The Connection: Abortion, Permissive Sex...

*The Connection: Abortion, Permissive

Sex Instruction, and Family Planning

What the Pro-Abortion Experts Say

And What the Pro-Life and other Experts Say (A compilation by Lynn K. Murphy of Life Research Institute, (510) 676-2929. November, 1993 revision) Pro-abortion researcher Malcolm Potts: ". . .those who use contraception are more likely than those who do not to resort to induced abortion . . ."[1]

Pro-abortion researcher Alfred Kinsey: ". . . we have found the highest frequency of induced [deliberate] abortion in the group which, in general, most frequently uses contraceptives."[2]

Pro-abortion former President of Planned Parenthood, Dr. Alan Guttmacher: "We find that when an abortion is easily obtainable, contraception is neither actively nor diligently used. . . there would be no reward for the woman who practices effective contraception. . . . Abortion on demand relieves the husband of all possible responsibility; he simply becomes a coital animal."[3]

Dr. Alan Guttmacher also said (immediately after the that legalized abortion), "Then how can the Supreme Court Decision be absolutely secured? The answer to winning the battle for elective abortion once and for all is sex education."[4]*

SPECIFIC EXAMPLES OF SEXUALITY EDUCATION/PERMISSIVE SEX INSTRUCTION FAILURES:

Professor of economics and statistics, Professor Jacqueline Kasun, reported to Congress that pregnancy and abortion rates are higher among teens who participated in family planning programs. Those states which spent the most on family planning showed and caused the largest increases in abortions and births out of wedlock. Those states which didn't participate in these programs continued to have lower rates. [In California] by offering free contraceptives and free abortions to all, the OFP [Office of Family Planning] has in effect invited all young people to engage in "free", "riskless" sex and has made those who do not accept the invitation feel that they are out of step.[5]

A Louis Harris poll says Teens who have had "comprehensive" sexuality education courses have a 50% rate of sexual activity than those who have not had such courses.[6]

A pro-abortion publication reports "One of Ms. Dawson's statistical models shows '[7]

Pro-abortion Planned Parenthood says[8] that

* A fourteen-year-old girl faithfully using the pill has a 44% chance of getting pregnant at least once before she finishes high school.

* She has a 69% chance of getting pregnant at least once before she finishes college.

* She has a 30% chance of getting pregnant two or more times.

People are now beginning to call sexuality education promiscuity education.

* Using condoms, the likelihood of unwanted pregnancy while she is in school rises to nearly 87%. One must conclude that this pro-abortion, pro-contraception organization who writes and implements most of the nation's sexuality-education programs realizes that sexuality education and contraception programs are a great failure.

From 1971 to 1981 government funding at all levels for contraceptive education increased by 4,000 percent. In that time teen pregnancies increased by 20 percent and teenage abortions nearly doubled.[9]

Testimony before a congressional committee be a committee staff member noted that 3 out of 10 sexually active unmarried teens became pregnant in 1971 and that this rate has not changed.[10] We all know that many more teens now have sex. Conclusion: Contraception use and sexuality education have increased pregnancies.

"Rates of teenage pregnancy were reduced when parents supervised WHO the adolescent dates, WHERE the adolescent went on dates, and the ARRIVAL TIME back home."[11]

"We find a net INCREASE of about 120 pregnancies among all 15- to 19-year old women for every 1,000 teenage family-planning clients RATHER THAN THE EXPECTED REDUCTIONS in the pregnancy rate."[12]

"As the number and proportion of teen-age family-planning clinics increased, we observed a corresponding increase in the teen-age pregnancy and abortion rates: 50 to 120 more pregnancies per thousand clients, rather than the 200 to 300 fewer pregnancies as estimated by researchers at the Alan Guttmacher Institute (formerly the research arm of the Planned Parenthood Federation.) We did find that greater teen- age participation in such clinics led to lower teen . However, the impact on the abortion and total pregnancy rates was exactly opposite the stated intentions of the program. The original problems appear to have grown worse. . . . Our findings have twice sustained formal review by specialists in the field."[13] "The truth is, Planned Parenthood's sex education programs have backfired, actually teen pregnancies. According to its own survey, conducted in 1986 by the Louis Harris pollsters, teens who have taken "comprehensive" sex education courses have a fifty percent rate of sexual activity than their "unenlightened" peers.[14]. And yet the courses had no significant effect on their contraceptive usage.[15] The conclusion, one that even Planned Parenthood researchers have been unable to escape, is that sex education courses only exacerbate [increase] the teen pregnancy problem."[16, 17]

