Sex on TV and Teenage Pregnancy

There appears to be a link.

Teenagers who watch a lot of television featuring flirting, necking, discussion of sex and sex scenes are much more likely than their peers to get pregnant or get a partner pregnant, according to the first study to directly link steamy programming to teen pregnancy.

The study, which tracked more than 700 12-to-17-year-olds for three years, found that those who viewed the most sexual content on TV were about twice as likely to be involved in a pregnancy as those who saw the least.

"Watching this kind of sexual content on television is a powerful factor in increasing the likelihood of a teen pregnancy," said lead researcher Anita Chandra. "We found a strong association." The study is being published today in Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

There is rising concern about teen pregnancy rates, which after decades of decline may have started inching up again, fueling an intense debate about what factors are to blame. Although TV viewing is unlikely to entirely explain the possible uptick in teen pregnancies, Chandra and others said, the study provides the first direct evidence that it could be playing a significant role.

"Sexual content on television has doubled in the last few years, especially during the period of our research," said Chandra, a researcher at the nonpartisan Rand Corp.

Is there a link--probably. But let's be careful, it is not likely to be causal link (I haven't read the entire study yet).

I find it very troubling as a parent that the incidences of sexual behavior is on the rise in programming aimed a teenagers.

A quick person story. My wife and my mother-in-law took my two young daughters to see High School Musical 3 at teh local theaters. My wife said that my mother-in-law that it was odd that the were was almost no hint of the hormones that would raging between the two teenage lead characters or their peers dealing with the high school prom or even a scene taking place in a treehouse (yes a treehouse). While I can see it, I have to say that I appreciate Disney going to great lengths to present a healthy teenage romance that does not depend on overt sexual behavior. The most we see is hugging and very little kissing. And there is nothing wrong with that kind of depiction.

Now, as for this link between TV sex and teenage pregnancy, I will admit that link probably exists, but there are also huge other factors involved.

1). I can almost say with certainty that today's teenagers have their own TV and their own computer in their room with cable service, meaning they can watch such shows in the privacy of their own rooms--no parental controls.

2). There is very little parental oversight on what these kids are watching and certainly no discussions of what is seen on TV.

3). There is almost certainly no discussion as to the importance and impact of some of the choices that TV characters make.

I don't completely blame TV for the state of affairs, they are in a market driven world and the market wants these kinds of depictions. However, to my limited knowledge (I spend a lot of time watching soccer) there is probably no discussions of the downside of sex, i.e. the potential for pregnancy, STDs, or even the psychological/emotional damage of engaging in sex too early, too often or too indiscriminantly.

NBC Goes Over the Line

I love good political satire and the whole Tina Fey as Sarah Palin bit was hilarious. But last week's bit about Todd Palin and incest was neither funny nor appropriate.

I don't watch Saturday Night Live a lot, and I probably won't be for a while.

Yeah, I Heard That Before

Didn't Alec Baldwin threaten to move to Europoe if George W. Bush was elected president? Yeah--that worked well. Now Susan Sarandon has threatened to do the same.

Don't the the door hit you on the way out sister.

Hollywood Sci-Fi Sucks

Erik Sofge looks at Hollywood's latest sci-fi and notes that the reliance on comic books as inspiration may be part of the downfall.

Hollywood has never been a safe place for smart science fiction. Since square-jawed actors first stepped into soundstage rockets, geeks have watched countless classic sci-fi novels beaten into 90-minute pulp, often filled with useless comic relief, bizarre romantic subplots featuring implausibly attractive research types, and a bold corruption of core scientific principles. Either that, or the movies just didn't make any sense—the 1984 David Lynch film adaptation of Frank Herbert's classic Dune was so incomprehensible to the uninitiated that some theaters passed out a glossary of the film's lingo to moviegoers.

