Steinem: Abstinence Only Education Increases Number of Abortions
The birth control pill turns 50 this week, a milestones that has prompted widespread celebration in the mainstream media. This is just another example of the media touting the Pill. On the May 5 “Early Morning Show” Harry Smith gushed how the pill because it “freed women from biological bonds.” Time's Nancy Gibbs unreservedly sang its praises. And on her May 6 HLN show, Joy Behar joined in celebrating the Pill with actress Hilary Swank and feminist Gloria Steinem. But the panel also used the anniversary to complain about abstinence-only education and other setbacks in the pro-abortion movement.
After Swank explained she was celebrating “the empowerment of women,” Behar wasted no time in expressing her disappointment over recent pro-life developments.
Behar fretted that, “
Steinem was ready with the predictable lefty answer. “We've been sliding backward because part of the reason we have this enormous unwanted pregnancy rate among girls bigger than in any other democracy in the whole word is because they don't know about the Pill,” she said. “They don't know about other birth control methods. We've had abstinence-only education, hello.”
Steinem lamented that abstinence only-education “doesn't work, which increases the number of abortions, which increases the number of unwanted pregnancies, so yes, we have the Pill, but we don't have access to it in all the methods that contribute to having reproductive freedom.”
Behar stated that 63 percent of woman are uninformed about the Pill and questioned if “abstinence education is to blame for that?”
Steinem continued, “Yeah. It's perfectly clear. Can you look at studies – that it increased abortion and increased unwanted pregnancy, and you had to have abstinence only education or you didn't get federal funds.” Steinem complained how the
Neither Behar nor Swank questioned Steinem's statement that abstinence only education increases the number of abortions. The panel also ignored statistics from the Heritage Foundation which found that teenagers who receive abstinence education not only wait longer to engage in sexual intercourse, but the education reduces the number of babies born out of wedlock.
This is just another example of the media touting the Pill. On the May 5 “Early Morning Show” Harry Smith too celebrated the Pill because it “freed women from biological bonds.” Time's Nancy Gibbs also celebrated the pill, but failed to include all the negative implications it can bring.
