When I first read the ABC News story alleging that Barack Obama favors sex education for kindergartners, I thought good grief, is he insane? It's the kind of thing that can really hurt a campaign. In the grand scheme of things, the war, health insurance, the deficit and all that matters more than sex ed for kindergartners. But this is exactly the kind of story that affects people's votes. Why? Because it gives you insight into the character of a poltician, and his or her gut values. You may think, y'know, Obama seems right on with his policies on x, y, and z, but jeez, I just can't vote for a guy who's so out of touch with my values that he would have the public schools teach sex ed to five year olds.
If you're Thomas Frank, you make fun of people who think such things as part of their political deliberations. If you're Drew Westen, you don't.
Well, CBN's David Brody explains that Obama's gotten a bum rap from the way this story has been passed around. Turns out that Obama believes that kindergartners should be taught about where babies come from, and "inappropriate touching" -- but that's about it. And anyway, it should be left up to local school districts to decide for themselves, and parents should have the chance to opt out.
I still think it's stupid for Obama to have gone in front of a Planned Parenthood conference and even put the word "kindergarten" in the same sentence as "sex education." But it's a relief to know that it's not as bad a story as it seemed. Normal people don't want their five year olds learning about sex in kindergarten. Says Brody:
The legitimate reasonable discussion here is whether the federal government and/or local school boards should get involved in providing these five year olds information about inappropriate touching or should it be left up to families only.
On the one hand, yes, they should, because some of these children will be being abused by family members who would normally be counted on to give them this information. On the other hand, what on earth is the government at any level doing undertaking something like this? So I'm divided.
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Kids must be taught about what is "inappropriate touching", as you said there are parents, adults that are doing the abusing in kids life that will trying to protect themselves. Leaving families to cover such area are not acceptable. Neither is leaving this education to school districts reasonable after the recent church sex abuse scandle. Do you want to trust a church school district with possible pedophile as teacher to teach their version of what is "inappropriate touching"?. As for Obama should not have say about this infront of pro choice group, the same people would make whatever Obama said sound as horrible as they could. Quite a few of these people are the same one that is hosting the creepy "Purity Ball" for their 10 year daughters to pledge their virginities to their father.
Belae
The issue is where is the line drawn between moral decisions that a parent must teach a child how to make, and objective knowledge that every child should know.
Information is amoral. It is the sexophobic who make sexual information a moral question.
Quite a few of these people are the same one that is hosting the creepy "Purity Ball" for their 10 year daughters to pledge their virginities to their father.
they pledge to keep themselves for marriage and their dads to protect them and be role models for them. get it right
a child starts learning about sexuality as soon as it is born, they know that when they are being cuddled and held that they are being loved and so forth, they start taking showers with their parents and asking questions as early as 3. Some children start going through puberty as early as 8 so why wait until their 13 or older to tell them whats going on with their own bodies or how to protect themselfs from getting a disease that is potentially deadly beacuase they made a chioce where they didnt understand the consiquences. understandably the education that they learn should be very basic but they should have at least that basic knoledge
Quite a few of these people are the same one that is hosting the creepy "Purity Ball" for their 10 year daughters to pledge their virginities to their father.
they pledge to keep themselves for marriage and their dads to protect them and be role models for them. get it right
Why isn't it the other way around too? The sons pledge to keep themelves for marriage? The Purity Ball makes the daughters seem inferior. Their sexuality is pretty much taken away from them until they get married and sign another contract. Since the sons don't have to do this, it seems like it's important for girls to stay virginal, pure, and innocent. While the boys are allowed to do whatever they want and chastity until marriage isn't as important for them.
and i most definetly agree with the above post.
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