Vintage STD/STI posters

http://www.medicalbillingschool.org/blog/50-vintage-std-propaganda-posters

After today's class period, I decided to search for examples of more controversial STD/STI prevention posters from the WWI-WWII period. I was most interested in those which, like the last South African poster we viewed, portrayed masculinity in this almost comic "action hero" kind of way. What I found was pretty shocking in itself. Not only were the soldiers the posters were targeted to called to assume this ridiculous caricature of manhood ("you kept fit and defeated the Hun"), but they consistently objectified women and dichotimized between the "good girl" and the "bad girl." The "98% of Procurable Women have VD" poster was especially disgusting. Women were consistently shown as the only group which spreads venereal diseases, and very rarely in the gallery is any kind of blame put upon the men in the situation. Examples such as the "Don't be her pin-up boy" poster, and the "easy girl-friend" ad, are especially bad.

Perhaps for us the most relevant poster is the one reading "8 out of 10 dead or syphilitic" and "9 out of 10 healthy and normal," referring to untreated and treated mothers respectively. Its statistics, while they may have been true for the period on some level, seem outrageously skewed and manipulatively marketed. Notice how "untreated mothers" and "treated mothers" is in a much smaller print than the other words. As you go through the gallery, try to look critically at each poster. How do you think teenagers, specifically those with an STI, would have reacted to seeing themselves depicted as being so wild and dangerous? Can you think of other criticisms or examples of posters where women are especially portrayed as being out unable to control their own sexuality?

--Greg W.

Sex Education!

http://www.thepregnancyshow.com/sexed_clips.html

I found this clip about sex education. As we discussed in class today, and watching Shelby's sex education video, there are many different ways individuals look at sex. This clip shows that when thinking about sex most people don't look at it from the perspective of "sleeping with all of your partners past partners." Have you ever looked at it from this point of view? Most individuals don't like to bring up past experiences with their partner or if they do not in the depth of how many people have they slept with besides you and were they being safe. Also, if we made this a more popular perspective, do you think it would make individuals want to take better precautions?

- Shelby Monroe

Facts and questions about abortion

According to abortiontv.com abortion is one of the most common surgical procedures in the US. In 2000, 1.31 million pregnancies were terminated by abortion in the US. What most people don't know is the short term and long term side effects of abortion. Here's the article that was posted on americanpregnancy.org which talks about the possible side affects of abortion.

http://www.americanpregnancy.org/unplannedpregnancy/possiblesideeffects.html

In one of the article we read in the class, the author mentioned about the option of abortion and how most teen mothers and even teen mothers' mothers want an abortion for their daughters. Do they know the possible side affects while considering this option? or do they just decide to "help" their daughters' future?

As a teenager I know most of them don't want to have a baby in their way but there are other options. Options like adoption. What might be preventing them?

-- Disha Jetani

How much truth could we get???

Recently I came across this news that teen pregnancy is going down and MTV is the reason for it. I wanted to search more about it and see if its really true.
Before I get into more details, I want to ask you guys something that I observed while watching teen moms and 16 & pregnant. I wondered how much information about their personal life is correct? to what extent does MTV play role in portraying it? And the impact it has on their family members and friends?
I feel like with 16 & pregnant and teen moms, MTV is saying that it is okay to be pregnant when you are a teenager. This video is giving more information on it.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/teen-pregnancy-fame-friends-teen-mom-star-jenelle/story?id=12891932

We could say that MTV is helping to portray the hard life teenage moms get after having a baby, to an extent. But it is also giving the wrong message. I feel like there are some teenagers out there who would try to get pregnant just to get a fame, like the ones described in this video. What could MTV say about that? How much truth could we get from MTV and teen moms?

-Disha Jetani

Dating Abuse.

So after our last guest speaker i could not stop thinking about abusive relationships. I came across a few articles after class while looking more into it. It makes me sad to think of how many people are in abusive relationships. There are many types of violence and sadly I don't think teens or even adults are educated on what an abusive relationship is. I also believe that no one wants to admit when they are in an abusive relationship and they will hide it for mabny reasons.


