When I graduated from high
school in San Antonio, Texas, I can remember at least two dozen girls
(out of a class of 600) pregnant or already with babies. It may seem
astonishing now, but it was fairly normal in 1991: so normal, in fact,
that our high school had responded with an academic track geared toward
expectant and young mothers.
PARIS — A set of proposed international sex education guidelines aimed at reducing H.I.V. infections among young people has provoked criticism from conservative groups that say the program would be too explicit for young children and promote access to legal abortion as a right.
All of us are in denial. Without it
we couldn't get through life. Were we to confront the implications of
mortality, were we to comprehend all we have done to the world and its
people, we wouldn't get out of bed. To engage comprehensively with
reality is to succumb to despair. Without denial there is no hope.