From Charles E. Rice, Professor of Law at Notre Dame University: "As one student said, 'if the clinic is giving it to you, it's telling you, 'Go ahead. Have sex'. Since they're giving it out, why not?'

The reduction in teen-pregnancy rates that is claimed as a result of the SBCs [school-based clinics] has been achieved by an increase in teen abortion, not by a reduction in teen sex activity."[18]

"One study by the Center for Disease Control showed that in 1970 (the earliest figure available) the percentage of girls having had premarital sexual intercourse before their sixteenth birthday was 4.6 percent, and that in 1988, the figure was 25.6 percent. Meanwhile, in 1974, the first full year that abortion was legal, there were 763,467[19] abortions in the United States, and in the years since 1987 there have been approximately 1,800,000 per year.[20] Although I was unable to find figures for how many of the 763,467 abortions were on teenagers, the pro-abortion Alan Guttmacher Institute reported that for 1987 25.5 percent of all abortions were on teenagers. 25.5 percent of 1,800,000 is 459,000 abortions by teenagers. Thus, it would be hard to believe that teen abortion hasn't skyrocketed since abortion was legalized in 1973. 1973 was a year when sex education was being introduced into our schools at a very fast rate."[21]

"In addition, a current study[22] shows that for every 1,000 girls who take Planned Parenthood-type sexuality education (promiscuity education), 113 get pregnant before marriage, but for every 1,000 girls getting abstinence sex education, only 4 get pregnant before marriage." "Exaggerated reports of the 'soaring welfare costs' of teenage pregnancy have been based on arbitrary assumptions and statistical exaggerations and fabrications.[23] . . .

What then is the 'teenage pregnancy problem' in California? Although among teenagers have declined, total pregnancies--that is, the sum of births and abortions--have increased by almost 50 percent since 1970. The of pregnancy has increased by more than a third. The abortion rate has more than tripled and now exceeds the rate of births among California women under 20 by 40 percent. Though comparable data for other states are not available for 1985, in 1980 California's teenage abortion rate was the highest of any state. In 1982 California's teenage abortion rate was 50 percent higher than the national average.[24] "Abundant statistical evidence[24] shows the futility of government-funded programs to control teenage pregnancy:

1. . Quite the opposite, studies have shown that teenagers who have had sex education are likely to engage in sex at ages 14, 15, and 16 than youngsters who have not had sex education. On the other hand, girls who attend church regularly are likely to engage in premarital sex, and girls with both parents in the home are less likely to engage in sex [25].

2. . Teenage pregnancy in California has risen with rising state expenditures on 'family planning' programs for teenagers. The more 'family planning' expenditures, the more teenage pregnancy. The states which spend most heavily to provide free contraceptives and abortions have the highest rates of teenage pregnancy. And the differences are major. The rate of premarital teenage pregnancy is more than twice as high in California as in Idaho or South Dakota, and California spends more than four times as much per capita as the other two states on 'free' birth control.[26]

3. The one clinic to claim to do so--the one in Baltimore--lost over 90 percent of its sample to follow-up. [More on this topic under references 45 - 49.]

4. Evidence of this comes from Minnesota, Massachusetts, Utah, and South Dakota. For example, in 1981 the state of Minnesota passed a law requiring parents to be notified of minor's abortions. There ensued dramatic reductions in abortions, births, add pregnancies among teenagers. Between 1980 and 1983 the teenage abortion rate fell by 20 percent, the pregnancy rate by 16 percent, and the fertility rate fell by 13 percent.[27]

5. Evidence from Ohio and Georgia has shown this.[28]

There are two reasons why government teenage pregnancy programs don't work and why restricting teenagers' access to free contraceptives and abortions does reduce pregnancy as well as abortions and births: First, freely available abortion and birth control encourage sexual risk-taking and a higher level of unintended pregnancy. On the other hand, when access to abortion and birth control is restricted, a significant number of persons take fewer risks of unintended pregnancy."

