Condoms for teen agers

[thir]

"Called the Hotshot, the condom has been produced after government research showed 12 to14-year-olds did not use sufficient protection when having sex."

This article from the 3rd of March concerns launching condomes for 12-14 year old boys in Switzerland:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/he...itzerland.html


"Seriously? I thought. Condoms for kids?"

A comment to above article.

http://www.care2.com/causes/womens-r...n-switzerland/

What say ye? Should 12-14 year old boys have condoms?

[DuncanONeil]

No!

"called the hotshot, the condom has been produced after government research showed 12 to14-year-olds did not use sufficient protection when having sex."

this article from the 3rd of march concerns launching condomes for 12-14 year old boys in switzerland:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/he...itzerland.html


"seriously? I thought. Condoms for kids?"

a comment to above article.

http://www.care2.com/causes/womens-r...n-switzerland/

what say ye? Should 12-14 year old boys have condoms?

[oww-that-hurt]

Let's see.... as a teenager in the 60's I had condom access.

Never got any friendly ladies pregnant, never got any STD's.

I feel that if a male is producing sperm, then he BETTER be doing something to slow down the little buggers. Don't rely on the female all the time.

In this AIDS and fellow-bugs society it behooves every male to use whatever protection is available. Remember the old saying "VD travels in the best circles"?

Ah, heck. Forget it. All the uppity-uppity high-moral folks can go stick their head in the sand and pretend "Johnny" will just say no to sex. Yeah, right. That's how I got grand-children!

The reply to the article brought out some good points. Maybe the parents and school systems here in the U.S. should step back and rethink their Victorian messed up minds and do serious sex education.

[DuncanONeil]

Here's an idea. Why make the kids go to school! They know what they want to do so let them!

Let's see.... as a teenager in the 60's I had condom access.

Never got any friendly ladies pregnant, never got any STD's.

I feel that if a male is producing sperm, then he BETTER be doing something to slow down the little buggers. Don't rely on the female all the time.

In this AIDS and fellow-bugs society it behooves every male to use whatever protection is available. Remember the old saying "VD travels in the best circles"?

Ah, heck. Forget it. All the uppity-uppity high-moral folks can go stick their head in the sand and pretend "Johnny" will just say no to sex. Yeah, right. That's how I got grand-children!

The reply to the article brought out some good points. Maybe the parents and school systems here in the U.S. should step back and rethink their Victorian messed up minds and do serious sex education.

[TantricSoul]

Absolutely they should ... anyone who is sexually active should have a thorough education and the proper means to protect themselves and others.

That includes 12 -14yr old boys ... and girls.

It loooooong past time to look past our conditioned morality issues ... and face what is real. To stop placing these preteens in a manufactured dilemma. Time to face that "just say no" doesn't work unless they have the education and understanding of why it might be the right choice for them to say no.

Seriously ... "because it's the right thing to do" or "you'll go to hell for sinning" or "wait for marriage" just doesn't hold up well against all those endorphins, pheromones and other biological intensities that people of that age are dealing with.

However on the bright side of abstinence only education ... apparently females who have only this kind of sex education are more likely to engage in oral and anal sex! Yay ... good job moral majority. lmao.
Respectfully,
TS

[DuncanONeil]

Endorphins rule!?!?!
Then there is no such thing as morality?
Morality is like bravery, making the hard choices.
Besides in times past copius means of birth control was not available and yet there was not as many unwed births as now. And that does not even consider the number of pregnancies terminated.

Absolutely they should ... anyone who is sexually active should have a thorough education and the proper means to protect themselves and others.

That includes 12 -14yr old boys ... and girls.

It loooooong past time to look past our conditioned morality issues ... and face what is real. To stop placing these preteens in a manufactured dilemma. Time to face that "just say no" doesn't work unless they have the education and understanding of why it might be the right choice for them to say no.

Seriously ... "because it's the right thing to do" or "you'll go to hell for sinning" or "wait for marriage" just doesn't hold up well against all those endorphins, pheromones and other biological intensities that people of that age are dealing with.

