Virginity Pledge*

[another CC passionate hypocrisy]

March 9, 2004 7:39 p.m. EST

HEALTH

Virginity Pledges Don't Prevent

Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA -- Teenagers who pledge to remain virgins until marriage have the same rates of sexually transmitted diseases as those who don't pledge abstinence, according to a study that examined the sex lives of 12,000 adolescents.

Those who make a public pledge to abstain until marriage do delay sex, have fewer sex partners and get married earlier, according to the data, gathered from adolescents aged 12 to 18 who were questioned again six years later. But the two groups' STD rates were statistically similar.

The study found that 99% of nonpledgers and 88% of pledgers have sex before marriage. The problem, the study found, is that the virginity "pledgers" are less likely to use condoms if they do have sex: Some 59% of males who didn't pledge abstinence used a condom during sex, while only 40% of male pledgers used a condom.

"It's difficult to simultaneously prepare for sex and say you're not going to have sex," said Peter Bearman, the chair of Columbia University's Department of Sociology, who co-wrote the study with Hannah Bruckner of Yale.

"The message is really simple: 'Just say no' may work in the short term but doesn't work in the long term."

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