The Health and Human Services Administration has a web site that offers advice to parents.  Among the topics is “Talk about waiting.”  It says:

·        Your teen son or daughter needs to know why you don't want them to have sex now. Tell them why waiting for sex until they are married is the healthiest choice. Tell them if they wait, they won't have to worry about getting pregnant or getting someone pregnant. They won't have to worry about sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS. Nor will they have to worry that the person they're dating is only interested in them because of sex. If they have relationships that don't revolve around sex, they'll be able to develop more depth in their relationships. Let your teen know that even though they are capable of having sex, having sex will not make them an adult...making good choices will.

Does that sound like good advice to you?  To the ACLU, the National Education Association and 100 other advocacy groups, it sounds oppressive, and they are demanding the site be taken down because it amounts to the government “dictating values.”

Monica Rodriguez of the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States is a leading opponent of the site. She says, "By and large, it's a Web site that believes in abstinence until marriage. Everything on the Web site is designed to promote that value and help parents communicate that value to their children."  She thinks that’s a bad thing.

Rodriguez represents a growing body of people and groups who want to stuff a sock in the government’s mouth on issues of morality. These groups have made major headway as of late. Among their greatest victories is the ruling by the 4^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that South Carolina and other states are not allowed to issue “Choose Life” license plates because the plates represent just one side of a controversial political debate.

I can’t say for sure, but I suspect if a government web site promoted the “proper use of condoms” or any of the other competing “values” embraced by the liberal advocacy groups, they and their friends in the ACLU would not be trying to force the government to take them down.

Where is it written that the government is prohibited from advocating values? Under what provision of the constitution does that fall?  Was Nancy Reagan violating the constitution when she advised children to “Just say No?”   Is the government dictating values by honoring military service and sacrifice on Veteran’s Day and Memorial Day – or by putting Abraham Lincoln’s likeness on money?

Almost every day of the year, Congress or some state legislature passes a resolution expressing appreciation for some person or group for the values they represent. Many if not most of our laws are imbedded with values.  Government is all about promoting values, and as long as the promotion thereof doesn’t infringe on the constitutional rights of others, they are a perfectly legal and proper reflection of society’s wishes.

Liberal groups that have been losing the values war in venues controlled by majority opinion are trying to use the judiciary to silence the majority. They have found friends aplenty in the judicial branch of government.

This latest attack on the promotion of abstinence may sound whimsical and frivolous, but it should not be taken lightly.