Guest Blog: Following the Science? Not in Sex Ed

How would it look if the federal government took the same approach to reducing teenage drinking that it takes to reducing teenage pregnancies?
Instead of telling them to wait, the focus would shift to making teen alcohol consumption “less risky.” Then, strategies would be employed to make teen alcohol consumption “less risky.” School programs would teach teens how to drink, but also encourage them to use good judgment through messages like: “Wait until you know you are ready before you have your first drink.” They would be encouraged to drink alone before deciding to drink with each other. They would be told: “The only one who can decide when you are ready to drink is you.”
Knowing what we know about teenagers and their ability to assess risk and act accordingly, this sort of approach sounds ludicrous. Nevertheless, that’s precisely the approach we’ve been taking to sex ed for decades. It’s been a miserable failure, of course.
Nevertheless, the Department of Health and Human Services directs millions of dollars every year to programs like these that are based not on science but on the dated assumptions of the sexual revolution.
We do it right in other areas. Teens are simply told “no” when it comes to other risky activities like smoking, drinking, and driving below a certain age.
For those more interested in science than ideology, there is another approach to sex education, one with proven results. It’s called Sexual Risk Avoidance.
Last week, the House Energy and Commerce Committee released a report that examined the problem of teen pregnancies and STDs, and dug into the science behind adolescent behavior. The report, entitled “A Better Approach to Teenage Pregnancy Prevention: Sexual Risk Avoidance,” analyzed the methods used by the government to combat underage drinking, smoking, and reckless driving. These prevention programs each promote “risk avoidance” as the best strategy. The report notes that in each category, avoiding risky behavior and involving parents and peers in decision-making produces the best results.
The report also looks at brain development among teenagers. According to scientific research, the social and emotional network of the brain becomes highly activated at puberty, yet the cognitive network matures more slowly. This means that if a teenager is thrown into an emotional situation where he or she is expected to show good judgment, the emotional network of the brain will dominate the teen’s ability to weigh the consequences of his or her action. When teenagers are in open communication with parents and peers regarding risky behavior, however, their capacity for acting responsibly is greatly enhanced.
At his NAACP speech yesterday, Mitt Romney made the important point that (according to the Brookings Institution): “for those who graduate from high school, get a full-time job, and wait until 21 before they marry and then have their first child, the probability of being poor is two percent. And if those factors are absent, the probability of being poor is 76 percent.”
No sex ed program can replace good parental instruction. Nevertheless, we clearly owe it to our kids to give them the same effective guidance we give them about other risky, adult behaviors. We need to tell them to wait.
Congressman Joe Pitts (R) represents the 16^th Congressional District of Pennsylvania and chairs the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health.
The views expressed by guest bloggers on the Foundry do not necessarily reflect the views of The Heritage Foundation.

Saudi parents want sex education in schools

[Used for illustrative purposes]: Is sex education the answer?
 
More than 90 percent of parents and teachers in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia support the introduction of sex education in public schools, according to a new study by a female professor at Umm al-Qura University in Mecca.

Professor Amal Mohammed Banouna told Elaph news website that children between 3 and 8 years of age develop curiosity to know more about sexuality and tend to ask numerous questions to understand and explore themselves and the world around them. Some of the children’s questions, professor Banouna said, can be embarrassing to the elders.

“Since we are in an age of globalization, scientific openness, we find many problems related to sexuality, and this has prompted me to address the issue within an Islamic context that respects the biological nature of individuals,” Banouna told Elaph.

“I started to do my research on early childhood as an integral part of my master’s degree at Hull University in England.”

Banouna’s study was recognized at an education researchers’ conference in Britain and will be presented at an international early childhood education conference in Portugal this year.

“I wanted to understand the position of parents and teachers on offering early sex education to children between 3 and 8 years of age and how important such education would be to Saudi Arabia’s educational system,” Banouna said.

Banouna gathered the data for her research from the cities of Riyadh and Jeddah through 500 questioners and interviews with parents, teachers and childhood education specialists.

According to her research, 47 percent of fathers find it difficult to answer their children’s questions related to sex and about 87 percent find it embarrassing to answer the questions and as a result they tend to ignore them.

In her research, Banouna recommended that both parents and teachers should be given training on how to deal with their children’s curiosity, especially when it comes to matters of sexuality.

