February 17, 2009

Bristol Palin: Abstinence-Only Sex-Ed “Not Realistic”

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In her first interview since giving birth, Bristol Palin told CNN Fox that enjoining young people to be abstinent is “not realistic at all.” This puts her at odds with her mother but squarely on the side of reams of social science research that shows abstinence education programs don’t work. The young Palin said she had decided to speak out (despite suffering through “evil” tabloid coverage) because teens need to know that having a child is “not glamorous.” She could be onto something. If she can put across a nuanced approach to sex ed that embraces contraception, it could help sway some conservatives–and maybe cover her childcare costs by landing her a lucrative book deal.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

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