There is a town in MA that you may know from the movie The Perfect Storm. This town was featured in Time Magazine recently, you can read the article here.
So, some of the girls in this town made a pact to get pregnant while in High School and raise their babies together. All in all, there are 18 of them pregnant, the oldest ones being 16.
This is very disturbing to me. (understatement)
This is a seaside town where fishing is the biggest income getter. Unfortunately, the fishing industry is going through an extremely rough time right now. There are many business men in offices far away making laws and putting them into place without thinking about the families these laws affect. It is a trickle down effect...the fishermen catch the fish, if they can only catch so many, they fire some of their crew, because of the lack of landings, the buyers fire some of their workers, the people that make the nets are making less nets, and it effects the gas companies, welders, electricians etc... Anyway, all this equals a lot of stress on the families.
I can relate to the fishing crisis because I live it here on the Cape. DH is a fishermen as is his brother, father and was his grandfather.
Back to the pregnancy crisis. Some are claiming this happened because this High School conveniently has a health center (where they gave out a MULTITUDE of pregnancy tests) and a day care so kids that get pregnant can still graduate HS. One interviewed girl claims that these girls want babies so they have someone giving them unconditional love. Some girls would take the pregnancy test and cry if they weren't pregnant. Others would hi-five if they were.
The only thing I have heard about the "fathers" is that one of them is a homeless 24 year old. Who are the other 15?
Where are the parents of these girls? (And boys for that matter.) I am sure more will come out in the coming months about this crisis. And this is a crisis, they usually average 3 pregnancies a year.
I don't want to judge these girls (boys) or their families. I just feel bad for them. Hopefully, this will raise awareness and remind parents to talk to their kids about sex and all.
Comments?
10 comments:
I've read that some of the girls were only 13.
I have to say too - where are/were the parents?
I hear the Mayor doesn't believe there was a "pact".
It's a sad mess all around.
I'm wondering how many of the kids will have been fathered by the same guy/boy/homeless man??
I can't imagine being the parent of one of these girls: how horrifying. What would I do? NO IDEA. It's a tragedy, that's for sure. With that many pregnant, the odds of all of them coming through it and being good parents and providing for their babies are pretty slim...
Gloucester is NE, 1/2 an hour away from us.
I am still waiting for all the facts to come out. Why is the Mayor just now saying it's not a pact, AFTER the Time Mag. article?
I hope the pregnant girls examine all their choices before they decide which is the right one for them.
I am stunned. This is insane. Why were they handing out PG tests and not contraception? These girls need psychological help and then in 10 years so will their kids.
I can not believe this happened.
Where were the parents?
What were these girls thinking?
The poor innocent babies coming into these sad circumstances.
Disturbing indeed.
It's craziness. I'm mostly worried about the babies....
Yeah, I found this incredibly disturbing...and am wondering why we haven't heard from any of the parents involved. Where were they? How did they not instill into their children the many consequences of sex (besides pregnancy there's all those exceptionally negative consequences like STDs). Having a baby so young is incredibly hard on their not-fully-developed bodies...besides the difficulties of childbirth and child-rearing, how are they going to afford to raise these babies? Do they realize that they just can't pass the baby off to their parents and go out and party?? That their lives are completely changed forever?
I didn't start having kids until 27...I wanted them as early as 20, but I knew I wanted them when (1) I was married (didn't want no baby-daddy drama), (2) I was done with school, and (3) when I could feasibly pay to feed and diaper the child. I don't know where these children got the idea that they were responsible enough to raise children of their own yet. I really really fear for the futures of these innocent babies...statistically they are going to be more likely to be abused, live below the poverty line, and are more likely to repeat the mistakes of their parents.
And where are the fathers of these babies???? I'm still at a loss as to when these really young girls had a chance to be alone with boys long enough to get pregnant. While there's plenty of women out there who got pregnant the first time they tried (or had sex), it's still rather rare...which means there were repeat instances where these 13-16 year olds were left to their own devices.
Wow...sorry...I could really go on and on. Maybe because my parents made it very clear that getting pregnant outside of marriage (well, technically, sex outside of marriage) was an ABSOLUTE no-no. It would not be tolerated. I know I wasn't the only kid to be told such things...so I can't figure out how so many girls in one community went along with whatever this was (pact or not, there was some sort of agreement or discussion among these girls).
Thanks to all you guys for commenting. The thing that has made me angry for the last 2 days is the media debating on whether there was a pact or not.
Good grief! Don't they think concentrating on the pregnancies or the parents or the "fathers" might make a difference? Pact or no pact, there are going to be 17 or 18 little babies living a tough life.
I had trouble getting pregnant with my first and I remember seeing pregnant teens at the mall- which made me cry. I hope someone can talk some of the girls into giving up their babies for adoption. There are so many infertile couples out there wishing and praying for babies. Those girls have so much of their lives to live before becoming moms.
I think the media is to blame, too.So many celebrity moms pregnant and not married. ugh.
I hope an outcome of all of this is raised awareness for the issue of teen pregnancy in the US. I hope...
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