Bannouna told Elaph that she did not face any problems while researching a topic that can be sensitive in the conservative kingdom. She said people tend to confuse sexual education with sexual culture.

In 2010, the Saudi-based Arab News published a report about a similar study that found 80 percent of Saudi parents approved of introducing sex education in schools.

The study found that 40 percent of Saudi fathers were reluctant to answer their children’s embarrassing questions.

Member of the Saudi Shoura Council and the Human Rights Commission Mohammed al-Sheddi then told Arab News that he believed that children should be equipped with necessary information to protect them against child abuse.

“The Shoura recently approved a protocol to protect children from being exploited for pornography. Children should be equipped with enough information that would allow them to differentiate between right and wrong, and detect whether they are being used or lured into a situation in which they may be abused,” Sheddi said.

He added ultra conservative individuals could misinterpret the term “sex education,” which he said should be offered at school within some limits.

Sex in the Olympic village: Will athletes get 'down and dirty?'

>The beds in London's athletes' village look comfortable, but are they big enough for two?

Sex And The City, move over. Here comes "Sex In The Village." Make that athletes' village. As in Olympics.
Tales of shenanigans at the living quarters for 10,000 super-fit young men and women have always abounded, and London doesn't look as if it will be any different.
U.S. women's soccer star Hope Solo recently dished about serious partying at the Beijing Games, and some newly arrived athletes say they can hardly wait for the fun to begin.
"The Olympics is the height of your career, so you might do some things you don't usually do," British beach volleyball player Shauna Mullin said with a giggle Wednesday.
Most, like Mullin, will restrain from going too far, aware they're in the international spotlight.
Still, there's no need to be prudish, according to the man overseeing the health of the Brazilian team.
"[Sex] is common at the Olympics. It's necessary. It's natural," Dr. Joao Olyntho Machado Neto said. "If you are going to be healthy people, why not make sex? ... Brazil is very tolerant with sex as a country. We don't have Victorian minds and we're not religious."
Ivory Coast swimmer Kouassi Brou was one of the youngest competitors in Beijing at 16, but he's grown up now.
And ready for some Olympic love.
"In 2008 I was so young and so shy, so I didn't interact with the women," the 20-year-old Brou said. "But now I'm a big man. So I can try. I will try."
And he's clear about his ambitions.
"If they are beautiful, it's OK," he said.
Thousands of free condoms will be available. Organizers have heard enough about village antics from previous games to know there will be heavy demand by athletes for contraception.
Solo recalled seeing competitors having sex out in the open in Beijing.
"On the grass, between buildings, people are getting down and dirty," the 2008 gold medalist told ESPN The Magazine recently.
Still, her revelations startled some athletes interviewed in the athletes' village on Wednesday.
"It's not something I've seen at all. … Maybe I wasn't up on the right nights," Australian canoeist Warwick Draper said. "It's not something I think you'd expect to see in the village."
Mullin knows how she would react to anything racy: "I'm pretty sure if I see it I'll end up laughing."
Wild parties in athletes villages are not new. Many of them live in a world where every move is followed by the media and they're delighted to unwind in the privacy of the village, where the outside world is excluded.
Ask fencer Kanae Ikehata about bed hopping between the apartment buildings, and her blushing cheeks turn even more red.
"I am Japanese," she said, suggesting her compatriots' behavior is more elegant than others.
"I'll only look," she added while shopping for Olympic merchandise.
But maybe the amorous couples Solo spotted outdoors in Beijing had the right idea.
Fitting just one person into the beds provided for Olympians in London is proving to be a problem in itself.
"As an athlete you have to relax, get a little bit of space … but here it is tight and the beds are too small," said Sierra Leone sprinter Ibrahim Turay. "It is a bit difficult for me to lie down."
There's also not much privacy.
"It's pretty tight for us. I'm sharing one room with my coach and there are four rooms in one apartment, with one toilet, so we have to figure out how to use the toilet," Turay said.
There won't be much party time for Turay. His events go nearly until the end. The closing ceremony is Aug. 12.
He hopes others can keep the sound levels down.
"I just have to keep myself away from the crowd, the noisy distractions," he said.

