Bristol Palin Makes a Commercial on Abstinence for the Candie's Foundation

Bristol Palin recently teamed up with the Candies Foundation on helping prevent teen girls get pregnant, but what is most striking about this is the fact that Bristol changed her views on abstinence. It was not that long ago when she told the media that expecting teens to abstain from sex was unrealistic. In reality, she was right, but what she fails to mention is what leads to teens getting pregnant: relationships between teen boys and girls that should not exist in the first place.

Many people would think that teens would never get pregnant, provided they were smart enough to use birth control. In the case of Bristol Palin, and Levi Johnston, who are both evangelical Christians, birth control is not an option since their religious views see the use of birth control as giving permission to have sex. Neither is it a secret that Sarah Palin allowed her daughter to sleep with Levi when Bristol was pregnant with Tripp. So what gives with this sort of behavior among teens who are supposed to eschew all forms of pre-marital sex until they are married?

It would appear that Levi and Bristol attempted to court each other when Sarah was campaigning as vice presidential candidate on the GOP ticket in 2008. Even when the media announced Bristol was pregnant, Sarah mentioned to reporters that her daughter was indeed planning to marry the father of the baby, Levi Johnston. Once the baby was born, however, Bristol and Levi broke up, which was not at all uncommon when a teen girl becomes pregnant. Upon discovering the reality of having a baby, the male flees, knowing he is nowhere near ready to assume responsibility for a tiny human life. Unlike most teen mothers, Bristol is the daughter of a wealthy mother and father, and is able to afford caring for a baby. Thus the advertisement she made with Candies, which portrays her in a room that is bare, and a baby in the background, emulating the life of a teen welfare mother. Called "Pause Before You Play" (I am thinking the "Pause" means "Think" in this case), the advertisement is supposed to encourage teens to think before having sex. While the ad in itself is a rather poor message in targeting teens (a much better ad would be targeted not to the teens, but to the parents of the teens), it does not look like Candie's will be successful any time around. So what is the solution here?

An advertisement targeting the fathers of teen girls would be a good start. Statistics show that girls who have above average relationships with their fathers are least likely to get pregnant in their teen years. Yes, Sarah Palin is married to a man named Todd Palin, a guy who is almost never seen by the media, and who is human and not a genie or a figment of someone's imagination, yet Todd almost never figures into Sarah's life or Bristol's life. While Levi does get some media time every now and then, he is almost never portrayed being with Tripp. Family cycles tend to repeat themselves, and in the world of evangelical Christianity, that is no exception. Bristol may lack a real relationship with Levi, even though she had to learn the hard way that sex does not make a relationship, all it makes is a baby. Hopefully the Candie's Foundation will wise up and come out with a much better ad campaign that will work, and not have Bristol Palin speaking about abstinence as a means of preventing sex. If abstinence did not work for her, there is a very good chance it will not work for anyone else, either.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_ts1504

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/05/bristol-palin-candies-fou_n_196838.html

http://www.candiesfoundation.org/