Bullhead, Mohave Valley, Laughlin with girls getting pregnant when too young? (Phoenix: neighborhood, high school)

[swbrotha100]

I'll be honest, I've never seen out of control adults the various times I've visited Laughlin. Crazy partying adults would probably have more fun going to Las Vegas.

[kttam186290]

Higher than average rate of Chlamydia cases in Mohave County too, according to this:

http://www.azdhs.gov/phs/oids/std/pd...nties-2011.pdf

Coincidence?

[Cyber Surfer]

Originally Posted by kttam186290

Higher than average rate of Chlamydia cases in Mohave County too, according to this:

http://www.azdhs.gov/phs/oids/std/pd...nties-2011.pdf

Coincidence?

Yeah, I'm not surprised to say the least. Someone mentioned Kingman's teen pregnancy, but its not as bad as Bullhead, but it seems the average age they start having kids is a year or two after High School.

The couples rarely stay together too, so there's this epidemic of single mothers and dead beat MMA wannabe dads all over too, heh.

[Goober13]

Teen pregnancies are a direct coorelation of lower socioeconomic backgrounds coupled with lack of comprehensive sex education and a huge push to make kids afraid to have sex without a condom.

No education, low incomes and poverty, and this is the result. We need a huge push to end poverty in this country and to make all schools top notch regardless of how much of a tax base they have.

Until you do these things, the problem will never get solved, and right now there lacks the political will to do this.

Casino proximity has absolutely nothing to do with poverty and poor education. There is very little future in areas like that careerwise. There are many other comparable small towns nationwide with similar problems.

[saffordpastor]

Originally Posted by Goober13

Teen pregnancies are a direct coorelation of lower socioeconomic backgrounds coupled with lack of comprehensive sex education and a huge push to make kids afraid to have sex without a condom.

No education, low incomes and poverty, and this is the result. We need a huge push to end poverty in this country and to make all schools top notch regardless of how much of a tax base they have.

Until you do these things, the problem will never get solved, and right now there lacks the political will to do this.

Casino proximity has absolutely nothing to do with poverty and poor education. There is very little future in areas like that careerwise. There are many other comparable small towns nationwide with similar problems.

I agree with you to a certain extent. There is a direct correlation between lower socioeconomic backgrounds and high teen pregnancies, but the contention that sex education alone will solve the problem is not totally right. I realize that there are indications that it does help, unfortunately I feel it is a band aid to try to fix the growing problem with the breakdown of the American family.

Single parent families, baby daddies, etc, are becoming the norm in these communities, and all the sex education, federal funds, etc that you throw at them will not solve the problem until we address the deep spiritual and moral degeneration that is overtaking these communities.

Watch the news, although violent crime and gun crimes are decreasing, certain areas and social stratus of our country seem to have taken on an almost animalistic behavior, fueled by total lack of parental supervision and healthy role models, plus technological advances, (flash mobs) some areas are getting out of control, and the community leaders and parents that should be putting a stop to it many times are complicit in the matter.

I fear that there will come a tipping point in some of these areas where they will really catch fire and then it will be almost impossible to put out.

I was raised in a "lower socioeconomic strata" ...my dad pastored a small church and we never had money, in fact there were times that we were poor as Jobs turkey. There were 5 of us kids, and not one got pregnant or impregnated someone out of wedlock, all of us got married and stayed that way, except for my oldest sister whos husband "came out" after 20 years or so and left with his boyfriend. We are not on welfare, we are not in jail, we dont do drugs, etc.

We are not perfect but the fact that we had a very strong family, (my parents were married 49 years until my mother passed.) very strong moral teachings, and (gasp) a very strong sense of shame...in other words we understood that somethings folks did were shameful and should be avoided at all costs. (something horribly missing in today's society, for goodness sakes, dont tell the little thugs they are acting like thugs or being immoral, because it might damage thier "self esteem")...helped to shape us and make us good citizens even though we did not have the financial resources that some did.

Poverty doesn't cause crime but moral breakdowns do.

Anyway that is my take on the matter.

[Packard fan]

Originally Posted by saffordpastor

I agree with you to a certain extent. There is a direct correlation between lower socioeconomic backgrounds and high teen pregnancies, but the contention that sex education alone will solve the problem is not totally right. I realize that there are indications that it does help, unfortunately I feel it is a band aid to try to fix the growing problem with the breakdown of the American family.

