Values or rationalizing

Hearing our Congresswoman Lauren Boebert assert that somehow teen pregnancy is a rural value is akin to arguing that a lack of education and adulthood are somehow rural values. I don’t think that the majority of rural voters would agree that their values are based on out-of-wedlock pregnancies (like Boebert’s family legacy), and not graduating from high school – as some 50% of such teen pregnancies result in.

To infer that under 18-year-old teens have the fiscal resources, life experience and foresight to choose to be parents is rationalizing, at best, from the perspective of those that have made the same mistake (vs. conscious choice). That is why it’s widely accepted that high schools students be educated in topic like sex education, something that Boebert wants to restrict, in order to give them accountability for their sexual decisions. Likewise, a responsible parent would value talking with their children on what teen pregnancy means in terms of life decisions. Topics like receiving adequate social, emotional, medical, fiscal and academic support when such things are more difficult to achieve when a teen.

Boebert’s moralizing about rural values is an easy way to help further stoke the culture wars and fails to address the deeper issues involved in teen pregnancy. If the congresswoman actually wanted to help rural teens, she would support education, including sex education, welfare programs that support pregnant or teen mothers (like food, housing, fiscal help), and maybe support legislation like TNAF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families). Which, by the way, Boebert tries to prevent out-of-wedlock pregnancies.

– Tim Thomas, Durango