A Set of Twins With Two Fathers.

The New Jersey Law Journal reported on Thursday that a New Jersey woman got the shock of her life when she discovered that her 2-year-old twins have two different fathers. The mother (identified as “T.M.” in court documents) got the news last winter when she received the results of a paternity test mandated by a family court as part of her application for public assistance.

The order was made so as to establish the paternity of the twins (in order to make the twins' "father" pay child support). DNA test results however revealed that the woman had two sexual partners who are now separately responsible for the kids' paternity.

This is grossly absurd. But then, what else really is new in America when it comes to sex? A couple of years back, a young woman appeared on “The Maury Show” to know the father of her new baby. The man she suspected was invited to the show for a DNA test which proved that he was not the father. Then, she brought another man who was found to be free from the paternity as well. After the eighth man was also cleared, the show host was livid with anger as he asked her “Just how many men did you sleep with within the same period of a menstrual cycle?” I lost interest in the case after the woman brought the 12th man from her neighborhood. Alas, even that one was cleared by DNA.

One thing I keep finding painful in stories such as these though is the unfairness of the women involved to the children born out of such sexual recklessness. The hapless kids could have been spared all the nonsense if only their mothers were not so dumb as to engage in unprotected sex. When a woman spreads her itchy legs wide open while shutting off her brain, this is what happens.

The Worst Case of Child Abuse.

I still don’t understand why it’s so difficult for some women to take just a few seconds to think about the consequences of unprotected sex. It’s not just about them. In fact, it’s more about the child that may be unfortunate to be a victim of their sexual recklessness which sometimes takes only a few seconds. Why risk bringing an unwanted child to this world when all it takes to prevent the “mishap” is a condom?

This brings one to a 1989 story when a Santa Ana police officer Michael Buelna (right) found an abandoned newly-born baby in a garbage dumpster. But for the officer’s kindness, the baby could have died from exposures to the elements, dehydration or starvation. And now a 25-year-old man, Robin Barton (left) met recently with the police officer in an emotional reunion.

According to the AP, Buelna was on duty in November 1989 when he heard a faint sound coming from a trash bin. Buelna started shifting through the trash and discovered a baby, his umbilical cord still attached. The child was just four hours old and weighed 4 pounds, 2 ounces.

"He still had all the mucus and stuff, and all the trash and gravel was sticking to him," Buelna said. "I tried to give him a tiny little bit of breath, and he reacted a little bit."

Buelna wanted to adopt the boy, but another Orange County family stepped in first. They named him Robin Barton. Officers released a sketch of Barton's 19-year-old biological mother, later identified as Sarina Diaz, to the public. She was arrested and later sentenced to three years in prison for child endangerment and attempted murder.

KCBS-TV reports that news of the reunion led Barton's biological father to come forward. The two met Sunday, and Barton learned from Marcos Meza that his biological mother moved to Mexico after serving her sentence and wants to see him.

Meza said he had an affair with Barton's 19-year-old biological mother and only found out Barton had been abandoned in a dumpster when police questioned him. Meza said he has been searching for his son for years.

"It's a dream" to meet his son, he said.

Barton said he hopes that meeting his biological mother will also provide closure. "I'm not angry or upset with her, and I forgive her because she was a young woman in a very compromising position," he said.

A Stitch in Time.

Some years ago, Queen’s College, the top notch girls-only high school in Lagos, Nigeria held its PTA meeting. The meeting had barely ended when many of the parents, panic-stricken, dashed toward the dormitories to bombard their daughters with a cacophony of queries and threats of “fire and brimstones”.

The cause of this uproar had been the disclosure that some of the students were found with contraceptives. As a parent of one of the students who was following the events on phone over 10,000 miles away, I could appreciate the official concern of the school authorities. But the hysterics and the moral posturing of the parents were absolutely uncalled for. These reactions, if anything, were terribly flawed.

It’s amazing to behold the "fire department" manner by which a great number of parents worldwide react to the upsurge in sexual promiscuity among teenagers. If they are not blaming the TV, the movies and the other usual scapegoats, these parents are ever busy placing all emphasis on the female child. Alas…they are as ignorant as the kids for whom they seem to be concerned.

Governments, mostly in the Third World and even the United States, especially in the Bush era, have been demanding for total abstinence. The situation is worse in Middle-eastern authoritarian societies where political and religious leaders are not only demanding for total sexual abstinence but also have often relied on draconian laws to discourage female teenagers from premarital sex. In the global community however, individual parents and largely more so, in the western hemisphere, have simply resolved to leave kids to their devices.

It’s very important for every parent to have, at least, the patience to provide a basic understanding of the fast-evolving human physiology to their kids. In the 21st Century, there are several preteen girls (as tenderly young as eight years old) who have begun to menstruate. Going further, many of these girls, with their male counterparts, are already experiencing raging hormones that baffle them. But how many parents are up to the task of providing these confused kids with appropriate education and guidance?

On the subject of sex, many youngsters are so ignorant that they can only fumble and wobble into maturity. Most parents, on the other hand, are either playing “the ostrich” or (and) playing the role of a moral judge. To these parents, the mere sight or mention of a condom to their kids by anyone (even on the TV) is enough to send the parents into fits of rage and righteous indignation.

Ideally, the ultimate panacea to the dangers of sexual recklessness among our young people is abstinence. But to stubbornly insist on abstinence without a consideration of other worthy options is akin to assuming that teenagers are immune to “weakness of the flesh”.

There is a strong need for every family, community and society to strike a reasonable balance between the pursuit of sexual abstinence and safe sex. And this is where sexuality education (sex-ed) comes in as the only effective tool in the attainment of this feat. It’s shameful though that some parents, out of ignorance, view sex-ed as an avenue for indiscriminate sex.

Sex-ed recognizes but goes beyond a mere sermon of sexual abstinence. It’s “a stitch in time that saves nine” with comprehensive information on self-awareness, reproductive organs and preventive measures. No amount of stubborn demands for abstinence can help a fully-blossomed twelve-year-old girl who doesn’t understand the fixation of boys’ attentions to her chest. And neither can this rigid doctrine enable the same girl to grasp the implications of being called a “sweet sixteen” by some leering, dirty old men.

Equipped with sex-ed however, such a fast-growing preteen will get to understand the purpose, cause and effect of her natural endowments. And with this understanding, she is bound to survive, unscathed, the many destructive social pestilences such as unwanted pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases and self-imposed infertility. Better still the preteen is spared a future laden with regrets, physical and emotional scars.