However on the bright side of abstinence only education ... apparently females who have only this kind of sex education are more likely to engage in oral and anal sex! Yay ... good job moral majority. lmao.
Respectfully,
TS

[Ozme52]

Endorphins rule!?!?!
Then there is no such thing as morality?
Morality is like bravery, making the hard choices.
Besides in times past copius means of birth control was not available and yet there was not as many unwed births as now. And that does not even consider the number of pregnancies terminated.

Morality, how it's defined, changes with time and place.

And in times past, birth control was in the hands of woman, who were far better versed in the use of herbals. The lack of unwed births (which I won't even argue... as shotgun weddings were prolific as were "premature" births, as compared to today...) was more due to the consumption of abortives than due to making the "hard choices".

Not to mention other options... meaning orifices, that are considered "improper" by those same moralists. And today... a teens are very willing to call themselves virgins and chaste because they don't have vaginal sex. Oral (nor anal) isn't even "sex".... they know because Bill Clinton said it wasn't.

[DuncanONeil]

Entire argument apocraphal!

Morality, how it's defined, changes with time and place.

And in times past, birth control was in the hands of woman, who were far better versed in the use of herbals. The lack of unwed births (which I won't even argue... as shotgun weddings were prolific as were "premature" births, as compared to today...) was more due to the consumption of abortives than due to making the "hard choices".

Not to mention other options... meaning orifices, that are considered "improper" by those same moralists. And today... a teens are very willing to call themselves virgins and chaste because they don't have vaginal sex. Oral (nor anal) isn't even "sex".... they know because Bill Clinton said it wasn't.

[denuseri]

Just when I thought it was safe to enter a thread where no one would try to make it personal,,,looks up and rolls my eyes.

I say YES they should have access to condoms and birth control, boy, girl, hermaphrodite it doesnt matter.

Teach them to not have sex at that age all you wish, if they want they will find a way to do it anyway. They may as well know how to be safe.

[DuncanONeil]

Don't you think that the fact that there are no consequences for their actions has a large bearing on the choices they make.

In a large part your post also reads as if kids have always been engaging in sex at the first opportunity. Yes I know a percentage do but that is not how your post reads.

All kids are going to have sex. At first opportunity. So let's not teach them discipline, just let them do whatever they want whenever. We will find a way to fix it so it does not present adverse consequences.

In large part that seems like teaching that there are no rules of any kind!!

Just when I thought it was safe to enter a thread where no one would try to make it personal,,,looks up and rolls my eyes.

I say YES they should have access to condoms and birth control, boy, girl, hermaphrodite it doesnt matter.

Teach them to not have sex at that age all you wish, if they want they will find a way to do it anyway. They may as well know how to be safe.

[Ozme52]

Don't you think that the fact that there are no consequences for their actions has a large bearing on the choices they make.

In a large part your post also reads as if kids have always been engaging in sex at the first opportunity. Yes I know a percentage do but that is not how your post reads.

All kids are going to have sex. At first opportunity. So let's not teach them discipline, just let them do whatever they want whenever. We will find a way to fix it so it does not present adverse consequences.

I'd say it takes far more discipline to choose to use a condom than to just go do it. It takes preparation, consent, willingness to be responsible for ones actions...

Condoms, especially condoms as part of sex education, represent knowledge and responsibility. Without that, it's just kids being their natural irresponsible selves.

In large part that seems like teaching that there are no rules of any kind!!

Whereas I obviously think it's just the opposite.

[SadisticNature]

I'd say it takes far more discipline to choose to use a condom than to just go do it. It takes preparation, consent, willingness to be responsible for ones actions...

Condoms, especially condoms as part of sex education, represent knowledge and responsibility. Without that, it's just kids being their natural irresponsible selves.

Agree with this 100%.

Also regarding the early discussion about childhood. I disagree that the main factor is the modernization of society. I think a lot of it is our advanced knowledge of brain development compared to previous societies. I suspect that had previous societies had detailed knowledge about brain development that they could test and verify, a lot of their rules and ages would have been different. Perhaps not, they might have been forced into impractical roles by the times.

As for the whole sex before marriage question, I don't think any classroom instruction in a public secular school system should be based on religious values. I think if you personally have problems with how the school does things you should opt-out (your child needs a permission form for sex-ed if you don't like the curriculum don't sign it), and teach them it yourself (or through your church if its a religious values program). The fact is discussions about various forms of protection are far more difficult than discussions about abstinence for most parents.

