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Responsible Education About Life Act - REAL (S. 972 and H.R. 1653)
Introduced by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA)
What it is
Why you should support it
Bill status
Take action
For more information
Sources
What it is>>
The Responsible Education About Life Act (REAL) is a bill that would provide funding to states for comprehensive sexuality education programs that include medically accurate information about abstinence, contraception, and disease prevention. These programs will supply young people with the tools to make informed decisions, resist peer pressure, set goals, manage stress, be responsible, understand and accept diversity, build healthy relationships, and have access to up-to-date information about how they can protect themselves against sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV/AIDS.
Since 1996, more than $1 billion in federal and state funding has been provided to unproven abstinence-only education programs that fall short of meeting the needs of young people. In order to receive federal abstinence-only funding, grantees must agree to exclude information about the health benefits of contraception to prevent pregnancy and STIs from their educational programs. Currently, there is no federal appropriation designated for comprehensive sexuality education.
Why you should support it>>
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Adolescents have a right to complete information on sexual and reproductive health. This right is recognized in the 1994 Cairo Programme for Action, adopted by 179 governments (including the United States) at the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in 1994. At the five-year review of ICPD in 1999, governments agreed that they should include at all levels, as appropriate, of formal and non-formal schooling, education about population and health issues, including sexual and reproductive health issues...in terms of promoting the well-being of adolescents, enhancing gender equality and equity as well as responsible sexual behaviour, protecting them from early and unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS, and sexual abuse, incest and violence (Paragraph 35 (b), ICPD Plus Five Document, available here). REAL would ensure that American adolescents have access to this kind of quality, comprehensive sexuality education.
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Comprehensive sexuality education benefits young people. Strong evidence exists that young people who receive comprehensive sexuality education become sexually active later than other teens, have fewer partners, and are more likely to use contraceptives when they do have sex. This is why eight states-California, Connecticut, Maine, Montana, New Jersey, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin-have opted out of requesting funding from the federal government for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs.
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Abstinence-only programs contain misleading, biased, and inaccurate information. A Congressional report found that two-thirds of the federally funded abstinence-only programs contained misleading or inaccurate information about contraception, genetics, and STIs. Many of them misrepresent scientific data on contraceptive effectiveness by comparing "perfect use" statistics on abstinence to "typical use" statistics on condoms and other forms of contraception. In October 2006, the non-partisan U.S. Government Accountability Office informed the Department of Health and Human Services that it is in violation of federal law for failing to enforce a requirement that federally funded grantees must provide medically accurate information about the effectiveness of condoms.
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Abstinence-only programs promote gender stereotypes. One federally-funded curriculum instructs: "Women gauge their happiness and judge their success by their relationships. Men's happiness and success hinge on their accomplishments." Sex Respect, an abstinence-only curriculum taught in Ohio, includes the following workbook text: "A guy who wants to respect girls is distracted by sexy clothes and remembers her for one thing. Is it fair that guys are turned on by their senses and women by their hearts?"
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Abstinence-only programs ignore lesbian, gay, and sexually active youth. By identifying marriage as the only context in which sexual activity is acceptable, abstinence-only programs discriminate against lesbian and gay youth living in states where same-sex marriage is illegal. Further, such programs are of negligible value to the 44 percent of U.S. adolescents in grades 9-12 who are already sexually active, not to mention those who are already parents.
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Parents support comprehensive sexuality education. A 2004 poll conducted by NPR, the Kaiser Family Foundation, and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government showed that the majority of American parents agree that abstinence should be a major piece of sexuality education curricula-but only 15 percent of parents believed that programs should only talk about abstinence.
Bill status>>
This bill was introduced in both the House and the Senate on March 22, 2007, by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ). For more information, including the full text of the bill and a complete list of co-sponsoring Senators, click here.
Take action>>
Right now, we need to build strong bipartisan support for this legislation in the House and Senate. Help ensure that all young people have access to critical health information and services. Make a phone call today.
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Contact your Senators and ask them to co-sponsor the REAL Act (S. 972). Click here to find your Senators' contact information.
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Contact your Representative and ask him or her to co-sponsor the REAL Act (H.R. 768). Click here to find your Representative and his or her contact information.
For more information>>
American Academy of Pediatrics
American Association of University Women
American Civil Liberties Union
SIECUS
Sources>>
The Content of Federally Funded Abstinence-Only Education Programs
Advocates for Youth
National Public Radio/Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard Kennedy School of Government, Sex Education in America, 2004
Report on Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Programs in Ohio
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