The law states that sex under sixteen is unlawful and young women cannot give consent for sexual intercourse to take place. Yet in 2000 there were more than 7,000 young people under sixteen, who had conceived, with over 54% ending in legal abortions. That’s a lot of young people participating in an illegal sexual intercourse.
Were have all the traditional family values gone? Traditionally people meet, fall in love, get married, have children and become a loving secure family unit. With the changing trends and loss of family values more than 90% of teenage births are outside of marriage. Thus changing family life has it was and creating a new trend towards single young mothers, children being brought up without permanent father figures, who are dependent upon the state to provide for them unless some changes can be made.
Is teenage pregnancy really a problem? According to Lawson and Rhode there are two problems commonly found in the literature on teenage pregnancy. First, authors frequently simply assume that teenage pregnancy is a problem. Second, commentators often conflate aspects of teenage pregnancy that are analytically and empirically distinct- such as chronological age, marital status, and the planned or wanted nature of the pregnancy`.
So whom is it a problem for?
The government states that it costs tax payers over £10 billion each year, the S.E.U reports say that this money could be better spent else where, and that unless we get this phenomena under control we can not support this rising tide of young teenage mothers. The government has been looking at the Netherlands and the United States for inspiration on how to deal with these issues. The Netherlands have one of the lowest teenage birthrate, they educate young people from a young age and take a more realistic approach to sex education. Compare this to the United States who don’t provide support for teenage mothers and have used controversial measures such as forced sterilisation of certain ethnic groups and the family of these young people have to support them financially and emotionally in order for them to survive.
Do young people see it as a problem? Is it an issue for young people? After looking at facts there seems to be no evidence that states it is a problem for the young people themselves, thus it is no big issue for them. Maybe it is just another way for the government to control the lives of young people? The government seems to be saying that teenage mothers are not equipped with the skills and knowledge to become competent parents, but who decides what makes a good parent, how can age be a deciding factor in good and bad parenting. So is it just an assumption that teenage pregnancy is a problem, functionalists would argue that it is just a process of socialisation and that if the young people aspirations could be raised then they would be able to break the cycle. Durkheim’s anomie theory (1951) seems to suggest ‘that a condition of normalness arises when a disruption of the social order occurs…so that they are no longer controlled by the collective social order.’ Compare this to Merton’s anomie (1938) ‘ the roots of which lie in a structural strain, generated by differential access to opportunity structures.’
Currently young girls who have little or no education and very few plans for the future are 30% more likely to get pregnant than those who aspire to gain qualifications and are well educated. Not being educated, in training or work are factors that are seen as being a negative influence on young girls and thus the risk of them becoming pregnant rises. Teenagers from socially deprived, poor families are less likely to have abortions compared to the young girls from more affluent families has they have higher aspirations in life and also have the funds to pay for private abortions. The lack of aspirations in the poorer young girls life, can lead them to believe that they can do nothing else and also if it wasn’t a problem for their mother then why should they expect anything else in life. Evidence seems to support the socialisation theory, with young girls often having no prospects due to lack of education, family support to break the cycle, believing that this is the way life is that this is all that life has to offer them and seeing that this is the way their life has been mapped out for them. The lack of knowledge and confidence can also stop young girls from accessing services, which are available to them, and this just reinforces the negativity within their lives.
Has a result of finding themselves pregnant many young girls from poorer backgrounds, are less likely to continue with their education, compared to the young girls from more affluent homes who are expected to succeed in education and already have a prosperous career mapped out for them by their parents and peers. As a result of this young mothers from poor areas, start to become trapped in the cycle of poverty, with no way of supporting themselves and child they find themselves in the benefit trap. If they wait until the child is old enough to start school, returning to education is extremely hard and most training and apprenticeships are only open to school leavers. So with no experience, qualifications, expensive childcare and limited employment options due to most young mothers only being able to afford to work during the school time hours which are usually the lowest paid jobs the poverty trap begins a down ward spiral of debt and depravation. Therefore becoming a single teenage mother is a stigma and figures show them to be a burden on society.
Are teenage mothers to blame for the creation of the emerging underclass in society?