[DuncanONeil]

Why must values that are also values within a religious setting to be excluded from a school setting?

Agree with this 100%.

Also regarding the early discussion about childhood. I disagree that the main factor is the modernization of society. I think a lot of it is our advanced knowledge of brain development compared to previous societies. I suspect that had previous societies had detailed knowledge about brain development that they could test and verify, a lot of their rules and ages would have been different. Perhaps not, they might have been forced into impractical roles by the times.

As for the whole sex before marriage question, I don't think any classroom instruction in a public secular school system should be based on religious values. I think if you personally have problems with how the school does things you should opt-out (your child needs a permission form for sex-ed if you don't like the curriculum don't sign it), and teach them it yourself (or through your church if its a religious values program). The fact is discussions about various forms of protection are far more difficult than discussions about abstinence for most parents.

[Ozme52]

Agree with this 100%.

Thanx.

Also regarding the early discussion about childhood. I disagree that the main factor is the modernization of society. I think a lot of it is our advanced knowledge of brain development compared to previous societies.

This is actually very "new" science and hasn't been widely accepted yet. if that were not so, we wouldn't be seeing more and more localities prosecuting children as adults instead of perhaps raising the age, especially for teen murderers who lashed out violently on a one-time basis against a constant, even dangerous bully.

Instead prosecutors are trying these minor children as full on adults.

So while I agree that science is beginning to understand that teen brains aren't "fully developed for rational thought" sounds good... it isn't being used and certainly not being used to justify delaying the teaching of sex ed.

It's strictly argued on moral grounds.

[DuncanONeil]

Oops! Wrong person.

I'd say it takes far more discipline to choose to use a condom than to just go do it. It takes preparation, consent, willingness to be responsible for ones actions...

Condoms, especially condoms as part of sex education, represent knowledge and responsibility. Without that, it's just kids being their natural irresponsible selves.
Whereas I obviously think it's just the opposite.

[DuncanONeil]

I think you have a misunderstanding of discipline.

I'd say it takes far more discipline to choose to use a condom than to just go do it. It takes preparation, consent, willingness to be responsible for ones actions...

Condoms, especially condoms as part of sex education, represent knowledge and responsibility. Without that, it's just kids being their natural irresponsible selves.
Whereas I obviously think it's just the opposite.

[Ozme52]

I think you have a misunderstanding of discipline.

I doubt that. There are many definitions. Please pay attention to the context of the sentence.

Definition #5c (if that helps.)

Main Entry: 1dis·ci·pline
Pronunciation: \ˈdi-sə-plən\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French & Latin; Anglo-French, from Latin disciplina teaching, learning, from discipulus pupil
Date: 13th century
1 : punishment
2 obsolete : instruction
3 : a field of study
4 : training that corrects, molds, or perfects the mental faculties or moral character
5 a : control gained by enforcing obedience or order b : orderly or prescribed conduct or pattern of behavior c : self-control
6 : a rule or system of rules governing conduct or activity

[SadisticNature]

Sorry that the statement got interpreted as an attack, wasn't my intent.

I was trying to suggest the level of extremism involved in claiming that the following are equivalent:

(1) The government enforcing a certain moral code regarding sex.
(2) The government enforcing educational requirements for youths.

I personally believe (1) is rather heinous, while (2) is common sense.

Just when I thought it was safe to enter a thread where no one would try to make it personal,,,looks up and rolls my eyes.

I say YES they should have access to condoms and birth control, boy, girl, hermaphrodite it doesnt matter.

Teach them to not have sex at that age all you wish, if they want they will find a way to do it anyway. They may as well know how to be safe.

[DuncanONeil]

Which government?

Sorry that the statement got interpreted as an attack, wasn't my intent.

I was trying to suggest the level of extremism involved in claiming that the following are equivalent:

(1) The government enforcing a certain moral code regarding sex.
(2) The government enforcing educational requirements for youths.

I personally believe (1) is rather heinous, while (2) is common sense.

