In case you were not aware May 6 is National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. I know most of you probably have BBQ and parades scheduled around the topic but for those who don't here's a heads up. As part of the national day the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy had a forum around the issue today. My supervisor signed me up for it and I was quite excited to go, seeing it was at the National Press Club and would include free food. The meeting was interesting but did not include too much new information seeing that I went to a week long conference on the issue two years ago. My favorite panel was the last one. The facilitator was Maury Povich. Yes that's the man himself.
For those of you who don't know he is a daytime talk show host that does a lot of the "Who's my baby's daddy?" episodes. After the panel I felt a bit like I had just sat through what one of his shows minus the single teen mothers berating the suspected teen fathers.
The other panel members were interesting too and included:
Kristen Alderson- I don't need to say more for all you Soap Opera fans who watch One Life to Live. She is on cast of that soap and her character is a teen who got pregnant. More compelling for me than the fact that her character got pregnant was the fact that she had been on the show for 11 years. Since she was 5. That's crazy!
Vickie Collier- Vice President of Digital Media of the Disney-ABC Television Group. Apparently in the show "The Secret Life of Teenagers" from the ABC Network one of the characters just had a baby. There was a blog for teens to talk about it and the show really tried to show the real consequences of the show. Since I have never actually see the show I can't really comment on it. She was a nice though.
Ann Shoket- Editor-on-Chief of Seventeen Magazine. I was very wary of her presence as I feel like her magazine probably does as much to objectify teen-aged girls so they feel like their main asset is their sexuality as it does to address positively address the topic of teen pregnancy. I was pleasantly surprised by her comments but would need to look at a recent edition of Seventeen magazine before I say too much more.
My favorite part was the free stuff. I got this shirt for myself and you better believe I picked one up for my 50-something year old supervisor too. When I got home Dana (the girl I live with) looked up the associated website, but it was under construction so I don't really know what it means. Maybe I should wear it to a church activity or a bar:)
5 comments:
My sister and I may or may not have secretly watched Maury every afternoon after school when we were kids.
Also, I hope you still have that shirt when you come back to Ann Arbor, because I'm already making up excuses to borrow it.
I dare you to wear that shirt to your next church activity. I double. dog. dare you.
ah, I love the shirt, maybe you should wear it running?
That is the best shirt ever. I would totally wear it. Though, it is true that I own a pair of underpants that say, "What's going on down there?" on the front . . . I got them from a women's health organization and they are AWESOME.
What an interesting panel of speakers. Not necessarily the peeps I'd imagine who would be promoting the prevention of teen pregnancy.
Hey Jessica! As one of the organizers of this event, thank you so much for your fantastic comments. We love getting feedback - especially of the positive variety. Also, glad you liked the Sex.Really. shirts - they were a pretty hot item that day, so I'm glad you snagged a couple! Just FYI, for all those upcoming birthdays and whatnot, the shirt is now for sale on The National Campaign's Online Store: http://tiny.cc/AAc5j. It'll also be available when SexReally.com launches later this Spring, so bookmark the page now and keep an eye out for the launch. Thanks again for coming on Tuesday and best of luck getting your boss to wear the shirt in public.;)
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