SIECUS CURRICULUM REVIEW SUMMARY Passion & Principles A Fear-Based Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Curriculum

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SUMMARY: SIECUS REVIEW OF Passion & Principles

Passion & Principles is a fear-based, abstinence-only-until-marriage curriculum. It contains almost no information on important topics such as puberty, anatomy, human reproduction, sexual orientation, and contraception. It includes a few scattered facts about Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs) and an appendix that provides a paragraph about each of several common STDs. Other than that, the program focuses exclusively on the inevitable consequences of premarital sex and the need for sexual purity. The information that is included is incomplete and often inaccurate and the entire curriculum relies on fear and shame and provides biased, and often religiously based, messages about marriage and pregnancy options. Ultimately, Passion & Principles falls far short of meeting the needs of young people.

NOT APPROPRIATE FOR PUBLIC SCHOOL

Religious Undertones — Promoting specific religious beliefs

  • “You must teach the students that sex is the glue that ultimately links them to someone for the rest of their lives within a biblical marriage relationship.” ( Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 26)

  • “‘The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good your whole body will be full of light.' Matthew 6.22” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, reprint of page 2)

  • “Pornography, like sin, promises to please me and serve me BUT it's only desire is to enslave and dominate. (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 50)

Although some of these statements were printed lightly or blacked out for the public school version there is no doubt that this curriculum remains patently religious in nature and is inappropriate for our society which was founded on the separation of church and state.

RELYING ON NEGATIVE MESSAGES

Messages of Fear and Shame— Trying to scare students and instill guilt.

  • Every number on the die represents a risk some are willing to take. This illustrated that SEX before Marriage will cost!” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 34)

  • If a student rolls a four, he or she contracted AIDS and the Leader is instructed to say “You're heading to the grave. No cure.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 34)

  • “Teens must understand that pornography not only destroys relationships between men and women, but actually changes brain chemistry, creating a dependence as powerful as an addiction to cocaine.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 50)

  • Students who have had sex are warned, “your heart will never be perfect…there will be scars from the choices that were made BUT you're worth waiting for!” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 24)

This focus on consequences is clearly designed to scare students rather than educate them and the odd focus on pornography serves only to underscore the curriculum's messages of fear. According to recent studies, forty-seven percent of all high school students have had sexual intercourse. It is inappropriate and potentially harmful for education programs to imply that these teens lack self-control or self-respect or to suggest that they are less worthy of love, trust, and respect. This can only be damaging to these students and serve to alienate them from their peers and the program.

Sexual Arousal —Describing sex as an uncontrollable force .

  • “A physical downward spiral happens once one starts engaging in sexual activities.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 40)

  • “I have the will power to stop” is “wrong thinking.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 40)

This is perhaps the most dangerous message teens can be given about sexual activity: in suggesting that teens have no control over their actions, it actually discourages them from making wise sexual decisions and taking responsibility for their actions. Young people need to know that at any point in a relationship, and at any point during sexual activity, they have the right and the ability to set their own sexual boundaries and that it is their responsibility to do so.

DISTORING INFORMATION

Sexually Transmitted Diseases— Misleading students.

  • “The causative agent [for AIDS], I-UV, is transmitted by body fluids such as blood and semen.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, Appendix A)

  • The appendix states that Chlamydia is “contracted only by intercourse,” whereas a card used for an STD activity discusses “skin to skin transmittal.” (Passions & Principles, Leader's Guide, Appendix A and STD Cards)

  • [Chlamydia's] primary site of infection is a woman's uterus, tubes and ovaries.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, Appendix A)

These statements are inaccurate: AIDS is caused by HIV, and Chlamydia, which is spread through contact with infected secretions (vaginal, cervical, or semen), primarily infects the cervix or urethra in women and the urethra in men. In addition to these blatant inaccuracies, the curriculum fails to explain that many long-term consequences of STDs are preventable if the STD is caught and treated.

Condoms— Emphasizing failure

  • “One in 5 times condoms will fail for pregnancy.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 10)

  • “CONDOMS provide little or no protection [from Chlamydia] due to the skin to skin transmittal.” (Passion & Principles, STD cards)

  • “Nearly 1 in 3 will contract AIDS from infected partner with 100% condom use.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, p. 12)

In truth, even with typical use condoms only have a 14% failure rate (not 20%), and with consistent and correct use they are recognized to reduce transmission of Chlamydia and have been scientifically proven to effectively protect uninfected individuals with HIV-positive partners. The curriculum relies on fear in an apparent attempt to undermine young people's confidence in condoms. This approach seems to be based on the illogical assumption that if young people believe condoms will not work, they will abstain from sexual intercourse. While such inaccurate information may discourage teens from using condoms, this does not mean they will not have sex. Instead it means that they will be at increased risk for unintended pregnancy and STDs, including HIV, when they do become sexually active.

PROMOTING BIASES

The Marriage Mandate— Promoting one lifestyle

  • “Once you enter into the committed marriage relationship…you will experience the most wonderful, beautiful, dynamic, exciting, intimate relationship for the rest of your life.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 8)

  • “Marriage helps to make one more stable and able to leave parents' home and create a self-sufficient, self-reliant household; married people live longer and generally are more emotionally and physically healthy than their unmarried partners” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 28)

The curriculum explores marriage in a limited and directive way that presents it as the only appropriate way of life and suggests that individuals who choose otherwise are making the wrong decision for themselves and society. It is not the place of education programs to mandate choices for students. In addition, this focus on marriage ignores the needs of gay and lesbian students who can never legally marry in this country.

Pregnancy Options— Mandating choices

  • “Adoption is an option because now there's open adoption. You can have contact by letters, pictures or visits.” (Passion & Principles, Leader's Guide, 34)

  • Question (answer in bold): When were You a unique individual? Birth At fertilization I haven't yet (Passion & Principles, Guidebook, 6)

It is important for educational programs, especially those for use in public schools, to respect the diversity of opinions and provide unbiased information on all options available to a woman confronting an unintended pregnancy as a teenager or an adult. Passion & Purity does not adhere to this standard of educational programming, instead it relies on an incomplete presentation and clearly biased language.

copyright © 2005, SIECUS