16andpregnant.com Is Cheesy, Not Dangerous

Torie, you wondered whether MTV's show 16 and Pregnant will encourage teenage moms-to-be to consider adoption. At least one pro-life group hopes so: Lifeline Adoption oversees several pro-adoption websites, including the fortuitously-named 16andpregnant.com. Fans of the show who type in that URL won't get a site about the show. They'll get one aimed at girls who are precisely that: 16 and pregnant. At first glance it's a relatively generic, "We know you're scared, here are your options," sort of site, but it quickly becomes it clear that the site designers really only have one option in mind.

The support hotline girls are encouraged to call is the National Adoption Answer Line. In the "My Options" section of the site, girls are told that parenting a child, "is a life-long commitment. When you feel like your whole life may be ruined by your pregnancy, it is even harder to look at parenting as a positive choice." Abortion carries "physical and emotional risks." But adoption provides a better life for you and your baby. Children who are adopted "grow up knowing that they are loved by both their adopted parents and the parents who gave them life." A link to "more about your pregnancy choices" leads to another site that purports to answer questions like "How much does it cost to raise a child?" and "Is he daddy material?" (Answer: No.)

The ladies at Feministing came down pretty hard on 16andpregnant.com, calling it "completely inaccurate and dangerous." I haven't found the inaccurate or dangerous parts yet—abortion does carry physical and emotional risks, and parenting as a teenager is difficult. But I wonder whether teenage girls will find the site compelling, accurate or not. The cheesy stock art of teenagers in various stages of shock or sadness is off-putting. The supposed "stories" from pregnant teenagers fall too neatly into certain categories. ("Parenting is hard." "Abortion is traumatic.") I can't imagine that today's tech-savvy teens aren't going to realize that this is a site that's selling something.

Comments

Selling for-profit adoption to minors is way beyond cheesy.

By: GiddyLydia | Mon, 07/27/2009 - 00:39

So what if "...today's tech-savvy teens...realize that this is a site that's selling something"? We all understand the purpose of TV commercials, and yet they remain effective sales tools.

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@MrsT

By: P Starling | Sun, 07/26/2009 - 12:02

(And yes, I know, I'm veering completely off topic.)

I think this is one of the underlying beliefs that makes talking about abortion and adoption so difficult. There's a strong feeling that people SHOULD be made to bear responsibility for their actions, particularly sexual acts. This is the underlying concept behind the anti-abortion idea that abortion should be limited except in cases of rape or incest. That's not morally defensible, if you truly believe that life starts at conception. (If that were the case, why would it be okay to kill a child because his father was a rapist?) Yet it's one held by the majority of people with anti-abortion views.

What it boils down to is an ultimately a punitive view of pregnancy and childbirth: that Woman, having chosen to sin, should undergo childbirth and parenting as a kind of penance. It's Redemption through Motherhood. This has strong Biblical roots, but in real life it's one hell of a bad model for a successful parent-child relationship. I think that we all can agree that people sometimes make bad choices. Those choices can have unavoidable consequences. But it's a brutally Puritan idea to enforce consequences "just to show them." Women choosing to have sex isn't a crime. There is no underlying social value to making sex a high-cost activity for women, particularly when the same standard isn't applied to men. It's also an idea that forces the innocent child to act as Society's punishment to the offender--and I can't imagine growing up as my mother's token of shame, a la Pearl Prynne. Or even just the visible sign of the reason my mom couldn't go to college and is stuck in a low-wage job in a bad neighborhood.

Ultimately, the decisions made by a pregnant woman must be made with a pragmatic eye to the best outcome for all parties. In a decision with this sort of impact on several lives, the idea of making the woman suffer for choosing to have sex--Good Lord. Even if having sex and getting pregnant were a culpable act under the law, there would be no justification for twisting pregnancy and motherhood into some sick social vengeance. And ultimately, a woman's sexual morals and decisions are not under the law's purview. Society has no business whatsoever butting in and trying to punish her for "irresponsibility."