Irked ethics minister tells media to reduce on sex talk

 

Lokodo says the more the media have discussed sex issues, the more promiscuous Ugandans have become

The minister for ethics and integrity, Rev. Simon Lokodo has asked local media to reduce on the amount of space and airtime spent talking about sex.           

The minister says the more the media have discussed sex issues, the more promiscuous Ugandans have become, resulting into increased HIV infections.           

“There’s wrong propaganda and abuse of the media to sell into the minds of the people the fantasy of sex,” Lokodo observed.

Speaking to New Vision, Lokodo also said there was need for stern action against pornographic media.

 “Radios, newspapers and TVs keep talking about making sex. Our people have continuously become promiscuous. “

”Everywhere there’s fun- making which involves risky sexual acts.  The whole modesty of sexual life has lost meaning,” said the minister.

He was reacting to the latest revelations which show that HIV infection rates in sub-Saharan Africa are reducing yet Uganda’s annual new infections continue to rise.

The latest report from the UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) shows that an estimated 1.7 million people were newly infected with HIV in 2011 in sub-Saharan Africa, down from 1.9 million the previous year.

Of these, about 300,000 were children.

There were an estimated 23.5 million people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa in 2011, including 3.1 million children. More than 90% of children living with HIV globally live in sub-Saharan Africa.

General HIV infection rates in sub-Saharan Africa have been declining in the past years, from the estimated 2.6 million (2.4m–2.8m) at the height of the epidemic in the late 1980s.

However, Uganda’s problem is only worsening.

Uganda’s new infections rose from 124,000 in 2009 to 128,000 in 2010. At least 130,000 more Ugandans acquired HIV last year, according to the country’s AIDS Indicator Survey (UAIS) 2011.

“Because of the too much sexual talk on radios and other media, many people, especially in villages, have started comparing AIDS to malaria, a curable disease. This must be stopped,” Lokodo said.

“There’s a lot of infidelity in Ugandan families. This softening of life has caused the problem to escalate.”

The minister called for strategic interventions to awaken the consciousness of Ugandans of the HIV pandemic, especially the youth.

Internet & Free Speech Leaders Blast Village Voice Media over Child Sex Trafficking Controversy on Backpage.com

SEATTLE, Jul 20, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Today a federal court will review a Washington state law targeting Backpage.com that requires classifieds advertising sites to check the age of individuals listed in ads for sexual services, two prominent internet freedom leaders are criticizing Village Voice Media for its abuse of free speech and free internet principles to maintain an unethical business operation in its classifieds site Backpage.com, where children and teens have been advertised and sold for sex.

Timothy Karr, senior director of Strategy for Free Press, the nation's largest digital rights and media reform organization, and Sascha Meinrath, Director of the New America Foundation's "Open Technology Institute," which works to strengthen communities and communications through technology development, applied learning, and policy reform, are denouncing Village Voice Media's attempt to hide behind the First Amendment and the federal Communications Decency Act, which states that online service providers are not responsible for the content of ads placed by third parties.

"We need a free and open internet and we need to abide by the Communications Decency Act; but it is morally reprehensible when a company like Village Voice Media hides behind the false pretense of Free Speech to profit to the tune of $22 million a year, while it knows children are being bought and sold via advertisements on its site. Village Voice Media needs to remove human trafficking from its business model," said Karr.

"Free speech is a foundation for participatory democracy, but it is no defense for the abuse of children," stated Meinrath. "When corporations like Village Voice Media claim that free speech allows them to abrogate the fundamental human rights of minors, they undermine the very underpinnings of civil society."

Wendi Adelson, an attorney, author and clinical professor at Florida State University College of Law, also addressed the free speech issue in a column last week on Huffington Post, writing: "Free speech matters critically to a free society, but free speech has never been thought critical to encompass facilitating criminal attacks on children."

The criticism against Backpage has come from many different directions and has been mounting since August 2011 when 51 of the nation's attorneys general wrote a letter to Backpage.com, demanding the adult services section of the site close. Since then, 700 multi-faith religious leaders, 53 leading anti-trafficking experts and organizations, 19 U.S. Senators, state and city lawmakers around the country, over a dozen prominent musicians, more than a quarter of a million citizens, and others have called on Village Voice Media to exit the adult ad business.

