We live in an increasingly permissive society. The media exploits sexual images to sell products, all kinds of products. Television, the internet, movies, billboards, magazines...all exploit sex appeal for profit. That has an impact on America's children. Children have sex at a young age. Here are some statistics on sexually active American teenagers:
- About one quarter of the American teenage population has had sex by the time they are 15 years of age.
- In the United States, 7 in 10 girls who had sex before the age of 14, and 6 in 10 girls who had sex before the age of 15, had sex involuntarily. They were raped.
- About 2800 American teenagers get pregnant each day.
- About 40% of teenage girls in America get pregnant at least once before turning twenty. Between 30 and 40 percent of those pregnancies end in abortion. Those that end in birth cost the United States taxpayers nearly 7 billion dollars annually.
- Teens 16 to 19 years old are three times as likely than the average population to suffer rape or sexual assault. One in two rape victims are under the age of 18; one in six rape victims are under the age of 12.
- In the United States, one in four teens become infected with a sexually transmitted disease.
We live in a permissive society. Most of the time I think this is a good thing--there are a lot of positives to having the kind of personal freedom we enjoy here in the United States. Permissiveness can be carried too far--in a society, in a family, in an individual.