sex in the news

Last week on CNN HLN with Mike Galanos, I discussed Carlie Beck, the 20 year old cheerleading coach who was fired from Casa Roble High School in Orangevale, California, after it was revealed that she posed nude for Playboy’s website as a “Playboy Cyber Girl of the Week.” Well, now she’s moving up. It was just announced that she will be “Playboy Cyber Girl of the Month for June.”

On CNN HLN, I discussed both sides of the issue of her firing. Carlie has every right to pose nude, if that’s what she wants to do. She seemingly tried to separate her high school coaching from her nude modeling, since she used a different last name to pose — Carlie Christine — and the nude pictures are only available with a credit card. On the other hand, teens must be taught to not pose for risqué or nude photos, and that anything they put online can have serious consequences. So, their cheerleading coach obviously was sending the wrong message to her cheerleaders. Also, since one of the cheerleaders knew about the pictures and told the principal, then Carlie must have told that cheerleader about it. It is highly unlike that one of her students would have just happened onto the photos, because they were posted on an interior page of the site amid dozens of 1 inch square images of other nude women.  So if Carlie told the students where to look that would have been inappropriate.  

The moral of the story, however, is not about whether her firing was right or wrong. It’s that the firing made her “famous.” Instead of illustrating how nude pictures can hurt someone’s life, now Carlie gets exactly what she wants. She wanted to be a well-known model, which is why she posed nude. If she hadn’t been fired, then no one would have noticed her nude pictures in the sea of other pictorials of attractive nude 20 year olds. Now she’ll be the girl of the month, instead of just the girl of the week. All her dreams are coming true, thanks to the scorned cheerleader who precipitated her firing.  If she gets her way, then by next year, she may even get into the actual Playboy magazine! Maybe she’ll aim even higher and strive to be the next “Girl Next Door,” and move in with Hef. Wonder what message that would give the girls she used to coach.

Last night’s Nightline story about sexting included some of my comments.  Vicki Mabrey, her producer, and the entire Nightline team did a great job telling the different sides to this story.  To see the video, click on the photo below, and it will open the video on the ABC News website.

Tonight I’ll be on ABC’s Nightline discussing sexting.

I began discussing sexting when I defined it on this blog months ago. Since then, there have been dozens of reports of teens who have been caught sexting.  Sometimes teens have been threatened with — or charged with — distributing child pornography.  The cases have run the gamut from the seemingly harmless, not “pornographic” (such as the PA teen wearing her white training bra who was consensually photographed by her friends), to the very troubling new case of an MA teen who videotaped two teens having intercourse and sent the video around a junior high via cell phone. Sexting, thus, becomes a complex topic to discuss because some cases may prove to be relatively innocent private activities, while other cases are extreme examples of exploitation.

While an uncircumcised penis leaves more for a man (and his partner) to play with, a new study confirms that circumcision reduces the chance of infection from HIV, HPV and Herpes-2.  

A study published today in the New England Journal of Medicine examined the occurrence of syphilis, herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) and human papilloma virus (HPV) in both circumcised and uncircumcised men in Africa. After two years, it found that circumcised men had a 25 percent reduced risk of infection of HSV-2 and a 35 percent reduced risk of infection of HPV.  Syphilis showed no difference. Previous research found that circumcision may reduce the risk of HIV transmission by 60 percent.  The results are said to be generalizable to American men, yet the study is not without its caveats. To read the details, check out the New York Times article about it.  Also, here’s the abstract to the study.

I was on The O’Reilly Factor tonight. Bill was on vacation, and Laura Ingraham was the guest host. We were supposed to talk about the increase in the birth rate among people of all ages, including teens and twentysomethings. However, instead Laura only asked me about abstinence ed funding and Planned Parenthood. She’s always interesting to work with, because her questions and comments can be surprising. At least I had the chance to remind her audience that most Americans want comprehensive sexuality education to be in schools for their children and teens.

77% of pregnancies among single, educated women in their 20s are accidental.

With last year’s talk of Juno, the Gloucester girls, Bristol Palin, and Jamie Lynn Spears, the media focused on unintended pregnancy of teens. Today, another group is identified at serious risk for unplanned pregnancies: single twentysomethings. According to a new study, 77% of pregnancies among single, educated women in their 20s are accidental.

The study, commissioned by The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, is reported in the new issue of Self magazine (with Taylor Swift on the cover). I am quoted in the Self article discussing common traits of some twentysomethings who are abivalent about their future plans, and thus about their birth control choices.

Twentysomethings are very much in need of sex ed. According to The National Campaign study, there are major gaps in the knowledge they have about birth control. For example, more than half say they don’t know about IUDs, Depo-Provera, diaphragms, or the contraceptive ring. Also, 64% do not know that emergency contraception is sold over the counter without a prescription.

The biggest problem is that 54% of sexually active non-monogamous singles surveyed, and 34% of sexually active monogamous singles surveyed, don’t use birth control every time they have sex. Of course, this is why they are getting pregnant. The vast majority of pregnancies are caused by not using or improperly using birth control. Only about 1 in 20 accidental pregnancies are caused by the failure of birth control. The study found that almost 60% of those surveyed underestimate the risk of getting pregnant from not using birth control. They don’t know that among couples who have sex regularly, 85% will experience a pregnancy within one year if they do not use contraception.

There is a huge disconnect for twentysomethings, when 80% believe that pregnancy should be planned, but then they do not use birth control every time they have sex. When I lecture on college campuses, college students often tell me that they take the risk of having unprotected sex, and I implore them to never do that again. If sex education were required in high school, and then again in college, then perhaps we’d launch a new generation of sexually educated twentysomethings. Until then, remind all of the people you know that if they do not want an accidental pregnancy, they must use birth control every time they have sex.