Teenage young mothers are often referred to as being a contributing factor in creating the underclass. The underclass theory (Murray 1980) describes this as ` people who are at the bottom of the social ladder, structurally separate and culturally distinguishable from the `decent` working class `. Murray (1980) discovered this new class of people in the 80’s and he labelled them as the new underclass in Britain. He blames this emerging underclass on the over zealous welfare state system, which was set up to provide relief from poverty, not provide people with an alternative way of life. Zinn (1980) says that `teenage pregnancy is often seen as at the heart of the larger problem of long term welfare dependency… the real issue behind the relation between teenage pregnancy and the welfare dependency is single parenting- in other words mothers living and surviving economically without men. ` Where has Marx (1951) suggests that` we are born into a social class…which are modified locally by region and neighbourhood`. Thus the teenage mothers cannot be to blame for the creation of the underclass, which adds viability to the theory put forward by Murray. The result of this theory is that there are now younger single parent families due to the ability to support themselves through the benefit system. Murray (1980) goes on to say that before the welfare system started to increase the level of provision there were few single parent families because they were not economically viable. He states ` that the more generous benefits have made it possible for women to have children outside of marriage… therefore the welfare state is to blame for this phenomenon. Thus he argues that the benefit system is to blame for single parents and they are a contributing factor of the underclass theory. Charles Murray (1980) goes on to say that we are creating a culture of dependency and if the benefits were taken away from single parents, it would discourage young people from becoming pregnant and is a possible solution to stop further development of the underclass. Many other people believe that young girls get pregnant on purpose in order to gain priority in the housing and benefits system.
There are many flaws in Murray’s (1980) theory the main one being that single teenage parents is seen in all class stratification and is not exclusive to the underclass element of society. Statistics show that it is not young people do not start to enquire about benefits and housing prior to getting pregnant therefore these facts are not a forethought to getting pregnant. Research shows that most teenage pregnancies are not planned and young people seem to rarely plan for the future until after they are pregnant so they are very unlikely to have become pregnant in order to obtain benefits. The underclass theory is not accepted by all social theorists Wilson (1987) says that `responsibility for the plight of the underclass tends to be placed primarily on the individuals and their perceived anti social behaviour…the benefit system which encourages dependency and penalizes those who work… research on the `underclass` has drawn attention to the ways that geographical concentration may play a part in the mechanisms surrounding social exclusion and the underclass. Sayce (2000) and Leslie (1997) say that although these factors play a part in the emerging underclass theory studies have shown that lack of human rights and discrimination in society towards sections of different communities are also to blame for the emerging underclass. Other more liberal thinking social theorists argues that the idea of an underclass diverts attention away from what the real issues are and the disadvantages experienced by certain groups of people in society especially young people from working class backgrounds. The conservatives denied poverty existed, so why is there a need for a welfare state and where is the emerging underclass. Labour said that it is just a lack of means to work that causes poverty, thus justifying the need for a welfare state and acknowledging the `underclass` exists. Other political groups outside these seem to blame poor education, bad housing unemployment, and family breakdown has main reasons why people become dependent on benefits and thus the underclass theory serves a purpose to hide the real causes of teenage pregnancy and social exclusion. Teenage pregnancy is a cause of and consequence of social exclusion, these young people share the values as everyone else unfortunately they have limited opportunities and are therefore restricted in plans for their future. These young people are deemed to be suffering from inequalities in life and are victims of an unjust society, which fails to ensure a fairer distribution of opportunities and resources. Evans (1998) calls them `the excluded` this being that they were those who fell through the net of social protection. Poverty and social exclusion has a direct affect on the choices young women make about abortion and sex education, and if all young people had the same opportunities and options open to them when they find themselves pregnant or prior to having sex then maybe the rate of teenage pregnancies would fall. If young women have a clear vision about their future, their options in life explained clearly through education and training then they will have nothing to gain by choosing early parenthood. Whereas young people with no job prospects, poor education, who expects to be on benefits anyway might see that having a baby is going to provide them with a better future.
How the government plans to cut teenage pregnancy
The government are under pressure to cut the rate of teenage pregnancies as currently the UK has the highest rate in the western world. So what can the government do when the media seems to undermine all the initiatives that the labour government have come up with? All the media misrepresentation has altered the public’s perception of teenage pregnancy and how the sex education program is delivered. The general consensus seems to be that Pregnancy advice is right, just the tactics used to deliver it are wrong. The media has highlighted this issue, alongside figures pointing out the amount of money currently being spent to deliver these services. It implies that all the time and money is being wasted has teenage pregnancy rates continue to rise.
The media seems to be blaming the government for wasting money and accusing them of being dictators to young people The Daily Mail newspaper reports “60 million to tell girls that it is okay to be a virgin” how can this reduce the rate of teenage pregnancy, this nanny government is wasting money telling young people how to their lives. Whilst the girls are being advised to stay virgins they are not being told about sex and how it could affect them in their future and the message to boys is that sex is okay just wear a condom so the gap between the genders just keeps getting reinforced.