Last week, FAIR Girls, a social service organization dedicated to preventing the exploitation of girls worldwide with empowerment and education, launched an online and television ad that portrays the true story of a 13-year old girl who was repeatedly advertised for sex by her pimp on Backpage.com. The ad calls on the public to sign a petition on SignOn.org, demanding Village Voice Media shut down the adult section of its website. The ad also calls on the public to contact 26 major advertisers in Village Voice Media's 13 flagship publications, and ask them to discontinue their advertisements in Village Voice Media newspapers until the company permanently closes the adult section of Backpage.com.

As Malika Saada Saar, Executive Director of Human Rights Project for Girls, has stated, "Backpage is a rogue entity that has unapologetically made the exploitation of children its business model, and as such has disregarded the tech industry standard for protecting children that leaders like Google and Microsoft have set."

Human Rights Project for Girls is a human rights organization dedicated to protecting vulnerable young women and girls in the U.S.

Who says sex books are boring?

Sylvia Day turns people on for a living.
She is an author, whose latest novel, Bared to You, is a New York Times bestseller.
It is an erotic romance novel which tells the story of a young and passionate (i.e., horny) couple.
She’s a newly-transplanted New Yorker about to embark on a new job at an advertising agency, located in an office tower owned by a very wealthy man, with whom she will soon find true love.
The romance begins and off come the clothes, over and over and over and over again. In every manner you could imagine.
The pages are smokin’ hot.
In fact, I searched and searched to find a sentence or two that I could share with you to give you an idea of how sizzling and graphic the writing is, but I couldn’t find anything suitable for this newspaper. Seriously.
It’s pornography or at least I thought it was before the author corrected me.
“Porn is written expressly for the sexual titillation of the reader. There doesn’t have to be a plot or character development,” Day said.
(From what I can gather in this story the guy in question has quite the development — you know, his huge office tower. Hello, Dr. Freud, are you there?)
Apparently there are two distinct types of erotic literate.
“There’s erotica, which is based on one character and how their sexual journey changes them, and there is erotic romance, which follows the journey of the romantic relations of two or more characters,” she said, adding “you can’t take the sex out, the story doesn’t work.”
I’ve always believed that.
Days’ Bared to You follows in the wake of the mega seller Fifty Shades of Grey, the first novel in a trilogy which includes Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed.
Fifty Shades of Grey chronicles the romantic journey of a young college graduate and her lover, who is also a young business magnate. Sound familiar? Therefore it qualifies as an erotic romance novel as well.
The book has been chastised by some for featuring bondage, discipline, sadism and masochism.
A disc jockey south of the border organized a book burning.
But apparently readers don’t care.
Thirty-one million books have been sold and the rights have been sold in 37 countries.
It is the fastest-selling paperback of all time, surpassing Harry Potter. I wonder if Harry has magic wand envy?
Interestingly enough, both books are authored by women.
Day doesn’t mind being in the shadow of Fifty Shades of Grey. She believes it has opened up a lot of people to erotic literature and has been a plus for the genre.
It’s also been cited for the boom in sales of sex toys and it’s believed by some that it will trigger another baby boom.
Kind of like the NHL strike did.
But aren’t these books really just Harlequin romance novels with exposed nipples?
“That’s actually not inaccurate,” Day said.
It seems we’ve entered a new age of literature — a more liberal and open-minded one.
And if these novels are the new Harlequin romances, at least men won’t be so quick to complain when their wives bring a book to bed.
No wonder some women seem to be smiling more often these days.
Ted Woloshyn hosts “Saturday with Ted” from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Newstalk 1010

Gay politicians and the tabloid press

A new book - Sex, Lies and Politics - analyses the coverage of gay politicians in British newspapers and asks how much has really changed since they were routinely "outed" by the tabloids?

"Readers of The Sun know and speak and write words like poof and poofter. What is good enough for them is good enough for us,'' Sun editorial, May 1990.
Politicians' private lives have always been a source of intense fascination for British newspapers and their readers.
But when homosexuality is thrown into the mix, the scandal is always served up with extra relish and, all too often in the past, distaste.
Homosexual acts in private between two men were decriminalised in 1967, but the 1960s also saw the Profumo scandal and an end to automatic deference towards those in authority.

