Here's a great example of how the mainstream media regularly deceives its readers in order to lead them to adopt the desired view.

While doing a bit of research to find out what forms of sex education were effective, I came across this paragraph in USA Today:

In Minnesota, a study found that sexual activity doubled among junior high school students taking part in an abstinence-only program. The independent study, commissioned by the state's health department, recommended broadening the program to include more information about contraception.

What does that sound like to you?

To me it sounds like they're saying that the abstinence-based education made the kids become more sexually active. It sounds like the program was worse than nothing, or competing programs.

But the truth is entirely different:

They found over the course of the year that the rate of those who said they were sexually active increased from 5.8 to 12.4 percent, and that the rate of those who said they would probably have sex before finishing high school increased from 9.5 to 17 percent. That is still lower than the average rate of sexually active adolescents in those counties, researchers said. But the abstinence-only message would have been viewed as a success if the rates of sexual activity and sexual intentions among the ENABL group had remained about the same in each year, researchers said.

Yes, you read that right. The program actually decreased students' interest in having sex, compared with the average in their area -- it didn't double it.

So how can USA Today write such a deception?

If you look into the study [pdf], what you find that the kids participating were around 12-15 years old -- i.e. going through puberty. They would inteview them before taking the program (say, at age 13) and then afterwards (say, age 14 or 15) and then compare the rates of interest in sex.

When they compared the two rates, they found that about twice as many kids were interested in having sex a year or more later. Well, duh -- that's due to puberty not the program. Of course more 15-year-olds are interested in sex than kids aged 12 or 13.

A scientific study would measure the program's effect against a random sample of similar kids, the same ages, in the same areas who didn't participate in the program and then see whether the program increased or decreased interest in sex in comparison. For example, if they found that kids who didn't participate in the program had four times as much interest in sex, then having only twice as much is a signficant reduction.

And we are told there was a reduction (see above), but we weren't told how big it was, so we can't judge exactly how effective the program was.

Yet, we are also told, the program would only be called "effective" -- NOT if it was as or even more effective than other sex-ed programs -- but rather "if the rates of sexual activity and sexual intentions ... had remained about the same in each year." In other words, if a 13.5-year old participates in the program for a year and a half, and doesn't have the less or the same amount of interest in sex at age 15 (in high school) as he did as a 13-year-old (in middle school), then the program will be dubbed a "failure!"

So you can see this is clearly a rigged game -- an impossibly high standard seems to have been created, perhaps so that this program could be called a "failure" and modified to be more sexually explicit and neutral -- even though it actually decreased kids' intensions to have sex.

It's also amusing to note they will be changing to a non-abstinence-based program. Will they submit it to the same tests and criteria to see if it "effective"? Hahaha, what -- are you kidding? That would be fair, or at least scientific. One program, we will demand impossibly high standards from -- the other will undoubtedly receive no such scrutiny.

Another problem with this particular program is that it didn't seem to teach abstinence the way advocates recommend:

In the classroom, MN ENABL teaches the Postponing Sexual Involvement (PSI) curriculum, comprised of five hour-long sessions concentrating primarily on refusal skills and avoiding situations where sex could take place.

In other words, the program took a values-free approach, and didn't tell kids having sex was wrong, stupid, or bad. Instead, it seemed based on the idea that children simply had no idea how to express the concept of "no", and stay out of situations where something might be demanded of them, and if we'd just tell them how to express the idea "no" -- without teaching them values, or course -- then everything would somehow magically get better.

Who came up with that idea? Anybody with any experience with children knows most children are adept at "no" (indeed, it's often one of the first words ever voiced), and are also generally proficient at avoiding situations where they might have to do something they don't want to do.

The problem isn't their skill in getting what they want. The missing element here is shaping their values, to tell them what they should and shouldn't view as good. It seems absurd to state endlessly in media and medical journals that sex among teens is bad, but then sponsor programs which won't come out and say that same thing. If authority figures such as parents and teachers won't shape or guide their values, then television, their peers, movies, HBO and Showtime, people they meet on the Internet, and their hormones certainly will.

Another lame aspect to this particular program is that, though its costs were represented as significant, it was just five hours per year! Many children watch that much television in a single day. If the effect was small, this might have been something to consider. Given that, it's astounding it had a measurable benefit at all.

Oh, and about the CDC study? I finally found one.

Question: Given that a badly-done, unscientific study gets prime (though dishonest) coverage in USA Today, where do you have to go to read about a study done by Atlanta's trusted Center for Disease Control?

Answer: A Catholic web site.

Among teens who had not yet had sex, the main reasons for not yet having had sex was that it was “against religion or morals”, followed by “don’t want to get (a female) pregnant”

So, if this is correct, it would seem if you want to get kids to have less sex, the surest way is to inculcate some kind of religious values, or at least generic moral values.

But apparently not, if you're a prominent Democratic politician:

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), Ranking Minority Member of the Committee on Government Reform, challenged the curriculums of abstinence programs, even faulting them for relying upon religious beliefs and moral values.

Yeah, Henry! You tell 'em! Don't teach them that teenage sex is wrong -- that's unscientific and has no effect. Never mind that the CDC -- not to mention common sense -- says otherwise.

Good to know the nation is in such capable hands.