The government have responded to this positively by bringing out new policies and are changing ways of delivering this service to young people these include:
Compulsory sex education
Sex education in schools is to become compulsory part of the national curriculum and will be taught alongside reading, writing, maths and science. The fact that it is compulsory seems to indicate that all children are being taught sex education but this isn’t so as parents can opt to remove their children if they so wish to. So were is the compulsory part? Should it be given to all children regardless to what a parent may feel? It is a civil right for every young person to be educated, so why is the choices to learn about sex being taken away from the young person, Why does a parent have the right to dictate to the young person what they need to learn to become a responsible adult later in life? Without sex education how can a child make the transition through adolescence from a child to a teenager who has a need to experiment sexually safely?
School contraception clinics get go ahead
The government recommended that young people should have better access to sex advice, free contraception and free access to other issues based around sex education. This is good practice but these clinics are not available countrywide, it is up to individual schools and parents to decide whether or not this service should be available at the local comprehensive school. (Dfes, 2002) Research amongst parents, seems to suggest that parents believe these clinics would encourage young people to have sex, controversially the survey didn’t include any feed back from the young people on how they felt about this service and whether they would actually use this facility if it was put into place at their school. So how can this government strategy to tackle teenage pregnancy actually work, it looks like a good idea but this practice is again ruled by parental control and not by the young people.
Working together Connexions and teenage pregnancy
The latest teenage pregnancy strategy that the government has come up with is linked in to connexions. The strategy aims to reduce the risk of social exclusion for those teenagers who become parents by enabling them to return to education or work. This will be done in partnership with sure start plus by providing specialist advice to teenagers who are pregnant or who are parents to ensure that they remain engaged in the learning process and thus the risk of social exclusion is minimised. The aim is to reduce teenage conception by 50% and to establish a downward trend in conception amongst under 16s. The way that this will be done is through information and advice centres (nothing new), by ensuring that young people are aware of where they can access this service and gain contraceptive advice, and that young people are aware of their rights of confidentiality to increase their confidence in using these services. The young people can discuss issues relating to sexual development and relationships with their P A and the P A can then make referrals to contraceptive services were appropriate.
This approach along with the use of personal advisors is a long drawn out process which many young people will be reluctant to use as sometimes they don’t want to tell anyone and they are going to get a little confused has to just how they are supposed to access these services if it is a three way process.
What does it mean to youth and community practitioners
As a youth practitioner I am being asked to deliver more sessions based on sexual health issues working in a multi agency setting. The problems of using the multi agency approach will impinge on my ability to work confidentially and the notion of `joined up` services proceeds from a dubious assumption that young people benefit from dealing with services that share information with one another (connexions strategy, 2002). Richard Sennett (1973) wrote there could be considerable benefits in this; there are also issues for agencies. Many work on a ‘fresh start’ – and may not welcome such information. Unfortunately in the current context they may not be able to avoid using it. This information can lead to a `depersonalised approach` that emphasises the management of cases rather than working with the young people’s situations. As a result there are lots of questions to be asked, were do our demarcation boundaries lie, just who is to be responsible for the distribution of condoms, at the moment youth workers may distribute these but only after assessing the risk factors (Gillick competence rule), and if information is being passed around, who says what should be disclosed and what other agencies need to know about the individuals. I believe that the individualisations of services are lost if all information is shared. As a youth practitioner I need to be able to develop a trusting and supportive relationship with young people in order to be able to work with, and promote independent learning. With the centralisation of services and the sharing of information between services the young person may become confused and stop accessing the services which are there to help them make the transition from child to adult.
Conclusion
Overall the reports show that there are no clear factors to support an `underclass` theory. ‘Since the hidden agenda of the underclass theory is an attack on mothers as practitioners of parenting’. (Thompson, 1983). Therefore if the link between single teenage mothers and the underclass is to be found, it may be just another excuse by a male dominated society. ‘Crudely, the underclass theorists target planners, single mothers and children as the detonators or order, discipline, community. Single mothers become represented as a contagion, their children become aliens, and their neighbourhoods become colonies contained in the imagery of big dogs, smoking women, wall-to-wall TV, snotty children who learn to say `fuck off` before they can say `please’. So the theorists` real lament is the loss of respectability.’ (Campbell, 1993).
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