Lord Boothby's private life was exposed by The Sunday Mirror

 

Politicians like Labour MP Tom Driberg and Tory peer Lord Boothby, whose homosexuality was widely known among colleagues and political journalists, had been able to use their contacts and influence to keep details of their private lives out of the press.
Even when a newspaper broke ranks, as the Labour-supporting Sunday Mirror did in 1964 when it exposed Boothby's sexuality and links to the criminal underworld, it often paid a heavy price. The Mirror retracted its story, paid Boothby £40,000 in damages and sacked its editor.
But by the 1980s, the "outing" of gay MPs and peers had become a tabloid staple.
And the advent of HIV/Aids had snuffed out growing signs of tolerance in favour of widespread homophobia, according to Open University lecturer Donna Smith's new book, Sex, Lies and Politics.
'Gay mafia' By the time The Sun published an editorial defending its use of the word "poof" in a headline, in response to a Press Council rebuke, attitudes in Fleet Street were starting to change.
But it took another eight years - and a new editor - for Britain's biggest selling daily newspaper to finally rethink its whole approach to stories about gay issues and, arguably, catch up with the shifting attitudes of its readers.

David Yelland, who took over the top job from Kelvin Mackenzie, says: "In 1998 The Sun ran a front page story claiming that the country was being run by a gay mafia.

"That was the turning point for me as an editor. I immediately felt ashamed that I had allowed the story in and I wrote an editorial the next day saying that in future The Sun would no longer invade the privacy of gay people by outing them.
"The gay mafia story felt wrong to me but I also believe it was out of step with the public, who were becoming far more tolerant and accepting of gay people.
"I think there was a golden age for tolerance during Tony Blair's first term, but in recent years I think some newspapers have gone backwards.
"Having said that, there is a world of difference between the tone of coverage now and some of the overtly homophobic stories of the past."
'Gay PM' The greater tolerance towards gay people in the tabloids "undoubtedly had an impact on the political climate", argues Yelland, now a director of PR firm Brunswick.
He adds: "I think it would now be possible, for example, to have an openly gay prime minister in the UK.

"I think that is very possible indeed because the British people are more tolerant than some of their newspapers."

The change in attitude has been remarkable, according to Donna Smith, but, she argues in her book, true equality will not have been achieved until there is "equality of scandal".
Suggestions of a gay relationship still bring out the prurient instincts in the tabloids and add an extra frisson to stories about politicians, as can be seen, she argues, from the coverage of David Laws, the Lib Dem cabinet minister forced to reveal his sexuality during a row about his expenses.
"Gay politicians who have a positive persona generally are ones who are in a relationship. There is no scandal around their sexuality," she told BBC News.
"They are open about their lives. There is no possibility of them being "outed" because they have pre-empted it."
'Ridicule and denigration' The newly tolerant climate came too late for Peter Tatchell, an openly gay political campaigner who was the victim of a tabloid witch hunt in 1983 when he stood as a Labour by-election candidate in inner-London Bermondsey.
"I was subjected to what is widely accepted as the most homophobic political campaign in history," says Tatchell now.

Gay rights campaigners have fought a long battle for equality

His victorious Lib Dem opponent, Simon Hughes, who years later was forced to admit having had gay and heterosexual relationships, has since apologised to Tatchell for the tone of his campaign.
But the real venom came from the press, says Tatchell, who believes his decision to stand on a "radical" gay rights platform meant that he was regarded by the tabloids as "completely beyond the pale", while more high-brow media simply shrugged their shoulders at the homophobic coverage.
"I was subjected to constant ridicule and denigration. Reporters went through my rubbish bins, they staked out my flat with telephoto lenses, The News of the World published a photo which made it look as though I had plucked eyebrows, lipstick and eye liner.
"And they got away with it. The then press regulatory body did nothing."
'Genuinely shocked' Far from putting him off public life, Tatchell's defeat in Bermondsey inspired him to step up his campaign for equality - often meeting journalists face-to-face to persuade them to change their approach.
"Even some who previously were not that sympathetic, or even a bit homophobic, when it was brought home to them the scale of violence against our community and the ongoing arrests of gay people for completely victimless, consenting behaviour, some of them were genuinely shocked," he says.
"And it motivated them actually to change the tenor and the tone of what they wrote and said."
Tatchell believes that if he had begun political campaigning now, rather than 30 years ago, "I suspect I probably would have won the by-election".
But he says he has no regrets and - like David Yelland - believes the climate has changed to such an extent, with several openly gay MPs now in the upper echelons of British politics, that a politician's sexuality no longer has to be a handicap to their career.
"I went through that baptism of homophobic fire in 1983. That's history. I'm living for the present and I hope that one day in my lifetime we will have an openly gay prime minister," he says.

