The issue of the Arizona anti-abortion stickers has been brought up due to the massive attention it got on social media when one mother posted a picture of the sticker.
It seems that Gilbert Public Schools officials have decided to make their stance on abortion and abstinence quite visible by providing each student with a sticker that stated that the school’s views are in perfect accordance with the state’s intention to encourage childbirth and adoption among women, rather than abortion.
“The District is also in support of promoting abstinence as the most effective way to eliminate the potential for unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.” the sticker also said.
The final part of the sticker advised students to discuss any questions that they might have regarding everything from intercourse to contraception options to pregnancy, adoption and abortion with their parents.
This sticker was actually meant to clarify previous issues that had been raised in regards to the biology book used in the school, “Campbell Biology: Concepts & Connections (7th Edition)”, a highly respected book in the scientific community.
The book includes information about not only abstinence, but about sexually transmitted diseases and how to steer clear of these, about various contraception options, from condoms to vasectomies and about abortion and the infamous morning after pill. It seems that this was regarded as unacceptable, precisely because it discussed abortion.
The sticker was actually the final version of a solution to the biology book issue, and others included ripping out the pages about abortion from the book and crossing those parts out with markers.
In spite of the fact that it was the lest intrusive option, the sticker still included extremely misguided information, because presenting abstinence as the best way to avoid pregnancy and STDs, without discussing the other options is clearly not the right course of action.
Furthermore, encouraging students to get their information about sex-related issues from their parents is questionable at best, for a wide variety of reasons. Firstly, the parents might not be sufficiently prepared to provide this information to the children, especially if they were educated by the same abstinence-oriented system.
Secondly, children and teens are embarrassed to discuss such issues with their parents and most of the time, they choose avoid having this discussion altogether. This means that they will still rely on the internet and their friends to get informed, which doesn’t usually lead to satisfactory results.
As proof of the poor job that the schools are doing in educating students about sexual health, NARAL Pro-Choice ppints out that Arizona is the second U.S. state in the teen pregnancy ranking, as reported by the Christian Science Monitor.
It remains to be seen if the stickers are going to be used further, but given the fact that Superintendent Christina Kishimoto is extremely proud of this option, chances are that Gilbert Public Schools students are going to be seeing a lot of them from now on.
Image Source: phoenixnewtimes
