In Print: Volume 86: Number 5
Abstinence Only Education Fails African American Youth
By Sarah Smith Kuehnel
86 Wash. U. L. Rev. 1241 (2009)
(PDF)
Studies consistently reveal that approximately half of all adolescents engage in sexual intercourse before graduating high school, and many legal scholars have analyzed the correlation between youths’ sexual activity and abstinence-only sex education. Studies also consistently reveal that the percentage of Black American adolescents engaging in sexual intercourse substantially exceeds that of their White American counterparts, but few legal scholars have analyzed the relationship between Black youths’ sexual activity and abstinence-only sex education. Legal scholars have addressed the dangers that abstinence-only programs cause for gay and lesbian youth, and for girls, but have all but failed to address the social ramifications such programs have on racial minorities. Several scholars argue that the right to information or freedom of religion guaranteed by the First Amendment precludes federal endorsement of abstinence-only sex education. Others base legal justification for comprehensive sex education, as opposed to abstinence-only education, in international human rights law.
The dearth of legal analysis of the impact of abstinence-only education on African American youth is surprising considering the groups’ rates of sexual activity, teen pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), including HIV/AIDS. Part I of this Note discusses the rates of STDs and pregnancy among Black youth. Part II discusses the historical and current frameworks of federal funding for abstinence-only education. Part II also addresses the increasingly strict prohibitions on the type of information teachers can disseminate in federally funded programs. Part III compares abstinence-only education programs with comprehensive sex education programs and shows that, although funding has increased for such programs, beneficial results from the implemented abstinence-only programs have not increased with increased funding.
Finally, in Part IV, this Note proposes a right to comprehensive sex education, based upon the Supreme Court’s reasoning in Plyler v. Doe. Comprehensive sex education would alleviate the consequences youth, especially African American youth, suffer as a result of inadequate information on sex, a problem currently compounded by abstinence-only education.
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