"Twenty years ago women were more resigned to unwanted pregnancy, but as they have become more conscious of preventing conception, so they have come to request terminations when contraception fails. There is overwhelming evidence that, contrary to what you might expect, [29] (emphasis added)

"The 'fun' [sex] ends for those who discover the reality that, in American society, venereal disease is second only to the common cold in frequency among teenagers. One of every four young people in this nation will contract venereal disease before reaching age 20. By the way, for the sake of you humanists who happen to read this, venereal disease is not a religious issue; it is a physical problem which often accompanies advanced promiscuity. It occurs in those who are exercising their 'right' to reject any attempts to impose Biblical morality upon society."[30]

"Adams High School of Commerce City, Colorado became the first school in the nation to distribute free condoms three years ago. According to , the birth rate at Adams has soared to 31 percent above the national average of 58.1 births per 1,000 students."[31]

Planned Parenthood's own journal states: , states; "More teenagers are using contraceptives and using them more consistently than ever before. Yet the number and rate of premarital pregnancies continues to rise."[32] "In 1982, 1,888 women (ages 15 to 19) were surveyed and researchers found that 'prior exposure to a sex education course is positively and significantly associated with the initiation of sexual activity at ages 15 and 16."[33]

"Even after exposure to comprehensive sex education, research shows that 'only 40% of sexually active student[s] . . . regularly use contraception."[34]

"In 1972, the pregnancy rate for 15- to 19-year olds was about 95 per 1,000. In 1981 the rate was 113 per thousand in that same category. In that time period, when the size of the teen population was little changed, teen abortion went from 190,000 to 430,000. One must reconcile the rise in teen pregnancies with major program efforts that saw a fivefold increase in teen-age clients and a twenty-fold constant-dollar increase in funding." [Constant dollar means adjusted for inflation.] . . . "Apparently the programs are more effective at convincing teens to avoid birth than to avoid pregnancy."[35]

"Massive, federally subsidized 'sex education' programs entered the American public school system during the 1970s, often supplemented by clinics located in the schools and offering additional information and referrals on matters of sex, pregnancy and abortion. Before these programs began, teenage pregnancy was already declining, for more than a decade.[36]

This long decline in teenage pregnancy then reversed and teenage pregnancies soared, as 'sex education' spread pervasively throughout the public schools. The pregnancy rate among 15- to 19- year-old females was 68 per thousand in 1970 and 96 per thousand by 1980. . . .[36]

Soaring rates of abortion were in fact offsetting soaring rates of pregnancy. Between 1970 and 1987, for example, the number of abortions increased by 250,000, even though the number of teenagers declined by 400,000.[36]

The National Center for Health Statistics claims that 53% of unplanned pregnancies were due to failed contraception.[37]

"Since the federal government began its major contraception program in 1970, unwed pregnancies have increased 87 percent among 15- to 19- year-olds.[38] Likewise, abortions among teens rose 67 percent;[39] and unwed births went up 61 percent.[40] And venereal disease has infected a generation of young people. Nice job, sex counselors. Good thinking, senators and congressmen. Nice nap, America."[41]

"There are 12 million new cases of STD's annually in the United States and 67% of these occur among persons under the age of 25." "Every year one out of six teens contracts an STD."[42] Note that teen girls are encouraged to have sex no matter what birth control method they use, but that only the condom offers any protection against STD's. Thus, the high STD rate is far from surprising.

