Do Gel Bracelets Encourage Sexual Activity? 4/14/2004
By Martha Kleder
Sex educators exploit silly teen trend.
Brightly colored gel wristbands are a teen trend nationwide. But some health department officials claim that the bands are a code used by students to trade sexual favors. If one student takes a white band off another’s wrist, he is requesting a kiss. A red one represents a lap dance and a black one means sexual intercourse. The color code varies from school to school, they add.
Now, so-called comprehensive sex educators are taking advantage of this fad to push their agenda.
“There’s a lot of things going on out there that we don’t know about,” Palm Beach County, Florida, Health Department spokesman Tim O’Connor told school board members Monday. Health Department Director Jean Malecki used the occasion to push for more comprehensive sex education in public schools, urging school board members to overturn the current abstinence-focused education.
Comprehensive sex education teaches teens to become sexually active whenever they feel ready--as long as they use condoms or other contraception. Abstinence education focuses on equipping teens to reserve sexual activity for marriage.
“It’s ironic that those who most loudly proclaim that we should ‘do for our children’ are the ones who use our children for special agendas,” said Dr. Janice Shaw Crouse, senior fellow of the Beverly LaHaye Institute. She also noted that most teens wear the bracelets because it’s a fad, and not to advertise sexual favors.
The trend, also known as a game called “Snap” because a boy is supposed to break one of the gels off a girl’s wrist to claim a particular act, has reached the point where some schools in Florida have banned the bracelets.
“I think jelly bracelets are awesome,” writes a teenager named Mandi on justorb.com, one of several Web sites dedicated to the topic. “I don’t believe the meanings. I wear them because they are cool.”
Another teen named James chimed in: “Dude, they are bracelets &ldots;just becuz (sic) someone snaps it, doesn’t mean you gotta do anything &ldots; I mean, c’mon! (sic)”
That’s the point Crouse says comprehensive sex educators are missing.
“This is a perfect example of misusing a silly teen trend,” she said. “The majority of the teens wearing the bracelets may not be aware of the sex game, yet sex educators are going to take a few incidents and use them to scare school boards into adopting comprehensive sex education as though it were a silver bullet that would stop such fads and activities among teens.”
“Palm Beach County Health Department Officials are debunking abstinence education, although they offer no evidence, and claim that comprehensive sex education is the solution, when they have not even defined the problem,” Crouse added.
“A teen committed to purity will remain so, with or without a gel bracelet.”