Single parent families, baby daddies, etc, are becoming the norm in these communities, and all the sex education, federal funds, etc that you throw at them will not solve the problem until we address the deep spiritual and moral degeneration that is overtaking these communities.

Watch the news, although violent crime and gun crimes are decreasing, certain areas and social stratus of our country seem to have taken on an almost animalistic behavior, fueled by total lack of parental supervision and healthy role models, plus technological advances, (flash mobs) some areas are getting out of control, and the community leaders and parents that should be putting a stop to it many times are complicit in the matter.

I fear that there will come a tipping point in some of these areas where they will really catch fire and then it will be almost impossible to put out.

I was raised in a "lower socioeconomic strata" ...my dad pastored a small church and we never had money, in fact there were times that we were poor as Jobs turkey. There were 5 of us kids, and not one got pregnant or impregnated someone out of wedlock, all of us got married and stayed that way, except for my oldest sister whos husband "came out" after 20 years or so and left with his boyfriend. We are not on welfare, we are not in jail, we dont do drugs, etc.

We are not perfect but the fact that we had a very strong family, (my parents were married 49 years until my mother passed.) very strong moral teachings, and (gasp) a very strong sense of shame...in other words we understood that somethings folks did were shameful and should be avoided at all costs. (something horribly missing in today's society, for goodness sakes, dont tell the little thugs they are acting like thugs or being immoral, because it might damage thier "self esteem")...helped to shape us and make us good citizens even though we did not have the financial resources that some did.

Poverty doesn't cause crime but moral breakdowns do.

Anyway that is my take on the matter.

Agreed. It's called "manning up" and NOT blaming the government for getting in trouble.

[kttam186290]

Mohave County has always been, and probably always will be, "Arizona's little slice of West Virginia".

I say that with sincere affection.

[Packard fan]

Originally Posted by kttam186290

Mohave County has always been, and probably always will be, "Arizona's little slice of West Virginia".

I say that with sincere affection.

Uh; maybe Kingman since it's been around for a while but Bullhead and Havasu? BHC and LHC have lots of Cali people and I don't think West Virginia can say that.

[Potential_Landlord]

Originally Posted by saffordpastor

I agree with you to a certain extent. There is a direct correlation between lower socioeconomic backgrounds and high teen pregnancies, but the contention that sex education alone will solve the problem is not totally right. I realize that there are indications that it does help, unfortunately I feel it is a band aid to try to fix the growing problem with the breakdown of the American family.

Single parent families, baby daddies, etc, are becoming the norm in these communities, and all the sex education, federal funds, etc that you throw at them will not solve the problem until we address the deep spiritual and moral degeneration that is overtaking these communities.

If you compare to Europe then the connection between religion / moral teachings and teen pregnancies falls apart. In Europe there are far less teen pregnancies and there is also far less religious influence compared to the US. I remember in Germany the meaning of Sunday is to recover from your hangover
To get to the root cause of differences in teen pregnancies across the Atlantic ocean we would need a carefully designed study. Short of that we would need to guesstimate and here are my personal and subjective observances:
- contraceptives are easily obtained and practically cost-free as part of universal healthcare
- the age to start sexual activity is certainly just as young as in the US, if not younger
- sexuality is much less taboo, much more on display and much more talked about, including at school
IMO a better predictor of human behavior than morality are incentives. This seems to be true even when it comes to sex and pregnancy. Fertility crashed in the US between 1800 and 1900 from something like 8 children per woman to 3.5 while contraceptives were completely absent. People made a conscious choice to have less kids as rising kids became less of a benefit and more of a burden (cost of education vs. cheap farm labor). So, there must be some (perverse) incentives for teenagers to become pregnant at a young age under certain circumstances. It may make sense to pay teenagers to graduate with collage education and not get pregnant rather than pay for child welfare (just an idea as I do not have a thorough understanding of circumstances). Which goes back to the other poster's statement: teenagers need a perspective in their life that is so realistic and so much better that it is worthwhile not to become prematurely pregnant. That fact that social mobility crashed in the US over the last 30 years certainly is not helpful here.

[MICHAEL J]

As one who has spent a lot of time in Bullhead following the sports of my grandchildren, I lay 100% of the blame on the parents.

I've seen fights among the Bullhead parents, loud, obnoxious and vulgar language from the parents. Officials flipping each other off... calling each other four letter words. And this is at children's sporting events from age 5 and up.

Worse in Bullhead than any other city I've been to.... and I've been to dozens over the past 10 years.