ProWomanProLife

Men and women are different. Woah. Crazy, I know. Takes research to identify this:

The researchers measured behavioural traits in a broader fashion than previous studies did. They argued that these broader definitions provide a more accurate description of personality characteristics. “We believe we made it clear that the true extent of sex differences in human personality has been consistently underestimated,” they write.

They show women scored higher in sensitivity, warmth and anxiety (hello, my old friend). Men scored higher in emotional stability, dominance, rule-consciousness and vigilance (wariness). This is not to say that no man will ever be warm, or no woman will ever be rule-conscious. (Though I maintain that every woman will always be anxious. I have yet to meet an exception.) But that there are differences should not be a controversial thing. Unfortunately, it is, leaving me to discuss the issue on Sun TV lately (no link, sorry) because of this.

Once again, a pro-life student group is having a rough start to being granted club status.

Dec. 19, 2011. Fredericton, New Brunswick:  Pro-life students at the University of New Brunswick’s (UNB) Fredericton campus were shocked last week to learn from their student newspaper, TheBrunswickan, that their club would not be recognized by the Student Union due to a “lack of information”.

“The whole situation has been incredibly frustrating,” says Amanda Magee, the President of UNB Students for Life.  “We have given the Student Union information.  We have offered to be present to answer questions.”

UNB Students for Life applied for club status in October, not anticipating any issues given that a pro-life club is active at the UNB Saint John campus and had also existed at the Fredericton campus only a few years previous.  When their contact on council, Andrew Martel, requested additional information from the club, they replied, ensuring that the information would be received before the next Council meeting on November 20th.  Despite this, Andrew Martel stated at the meeting, according to the Nov. 20th minutes, that he did not receive any information from the club.

“We’ve had to rely on the student newspaper and the minutes of the meetings to piece things together,” adds Magee.  “And the Dec. 4th minutes still aren’t available so we’re not entirely sure what happened.”

Read the entire press release here.

According to this poll by Angus Reid, Canadians (as compared to Britons and Americans) are more in favor of controversial sexual education topics in classrooms and that it should occur at a younger age. Lucky Canada, eh?

The pressure to be sexually active comes at us all from various angles. The ads we see each day run the gamut from subtle ads for “performance enhancing” drugs to use later in life (when some of us may not even want to be all that sexually active) to the more aggressive ones, continuously targeting younger and younger audiences. You can’t escape these images, they’re on bus stops, locker rooms, in a banner on a website, in fact they’re so common that they hardly seem to stand out. As adults, maybe our life experience can buffer some of this imagery, but what about kids, teens who are in the process of figuring themselves out as people? A survey by ESSENCE magazine revealed that,

Black youth report considerable pressure to have sex, according to a new survey of 1,500 Black youth ages 13-21 released by ESSENCE Magazine and The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. Of those who have had sex, 47% of those 13-21 (including 21% of those 13-15) say they have been pressured to go further sexually than they wanted to. [...]

Overall, the survey found that almost half of Black teens ages 13 to 21 reported that they have lied to get out of a sexual situation, and 54% of Black males said they feel pressure from their friends to have sex.

But some of the findings in the survey are hopeful. Nearly half of younger children (13-15) say they value their parents’ opinions and that their parents influence whether or not they will be sexually active. This gives parents an opportunity to express to our kids that they’re not expected to have sex.

What is the appropriate age to discuss abortion? Is there such an age? These were my questions during public pro-life events, and to be honest, I don’t know the answers. It is troubling though to think that discussing oral sex with 12-year-olds might be found appropriate while handing them plastic fetuses is seen as “disgusting”.

Jane Hannam, 12, was walking home from Heretaunga Intermediate with a friend last Thursday when they were approached by a female protester outside Hawke’s Bay Hospital and given a rubber foetus and information card about foetal development.

Her parents, Brian and Zarlene Hannam, said it was disgusting that protesters would target young school-aged children and made a complaint to Hastings police.