After reading a little about teen dating abuse what do you guys think? Why don't people seek help when they are in an abusive relationship. What makes people think that nothing wrong? What would you do if your friend was in an abusive relationship? What if it was your sister, brother, or child? How can we prevent abusive relationships in the future.
-brittany white

New Beginnings!

I don't think Hilary is going to make a blog, so I decided to go ahead and do one to make sure everyone gets their points! I hope you all don't mind! :)

I was doing research on what woman could do to have to support themselves and their children if they aren't married or the father figure isn't in the picture. I came across a documentary called "Grown in Detroit."

http://grownindetroit.filmmij.nl/

Detroit is becoming a run down city and you can find a lot of single mothers there who have a hard time financially. This video is about taking different vacant lots in Detroit and changing it into crops. The hope is for each of them to make 20,000 dollars a year by selling the crops they raise to help them become financially independent. I think this is an amazing idea, what do you guys think? Can you think of anything else like this that could help a large amount of single women be financially stable?

- Shelby Monroe

Seeking Options

America has one of the highest teen pregnancy rates in the world. However, with teens not being well educated, do they really know all of their options when it comes to their baby? Almost 50 percent of teen moms are having abortions. Due to their age, most require a parent’s consent. In the article found at

http://pregnancy.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Stories_on_Teenage_Pregnancy

Pregnancy it tells many stories of those who have had abortions and how they feel about it after they have done the procedure. With 50 percent of babies being aborted, that could be a lot of babies that could go to homes that have been wanting a baby for a long time and not able to have one. Families could have adopted these babies. Coming from a religious background, I believe there are better options than abortion, but are teen moms aware they could choose adoption too if not wanting to parent? Also, are they choosing abortion because they don’t want to be labeled as a "teen mom" or others knowing they were pregnant? Learning about the fathers this week, how much do the men have a say in the mother’s decision?

-Shelby Monroe

Teen pregnancy and the wiki

When researching a controversial issue like teenage pregnancy, our sources for information must be carefully chosen and highly scrutinized. Fact-checking is a must, and one must pay close attention to the "spin" being put on the topic. One writer may cite the same statistics in a negative fashion, while another may use those to portray it more positively. What biases does the writer have on the topic? What are their values, and how are they reflected in their depiction of the issue? While many dissect the rhetoric of television and newspaper articles concerning teen pregnancy, I thought it would be interesting to look at its depiction in a different place, and perhaps one the average college student turns to more often: the online encyclopedia.

As a Wikipedia contributor myself, Wikipedia is often the first place I visit when researching a specific topic. Though some articles are admittedly much less complete than others, it is almost always an excellent first place to look. The article for teenage pregnancy is no exception. If you haven't already, take some time to skim through it now. To me, it appears well-cited and seems to cover nearly all facets of the issue. Even so, there is always room for improvement. One sentence is tagged as missing a citation, and the article could do with some reorganization.

Even though it seems well-written, it is important to remember that in a communally-edited encyclopedia the values of one editor may be radically different from another, and the tone of the piece may reflect this. Take this recent anonymous edit as an example:

Men are selfish pigs and they dont think about what they are doing and when they do it they dont want the resposibilities of the kid when its to late. i think if a man does the deed not to put a condom on then he should be forced to take care of the kid he wants to or not. i mean the woman is suppose to make sure that he puts it on but if she says no then its his job to say hey i putting on a condom cause i dont want no kid right now

Note how incredibly out-of-place it is in an otherwise encyclopedic article. Someone reading it would notice the stylistic shift, and may take it as a reason to discredit everything that they've read so far. Is it an act of vandalism? Should we assume the contributor had good intentions when writing it? Other odd edits are also common, as seen here:

Sex is very very very very very very very very bad for you thank you.

