Girlmom.com

Doesn't it seem like teenage pregnancy has been coming up a lot lately? I mean, it has always been a favorite way for the media to proclaim young girls as stupid, wild tramps. But it sort of seems like the media is attempting to take another position, since the stupid, wild ramp image is being frowned upon a little more (wonder why...?) 

First there was Juno.

I loved Juno, but more for the hilarious one-liners (Bren-duh) than the actual plot of her pregnancy. In the end I don't think the movie actually made a strong argument about teen pregnancy. Diablo Cody kind of copped out by avoiding abortion (granted, if Juno had aborted, it would have been a totally different movie) but also avoiding having Juno become a teen mother. I mean, these are the real issues that pregnant teenager has to face: both will changer her life forever, and a lot of emotion leads up to both of them. Not that adoption, the route Cody took, isn't life changing or difficult, but Juno didn't seem to acknowledge this except for the scene directly after she gives birth. 

So what would it have been like if Juno had kept her baby? We all grew to love her. We know she's smart, kind and has a great taste in music. But wouldn't we stare at her disapprovingly when we saw her with a backpack in one hand and a baby in the other? Wouldn't we chalk her kid's public displays of crankiness up to the fact that her mother's young so she must be a bad parent (even though that happens to every mom)? Wouldn't we expect her to give up a college career? 

That's exactly the stereotype Charlie Rose, a teen mom, wants to dispel on her website girlmom.com. I found out about Charlie Rose in an article in The Sophian- Smith College's magazine (the college Rose attends). 

Rose says: "For some reason people have very visceral responses to teen pregnancy. It's sort of the unifying issue, because everyone thinks that teen moms are awful. I challenges the idea of adulthood that we've established the idea that teenagers are always irresponsible. From a patriarchal state, teen mothers are threatening because women are supposed to belong to their fathers until they belong to their husbands." 

While, according to this article, Rose apparently made the conscious choice to have a baby at 16 (a choice I myself can not fathom), she brings up a lot of great points that would affect any teen mother, intentionally so or not. Points like the negative way people reacted to her deciding to leave her child's father, or the negative way people reacted to her choices regarding the raising of her child. 

So here's my opinion: it's not that hard to use protection so do it. Wait to have a baby until you're ready (emotionally, financially, the whole shebang) But also- just because you're a mother and you're a teenager doesn't mean you're a bad person or bad parent. It also doesn't mean you have to give up on your ambitions. I think we need to stop judging and start supporting (not only once the baby is there but in comprehensive sex education. That's what I think.