Poverty breeds domestic violence, criminal activity, neglect and stress. Teen pregnancy is part of the cycle. Nelson says that even though girls begin menstruating much earlier than a couple of generations ago, teen birth rates have greatly declined since the 1950s, when girls who got pregnant usually got married. Two incomes are obviously better than one, but for some, marriage is not possible. We stay away from the whole wedlock issue.
Conservatives are more than willing to pick up the issue.
Conservatives advocate abstinence-based sex education, one of the major proposals in St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman's recent State of the City speech. Barbara Anderson, a sex education researcher for the group Taxpayers for Excellence in Education, says comprehensive sex education programs in schools have been a failure, and it's time to try something new. Abstinence is gaining support in school sex ed programs, but when it's taught as an option, it has little chance of success, Anderson says. She doesn't believe the message is contradictory. It's unrealistic to think that all people are going to adhere to that standard.