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Unsentimental Education

By Monica Mehta, AlterNet. Posted June 21, 2005.


A PBS documentary depicts the transformation of a Texas teenager -- from conservative Christian to champion of sex education.

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Comprehensive sex education is at the heart of what divides America today. One side thinks it's a direct affront to the Christian value of abstinence until marriage; the other thinks it helps prevent the 60% of teens who already having sex from getting pregnant, or contracting a disease and dying.

Tonight's documentary on PBS, "The Education of Shelby Knox," traverses the bridge between both sides. Shelby Knox is a 15-year-old Christian girl who takes a church pledge to not have sex until marriage. She lives in Lubbock, Texas, a Republican Christian stronghold where local government meetings begin with a prayer, and where students learn that abstinence is the only way to prevent pregnancy and disease.

But surprise, surprise: Shelby's town also happens to have one of the highest rates of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases in the country.

Shelby's personal story, which follows her from her sophomore to senior year of high school, is compelling: She develops from an obedient, sheltered teenager who doesn't know what a condom looks like into an activist for sex education and gay rights. She makes great, wise statements, like, "All these wonderful people can't be going to hell. I don't think God ... would create all these people and then not let any of them into heaven." She battles old white Christian men, telling them to back off as they attempt to question her morals.

She even takes her pastor, with whom she made the abstinence pledge, to task: When he tells her "Christian and liberal is like oil and water" and "Christianity is the most intolerant religion in the world," she informs him that "Christianity is about being tolerant." And by the end, she exemplifies the true meaning of a compassionate Christian: One who believes in "God, family, country -- in that order," but who at the same time, champions progressive causes.

Filmmakers Rose Rosenblatt and Marion Lipschutz say Shelby's story shows that dialogue is possible between both sides. Nowadays, however, it's difficult to find people like Shelby Knox in this country. People believe what they believe, and for the most part, that's how is. And although people do talk a lot in the film, most of them don't change their minds. It's actually a bit disheartening, given the outcome of the sex education and gay rights campaigns that Shelby gets involved with. Shelby herself has said, in interviews, that she wants to move to a liberal area of the country and run for office. She's seen how hard it is to create change in the opposite camp. How do you get through to people who stop all rational discussion with the statement, "It's a sin"?

What is apparent from the film is that if conversion from right-wing thinking to open-minded tolerance does happen, it happens on an individual level. At one point, Shelby visits a group of gay students whose gay-straight alliance has been banned by the school administration. She appears uncomfortable when she first meets them, sitting at the far end of the couch. But as she listens to them talk about how they've been beaten up and targeted by teachers, you can see her realize that they are just human beings, and pretty nice ones at that.

"I'm a Christian, and I don't think that the church should control the schools or government," she says, to which a young man replies, "If there were more Christians like you, we'd be in heaven." Pretty soon, she's letting him put makeup on her.

There's another, much less celebrated individual who experiences a transformation here: Shelby's staunchly Republican mom. At first, she isn't comfortable with gay issues. But eventually, she's marching next to her daughter in a gay rights rally. It may just be in the name of love, but in the end, maybe that's the only cause that can cross lines.

The Education of Shelby Knox airs Tuesday, June 21, at 10pm on PBS (check local listings). Read AlterNet's recent Q&A with Shelby Knox.

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Monica Mehta is an associate editor at AlterNet.

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Genetics and politics
Posted by: rini on Jun 21, 2005 2:29 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
This article reads differently to me than it would have an hour or two ago. Having just read a New York Times report on the strong genetic component to political beliefs that was found during a recent twin study. Fraternal twins had less political similarity than identical twins.

I have long suspected that I was born progressive. I never have been able to tolerate violence of any sort. I still might cry at that infamous Bambi scene (I don't even want to describe it.) I am amazed at the natural callousness of some people.

There are, obviously, other factors as well. I remember the Reagan excitement in 1980. I was almost pro-Reagan at age 14, but argued with my father that Jimmy Carter was a better choice because he was against nuclear proliferation. I marveled at my father's anti-intuitive and backwords idea that a good nuclear stockpile was helpful in creating peace. (He grew up on a little Greek island where adults teased his brother for bedwetting and violence was normal.) Now he is finally coming into his own. He is disgusted at the Terri Schiavo case and agrees that the idea of "knowing what god wants" is scary.