Both of these strange edits were deleted within moments of their being posted. Despite these occasional defacements, the article appears much in keeping with Wikipedia's striving for a neutral point-of-view, or NPOV. Do you think it portrays teen pregnancy accurately?

Though it and Wikipedia look roughly the same, one of the goals of the online encyclopedia Conservapedia is to write from a "conservative, family-friendly" perspective. It seeks to counteract the "liberal bias" of Wikipedia, and present articles from an American Christian point-of-view (1). Popular articles on Conservapedia include those attempting to disprove evolution and the theory of relativity, condemn homosexuality biblically, and set the age of the earth at around 6,000 years old (2). As of this writing, their featured article is on the "Muslim agenda of the Obama administration" (3). Given their point-of-view, it is interesting to look at their short article on teenage pregnancy:

[Teen pregnancy] is a major social problem as teen pregnancies most often either result in abortion or in the raising of children in unstable single-parent families. The increasing rate of teen pregnancies is a consequence of increasing atheistic and secular pressures in modern society. These include the influence of Hollywood values and other manifestations of materialistic culture which erode and undermine moral standards, the hostility of school boards to the exercise of religious faith, and the bias of public school sex education against abstinence education programs, which are the only sure safeguard against teen pregnancy.

I have added the bolded line for emphasis. The editors of the Conservapedia article are clearly more politically motivated, and see teen pregnancy as an undermining of their core Christian values. Rather than expound more on the "what" of teen pregnancy, they're quick to point fingers at "why" it has occurred. The perceived hostility against abstinence-only education is touched upon, as well as an apparent allusion to Christian persecution in schools. In this article, the issue of teen pregnancy is irrevocably tied up with morality. To me, it seems to have less to do with teen pregnancy as it does with what the editors perceive as the the current political climate in America. How does this contrast with Wikipedia's approach? Is it in keeping with the site's billing itself as the "trustworthy encyclopedia?" Which do you think has the most biases, or is the most accurate?

In any case, we have to realize that no single source, whether it's Wikipedia or Conservapedia, MTV or Dubious Conceptions, can provide everything there is to know about teen pregnancy. Each one paints a certain type of picture, and it is left up to us to connect the dots. So, sorry for the long post. I'm curious to know what you all think.

-- Greg W.

Babies Having Babies!

Two years ago Journalist KATHLEEN KINGSBURY  posted an article about “Pregnancy Boom at Gloucester High (school)” in Time magazine. 17 girls got pregnant and according to school officials it wasn't an accident. These girls according to the article and some internet resources come from middle class families. Here's the article:

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1815845,00.html

Before I ask my questions regarding to this, I want you guys to think about what could have happen? Was is just ignorance? Were they trying to make some kind of statement? And if yes, what could it be?

I remember being in high school, thinking about going to Mizzou and working hard to get the job of my dream! But when I heard about this, it made me wonder why would anyone want to get pregnant on purpose when they are still babies? We hear about teen pregnancy and often hear about how they were not using contraceptives etc etc. But getting pregnant on purpose and above all making a pact to raise babies together is something to think about.

Disha Jetani

sex ed

I wasn’t sure what to do my blog about so I decided to try to find something that was revelent and personal… what could be more personal then Missouri itself. Teen pregnancy has become a trend/common occurrence all over America but do girls or even guys really know what they are doing? Do they really understand that their actions have results? How would they know if no one told them. 

I agree with this conclusion of the article. I believe that teens and pre teens are not educated enough on sexual activities and what could result from them. I went to a school where we were not given a “sex ed” class. Everything I learned was from when my parents talked to me. I think it is important to educated girls about sex and the possible outcome from sex if they are not careful. I don’t think girls really know how it will change the rest of their lives. 

http://missourifamilies.org/features/adolescentsarticles/adolesfeature13.htm

-Brittany White

schedule

Brittany White
Disha Jetani
Greg Winkler
Shelby Monroe
Hilary Prola

Intro!

This is our intro post :)