Spanier denies knowledge of sex abuse allegations

Casts blame on former general counsel Cynthia Baldwin

Former Penn State President Graham Spanier delivered a three-page letter to the university's Board of Trustees Sunday, telling the group that he had no knowledge of previous allegations of abuse against Jerry Sandusky until he read the grand jury presentment.
In the letter, he casts blame on former Penn State general counsel Cynthia Baldwin, saying that he was guided through the process by her, and that she gave him little information on what was going on.
Specifically, he said that she failed to inform him about the testimony provided to the grand jury by two top administrators, as well as about what they said in her presence during interviews with prosecutors from the state Attorney General's office. Mr. Spanier also contends that Ms. Baldwin failed to inform hiim that he had been subpoenaed to testify.
"She told me I was going voluntarily, as I had previously agreed to do, and she accompanied me before the judge and in the grand jury room and sat through my testimony. I had no preparation or understanding of the context," he wrote in a letter obtained by the Post-Gazette. "As I was being sworn in for my grand jury appearance, much to my surprise she handed over to the judge a thumb-drive containing my entire history of emails back to 2004."
Charles DeMonaco, the attorney representing Ms. Baldwin, said that he and his client deny any improper conduct by Ms. Baldwin.
"She at all times upheld her duties to the university and its agents. She is obligated to maintain silence to fulfill her ethical obligations to the university," Mr. DeMonaco wrote in a statement. "This silence should not be used against her to give credibility to these and other allegations against her. [W]e intend to address factual allegations and legal issues directly with the university and in legal proceedings, not in the media."
Attorneys for Mr. Spanier would not comment in the letter.
In it, he said that he also provided to the trustees as much information as he had regarding the Sandusky matter, countering claims within the Freeh report that he withheld important information from the university's governing body.
"The Freeh report also is egregious in its incomplete and inaccurate reporting oof my 2011 discussions with certain trustees, advice and reporting from the university's general counsel, and the recounting of unfolding events in November 2011," he wrote. "I want to be clear that the chair of the board of trustees was kept informed by me throughout 2011 to the fullest extent I was able, beginning on the Sunday after my grand jury appearance and in other discussions with trustee leaders."
Mr. Spanier denied having any knowledge of Mr. Sandusky's repeated abuse of young boys, saying he "hadn't the slightest inkling" until after the grand jury presentment was released that Mr. Sandusky was being investigated for incidents before or after a complaint in 2001 that he was having sexual relations with a boy in a locker room shower. "Had I known then what we now know about Jerry Sandusky, had I received any information about a sexual act in the shower or elsewhere, or had I had some basis for a higher level of suspicion about Sandusky, I would have strongly and immediately intervened," Mr. Spanier wrote.

Air Force instructor sentenced to 20 years

Air Force Staff Sgt. Luis Walker arrives for the fourth day of his trial at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, Friday, July 20, 2012. Walker is accused of sexually assaulting 10 basic trainees, with charges ranging from rape and aggravated sexual assault to obstructing justice and violating rules of professional conduct. If convicted, he could be sentenced to life imprisonment. (AP Photo/San Antonio Express News, Billy Calzada)

