Teen Pregnancy Case

Paper 3 (Teen Pregnancy)

        Today, people in our society are paying close attention on teen pregnancy since it was the root cause of many different kinds of social problems such as single-parent families, children poverty, and lack of children care. In the United States, getting pregnant is a big issue and also not a good sign for teenagers because teen pregnancy most likely ends up with inducing some negative effects to both the teenagers and the babies such as the psychological scar on teenagers induced by abortion, and lack of care on babies due to immature teen mothers. As a matter of facts, the United States has the highest rates of teen pregnancy and births in the western industrialized world compared with other European countries. Teen Pregnancy costs the United States more than $7 billion annually. According to an online article, it gives us a general idea of some teen pregnancy statistics and facts, “thirty-four percent of young women become pregnant at least once before they reach the age of 20. Eight in ten of these teen pregnancies are unintended and 79 percent are to unmarried teens.”

        In fact, teen pregnancy problem is not that serious in European countries comparing with the United States. According to an article “Teen pregnancy low in 'sleepover' country; American parents say, 'No way'”, it mainly talks about different views of teenage sex between European parents and American parents. They did a survey by asking both European parents and American parents if they allow their teenagers to spend a night with his or her sweetheart in their home. In this survey, 29 out of 32 American parents would say no and 24 out of 26 of parents in Netherlands would say yes since their children are doing protection for that. Ironically, the Netherlands has fewer teen pregnancies, births and abortions than the U.S. In Netherlands, parents didn’t abandon sexual behavior on teenagers since they believe sex behavior is a kind of natural human being. In fact, one Dutch mother told her daughter to be honest if she are ready for having sex and also teaches her to use pills for contraception. Under this situation, the mother allows her daughter to sleep with her boyfriend regularly in her family home. According to the article, Ms. Schalet explained the difference between Netherlands parents and American parents, “Dutch parents have learned to "normalize" sexual development with their children, but American parents are still "dramatizing" it”. This sentence interprets that Dutch parents encourage their children to have sex in the right circumstance while American parents extremely oppose teenage sexual behavior since teen pregnancy would likely to ruin one’s life. In order to prevent teen pregnancy become an aggravated social problem, A Senate-passed appropriations bill for fiscal 2012 would spend $113 million to maintain the administration's fledgling grant program and teen pregnancy prevention program by discussing sexual abstinence as well as birth control and condoms. On the other hand, the House Appropriations Committee developed a draft bill that slashes the funding to $40 million and splits it between teen pregnancy prevention and abstinence education programs. The abstinence supporters were absolutely pleased to hear the action taken by the House Appropriations Committee. Nevertheless, the people who support the Obama administration's approach are aghast which postponed the decision about the funding.  Fortunately, Congress passed a bill to extend funding for Health and Human Services programs on December 16th. These are the actions taken by the government to confront high number of teen pregnancy in the U.S. In Netherlands, parents talk openly to their children about sex and state that sexual behavior is healthy. They told their children to be honest when they want to have sex and also teach them to have responsible behavior when sexual activity begins such as contraception use. The teenagers in Netherlands know that they can ask for permission if their parents allow them to have their partners spend a night in their bedroom when they turn 16 or 17 and most parents would say yes. On the other hand, teen sleepovers in the U.S. family home are virtually taboo. This may lead to teenagers sneaking around to have sex secretly. If they got caught by their parents because of this, there would be a big conflict between children and parents which badly damage their relationship.  Obviously, Europeans look at sexuality as a normal, healthy part of human being while the Americans view sexuality as sort of an oppositional force that has to be fought with. An Advocate for Youth report shows that teenagers in Netherlands are far more likely than American teens to use condoms or oral contraceptives. It is because Dutch parents gave their children a positive image about sexuality and support them to have sex in a right situation with adequate protection. They especially support young people to have happy and fulfilling adult lives romantically and sexually. Under daily influence by parents, Dutch teens view sexual behavior as normal and certainly they don’t feel guilty to have sex. They understand that they need to have contraception before enjoying sex. In addition, the strong cultural message against teen pregnancy in Europe significantly makes a difference compared to the U.S. In most European nations, they don’t think teen pregnancy is a big issue while the American teens are ambivalent about having a baby. Therefore, the teen pregnancy number in Netherlands is much lower comparing with the U.S’s.