Educating sex ed

Ross Douthat's editorial in the New York Times today is an excellent take on the state of sex education, specifically, how Washington is sticking its nose where local governments could handle it better.

Both sides (abstinence-only and sex-safety/pregnancy-preventation) have a lot to say about statistics and which methods will work, but I think this is a clear-cut case of a place where one sweeping government mandate, whichever one it is, will do no good for the nation. As Douthat shows, different areas deal with different beliefs and concerns, and it's most often the kids' environment and parents that affect them the most (as they should). Getting the government to command people what to do, when they are long entrenched in a particular point of view, is just asking for trouble.

(Caveat: The moral question of this is aside, of course. If people's hearts could be changed, there would be a totally different form of sex ed sweeping the nation. But people are what they are, and trying to get the government to change them is one of the stupidest ideas I can think of.)

Kudos, Douthat; you hit this one right on the head.