Pro-Life Colorado Republicans Angry That Teen Abortion Rate Declining

Who would have guessed that the "pro-life" sex education plan, which is essentially "do not have sex ever, you whore," doesn't work? Everyone would have guessed that! But Colorado has a lesson to teach America about what DOES work, and it is free birth control for everyone, so that ladies can do sex without worrying about unplanned pregnancies. We're not sure the religious right will like this news, because it also means that ladies can do sex without asking their permission:

Over the past six years, Colorado has conducted one of the largest ever real-life experiments with long-acting birth control. If teenagers and poor women were offered free intrauterine devices and implants that prevent pregnancy for years, state officials asked, would those women choose them?

They did in a big way, and the results were startling. The birthrate for teenagers across the state plunged by 40 percent from 2009 to 2013, while their rate of abortions fell by 42 percent, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. There was a similar decline in births for another group particularly vulnerable to unplanned pregnancies: unmarried women under 25 who have not finished high school.

Stunning! Because, despite what Republican lawmakers, the self-appointed hall monitors of America's womb parts, seem to believe, the fact has always been that teenagers fuck each other. They just do, and they have in every society that has ever existed, due to their dumb, non-functioning hormonal brains. So it is a good idea to keep them from getting pregnant, so that they can go on to become responsible adults and have kids when they're ready, instead of trapping them in a cycle of poverty forever.

The Times reports that in the poorest sections of Colorado, the average age a woman gives birth for the first time has jumped from 21 all the way up to 24, which "gives young women time to finish their educations and to gain a foothold in an increasingly competitive job market." But if the ladies do that, how can we adequately shame them for being Slutty McSluttertons? Unfair.

Of course, this amazing success is in danger, because of course it's in danger:

The private grant that funds the state program has started to run out, and while many young women are expected to be covered under the health care law, some plans have required payment or offered only certain methods, problems the Obama administration is trying to correct. What is more, only new plans are required to provide free contraception, so women on plans that predate the law may not qualify. (In 2014, about a quarter of people covered through their employers were on grandfathered plans, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.) Advocates also worry that teenagers — who can currently get the devices at clinics confidentially — may be less likely to get the devices through their parents’ insurance. Long-acting devices can cost between $800 and $900.

Yes, because despite the fact that teens are always doing sex on each other, they don't always want to tell their parents about it. Weird!

The program has been funded up to this point by grants from the uber-liberal Buffett family, but the Colorado Assembly wouldn't step up and keep their money flowing, because SLUT PILLS or whatever. Maybe the folks who run the Colorado Springs-based Focus On The Family could step up and use their money for an actual good cause for once. They could say they're actually doing something to decrease the abortion rate, for the first time in their lowly existence. They won't do it, because they don't actually care about unborned babbies as much as they care about controlling ladies' sex parts, but it's a good suggestion nonetheless.

[ New York Times ]