Mixed Messages About Teen Sex By Stephanie Mollborn

I just read this very interesting article “Mixed Messages about Teen Sex” by Stephanie Mollborn. In this article, Mollborn first talks about how society as a whole is sending mixed messages to teens about sex. She uses the stories of two students living in the same state, but come from very different backgrounds to demonstrate the different messages we as a society are sending to our teens about sex. In the article, Mollborn talks about how societal norms form our views on teen sex and pregnancy. She then gives examples of how we are taught to act when someone violates those norms, metanorms. She goes on to show that how we react to certain things tends to vary from culture to culture, or in this case, community to community. Mollborn goes

If sex wasn’t treated as such a taboo, and was practiced safely among teens who are ‘ready’, it would be easier for teens to ask questions, and practice safer sex. Maybe, if teen sex was embraced instead of being regarded as such a negative thing, teaching sex would be easier, and the message we deliver would be more uniformed. If we change the norm of the way we look at sex, we would also change our metanorms of how we react to teens having sex. I think the message that Mollborn was trying to convey in her article is that culture has a huge impact on the way we view things, and what we, as a society, consider normal. In turn our society shapes how we react when someone violates these

I remember my sophomore year of highschool, I saw my very first pregnant teenager. Then my senior year, it seemed like there were more and more cases of pregnancy. When a girl in my school got pregnant she was immediately outcasted; she was the talk of the school. She was a slut. On the opposite end of the spectrum, my friend went to a Catholic high school. She was taught that abstinence was the answer, and sex before marriage was wrong. Her school went as far as telling teachers they couldn’t talk about condoms or birth control even if they were directly asked about them. She told me about how there was only one girl in her school to ever get pregnant while she was there, but everyone accepted it willingly. According to my friend, her school consulted with the pregnant girl and tried to coach her against abortion, and were supportive of the