BCT Editorial – 1/2/09

This page was last updated on January 4, 2009.

Outside agitators; Editorial; Beaver County Times; January 2, 2009.

The editorial subtitle is “Abstinence programs don’t work, yet many won’t acknowledge that.”

FYI, “outside agitators” are anyone with whom the Times disagrees.

The editorial doesn’t get past the first two paragraphs before its credibility is shot. After taking a shot at “religious fundamentalists,” the editorial talks of “the sound scientific basis of … [manmade] global warming.” Please read my paper entitled “Manmade Global Warming” to see what I mean.

As for the believability of the quoted study, who knows? Previously I’ve researched studies cited by the Times and found them driven by ideology.

Finally, the editorial concludes with “Despite what its critics contend, sex education is a public health issue, not a moral one.” I always learned it was a bit of both. Then again, I’m one of those closed minded conservatives. Though I’m not an expert on the subject, I believe you’ll find public health and economics are actually at the root of the moral issue of abstinence. Long before recorded history I suspect people figured out that promiscuity spread disease. Further, children born to unwed women were an economic burden on communities because they didn’t have a recognized father to provide for them. I suspect you’ll find nonreligious issues like these made abstinence a moral issue.