seen confirmation of the wide shock and disbelief when she announced "her" pregnancy at 7 months, including the media and even her own staff: http://www.adn.com/front/story/336402.html.
http://www.newsminer.com/photos/2008/mar/06/807/
I've seen confirmation that she gave birth one month later to 6+ pound child after not even "showing" a month earlier! : http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/380134.html I've seen a lack of a birth listing for that day at the hospital (and the days before and after) when she supposedly delivered: http://www.matsuregional.com/nursery/show_day.php?date=2008-04-18.
I've seen confirmation questioning the wisdom of a long trip back home of a woman with a known special needs fetus, water breaking a month early of due date and not even notifying the airline/airplane staff of her supposed condition:
http://www.newsminer.com/news/2008/apr/22/palins-flight-labor-falls-under-scrutiny/#comments
Maybe I'll just wait till the National Enquirer finishes their investigation.
Having a child is not death of dreams. Not for Bristol, nor Levi.
We do not have to write off two entire lifetimes (and, baby makes three?) because of three minutes of blind teenage passion.
It cannot be true in a society as wealthy as this, that a single teen mistake can haunt someone for life. Or, we need to change our priorities until this is no longer true.
To the contrary - she writes that having dreams is a powerful force in preventing unwanted pregnancies.
Your biases are projecting through - No one is writing off lifetimes, but you cannot argue that this event does not inexorably and permanently change the lives of not only the mother to be and the father, but also the child and the parents and extended family.
Sure lemons can be made into lemonaid, but in many families a "single teen mistake can haunt someone for life."
I should know - my mother had a baby out of wedlock (me) and it still haunts her.
It is something people don't understand if they have not lived it.
Peace be with you,
Could it, perhaps, have been this line?
Don't assume I have not lived this experience, and therefore do not understand.
You make my point for me: for a society as wealthy as ours, this should never be true.
NO teen - boy or girl - should be placed in a position to forfeit their power to make decisions because of a completely normal, perfectly natural exercise of their sexuality.
Sexuality is life, life giving, and life affirming it is not some dark lure to disaster, which should be penalized.
Poverty is a possible outcome for teen pregnancy, because POVERTY is tolerated, not teen pregnancies.
Despite the best efforts of the abstinence only crowd, in 2008 I have a difficult time believing that teenagers don't know about the consequences of sex and how to mitigate the risk.
The bottom line is that two teenagers acted irresponsibly and are now facing the consequences. They, and they, alone share in the blame.
Teenagers don't think like adults. That's why they aren't called adults.
I don't disagree with anything you said, only the concusion that somehow I haven't considered it.
I certainly have and I still feel the same way. In 2008, young people are aware of the consequences of sex and therefore responsible for thier actions.
Like you, my heart goes out to Bristol who really had no choices for herself once she became pregnant, given her family's point of view on the matter. I'd just add to your excellent points about teen pregnancy and prevention that until our society comes to healthier terms with sexuality and teaches young people how to acknowledge their very normal sexual feelings along with how to make responsible decisions about sex and pregnancy, the U.S. will continue to have the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the developed world.
If she believes that 'liberal' sex education promotes promiscuity, I would argue that 'forbidden fruit' has proven to be a bigger problem for her. And I can only imagine the "How could you do this to me?" type gut feelings going back and forth here. Bristol found out what she'd done a couple month after the fact but her mom chose her course before hand. The Gov may overcome this 'hurdle' & get elected, but life will NEVER be the same for Bristol either way.
Terrific piece as regards teen pregnancy. (I must agree however with those who demur from calling Sarah Palin a shining example of anything, as her positions make her a male supremacist in faux feminist clothing.)
Like you, my heart goes out to Bristol who really had no choices for herself once she became pregnant, given her family's point of view on the matter. I'd just add to your excellent points about teen pregnancy and prevention that until our society comes to healthier terms with sexuality and teaches young people how to acknowledge their very normal sexual feelings along with how to make responsible decisions about sex and pregnancy, the U.S. will continue to have the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the developed world.