Maybe we can figure out ways to tap the "hidden progressive" in everyone? Or at least, try.

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» RE: Genetics and politics Posted by: rroth@igc.org
God and Politics
Posted by: Urstrly on Jun 21, 2005 3:59 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I can't wait to see this film, and while I understand why Shelby wants out of Texas, I wish I knew how more Texas teens could be freed from this right-wing misogynist propaganda. Incidentally, whether or not she is aware, Shelby's declaration that God wouldn't send all these good people to Hell is a tenet of Universalist Christianity. Univeralists were once a big movement in the mid-West, and they merged with Unitarians in the 1960s. Today, the UUs offer an excellent sexual education program to teens called Our Whole Lives. It promotes both caring for others and honest biological and medical information.

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God is Love
Posted by: mkwagner on Jun 21, 2005 7:28 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Thank you Shelby, for letting PBS tell your story. You are absolutely right when you say that Christianity is about tolerance. Jesus accepted people and calls on his followers to do as he did. Thank you Shelby for truely following the teaching of Christ Jesus.

If it helps, Jesus was crucified for his radical political views.

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» RE: God is Love Posted by: anti-emily
» RE: God is Love Posted by: Michiganman
PBS Lefty Bias
Posted by: nakis on Jun 21, 2005 9:06 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Why this is a prime example of Liberal bias in the Public Broadcasting System. It should be balanced with a show about joys of celebacy and gay bashing.

Sorry, couldn't help it. With all the stupidity the Right is putting to PBS reading this article just jumped out saying Liberal bias if your a Right winger. You know they're going to be all over this like Spongebob.
Yet somehow they'll never quite equate the high rate of pregnancy and communicable diseases with their abstinence/ignorance program.
I bet if they polled the teenagers and preteens on how women get pregnant they would have a wonderful compendium of ludicrous statements. And a scarily small percentage who have it right.

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Christianity doesn't need to be intolerant OR watered-down
Posted by: Jasonix on Jun 21, 2005 11:14 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The problem with shows like this is that they imply that instead of being a fundamentalist, one has to be a Unitarian! One can back progressive causes like environmentalism and economic justice, without abandoning one's spiritual and moral beliefs. There is a huge middle ground between the Mormons on one hand and the Unitarian Universalists on the other.

Christians can be true to their own beliefs and still respect others. The Baptist Church was founded on the idea that one's spiritual and moral beliefs must be voluntarily chosen, and that the State has no right forcing anyone to believe anything. (This was before southern plantation owners created their own Baptist "brand" that said that slavery was OK and that separation of church and state was a lie of the Devil.) Therefore, a Christian can be one who believes that certain things are "wrong" because they cause suffering and pain to those who practice them, and that Christ is a unique religious figure - the incarnate Word of God, in fact - with a unique message, and STILL respect the rights of others to believe as they choose. That's the kind of detente progressives should be looking for with Christians right now. Hoping they'll all become UU's is a fantasy.

If progressives insist that evangelical Christians abandon all of their core moral and spiritual beliefs before everyone can learn to co-exist, I expect most of them to lean Republican for a long time to come. And that's too bad, because let's be honest - the only community in existence right now that could even potentially have the strength to combat the Right is an Evangelical Christianity that's been reformed and returned to Biblical values of compassion, charity, and respect for human dignity and the dignity of God's creation. These are causes that all have direct support in the Bible and traditional Christian teaching - progressives should appeal to these teachings. It's always better to find common cause with someone first, and then debate differences later. If progressives insist that Christians dump all their morals and spiritual beliefs out the window, charlatans like James Dobson and Ted Haggard'll exploit them for at least another decade.

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» RE: That's not the problem Posted by: AdamSelene40
Heartwarming and hopeful
Posted by: mountainmama on Jun 21, 2005 11:52 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I can only hope and believe there are more young people like Shelby willing to think for themselves...rationally. I applaud her and those that created this film. I have no doubt God will bless Shelby richly!