This isn't to downplay the fact that we, as women, have a moral obligation to acknowledge the consequences of our actions and behave responsibly. But this is a private obligation and a private decision, not something in which the government can or should be involved. Yes, I agree that people who have sex SHOULD be prepared to accept responsibility for any possible pregnancies. But none of us live in a world where that's actually the case. So "what people should do" is completely beside the point.

MrsT, I know I'm responding beyond the scope of your original comment--I don't mean to imply that you necessarily have opinions on government regulation of abortion or adoption. I do think that this is a core belief that's seldom articulated as part of the national debate but plays a big part and should be examined.

I think there are legitimate questions raised by the anti-abortion movement, particularly in the discussion of later-term abortions. There are nuanced and heartbreaking issues. (Remember Ayelet Waldman's articles a few months ago?) But one of the first things that must go if we are to have a productive dialogue about unintended pregnancy is the ancient but untenable idea that we as a society are somehow in the business of teaching loose women a lesson.

Honest discussion about adoption

By: geml | Sat, 07/25/2009 - 21:10

What's dishonest about the adoption option is that while it discusses the negatives of raising a baby when the mother is too young, and the negatives of abortion, it never mentions any negatives at all about women who relinquish their babies, or the feelings those "babies" have when they grow up to be adults who don't necessarily see their childhood story through rose colored glasses.

Women who give their children up often have high rates of alcoholism, drug use, unexplained fertility issues and suicide rates. Higher even than the "traumatized" women who have abortions.

I realize this post sounds negative about adoption, and I'm really not, but it would be nice to have an HONEST discussion about it, rather than using it as a soundbite sized solution to a genuinly complicated situation.

In response to George

By: MrsT | Sat, 07/25/2009 - 15:49

In response to George's comments, I would like to throw out my opinion. Granted, it is taxing and stressful to concomitantly raise a child and complete an education at any age, let alone as a teenager. However, before citing the medical risk of pregnancy and the adverse effects on the young mother, wouldn't it prudent to address the responsibility of the teenager in conceiving a child in the first place? I feel that if a person of ANY AGE willingly chooses to have sex, then implicit to this decision is the responsibility to accept the ramifications of that choice. Plain and simple: if you feel you are mature enough to have sex, don't claim immaturity as a reason to terminate a pregnancy.

Since when is inaccurate info not dangerous?

By: george | Sat, 07/25/2009 - 00:20

The site never says the vast majority of women who have an abortion never regret it. Abortion carries a much lower risk of physical and mental after effects, while pregnancy carries a much higher risk of death and damage. These are facts. So pregnancy not only carries emotional and physical risks, but they are much higher than for those that chose abortion. And hey, why don't they add a link to the site imnotsorry.com where actual women who have had abortions give testimony. But you do hear about how wonderful adoption is...with links to orgs that make money off adoptions....

Yet..you'd never get that info from their site. It's not empowering women with the true levels of risk so they can compare and not truly detailing their options. Sure like Barbie said about math "parenting is hard..."

But in these arguments, they never mention the true impact of lost years of education, they never mention the perspective of the child - what is it truly like for a child being raised by a child, particularly a child raising a child that can never be home because she's on the treadmill of concurrently working and trying to get an education. Not to mention the impact on all relationships with men. Of course, most of these sites think women don't really deserve to have full sexual lives, just motherhood. Full information is needed for the best decision for the young woman.

There are also many organizations to help with real choice, and they only link to those who advocate for adoption. They also really don't mention the financial incentive some of these adoption "helpers" get by getting a teen mother, particularly a white one, to have a very adoptable baby. There are very legitimate, honest adoption groups, but this one leads them down a primrose path like a car salesman.

It is dangerous and disingenous, and might I add, stupid for you to write in a breezy tone that the site is cheesy. So...matters of a young woman's life, serious decisions about her life are to be dealt with by a cheesy site? An inaccurate site? A site that has more spin on it than a WalMart site about unions?

I mean, she could find more balanced information about stocks from Bernie Madoff's site.

It is disingenuous to say that you couldn't find the inaccuracies or the danger of people getting their guidance from the site. I doubt you'd say the same for environmental information from an oil company, labor union risks and benefit info from Walmart, or feminist information from the Promise Keepers.