"Myth 9 [This is not PP saying this is a myth, it is pro-life saying it. Ditto with Myth 10.] : Sex ed can change teen sexual attitudes and behaviors so that sexually active teens will use birth control." The author then provides facts from a Louis Harris 1986 poll sponsored by pro-abortion Planned Parenthood: "Thus, 60% of all students who have taken a comprehensive sex-ed course and who are sexually active do not consistently practice contraception. The comparable regular-use figures are 30% for students who have had a noncomprehensive sex-ed course and 25% for students who have had no sex education course." (Most of figures developed from Louis Harris poll can be found on page 15 of Full text of poll is available from Louis Harris and Associates, Inc., 630 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10111.)[43]

"Myth 10: Contraceptive oriented sex ed courses do not encourage teen fornication; rather, they are effective in decreasing teen promiscuity and teen pregnancies. Wrong again. While biological sex ed courses do not increase teen promiscuity, contraceptive-oriented sex ed courses yield an astounding 50% higher rate of promiscuity." Internal reference: Calculated from , page 53. "In addition, comprehensive sex education courses are correlated with a 31% increase in both the rate and the absolute number of teens engaging in sexual intercourse without regular contraception." Internal reference: same + calculations.[43]

Now quoting the pro-abortion Alan Guttmacher Institute, "The final result to emerge from the analysis [of our data] is that neither pregnancy education nor contraceptive education exerts any significant effect on the risk of premarital pregnancy among sexually active teenagers--a finding that calls into question the argument that formal sex education is an effective tool for reducing adolescent pregnancy."[43]

In Virginia Beach, Virginia, 14% additional females became sexually active immediately after promiscuity education compared with before. The figure for Norfolk, Virginia is 12.9%.[44]

Evidence is lacking for even one successful family-planning program: Declared U.S. Public Health Service officer, Dr. William Archer III, in 1992: "No condom program of school-based clinic has ever shown the ability to reduce pregnancy."[45] The following two examples show that attempts by Planned Parenthood to show otherwise have been invalid: Following initial praise from a sympathetic media, Planned Parenthood's Baltimore School Birth Control Program wilted under scrutiny. Analysts noted that program evaluators failed to account for a) girls who dropped out because of pregnancy; or to explain b) why the dropout rate at campuses offering birth control was three times that of schools with no birth control clinic; c) why only 96 or 1033 girls returned their final questionnaire;[46] d) why seniors supplied no responses;[47] or e) why abortion was not mentioned as a depressant on the pregnancy rate.[48] Similarly, in-house evaluators for Planned Parenthood's acclaimed St. Paul program a) failed to account for a 25% enrollment decline; b) failed to verify the pregnancy rate; and c) failed to provide abortion statistics (they gave only birth data).[49] An analysis of Planned Parenthood's research data shows ". . . contraceptive users were more than 20% more likely to become unintentionally pregnant than were girls who did not use contraceptives."[50] Reasons for the high risk include carelessness, false security, more frequent intercourse, more partners, intercourse at a younger age, and reliance on abortion.[50]

Professor of economics and statistics, Professor Jacqueline Kasun, reported that "for every additional million dollars given to family planners by the federal government, about 2,000 adolescent pregnancies were occurring two years later."[51]

Kasun also found that states most heavily invested in family planning programs have the highest incidence of premarital pregnancy and abortion and that an actual reduction in state government appropriations to family planning led to a reduction in teen pregnancies and abortions.[52]

Wrote Dr. Douglas Smith, a former family-planning director in Tennessee: "Contrary to claims that the knowledge of birth control is the truth that sets on free, these programs often result in just the opposite, chaining young people to a loss of self-respect, moral dissipation, and unrelenting guilt. They present teenage sexual activity as an acceptable lifestyle, providing teenagers use the agents of exploitation that they peddle . . . ."[53]

The U.S. government reports: "Currently, federal policy mandates that children be given contraceptives without their parents' knowledge and consent [should have said "or consent"]. The result has been a dramatic increase in the rate of pregnancy among unmarried teens, due to a proportionate increase in sexual activity among unmarried teens and no decrease in pregnancy rates for those who are sexually active."[54]

To gain clients, Planned Parenthood endeavors to counsel adolescents onto contraceptives before the youth are sexually active. Once active, adolescents who use contraceptives experience sexual intercourse more frequently than do peers without birth control. Garris, Steckler, and McIntire found among teenage contraceptive users a rise from 8.8 to 13.4 acts monthly, within six to eight months of their first clinic visit.[55] In 1992, Planned Parenthood earned approximately $85 million from contraceptive sales in the U.S.