SAN ANTONIO — An Air Force instructor was sentenced to 20 years in prison Saturday, after being convicted of rape and sexual assault in a sweeping sex scandal that rocked one of the nation's busiest military training centers.
A military jury at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio found Staff Sgt. Luis Walker guilty Friday night on all 28 charges he faced, including rape, aggravated sexual contact and multiple counts of aggravated sexual assault. A judge consolidated those charges Saturday into 20, but that didn't affect Walker's maximum sentence. He could have received life in prison.
Walker is among 12 Lackland instructors investigated for sexual misconduct toward at least 31 female trainees. Six instructors have been charged, on counts ranging from rape to adultery, and Walker was the first to stand trial. Walker also faced the most serious charges of all those accused.
Prosecutors say from October 2010 through January 2011, Walker sexually assaulted or had improper sexual or personal contact with at least 10 female recruits. Walker's court-martial included testimony from all 10 women, including one who described him luring her into an office and sexually assaulted her on a bed, ignoring her pleas to stop. The Associated Press does not usually identify sexual assault victims.
Five women testified during Saturday's sentencing hearing, saying they couldn't sleep or maintain relationships with men after the assaults. They said Walker's actions eroded their trust in authority and affected their performance at work.
One said it affected her tour in Afghanistan because she felt uncomfortable being alone with men.
"It's made it extremely hard to interact with authority figures," she said. "During my tour in Afghanistan, I was a little bit more scared of everything. I can't work with certain individuals just since they remind me of Staff Sgt. Walker."
Lackland is where every American airman receives basic training. It has about 475 instructors for the approximately 35,000 airmen who graduate every year. About one in five recruits are female, pushed through eight weeks of basic training by a group of instructors, 90 percent of whom are men.
Walker was convicted by a jury of six men and one woman. Under Air Force rules, the jury can declare a defendant guilty by a three-fifths vote on each individual count, rather than the unanimous decision required in American civilian courts.

Chaplain at same-sex wedding leaving SBC

NAMB head says military chaplains must be willing to support Southern Baptist teachings “without reservation.”
A Southern Baptist-endorsed Air Force chaplain portrayed recently in national media as watching approvingly the blessing of a same-sex civil union in the chapel he oversees informed officials at the SBC North American Mission Board July 19 that he is leaving the Southern Baptist Convention.
Earlier Baptist Press carried a story quoting chaplain Col. Timothy Wagoner saying he didn’t mean for his attendance at what is believed to be the first gay civil union or wedding ever to take place at an American military installation to give the impression that he personally condones same-sex marriage, but he was there to show support for the serviceman who took part in the ceremony with his civilian partner and the Lutheran chaplain that Wagoner supervises who officiated.
After a July 4 Associated Press story about the ceremony, NAMB chaplaincy officials contacted Wagoner to “talk to him” about the article, NAMB spokesman Mike Ebert said July 17. “He wanted to make it clear that he stands squarely on the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 view of this issue, and he was happy to have that point clarified since the article might have given readers a different impression," explained Ebert, vice president for communications.
A July 13 Baptist Press story quoted Douglas Carver, retired U.S. Army Chief of Chaplains and a two-star general who took over as executive director of NAMB’s chaplaincy work after retiring from the military this year, as saying he had received assurance that Wagoner was “either misinterpreted or quoted out of context” by the Associated Press.
On July 20, however, Baptist Press quoted NAMB President Kevin Ezell saying that he expects the 1,450 Southern Baptist chaplains that serve in the military to support Southern Baptist doctrines “without reservation” and if a chaplain cannot do so, “then it is best to part ways.”
"When it comes to what our chaplains believe and practice, we do ask and we do expect them to tell," Ezell said in a play on words on the military’s former “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that prevented people who are openly homosexual from serving in the military but also prohibited harassment or discrimination against those that remained in the closet.
Social conservatives warned that allowing gays to serve openly would lead to a mass exodus of military chaplains forced to choose between military policy and their faith. According to the July 4 AP story that quoted Wagoner, however, there have been very few problems since the ban was lifted last September. Col. Paul Dodd, a retired SBC-endorsed chaplain and co-chairman of the pro-gay Forum on the Military Chaplaincy, said July 23 that he found it ironic that for all the dire warnings that the DADT repeal would create a crisis of conscience for large numbers of chaplains, one of the first conflicts reported involved pressure not from the military but instead the sponsoring body.
Unless Wagoner finds another body to endorse him, he will have to resign from the military. Attempts to contact him July 23 were unsuccessful.

