With the news yesterday that teen pregnancy rates have increased for the first time in 2005-2006 since the 1990s, the debate over abstinence-only education versus comprehensive sex education has been revived. Fortunately, this fall President Obama signed the Fiscal Year 2010 Omnibus Appropriations bill, which ended “funding for the failed Community Based Abstinence Education program and instead directs significant resources into medically accurate, evidence-based teen pregnancy prevention programs.” Those significant resources are split 75%-25%, with the former including programs that have been proven to work and the latter including “innovative possibilities”, and it is possible that ab-only programs would be included in the latter 25%.

The ACLU’s opposition to abstinence-only education is based on several factors. Ab-only education censors vital health care information, stigmatizes homosexuality by discussing sex purely within the context of heterosexual marriage, implies STDs are punishment for homosexuality, promotes gender stereotypes and in some cases, advocates religious doctrine. It does all of this with our tax dollars.

Lastly, ab-only education is not effective. The New York Times writes that “While it is difficult to pinpoint precisely how different factors influence teenage sexual behavior, some experts speculate that the rise in teenage pregnancy might be partly attributable to the $150 million a year of federal financing for sex education that emphasized abstinence until marriage, avoiding all mention of the possible benefits of contraception.”

Fortunately, it is now 2010, and the aforementioned Appropriations bill is in effect with the appropriate re-allocation of tax payer dollars to sex-ed programs that are actually effective and kinder to our civil liberties. But be on the look-out as health care moves forward, because ab-only advocates definitely have their eyes on tax dollars for ab-only education programs.