Editorializing by Lynn Murphy: If the rumor is true that the average married person has intercourse twice per week, the above means that teens visiting clinics have intercourse 50% more than married people do!

Rockford Institute's president Allan Carlson has outlined the promiscuity-education industry's strategy for "a new moral and sexual order,"[56] as follows: 1) declare the old morality dead; 2) destroy the residual influence of tradition and religion; 3) make everything relative by recasting the traditional as the abnormal; 4) declare religious opinion unacceptable in public debate; 5) advocate "choice"; 6) advance the "contraceptive" solution; 7) seize control of the schools and indoctrinate the young.[57]

Harvard University contraceptive developer Dr. Robert Kistner said in 1977, "About 10 years ago I declared that the pill would not lead to promiscuity. Well, I was wrong."[58]

George Grant said, "Just as Planned Parenthood's wealth and prestige has been built on death, defilement, and destruction, its reputation has been built on deception, disinformation, and distortion. It is a reputation build on illusion."[59]

"The only avenue the International Planned Parenthood Federation and its allies could travel to win the battle for abortion on demand is through sex education."[60]

When asked "What do you tell people who claim that sex ed programs haven't decreased teen pregnancy and VD," Cory Richards of the Alan Guttmacher Institute (part of Planned Parenthood, who designs the programs) said "the goal of comprehensive sex education was not to reduce teen pregnancy and VD, and moreover that it was unfair to suggest that the programs actually do so."[61]

Endnotes

1. Malcolm Potts, 491.

2. Alfred C. Kinsey quoted in Mary Calderone and Planned Parenthood Federation of America, (New York: Paul B. Hoeber, Harper & Brothers, 1958), 157.

3. "Rutgers Law Review," vol. 22, 415-43.

4. 3 May 1973.

5. Congress, House, 20 July 1983 (Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office), 131-33.

6. A poll for Planned Parenthood by Louis Harris and Associates, 1986, Lou Harris Project No. 864012.

7. Deborah Dawson in a Planned Parenthood publication, July/August 1986, 166.

8. two issues: September/October 1986, Table 5; January/February 1984, 6-13.

9. Richard D. Glasow, (Washington, DC: National Right to Life Trust Fund, 1988).

10. Congress, House, December 1985, "Teen Pregnancy and What is Being Done: A State-by-State Look" (Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office), 385.

11. Hogan and Kitagawa, (1987), 250-51.

12. Joseph A. Olson, "Effects of Family Planning Programs for Teenagers on Adolescent Birth and Pregnancy Rates," Fall 1986, 160; Stan E. Weed, "Curbing Births, Not Pregnancies," 14 October 1986, 32.

13. Weed, 32.

14. Only thirty-two percent of teens who have had no sex education are sexually active, compared to forty-six percent of those who have had "Comprehensive" sex education courses. Lou Harris Project No. 864012.

15. Harris Project 864012; William Marsiglio and Frank L. Mott, "The Impact of Sex Education on Sexual Activity, Contraceptive Use and Premarital Pregnancy Among American Teenagers," July/August 1986.

16. "Celebrating seventy years of service" <1986 Annual Report,> 3, 18-21; Alan F. Guttmacher, (New York: Signet, 1973), 163-175; Alan F. Guttmacher and Irwin H. Kaiser, (New York: Signet, 1986), 203-20 and 464-64.

17. George Grant, (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, 1988) 32.

18. Charles E. Rice, Professor of Law at Notre Dame University.

19. Center for Disease Control.

20. A figure accepted as approximately correct by both pro-life and pro-abortion if increased by 12.5% to account for abortions done for super secrecy and income-tax evasion.

