Dana, I never said ignoring me made him an asshole. I said he's being an asshole because he gets nasty with me every time I question him. No point in having a discussion if only one view is acceptable. Last thread was about using a litmus test to hire professors and he decided to talk about a litmus test to hire scientists without telling anybody and claimed I had a reading comprehension problem for not reading his mind, yeah that again. As always he has a strong opinion until I throw around facts and the he gets real and forgets we were in a discussion.
Funny how you say I'm closed minded because I don't accept his interpretation of that old study as law when you do. I dare say if you weren't so narrow minded you'd realize his claim that teaching abstinence can never work and will always be a waste of money is too far fetched to fathom. After all the study was based on short surveys given to teens. Now if you think his theories can become law based on a teen surveys then there's no hope and you should ignore everything I say. The link to the Heritage.org article was the first of many that Google came up with debunking Waxman's claim, and the main issue I pointed out from that article was that funding was only $1 for each $12 of condom programs. I never claimed abstinence lowers the birth rate in teens and don't even support abstinence-only programs. I know it seems like I'm supporting Bush but I'm not, just trying to clear up facts and have a friendly discussion. Now as for the BMJ. It doesn't claim abstinence-only programs are a waste of money, that was Larry's conclusion. Here's the conclusion again: Conclusions: Primary prevention strategies evaluated to date do not delay the initiation of sexual intercourse, improve use of birth control among young men and women, or reduce the number of pregnancies in young women. Now the study he refers to that was a success is the Teen Outreach Program. http://www.cornerstone.to/top/top.html A search of there site came up with this: http://www.cornerstone.to/what/best.pdf The federal government has favored abstinence-only programs. Under 1996 welfare reform legislation, $50 million is available to states each year from 1998 until 2002 for education that “has as its exclusive purpose teaching the social, psychological, and health gains to be realized by abstaining from sexual activity.” The law also includes funding to evaluate programs. To date none of the studies of abstinence-only educational programs have found consistent and significant effects in delaying the initiation of sexual activity. One study provided strong evidence that the program did not delay sexual initiation. Most of the studies had methodological shortcomings. At this time, there is not enough evidence to determine the impact of abstinence-only programs (see 19) Here's 19: No Easy Answers: Research Findings on Programs to Reduce Teen Pregnancy by Douglas Kirby, Ph.D. Director of Research ETR Associates A research review commissioned by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, Task Force on Effective Programs and Research Washington, DC March 1997 http://www.teenpregnancy.org/resources/data/report_summaries/no_easy_answers/SumEdu.asp Abstinence-only programs focus on the importance of abstinence from sexual intercourse, typically until marriage. Either these programs do not discuss contraception or they briefly discuss the failure of contraceptives to provide complete protection against pregnancy and STDs. To date, six studies of abstinence-only programs have been published. None of these studies has found consistent and significant program effects on delaying the onset of intercourse, and at least one study provided strong evidence that the program did not delay the onset of intercourse. Thus, the weight of the current evidence indicates that these abstinence programs do not delay the onset of intercourse. On the other hand, this evidence is not conclusive because all but one of these evaluations had significant methodological limitations that could have obscured program impact. For example, two studies measured the impact of the program for only six weeks post-intervention, which was too short a time to measure a significant change in behavior in either the program or control groups. Thus, at the present time, it is not known whether or not abstinence-only programs delay intercourse. Therefore, more research should be done on these programs. Then I also came up with this: http://www.childtrends.org/_pressrelease_page.cfm?LID=88E50A94-4B66-4DE4-BE6A5B56DCBD410A Only one abstinence-only program has been evaluated with a rigorous experimental design so far, and it did not have a significant impact on the initiation of sex, frequency of sex, or number of sexual partners. Additional large-scale evaluations of abstinence programs are under way now and should provide additional information on the effectiveness of this approach Then there was this study: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=1962546&dopt=Citation IN the end the only point I was bringing up is we that we shouldn't dismiss abstinence because of a survey over 7 years old. The government has been pushing this since 1976 and Bush just upped the funding. The only thing everyone except Larry knows for sure is we need more studies. The new study will be out in 2006. And in case you're still reading :) I realize how frustrating it must be to have to keep telling someone you're ignoring them. I'll pretend I give a shit and post a message ones a week asking if you're ignoring me. That way you won't have to keep telling me :P --- dana tierney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Sam, > > I have been doing my best to ignore you and no doubt > this makes me an > asshole too. But here is one more attempt to explain > things to you > before I write you off again as a terminally closed > mind. Discussion > is great and I enjoy it. So apparently do you. But > you seem to think > that it suffices to show that there is another point > of view out > there, regardless of the validity or accuracy of > that point of view. > You can't post Rush Limbaugh in answer to the > British Medical Journal > (for example) and expect people to take you > seriously. I am wondering > why I am bothering as I write this -- no doubt you > will construe it as > me calling you stupid -- but I see you as a kind of > symptom of what is > wrong with the country right now, a polarization of > information where > an entire segment of society believes things that > are demonstrably > false. If you really want to prove that abstinence > lowers the birth > rate, I'd suggest a link from a medical or possibly > a sociology > journal. I say this without sarcasm. Waxman can > certainly be > legitimately suspected of having an agenda if you > are so minded, but > are his facts wrong??? > > Dana > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! 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