Sex Education and its role in schools.

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by Bells, Feb 12, 2014.

  1. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    21,635
    And is at little risk of being killed by a car.

    Yes. Just as you ignore the potential ways a driver might reduce the risk.

    No, I included ALL causes. Again, you can be more selective to make the stats say what you want.

    It sure sounds like you are trying to claim that cars are more dangerous to people, on average, than guns. Your evidence does not support that. You may decide that TO YOU a gun is less dangerous because you are more competent/less careless/less suicidal than other people. That's fine and is your decision to make. Likewise, I could decide that since I am such an excellent driver, guns are far more dangerous to me than cars. That's also fine and is a decision I might make. Neither decision changes the fact that to an average person the risk is about the same.

    If you dislike that, and want to skew the data to "prove" that guns are safer - then you are guilty of precisely what you are claiming the government does.

    Are you then retracting your statement "If the schools are going to educate children about sexuality (and if not the schools, who?) then they cannot be left on their own to do it - they have to be continually monitored and kept on task by the adults in the community" ? A group of adults that make decisions for other people is pretty much the definition of "government."

    Interesting. Which of those do you disagree with? As someone who first visited LA in the 1970's, I have first hand experience at how well emissions laws have worked.
     
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  3. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    So why hoopla about guns - which are even less of a risk than suicide, let alone cars?

    That would be better than making gibberish "averages" of them - but I was not selective at all. I too analyzed all the causes to an extent - rather more thoroughly than the folks who just put every death stat in a blender and divided by the population of the US.

    I've made my claims explicitly, right here, at least twice. You don't have to invent shit that it "sounds like", you can just read the posts.

    That is false. The average American person is exposed to a far higher share of the risk from cars than from guns. A small percentage of the population absorbs almost all the risk from guns - the skew is much less with cars, because car deaths are much more likely to be accidental and cars are far more widely - even universally - encountered in risk-bearing situations.

    You might as well try to "average" the risk from genetic-linked diseases, like prostate cancer (the average American is female) or Huntington's Chorea.

    Note that I have gone so far as to accept your reframing of the discussion in the first place, rather than bother to insist that you deal with my original assertion there - which was that if you are an average American your neighbor's car is far more of a danger to you than your neighbor's gun.

    OK, I admit to bafflement there. What do you think I said, and what is your objection to it?
     
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  5. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    I suggest that you take my lead and try to return this discussion to its original topic.
     
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  7. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    You clearly have a very strong political position on guns, so in the spirit of trying to return to the topic (per FR's suggestion) I will leave you to your beliefs on the topic. We could perhaps revisit them in another thread.

    "If the schools are going to educate children about sexuality (and if not the schools, who?) then they cannot be left on their own to do it - they have to be continually monitored and kept on task by the adults in the community." - You seem to be calling for more government (i.e. selected adults with the ability to make decisions for others) control of schools.

    "The fact that mistrust of the government to "do the stats right" in this matter is well founded, should give a pause for reflection though." - You seem to be saying that the government should not be trusted in matters that have to do with statistics.

    In the first statement you seem to prefer government control of schools, and in the second you seem to mistrust government. Those seem contradictory. (Unless you simply prefer a different kind of government be in charge of schools than in charge of statistics.)
     
  8. river

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    17,307
    I would think that nowadays the street informs these teens on sex

    What the street doesn't teach is responsibility and consequence of sex

    This is where sex education in schools could be more effective
     
  9. TheHun Registered Member

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    91
    The street does nothing. Peers, media, and the paranoia of parents who are afraid to talk about how bodies function and what role emotions play in the mating game that informs kids about sex is where they learn about it.

    Eventually, we hold schools responsible for educating them about sex and if they do, we jump down their throats for it. Stupid and useless programs like Abstinence Only—a 50 million dollar waste—are the results of this fear of sex. You can read a comprehensive report here: http://ari.ucsf.edu/science/reports/abstinence.pdf

    And you’d think that parents, having been kids once themselves, would have the common sense to teach their kids about how their bodies function and what to expect once the hormones get going, but NO!

    They confuse biology with their so-called morals. I, like many others who grew up in the 70s learned about the biology of sex in biology class—the morality of it was our parents’ responsibility—and we were able to therefore make informed choices. And in case this is not clear, we did not all run out and experiment just because we learned about how babies are made and STDs are transmitted.

    Now we don’t want our kids to know about sex and what is the result? http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/sexualbehaviors/

    I, for one, think that if they had good foundational information/knowledge about their own sexuality, then the stats would not be so dismal.
    http://teens.webmd.com/features/teens-stds-get-facts truly, ignorance is bliss—if you own stock in pharmaceuticals.
     
  10. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    In my area, for example, outside of the special provisions made for themselves by the rich or religious, the schools are government agencies, run by the government. There is no such thing as "increasing government control of schools" - they are completely controlled by the government in the first place.

    For another, my claim of good foundation for mistrust of official ("governmental") statistics was specific - "in this matter". I am saying that mistrust of US governments in matters having to do with guns is well founded.

    And so forth. Simply erase every sentence in every response to me that contains the word "seem", and we can start over.
     
  11. Asguard Kiss my dark side Valued Senior Member

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  12. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    OK. In that case, your statement about MORE local government control over schools is moot; they are completely controlled by the government already.
     
  13. TJones1979 Registered Member

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    17
    I think schools should provide some information, but it shouldn't be the only education they get on the matter, parents need ot take the most responsibility. They should talk ot their kids from an early age, without being explicit and using very basic language but i don't agree with this idea of waiting until they're a certain age and then bombarding them with facts. It's not just about the biological issues, it's to do with emotions and feelings too. And never underestimate how even little kids can know about sex and get the facts completely wrong.

    It's worrying that a lot of young boys are getting their sex education from porn alone.
     
  14. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    No such statement appears in my posts.

    Schools that assume parents have, or even can have, taught their children the basic facts of sexual biology in human beings - at any age - are abandoning their role of formal education in an industrial society. When children grew up on farms surrounded by domestic animals, or in one room nomadic shelters surrounded by the adults in their community, what they learned from the conscious and deliberate teaching of their parents and the many other adults that were raising them had a basic physical reference and foundation of observation.
     

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