As for the far-right, self-righteous moron adults...I fear they are hopeless.

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agnostic
Posted by: agnostic1 on Jun 21, 2005 1:46 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Were it not so sad, it would be amusing that the highest rates of unwanted, single mom teen-aged pregnancies occur in the "so-called" red states, especially among those who have taken some "pledge." The rates in more "liberal" areas - ie, the rest of the country, are statistically lower.

The deliberate failure to teach these fundie kids the most basic sexual and health care facts dooms these teens to abuse, insults and worse. (not to mention destroying their teen years) Education could and would help cure this problem. But an educated person is precisely the last thing that your basic fundie-mental wishes to see.

Peer pressure, elder demands and family pressure, approval, etc, do wonders in structuring behavior of youth. but they don't compare, in terms of strength, with your natural, hormonal drives, need for social and sexual interaction and your basic human love of pleasure.

Christian fundies find this whole natural idea of sex as clean fun, exciting interaction and a wonderful way to spend the day as offensive as the idea that the universe is just slightly longer than their instruction manual says it is. Let's see: 14 billion orbits around Sol vs. 4,553 years as poorly described and translated in their propaganda manual. I think that I will choose the former as more realistic.

To insure their control over their "oh, so human" offspring, Christian fundies created a guilt-based control program to control what they perceive to be their personal property (the brains and free will of humans, especially those who receive half of their genetic material through sexual reproduction from that particular adult). Guilt and shame can be powerful brainwashing tools. Fundies have a lot of experience with this sort of brainwashing. Since birth, in many cases.

unfortunately the most ferverant bible beating bas****s no longer have shame as a working emotion. instead, they prey and smile even though their professed love and faith-based policies do incredible damage to society at large, and their members in particular. What is worse is their version of god, through their badly translated book, tells them that they must teach everyone else that either you are with them, or you are their enemy. My, that sounds familiar.

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» RE: agnostic Posted by: specom
» RE: Young Earth Theory Posted by: AdamSelene40
» RE: Bible Study Posted by: AdamSelene40
» RE: Young Earth Theory Posted by: specom
Michael Dickey
Posted by: michaeld3668 on Jun 21, 2005 2:14 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I don't believe that Miss Knox needs to move, but instead perhaps she should look into the Libertarian Party who have the same basic belief's as herself. FREEDOM for ALL! regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, or anything else that might differentiate between the differing members of a nation.

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» RE: Michael Dickey Posted by: ljsullivan1166@earthlink.net
Break out
Posted by: Michiganman on Jun 21, 2005 7:45 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Good story. Somehow the religious right has to be brought out of their trance, stop looking at the flames you fools, look away!!!

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Just watched this film last night
Posted by: Guy on Jun 22, 2005 7:41 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I was very impressed; what a smart and courageous girl! I could comment on a lot of particulars, but let me just say to see this if you haven't already. One thing this film did bring home to me is that Lubbock, Tx is on another planet from the one I live on; they speak a different language and have different mantras. It makes you realize just how differently people think in this country. And makes you realize that these are the people who elected GWB and his ilk.

Guy (Morgan Hill, near San Jose, CA)

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Praising liberal converts?
Posted by: JesseBC on Jun 22, 2005 3:10 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
How strange that we liberals are now doing what Christian conservatives were doing a decade ago...holding up as examples those who have seen the light and changed their ways, praise be to Marx! Are we going down the same path they did?

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Liberal?
Posted by: dotfret on Jun 27, 2005 9:53 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I have a problem with what I see as equating any homosexual tolerant viewpoint as liberal. To any heterosexual, homosexual love is repugnant on an animal level - it may be tolerated only because God gave us the abilities to rise above those animal feelings generated by instinct and hormones. This is not liberal, it is using the rationality given by God - the free will - to see that His creation has more lessons to teach us than we can understand, and that there is good in all His creation if we can only see it.

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» RE: Liberal? Posted by: kmissile
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