Opinionated News

At 16 years old I knew where babies come from.  I wasn’t exactly sure how they got there.  I hoped to have babies somewhere down the road.   I also knew that babies were a huge responsibility and much more problematic and time consuming than a dog or a cat.  Whilst I wasn’t clear on the mechanics of baby making, I was very clear on many aspects of caring for a baby, and how a baby affected everyone it came in contact with.

Now I was a 16 back in the early 1980s.  We thought we knew a lot about life – at least more than our mothers had done at our age.  We weren’t as streetwise as today’s 16 year olds however.  They have evolved more than we did at the same age.  Which makes the story in CNN.com today even more puzzling.  A school in Massachusetts has 17 girls all under the age of 16 pregnant.  This appears to be the result of some kind of pact where the girls would get pregnant and have their babies at the same time. 

The current thinking behind the scheme is that these girls lacked in self esteem and didn’t have much love in their lives.  Sorry, I’m not buying that.  That seems a very nice little rationale for what could be an epidemic of teen pregnancy in this area.  I don’t know why these girls suddenly decided that a baby would make a great bonding accessory but I think the school has to just deal with these girls as it would any other pregnant girl in their school and begin a vigorous campaign aimed at the girls who aren’t pregnant.

Resources need to be spent on the computerized babies,   the totally interactive computerized dolls that the girls would have to carry around with them at all times, caring for them as they would a newborn.  I’m pretty sure that after a few sleepless nights, and interrupted TV programs – not to mention showering and bathing, they’ll realize that a baby is going to create more feelings of isolation and inadequacy that they have already. 

Babies are wonderful for those who are ready to have them, but even doting new parents are usually quick to tell how much work it is emotionally and physically in those early weeks from birth to say ….5 years old where you go from stage to phase never sure what you’re dealing with or if you’re handling it the best way possible!  Babies are rarely good for self-esteem issues because there’s always someone there to tell you that you should have done x better or y differently. 

I hope that this school is able to get past the “pact” business, let the babies be born and be dealt with by the girls, their parents and the authorities and focus on what’s really important, channeling resources into the other girls in the same age group so that they are fully aware of the long-term commitment a baby needs.