21. Lynn K. Murphy, 111.

22. Dinah Richard,

23. Assembly, State of California, 229.

24. Ibid.

25. July/Aug 1986, 151-70.

26. Jacqueline R. Kasun, (Stafford, Virginia: American Life League, 1986).

27. Congress, House, 99th Cong., 1st sess., December 1985, 196-99.

28. James Trussell et al., "The Impact of Restricting Medicaid Financing for Abortion," May/June 1980, 120-30.

29. Judith Bury, "Sex Education for Bureaucrats," 29 June 1981.

30. Kent Kelly, 101.

31. "Condom Distribution Increases Birth Rate," October/December 1992, 6.

32. "In This Issue," September/October 1980, 229.

33. William Marsiglio and Frank Mott, "The Impact of Sex Education on Sexual Activity, Contraceptive Use and Premarital Pregnancy among American Teenagers," July/August 1986, 151, 158.

34. 1986, quoted in Robert H. Ruff, (Arlington, Texas: New Vision Press, 1988), 44.

35. Stan E. Weed, "Curbing Births, Not Pregnancies," 14 October 1982, 32.

36. Thomas Sowell, "The big lie," 23 December 1991, 52.

37. "Contraceptive Problems Cause More Pregnancies," 25 May 1993, B1.

38. "Condom Roulette," (Washington: Family Research Council, February 1992), 2.

39. Gilbert L. Crouse, Office of Planning and Evaluation, U.S. Dept. of Health & Human Services, t.i., 12 March 1992, based on data from Planned Parenthood's Alan Guttmacher Institute. Increase calculated from 1973, the first year of natiowide legal abortion.

40. Congress, House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Health and the Environment, testimony submitted by Charmaine Yoest, 102d Congress, 2d sess, 19 March 1991, 2.

41.

42. 1 April 1993.

43. Alan Guttmacher Institute, "The Effects of Sex Education on Adolescent Behavior," July/August, 1986, 162-169, quoted in Ruff, 44.

44. Calculations from "The Impact of Sex Education on Sex Activity, Contraceptive Use and Premarital Pregnancy Among American Teenagers," July/August 1986, 151-152, quoted in Jacqueline R. Kasun, (Stafford, Virginia: American Life League, 1990) Calculations are from a table on page 6.

45. Larry Witham, "Abstinence-based Sex Classes Urged by Health Service Aide," 27 September 1992, A-6.

46. Jacqueline R. Kasun, Ph.D., "The Baltimore School Birth Control Study: A comment," 74; and Robert G. Marshall and Charles A. Donovan, (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1991) 91.

47. Laurie S. Zabin, et al., "Evaluation of a Pregnancy Prevention Program for Urban Teenagers," May/June 1986, 119-126, quoted in Marshall and Donovan, 91-92 and Kasun. Marshall, Donovan, and Kasun also respond to Zabin.

48. Marshall and Donovan, 65.

49. Barret L. Mosbaker, ed., (Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1987) 73-74.

50. James H. Ford, M.D. and Michael Schwartz, "Birth Control for Teenagers: Diagram for Disaster," February 1979, 73-74.

51. Jacqueline R. Kasun, Ph.D., "Media Effects Versus Facts," 1984, 2. In 1986 this was updated by Kasun and reprinted in (Stafford, VA: American Life League, Inc., 1986) 61-68.

52. Winter 1987, 23-25, quoted in Kasun, 22.

53. Congress, House Appropriations Committee, Labor and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee, , 14 March 1986, testimony of Judie Brown quoted in 9, a 1986 brochure published by American Life League, Stafford, VA, 1986. (X is a Roman numeral. Title X means Title 10.)

54. Congress, House, December 1985 (Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office), 385.

55. Lorie Garris, et al., "The Relationship between Oral Contraceptives and Adolescent Sexual Behavior," May 1976, 138.

56. Barret L. Mosbaker, ed., 17.

57. Ibid, 18.

58. Robert W. Kistner, 15 December 1977, 1.

59. George Grant, 24.

60. Alan Guttmacher, 73 May 3, quoted in magazine, August/September 1979, 11.

61. September-October 1993, 21.