[TantricSoul]

lets stay on topic here ok folks? (I am referring to the removed post not yours denu)
Thank you very much.
Respectfully,
TS

[Thorne]

While it's true that 12-14 is far too young for kids to be having sex, it's undeniable that they are anyway. Trying to hold them back, keeping them uneducated, only hurts them in the long run. If they're going to have sex anyway, better by far that they're prepared and knowledgeable. So yes, provide condoms to kids (boys AND girls) and allow doctors to prescribe birth control medications to sexually active girls.

And most important of all, GOOD, intelligent sex education classes, for all kids. Take away some of the mystery and excitement, and you take away some of the causes of early sex in the first place. Keeping kids ignorant and unable to obtain birth control only makes for more teenage pregnancies and transmission of STD's.

[DuncanONeil]

I think there is something more to it than just "mystery & excitement"
No matter how you think about it the species has divisions. Some are meaningless. But perhaps the greatest division is, although somewhat arbitrary, child and adult. Activities routine and normal for the adult are restricted from the child. Unless one wishes to say that no human activity is to be denied the child. Which would include sex, drugs, war, work, or any other number of things. Carried to that extreme, and many today bemoan the loss of childhood, means we will not have children. Merely little adults, which is how some actually refer to children already!

Just a few thoughts!

While it's true that 12-14 is far too young for kids to be having sex, it's undeniable that they are anyway. Trying to hold them back, keeping them uneducated, only hurts them in the long run. If they're going to have sex anyway, better by far that they're prepared and knowledgeable. So yes, provide condoms to kids (boys AND girls) and allow doctors to prescribe birth control medications to sexually active girls.

And most important of all, GOOD, intelligent sex education classes, for all kids. Take away some of the mystery and excitement, and you take away some of the causes of early sex in the first place. Keeping kids ignorant and unable to obtain birth control only makes for more teenage pregnancies and transmission of STD's.

[Thorne]

I think there is something more to it than just "mystery & excitement"
No matter how you think about it the species has divisions. Some are meaningless. But perhaps the greatest division is, although somewhat arbitrary, child and adult. Activities routine and normal for the adult are restricted from the child. Unless one wishes to say that no human activity is to be denied the child. Which would include sex, drugs, war, work, or any other number of things. Carried to that extreme, and many today bemoan the loss of childhood, means we will not have children. Merely little adults, which is how some actually refer to children already!

Just a few thoughts!

I think you're reading too much into my statement, Duncan. I'm not saying we should unilaterally permit rampant sexual orgies among teenagers. I'm saying educate them, responsibly not with fairy tales, to insure they know the problems and responsibilities of their actions. And if they DO become active, make sure they have access to condoms and birth control, where necessary, to insure they violently thrust into the world of adulthood by becoming parents while they are still, by our culture's standards, children.

As for when children should be treated as adults, this can vary from person to person and from activity to activity. Obviously nature turns children into fully functioning adults, sexually, at puberty. Emotionally they may not be ready, but this is a product of culture more than nature. If they were taught from early childhood that they would become adults at a certain age they would be more emotionally able to handle it.

As for drugs and alcohol, obviously no one is adult enough to handle putting toxins into their system, but it has been shown that most people under the age of about 19 or 20 are unable to properly deal with the effects of alcohol, biologically speaking, than older people can. Younger children can be seriously damaged by even small amounts of alcohol in their systems. So our culture has decided that it's better to restrict alcohol to those who are old enough to metabolize it more readily, which we have defined legally as 21 years old.

As for war, well, children have been going to war almost as long as men have. Again, puberty seemed to be the point at which a boy became a man, with all the responsibilities that implied, including going to war. Our culture has assigned the age of 18 to determine if a man is able to be sent to war, but it is arbitrary at best. Some might be mature enough to handle it at a younger age, some might never be mature enough. (Aside, sort of: I was intrigued, and pleased, when watching "Master and Commander" by their somewhat historically accurate portrayal of what we would consider children as crew members of a ship of war. This was quite common throughout most of our history. Not surprisingly, though, they chose to ignore the sexual side of this in the movie.)

