Hej Jim,
You should send Blair over here! Tomorrow night we are going to organize a
disco for the kids with a "special" indoor rain. The state run agency for
sexual education is gonna fill a bunch of balloons with condoms (3000) and
they will explode over the dance floor tomorrow night. Now that's the way to
go.
Down with 12 year old pregnancies!
Wait till your 40!
We are going to catch a lotta shit from parents for this, but the kids come
first.
Warm Regards
Bob Malecki
-----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
Från: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]För Jim heartfield
Skickat: Thursday, September 09, 1999 7:54 PM
Till: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Ämne: M-TH: Blair's moral purpose
National moral purpose sex shocker
Tony Blair thinks that teenage sex 'should be a matter of anxiety and
concern to anyone who believes in the future of the country', which is a
bit weird, according to James Heartfield
It is sad news that two twelve year old girls have fallen pregnant, but
it must have been a surprise to them as much as to anyone else that they
were to become the Prime Minister's next moral crusade. After showing
his determination to fight in Kosovo to the last American soldier, Blair
has decided to fight teen sex with the same determination.
'We need to find a new national moral purpose for this new generation.
People want to live in a society that is without prejudice, but is with
rules, with a sense of order. Government can play its part, but parents
have to play their part. There's got to be, if you like, a partnership
between Government and the country to lay the foundations of that moral
purpose.'
It's the equivocal aside 'if you like', that speaks volumes. Blair's
brash talk of a moral purpose sounds confident, but it is symptomatic of
its opposite: a lack of moral purpose, in the country, and in his
government.
Most depressing is the realisation that the only way that the Prime
Minister feels he can galvanise a sense of purpose is around extreme and
exceptional circumstances. Blair says that anyone who cares about
Britain should be concerned with the case of the two pregnant twelve-
year olds. The parents no doubt, have a lot to worry about. But for the
rest of us, this is a story that is interesting because it is so
bizarre. Public interest in this case is not an expression of moral
purpose, but one of ghoulish, lip-smacking prurience.
One group of people whose resolve really stiffens at the thought of all
that underage sex is the Prime Minister's own Social Exclusion Unit. The
reason that the PM was so flushed about these recent cases is that his
special unit has been poring over the figures for teenage pregnancy.
Britain has the highest proportion of unmarried teenage mothers of any
country in the world, according to am international survey of sexual
activity in young women by the Allan Guttmacher Institute in New York.
But since the survey is of 15-19 year-olds most of those pregnancies,
problematic as they are, are not underage.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed that 8,829 under-
age girls became pregnant in 1996, the highest level since 1985 when
there were 9,406. That is about 9.4 girls under 16 in every 1000. Of
course, each of those is a grave problem for the individuals concerned,
but it is not a significant trend, and certainly not the basis of a
moral crusade. According to the Family Planning Association, the main
reason for the increase in 1996 was the health scare over the pill
around that time.
There is a problem of young unmarried mothers that is due principally to
the diminished life chances of a significant group of younger women. For
them, motherhood is not such a bad option in comparison to unemployment
or the local technical college.
The Social Exclusion Unit however is not interested in solving a
practical problem, so much as generating a national moral purpose. The
Home Secretary has swung into action demanding to know why local
authorities have not imposed curfews - as if the prospect of teenage
shagging in the streets would breathe some life into that initiative.
The Prime Minister favours more sex education. He wants a moral purpose,
but characteristically he is reluctant 'to go back to the old days when
sex wasn't talked about - it doesn't mean you revisit a whole series of
old prejudices.'
The perverse effect of the PM's concern is that children are being
taught more and more about sex at a younger age, because the school
curriculum has to be organised around the small minority of children who
are sexually active. Blair is nervous of revisiting old prejudices
because that smacks too much of condemnation. Instead 'you've got to
make youngsters aware of the undesirability of having sex at the age of
12' - though for most that is more awareness than they need. The
preoccupation with sex education is a classic middle class reformer's
understanding of the 'problem' of teenage sexuality. For people who are
obsessed with such things, but lack the confidence to simply disapprove,
education seems like the best way to control horny teenagers.
The prejudice that teenagers are out of control, though, tells us more
about the concerns and preoccupations of the government than it does
about teenagers. A man whose waking thoughts are peopled with teenagers
copulating irresponsibly in the streets after dark has a problem. Fears
of disorder are really just a projection of the government's own, half-
acknowledged lack of a moral purpose. The perception of disorder,
whether international or domestic, expands to fill the vacuum at the
heart of the government's own political agenda. The call for a national
moral purpose is simply a restatement of the problem. The fact that they
have to pillory gymslip mums to do it is pathetic.
--
James Heartfield
--
Jim heartfield
--- from list [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---
--- from list [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---