Even among sci-fi scripts that weren't pulled from the pages of classic novels, the influence of Flash Gordon was hard to shake. The “What if?” thought=experiment premises that were the hallmark of great sci-fi gave way to decisions over how much clothing a Martian lady should or shouldn’t wear ("less" usually won). But failure, like most things, occurs in degrees. There was a time when big-budget science fiction wasn’t completely brainless. In fact, some of it was good, even brilliant, and a source of inspiration for generations of researchers. From 2001: A Space Odyssey to The Terminator, the promise (and the apocalyptic threat) of technology was sometimes presented with a surprising level of authority and thoughtfulness. The plotlines still veered toward pulpy melodrama, but by respecting the science, these films helped shape the years that followed.

Sofge notes that the rise of the graphic novel has sort of coincided with the death of really good sci-fi in movie theaters.

That is not to say that comic book based movies are lacking in any appeal, just look at the box office numbers. But some of the best movies, Spiderman 2 for example, dealt with real human emotions and problems, just placed into the context of the "super hero." Note Dr. Octupus' horror at what he had done or Peter's struggles with his "normal" side and his Spiderman side. But Sofge is corrent when he writes:

There’s a reason to pick on these movies. It’s not that they’re claiming any level of realism. But superhero movies, with their alrflagrant, built-in disinterest in getting any aspect of science or technology right, have taken a bite out of science fiction’s market share. Not only do they appeal to much of the same demographic, but they vie for the same studio funding, and the same creative personnel.

But comic book movies are easier to write (someone else has largely done most of the work) and there is something of a built in audience with a deep background knowledge (see the joke in the first X-Men movie about black leather vs. yellow spandex for Wolverine).

Now not all the blame for the dearth of hard sci-fi can be placed at the feet of Hollywood. To a large extent movie goers are not looking for depth and meaning in their films (at least not all of us), so if a movie provides a two hour escape in a darkened, air-conditioned theater, I don't mind paying $8.00 so long as the plot is moderately engaging and the characters and dialogue are not inane.

But I do wish for science fiction that is real science fiction. I remember when James Cameron's The Abyss came out, I thought it was brilliant, so brilliant that I frequently skipped class to go see it first in the full run theaters and then in the sticky floored $1.00 theater. I still think it one of the best science fiction movies around, in part because it was real, it was thinking and it dealt with real people, with real personal problems, looking for real solutions to a deadly situation.

There are writers out there who are really advancing the vision of hard science fiction, but what makes such things movie possible are the characters, based in a real science environment. Take Battlestar Galactica now on the Sci-Fi channel. The driving force of the series is the interaction and the development of the characters. They, human and Cylon alike, drive the story with how they cope with their various situations and the blurring of the lines between human and Cylon. The Cylon's have very real, very human problems despite their appearance as either humanoid or machine. BSG also possesses some odd anachronisms, like clunky telephones and Ship to Ship communications, along side things like a faster than light speed drive (but one that requires some "spin up" time).

Still, I think that the comic book fad will fade in time (there is a finite number of possibilities) and like all these fads it will cycle back sometime in the future.

Natalie Portman Hypocrisy Without Any Apparent Remorse

I like Natalie Portman as an actress and for standing up for her belief. But in this interview, Portman appears to criticize capitalism with one breath and then talks like a capitalist in the next.

ELLE: Your recent film, The Other Boleyn Girl, strikes me as a classic cautionary tale about female ambition. Your character, the notorious Anne, is punished with rape, humiliation, exile, and ultimately execution for being cunning and opportunistic. Her “golden sister” Mary [played by Scarlett Johansson] wants nothing more than a simple country life and is content to accept whatever fate her father, husband, uncle, and king devise for her—and she gets to live happily ever after.
NATALIE PORTMAN: That's so interesting, because I really saw it as a cautionary tale about capitalism. All of the characters who subscribe to these values of rising up and gaining power and who will step on anyone to get there are punished.

Okay, fine if you think that is what the movie is about and if you belive capitalism is bad, but you can't argue that captialism is bad and also have two companies, one a movie production company and another to produce vegan friendly shoes--that is capitalism.