So yes, Duncan, sometimes we need to treat our children as little adults. Make them aware of the problems which can occur when engaging in sexual activities, emotional and physical. Teach them the reasons they are feeling what they are feeling, and how to control those feelings. Let them know that masturbation, far from being the dirty, filthy habit that some would procaim, is actually a healthy activity, albeit one which should be practiced in private and discretely (kinks aside, of course). Teach them that they should feel free to say no if they don't think they are ready, and that they shouldn't allow themselves to be pressured into sex. But sooner or later some kids are going to experiment. It's what kids do. It's how they learn how to be adults. Regardless of what morality you try to teach them, some kids are going to want to make their own rules. All you can do then is try to steer them in the way you think is right and hope they don't fuck up their lives while doing it.

[leo9]

So our culture has decided that it's better to restrict alcohol to those who are old enough to metabolize it more readily, which we have defined legally as 21 years old.

Which shows another reason this distinction is arbitrary. Your "we" is the USA: here in the UK that limit is set as 18, and in other countries lower still. Similarly, there is no global agreement, even within the Western world, on the legal age for sex. In my and thir's countries sex is legal at 16, and sex between younger teens (as illustrated by the original article) is officially ignored unless older people are involved or there is evidence of coercion or bullying. So far, this has not led to the fall of civilisation.

[leo9]

No matter how you think about it the species has divisions. Some are meaningless. But perhaps the greatest division is, although somewhat arbitrary, child and adult. Activities routine and normal for the adult are restricted from the child. Unless one wishes to say that no human activity is to be denied the child. Which would include sex, drugs, war, work, or any other number of things. Carried to that extreme, and many today bemoan the loss of childhood, means we will not have children. Merely little adults, which is how some actually refer to children already!

As two other contributors have pointed out, historically speaking, childhood is one of those meaningless divisions you mention. Obviously, younger people are physically unable to do some things, but up till the last few centuries the rule for everything was that when they're big enough they're old enough.

In the 10th Century "Njal's Saga" (which might be called the first recorded celebrity biography) the hero at age 12 asks his father to take him along to a feast, and is told that he can't come because he gets too violent when he's drunk. So he steals a cart-horse and comes anyway, gets into a fight and kills another boy. All this is reported as the story of a berserker who started young, but with no idea that there was anything intrinsically strange about such behaviour in a "child". Compare with a couple of recent cases of murders by preteens in the UK, where the media response has been not only a perfectly reasonable outrage at the details of the killings, but also an almost superstitious horror as if there were something monstrously unnatural about the perpetrators, purely on account of their age.

The reason for the invention of childhood, in the opinion of historians, was firstly the need for a higher level of general education in more technically advanced societies. It therefore became necessary to class people as schoolchildren who had previously been classed as young adults. This became complicated by the Victorian obsession with innocence, narrowly defined as ignorance of sex; moralists took the completely artificial redefinition of childhood as real, and equated teenage sex with child abuse. The resulting conventions were so hammered into Western society that when Europeans encountered cultures where sex still started at puberty, they took it as evidence of the savages' immorality and set out to save them by teaching their children shame.

There are areas where it is a genuine advance of civilisation to restrict young people's access to adult practices: young Njal's drunken brawls were the mark of a barbaric culture. But if we are going to debate the question of chidren's sexual behaviour, it must be on the basis of known realities of physical and mental health and the welfare of society, not an undiscussed assumption that some things are just wrong because it's always been so.

[Ozme52]

As two other contributors have pointed out, historically speaking, childhood is one of those meaningless divisions you mention. Obviously, younger people are physically unable to do some things, but up till the last few centuries the rule for everything was that when they're big enough they're old enough.

In the 10th Century "Njal's Saga" (which might be called the first recorded celebrity biography) the hero at age 12 asks his father to take him along to a feast, and is told that he can't come because he gets too violent when he's drunk. So he steals a cart-horse and comes anyway, gets into a fight and kills another boy. All this is reported as the story of a berserker who started young, but with no idea that there was anything intrinsically strange about such behaviour in a "child". Compare with a couple of recent cases of murders by preteens in the UK, where the media response has been not only a perfectly reasonable outrage at the details of the killings, but also an almost superstitious horror as if there were something monstrously unnatural about the perpetrators, purely on account of their age.