“We just found her playing with this toy foetus,” Mrs Hannam said. “It was sort of like a really soft spongy flesh-coloured foetus. I just think that’s disgusting.

“Everyone is allowed to protest and I don’t have any problem about that, but what they gave out was really inappropriate.”

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Andrea adds: I think it’s fair to find handing out plastic fetuses weird. I do. Just being honest. The first time I was handed one, can’t be helped, that was my feeling: something along the lines of “ok, so this is weird.” But “disgusting?” “Really inappropriate?” Comments like that reflect on the pro-choice views of the parents. Nothing more, nothing less.

Wait no more to find out! China’s Ministry of Education is apparently making a course on love and sex compulsory for university students. Because nothing says love like the Chinese authorities forcing a course on the topic.

Socioeconomic factors, not your “wantedness”, will play a big factor in how successful you are in life. This article from The Telegraph shows that the educational success of a child has very little to do with being planned or unplanned, and everything to do with being rich or poor.

A study has found that pupils whose parents did not intend to have a baby lagged five months behind planned babies at age five, when their vocabulary was tested, and a further three to four months behind those born after IVF.

However experts say the findings are just down to the developmental gap between rich and poor in Britain. The differences in scores “almost entirely disappear” when family background is taken into account, since children born following assisted reproduction tend to have older, better educated and richer parents. [...]

Dorothy Bishop, Professor of Developmental Neuropsychology at the University of Oxford, said: “This study shows how important it is to take social factors into account when looking at child outcomes. Children from unplanned pregnancies have lower scores on cognitive tests than those from planned pregnancies, but they are also much more likely to come from single parent, low income households. Once this is taken into account, there is no impact of an unplanned pregnancy on children’s development.”

Planned Parenthood is suing another state.

PIERRE, S.D. — Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit in federal court yesterday seeking to block a South Dakota law that would require women seeking abortions to face the nation’s longest waiting period — three days — and undergo counseling at pregnancy help centers that discourage abortion.

The lawsuit asks a federal judge to suspend the law until a final ruling on whether it violates a woman’s constitutional right to abortion established under the US Supreme Court’s 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade. The law is set to take effect July1.

The legal challenge was filed in Sioux Falls, where Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota operates South Dakota’s only abortion clinic.

State Representative Roger Hunt, Republican of Brandon, the chief sponsor of the bill, said the lawsuit was expected.

“I don’t understand why, because it just seeks to give women more information, and it seeks to remove coercion, seeks to deal with a number of coercion elements where you have possible rapes and problems within families and whatnot, and we’re trying to help those women deal with that coercion,’’ said Hunt.

Survey says one in three German students would consider sex work to pay for school.

Now that would be shocking, however, my hope is that it is purely theoretical since higher education in Deutschland is free.

From Texas,

AUSTIN — A sonogram bill that would require women seeking an abortion to hear a detailed description of their fetus, as well as be presented images and heartbeats, won Senate approval Monday, moving it closer to becoming one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the nation.

Women could opt out of seeing the sonogram or listening to a heartbeat, if it is detectable, but almost all would have to listen to a doctor outline what organs and extremities have developed. The measure was tentatively approved, 21-10, and faces one more vote before it heads back to the House.[...]

A tougher sonogram bill already has passed the House. Bill author Rep. Sid Miller, R-Stephenville, said he will review the Senate version and is likely to ask the full House to accept the changes so it can be sent quickly to the governor, who has supported the bill.

Under the bill, all women would be required to have a sonogram within 24 hours of the abortion procedure, even if they recently had the test. A daylong wait would then be required, except for women who live more than 100 miles from an abortion facility; they could have an abortion the same day as the sonogram.

In almost all early pregnancies, a sonogram is performed with a vaginal probe. Women could avert their eyes if they choose not to see the image.

In all cases — except for medical emergencies, rape, incest or minors who have a judge’s order allowing the abortion — the women would have to hear a detailed explanation of fetal development.