NY marks 1 year of gay marriage, impact unclear

NEW YORK –  One year ago, New York became the largest and most influential state where gay marriage is legal, raising supporters' hopes that it would boost national momentum and pump money into the state with a flurry of weddings from Manhattan to Niagara Falls.
As the anniversary nears Tuesday, the law's effects are noticeable if hard to measure.
Thousands of same-sex couples have wed across New York, but it's unclear just how many, partly because marriage applicants aren't required to identify themselves by gender. The wedding business is up, but some planners in New York City say it's not booming.
And while President Barack Obama announced support this year for gay marriage, no state has enacted a law allowing it since New York. And opponents note that North Carolina voters banned it.
California, which is almost double the size of New York, has been tied up in court over the issue since at least 2004 when the mayor of San Francisco ordered city clerks to issue licenses to gay couples and the subsequent popular vote in 2008 to ban same-sex marriages.
One thing is clear: legalizing gay marriage in the cultural, media and business hub of New York City amped up the national spotlight on the issue.
"Do you know I still have people come up to me and congratulate me on my wedding?" said Carol Anastasio, who was among the first bouquet-waving, teary-eyed newlyweds when New York legalized gay marriage July 24, 2011. News crews swarmed Anastasio and Mimi Brown outside the city clerk's office in Manhattan.
"I work in a public park so I'm outdoors a lot and people will be walking a dog: 'I thought that was you! I saw you in the paper! That's great!'" said Anastasio, a city parks manager. "It's really amazing how it just continues."
New York inked its gay marriage law with a nail-biting state Senate vote on the night of June 24, 2011, after weeks of intensive lobbying by Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Exactly one month later, New York became the sixth and largest state to allow gay weddings — more than doubling the number of same-sex couples eligible to wed.
The new law was ushered in with a whirlwind of weddings that started in the minutes after midnight from Niagara Falls to New York City.
"When it became a reality in New York, that's when I think most Americans started to realize that this is something we'll all be dealing with and started thinking about it seriously," said Marty Rouse, national field director for the Human Rights Campaign. "The momentum from New York can't be underestimated. After Massachusetts becoming the first state, nothing has had that influence."
Rouse said that because of New York's size and influence, people around the country had to think seriously about what legalization meant for them and their families.
Even as Obama announced his support in May, North Carolina voters that week approved a constitutional amendment defining marriage solely as a union between a man and a woman. State lawmakers in Maryland and Washington passed same-sex marriage laws, but voters will have a final say in November over whether the measures will take effect. The issue is also on the ballot this fall in Maine and Minnesota, where opponents are ready to spend up to $20 million to keep the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman.
Opponents note that despite legislative victories in states like New York, voters have rejected gay marriage in all 32 states where it has been on the ballot.
"As it passes, people begin to realize that it's more than two people standing at the altar, it literally alters all of society," said Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council.
Ahead of its passage, an analysis by the New York Senate's independent Democratic conference predicted there would be up to 66,500 same-sex weddings in the first three years that would generate $311 million in increased revenue and economic activity.
A year out, the exact number of gay couples wed statewide is unknown. New York City, where most gay people are wed in the state, did not immediately have any numbers. At least 3,424 same-sex marriages occurred outside of the city by mid-July, according to state Department of Health figures.
People involved in New York City's wedding industry report only a mild surge in business. The prevailing view among vendors is that many gay couples already had celebrated their unions before the legislation was passed. Now all they really want is the legal paperwork, not a four-tier cake.
"The kind of people who were throwing lavish parties or celebrations were celebrating with or without the piece of paper," said Sarah Cohen, owner of Blossom and Branch, a Brooklyn-based boutique floral design studio. She guessed the law's passage translated to two or three more weddings this year than she would typically handle.
The Rev. Will Mercer, a New York City-based Christian minister, said gay weddings now comprise a third of his total business — generally about 150 ceremonies a year. But at least half of them choose quiet ceremonies with only about a dozen close family members or friends.
"The wedding is part of their whole experience during their visit to the city," Mercer said.
The change was more noticeable in the "honeymoon capital" of Niagara Falls where the city clerk issued 459 marriage licenses in the year after passage, compared with 382 the previous year.
"That's business we wouldn't have had otherwise," said Sally Fedell, whose Falls Wedding Chapel is one of several in town.
But proponents say the true impact goes beyond numbers. New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who married her longtime partner Kim Catullo in May, said she's been struck by the goodwill same-sex marriage has generated around the city, and not just among supporters.
"I go to places where you think based on the sign over the door: This place is conservative, they're not going to want to see the ring, ask how it was, congratulate me," she said. "Couldn't be more wrong."