The reason for the invention of childhood, in the opinion of historians, was firstly the need for a higher level of general education in more technically advanced societies. It therefore became necessary to class people as schoolchildren who had previously been classed as young adults. This became complicated by the Victorian obsession with innocence, narrowly defined as ignorance of sex; moralists took the completely artificial redefinition of childhood as real, and equated teenage sex with child abuse. The resulting conventions were so hammered into Western society that when Europeans encountered cultures where sex still started at puberty, they took it as evidence of the savages' immorality and set out to save them by teaching their children shame.

There are areas where it is a genuine advance of civilisation to restrict young people's access to adult practices: young Njal's drunken brawls were the mark of a barbaric culture. But if we are going to debate the question of chidren's sexual behaviour, it must be on the basis of known realities of physical and mental health and the welfare of society, not an undiscussed assumption that some things are just wrong because it's always been so.

Right and absolutely right because in fact, it has NOT always been so.

[thir]

Activities routine and normal for the adult are restricted from the child. Unless one wishes to say that no human activity is to be denied the child. Which would include sex, drugs, war, work, or any other number of things. Carried to that extreme, and many today bemoan the loss of childhood, means we will not have children. Merely little adults, which is how some actually refer to children already!

Just a few thoughts!

The sad and bad reality is that in very many places in the world, this is exactly what happens. Children soldiers, children addicts, children prostitutes, children workers.

Now, I think most would agree that that is not what we want for our children, or any children, and that the protection from working exploitation and so on is a good thing indeed. But there is such a thing as going overboard with it, and seeing children as sort 'cut out of' the world we all live in, as little blank slates just waiting for us to write on, and nothing to do with the 'real' world.

Children are personalities with opinions, and they share our world for better or worse. We cannot protect them from it, nor in some cases should we, meaning they must learn the world, in as protected ways as can be managed, but they must not be kept apart from it or be seen as apart from it.

[DuncanONeil]

The sad and bad reality is that in very many places in the world, this is exactly what happens. Children soldiers, children addicts, children prostitutes, children workers.

Now, I think most would agree that that is not what we want for our children, or any children, and that the protection from working exploitation and so on is a good thing indeed. But there is such a thing as going overboard with it, and seeing children as sort 'cut out of' the world we all live in, as little blank slates just waiting for us to write on, and nothing to do with the 'real' world.

In a manner of speaking they are blank slates. Else why would they need to be taught values or morals?
Never intended to suggest they be " 'cut out of' the world". But they do need to be taught about the world.
As far as "waiting to write on". That is exactly what the schools are doing. Unfortunately much of what they are writing is not appropriate!

Children are personalities with opinions, and they share our world for better or worse. We cannot protect them from it, nor in some cases should we, meaning they must learn the world, in as protected ways as can be managed, but they must not be kept apart from it or be seen as apart from it.

Personalities, yes! But their "opinions require development. Learning the world is a dual task job, that of their parents and the schools. Many parents abdicate to the schools and that is a bad thing. And much of schooling is misdirected.

[thir]

lets stay on topic here ok folks? (I am referring to the removed post not yours denu)
Thank you very much.
Respectfully,
TS

Did not see the removed post either, but it seems to me people were before and are now.

[Ozme52]

(Didn't see the flames as they were removed long before I got here. So nothing said here is relevent to what may or may not have gone before...)

I heartily approve of sex education at a young age, curiosity appeased is activity deferred. It was true for me for alchohol, for tobacco, and possibly for sex (who knows how much earlier I would have started... but none-the-less, I did start early.)

And yes, that included condoms. I'd rather see a little youthful promiscurity than a little too youthful parenting.

And as to whether it's appropriate at that age... that's a societal convention. There was a time that 13 year olds were expected to make their own way in life, adding to the financial potential of the family... and adding to the family through marriage and child rearing.

Even in this country, just a few centuries ago, most "children" were fully contributing adults, already out of school and working full time by their teens.

So absolutely... if we wish to prolong their "childhood" and afford them the opportunities modern life delivers... rather than pretending that sexual activity doesn't start at puberty, educate... we should educate them and help protect them.

One, non-parent, opinion. I'd like to think, as my parents did, that I would have this opinion regardless.