What is America Teaching Her Daughters?

I do not believe in a double standard; I am a firm believer that boys should be held to just as strict a standard as girls. Nevertheless, when a girl becomes pregnant out of wedlock, she is the one who pays the highest price. In almost all cases she is the one who supports and raises the child; she is the one who may find it necessary to delay higher education, perhaps permanently; she is the one whose reputation suffers.

A few months ago when I arrived at my office and brought up my AOL homepage to begin my day’s work, I saw an article about Linnese Ortega, a young woman whose name appears on a Facebook “Smut List.” Although I was very busy, I clicked on the article to see why this pretty teen was upset enough to appear on the Today show to protest having been included on the list. According to the article, the “Smut List” is a list circulating around seven school districts in Greenwich, Conn. and New York’s Westchester County of 100 high school girls who were rated based on their level of sexual activity. I had naively expected Miss Ortega to say that she had been misrepresented as someone who is promiscuous when, in fact, she is not. I was wrong.

Before I go on, I want to make my own position clear. I think that it is both wrong and cruel for anyone to ridicule another person for any reason. If I were the parent of one of the teens involved in posting those names, I would administer a stiff punishment and have several long talks with the offending teen about the damage that such antics can cause. I would also make it crystal clear that nothing like that had better ever happen again. However, I believe that this incident is symptomatic of a much deeper problem.

The article describes Linnese Ortega as a teenage Mom of two who can’t figure out why she is on the list when “she isn’t even in high school anymore.” Linnese said that her sixteen year old sister also made the list and that she feels “bad” for her.

I genuinely feel sorry for the girls on the list as well as for the teens who targeted them, but the entire incident demonstrates a terrible lack of teaching for all concerned. Our society has become so skewed that we have lost sight of the fact that parents are the ones responsible for instilling values in their children that keep them from living a lifestyle that will cause them to be included on such a list and from being so insensitive that they would participate in the compilation of such a list.

The article, which was written by Emily Tan, argued that this is yet another form of cyber-bullying and that criminal charges should be filed against any teens who were involved in posting the names of the girls who appeared on the list. I think that Ms. Tan has rocks in her head, and I think that she is an excellent example of just how lost we have become as a society.

America is teaching her daughters that it is perfectly alright to have extra-marital sex. Therefore, when a young woman is faced with the consequences of her bad choices, she believes that no one has the right to criticize her. On the other hand, America is also teaching her daughters that treating other girls badly makes the perpetrator very “cool.” In fact, we constantly see ads for television shows such as Bad Girls that, apparently, glorify this kind of conduct.

It is the parents’ responsibility to teach their daughters that no sex outside of marriage is permissible. It is also their responsibility to teach their daughters that when a girl makes a bad choice and disobeys God’s laws it is our responsibility to treat her with love and compassion.

If parents would concentrate on really instilling these two beliefs in their daughters, we would have far fewer illegitimate births, far fewer venereal diseases, and far fewer young women who are humiliated at a time when they need to be extended Christian love and Grace.

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