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McCain's Sex Ed Ad: Everyone Has it Wrong

This post inspired enough insightful commentary that it required a follow up.

After a very good conversation with JS and CK, I co-wrote this piece with CK, and we submitted it to a few places to publish as an Op-ed. Mostly silence so far, but we don't have the energy to keep going.

So here it is:

McCain?s ?Education? Ad: Everyone Has it Wrong

In an old Jay Leno bit, Jay reads a viewer?s letter asking about Kathie Lee Gifford?s husband. ?My wife says Regis and Kathy are married. I say her husband is a professional baseball player for the Dodgers. Which one of us is right?? Leno sighs, feigns anger, and announces that both husband and wife are wildly off the mark. In our view, the 2008 campaign season is a lot like the bit where neither party has it right.

For instance, on September 10, Senator John McCain released a new television ad titled ?Education,? which purports to describe Senator Obama?s views on sex education in kindergarten classes. The ad takes its content from a 2003 Illinois State Bill (S.B. 99) that the then-State Senator voted for in the Health and Human Services Committee. The Bill passed the Committee 7-4, but never received a vote in the State Senate.

What, exactly, was in the Bill? Senator McCain?s ad claims that it was ?legislation to teach comprehensive sex education to kindergartners.? That means, says the ad, that the Bill would have had children ?learn[] about sex before learning to read.? But did the Bill really function in either of these ways? Not really.

Factcheck.org and Checkpoint (a New York Times feature) have already suggested that the ad is misleading on a number of accounts. But these popular websites have it wrong. The ad may be misleading, but only because the Illinois State Bill was so poorly written that it?s impossible to actually know what Senator Obama thought he was voting for.

The Bill works as an if/then statement. If sex education is taught in the classroom between the grades of K-12, then the materials used for those courses must include certain subjects to comply with the statute. But theoretically, the statute wouldn?t mandate any sex education be taught at all; certainly not ?comprehensive? sex education, as Senator McCain claims.

What, then, were those mandates, if sex education (comprehensive or otherwise) was taught in k-12 classrooms? Factcheck and Checkpoint are right to point out that the Bill insisted, in Section 27-9.1(c)(2), that ?All course material and instruction shall be age and developmentally appropriate.? This seems to favor Senator Obama?s position. Only a few lines below that, however, the statute demands, in Section 27-9.1(c)(3), that ?Course material and instruction shall include a discussion of sexual abstinence as a method to prevent unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV.? This seems to favor Senator McCain?s interpretation that children as young as kindergartners might be ?learning about sex.?

The truth, however, is that the Bill is a contradiction unto itself. Consider the Section quoted above about ?age and developmentally appropriate? sex education, in conjunction with Section 27-9.1(c)(8): ?Course material and instruction shall advise pupils that it is unlawful for males or females of any age to engage in sexual conduct or have sexual relations with a minor as specified in Article 12 of the Criminal Code of 1961, as now or hereafter amended.? We suggest giving an award to any kindergarten teacher who manages to effectively convey the provisions of Article 12 of the Criminal Code to her 5-year-old students.

The (very obvious) problems in Bill were implicitly acknowledged by an amendment proposed by its own sponsor shortly after it passed the committee vote. The amendment makes clear what Obama and its supporters probably assumed: that ?If a school offers a class or course in sex education in grades K through 5, the course material shall be age and developmentally appropriate . . .?. That is, the ?age appropriateness? requirement should trump all other requirements. The Amendment, like the Bill, never passed.

Given the ambiguity of S.B. 99?s initial language, Senator Obama?s reading of the statute doesn?t take into account that the requirement of age-appropriateness is just one of the statute?s many mandates. But Senator McCain?s reading doesn?t take into account that the statute can?t possibly mean what it says -- that kindergartners must be exposed to absurdly complicated sex education content.

We are back where we started. Senator Obama supports K-12 students being exposed to sex education. But it?s the type of sex education that is at the heart of the dispute between himself and Senator McCain. Obama says age-appropriate education might involve lessons about what is a ?good touch? and what is a ?bad touch.? That is surely true. But, given the confusing language of S.B. 99, what else it might include is a mystery.

In light of its muddled language, we suggest a truce on S.B. 99. Senator Obama should admit that the statute he voted for in Committee was poorly drafted and contradictory, even if well-intentioned. While Senator McCain should cease, immediately, claiming that Senator Obama supported extensive and explicit sex education in grades as low as kindergarten.

Full post as published by Expressio Unius on September 16, 2008 (boomark / email).