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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.
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16 and Pregnant has been appointment television for me since I reviewed it for Double X's “Xxtra Small” and was thrilled to learn it’s been picked up for a second season. But like Jess, I find myself wondering whether the show will keep any teens from becoming moms. I suppose the National Campaign To Reduce Teen and Unwanted Pregnancy, which helped produce the series (get used to these sorts of nonprofit/TV partnerships), would measure success by whether more teens get intimately familiar with contraception and, for the love of god, use it correctly. The show’s teen stars are utterly thick-headed about family planning. One couple claims conception happened after they used a condom that had been through the wash; another baby came about because of that oldest excuse—the young dad just doesn’t like condoms.
Some critics have faulted the show for not presenting abortion as an option, but I have to agree with 16 and Pregnant’s decision—for one thing, it might not be safe for a teen to go through an abortion on national television; for another, it’d be hard to fill an hourlong show. One option 16 and Pregnant did present, with the season’s final couple, was adoption. Tyler and Catelynn are stepsiblings: His dad and her mom met and married after the kids started dating. Tyler’s dad spent significant periods of time in jail; Catelynn’s mother battled some vaguely referred to “problems” (I’m guessing of a substance-abuse nature). Despite pressure from their parents to keep the baby—Tyler’s dad says he thinks his son should “man up,” because “all a baby needs is love”—the young couple selects a picture-perfect adoptive couple for their daughter. The show makes it clear that adoption is not the easy solution—Tyler and Catelynn cry buckets of tears before, as, and after they hand over their little girl. But perhaps the constant refrain of how this is the best thing for the baby and for the teenagers will sink in. Or, at the very least, maybe couples who decide to keep their babies will go in with their eyes a little more open.
Photograph by Getty Images.
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I've aged out of almost all of MTV's programming—watching barely legal 20-somethings binge drink grain alcohol on various incarnations of the Real World is no longer my idea of entertainment. But I've caught a few episodes of the MTV series 16 and Pregnant, and althought I'm not the target audience, I have found the show to be pretty riveting stuff.
True to the title, each episode follows a different teen mom-to-be for several months during her pregnancy, through the birth of her child, and into her first months of being a mother. Though there are twee Juno-esque interstitials, the series offers a pretty unvarnished view of being a teen mom. The second-to-last episode followed a Georgia girl named Whitney, who seems thoroughly beaten down by her pregnancy. She's dropped out of school and withdrawn from her friends almost entirely, and spends most days lying on the couch. Other women in the series seem to take pregnancy in stride, like Maci, who has a supportive family, graduates early, and goes to college, all while taking care of an infant.
In Salon today, Amy Benfer, who was 16 and pregnant herself 20 years ago, says, "No one's asking teenagers to take the girls of 16 & Pregnant as role models." But that rings false to me, because I know that the show was produced in conjunction with the National Campaign to Reduce Teen and Unwanted Pregnancy. So one could argue that yes, someone is asking these girls to be role models, and whether they want to be role models or not, they are going to be looked up to by some sheerly because they are on national TV. A much better point, one that Benfer also makes, is that what's great about the show is it gives pregnant teens "some space to talk about their own lives, rather than be talked about by others who see them as statistical symbols of social decay."
Tonight is the season finale of 16 and Pregnant, and this episode follows up with each woman months after she's had her baby. It will be interesting to see how they're faring. The show taken as a piece of art or entertainment is clearly a success: It's infinitely watchable and genuinely moving. I never believed that more girls wanted to get pregnant after watching Juno, or seeing Bristol Palin on network news shows. But I wonder if 16 and Pregnant—a show explicitly meant to reduce pregnancies—has any effect whatsoever on the behavior of teens who are watching it. My guess is that it's a wash, and that teens are more influenced by their parents and peers. What do you think?
Photograph by Stockbye/Getty Images.
