There have been countless campaigns to discourage teenagers from having babies. The efforts are needed because there’s a high price that such young parents pay.
The cost of teen pregnancy
New York City launched a new campaign to warn against teen pregnancy. The ads show kids having a candid conversation with their parents about the cost of raising children. Some critics say it's too harsh on young parents. Supporters of the campaign say it reflects harsh realities. What do you think?
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But what’s the right way to warn teens before they become parents?
Some critics say that New York City’s latest effort goes about it the wrong way. Others believe the campaign is right on the money. The city has put up five different posters showing cute little kids having a candid conversation with their parents. Many bear the tagline “Think being a teen parent won’t cost you?”
One poster with a picture of a frowning, curly-haired boy reads: “Dad, you’ll be paying to support me for the next 20 years.”
Another one, showing a tearful little girl, reads: “Got a good job? I cost thousands of dollars each year.”
Are the words from the babes too blunt, too bruising?
“The latest NYC ad campaign creates stigma, hostility and negative public opinions about teen pregnancy and parenthood rather than offering alternative aspirations for young people,” Haydee Morales, vice president of education and training at Planned Parenthood’s New York office, said in a news release.
One of the teen pregnancy prevention posters reads: “If you finish high school, get a job and get married before having children, you have a 98 percent chance of not being in poverty.”
Commentator Melissa Harris-Perry lit into New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg about the campaign. In a direct message to Bloomberg on her MSNBC show, she said: “That is the kind of misleading statistic that might lead some people to, you know, blame young mothers for America’s deepening poverty crisis, rather than putting the blame where it belongs, on a financial system that concentrates wealth at the top and public policies that entrench it there.”
Watch Harris-Perry skewer Bloomberg.
The New York Times’ Michael Powell called the effort a “jarringly judgmental advertising campaign that aims to shame teenage parents and scare teenage girls who are not yet parents by warning that really bad consequences await should they get pregnant.”
But Keli Goff of The Root.com thinks the posters get it right.
“I’m much less concerned about the stigma teen parents may face than about the lifetime stigma their children face as they miss out on one opportunity after another because their parents weren’t ready to realize their full potential as parents while raising them,” Goff wrote.
The New York Daily News editorial board also offered its support, saying, “Cultural disapproval of personal choices is a good thing when those choices are likely to lead to destructive results.”
What’s my take? I agree with a friend who said: “If you remove the social stigma, you remove the fear, and that may contribute to more unwed mothers. The solution is to find a way to move forward. I sort of think the NYC ad campaign tries to do that by reminding young women about the financial consequences of their actions.”
The Color of Money Question of the Week: What do you think of New York City’s teen pregnancy prevention campaign? Send your responses to colorofmoney@washpost.com. Be sure to include your full name, city and state.
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