Teenage Pregnancy, courtesy of ABC Family

In class we discussed the advertisement of birth control. The discussion centered around the fact that these advertisements tend to avoid the fact that birth control is actually for preventing people from becoming pregnant. I thought that was very interesting and in fact, birth control is not really discussed that much at all in the media. if the topic isn't avoided at all, when it is discussed (outside of advertisements) birth control is talked about for it's side effects (ie clear skin, etc.).

Recently, there are shows popping up on every network that revolve around the controversial pregnant teenager. ABC Family's "Secret Life of the American Teenager," MTV's "16 and Pregnant" and it's sequel "Teen Mom" all depict the lives (fictional and non-fictional) or teen girl's who have unexpectedly become pregnant. As these shows should be/have the potential to be very educational to young girls thinking about becoming sexually active, producers have actually skipped over one very important issue: the pill. These shows completely skirt the issue with contraceptives only being mentioned a few times in it's first season--not at all in the MTV shows. The issue is very horrific to some, like Stanford Professor Nancy Brown who "gets frustrated when she watches movies pass up perfectly good opportunities to add a line or two about contraceptives of STD's." As an example she provides the following: "when Juno's dad, after he learns that is daughter is pregnant, tells her, 'I thought you were the kind of girl who knew when to say when.'" She suggests instead, "what would be a lot better is 'I wish i had talked to you about birth control when you were 12.'"

These shows skirt the issues because networks, like advertisers, know the political/religious controversies such conversations could stir up--so instead of discussing it at all, the pill is avoided all together.