Hey Sarah Palin, don’t blame Levi Johnston for that baby in your daughter’s belly. Blame Blair Waldorf and Serena van der Woodsen!

Teenaged girls who watch so-called television programs with high sexuality content, like Sex & The City, That ’70s Show and Gossip Girl, are more likely to become pregnant within the next 3 years, reports the New York Daily News.

That’s rich.

I’m not denying the media’s impact on impressionable minds. But it’s an argument full of holes (no pun intended).

First of all, the messages on these so-called “racy” shows are being characterized as black-and-white: pro- or anti- wild irresponsible sex. On That ’70s Show, the lead characters Donna and Eric dating for a long time before sleeping together. Same thing for Dan Humphrey, who is a virgin when he sleeps with Serena on Gossip Girl, and Blair, who was saving herself for her boyfriend Nate Archibald. (Nevermind that she got distracted by Nate’s best friend…but it is a primetime soap, people!) These characters are all juniors or seniors in high school, which means they are 17 years old or so, the average age an American woman loses her virginity.

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The TakePart Top 10 Weekly Roundup is now here to give you the very best of Katie, Nicole, Giulia, Gina and Kerry! If you worry about missing your favorite bloggers’ posts as they push their way down the page each and every week - Never Fear! Check out our most popular posts of the week, as well as a few TakePart blogger favorites.

Katie:

Woody Guthrie: This Grammy Is Your Grammy / This Grammy Is My Grammy

Rambo Fights for Burma’s Freedom + 5 Steps You Can Take To Help Burma In 5 Minutes

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Nicole:

“Yes We Can” Obama Music Video a Unique Celebrity Endorsement

Top 10 US Grant, Scholarship and Fellowship Awarding Foundations

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Giulia:

Ba-Da-Bling Commercials Pulled in New York

“Safe Sex or No Sex” Shirts Get Teens Suspended

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Gina:

10 Internet Videos Featuring Celebrities Advocating For A Cause

Close Up: An Introduction to Iranian Cinema and Cinematic Rainbows

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Kerry:

Sheryl Crow’s Apocalyptic Peak-Oil Song

Solar Powered Soldiers Wear Uniforms with Built-In Batteries

Tori Shoemaker and Cheyenne Bird, two St. Louis-area 9th graders were  suspended from their Illinois junior high school for wearing condom-bedecked t-shirts proclaiming “Safe Sex Or No Sex” as a way of protesting their school’s abstinence-only education policy. Jezebel.com reports

Shoemaker, 15, told a local TV station, “We were supporting safe sex, it’s something we believe in and we shouldn’t get suspended. It’s freedom of speech.” The school superintendent, however, found the shirts “inappropriate” and “a distraction at school”. Shoemaker and Bird’s school, Lewis & Clark in Wood River, Illinois, teaches abstinence only to sixth and eighth graders, and Shoemaker thinks that safe-sex education is imperative for teens entering high school. “We’re more mature, we’re going up to the high school, and teenagers are going to do what they do,” Shoemaker explained to a reporter from KMOV TV.

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Conservative Virginians are fighting back against their own Governor after he slashed funding for abstinence only education. Timothy Kaine eliminated 275,000 from the state’s budget that was set aside for programs that taught high school students abstinence as a form of sex education and pregnancy prevention. Attorney General Robert F. McDonnell seemed slightly confused about the idea of “separation of church and state” when he expressed his surprise at Kaine’s actions:

“He is a Catholic, and I am a Catholic, and I know our church teaches abstinence,” McDonnell said of Kaine. “I am puzzled by his decision.”

Both parties cite different studies to back-up their claims that teaching kids not to have sex works or doesn’t. On the other end of the sex-education spectrum in New York City, Dr. Michael Carrera has implemented programs across the boroughs that work to empower young women and educate them about their bodies through a community and skill based curriculum. Young people starting at age 12 can participate in programs designed around Carrera’s plan in approximately 20 states throughout the country.In Queens NY, teens at the Jacob Riis Settlement House use Carrera’s ideas in their Project Excel program and just finished their first collaborative CD, “The Triumph - Our Journey, Our Story.” There may not be a study to prove the program’s effectiveness but take a listen to some of the amazing tracks on their myspace page - they’re proof enough that empowerment and creative expression is never the wrong way to go.The debate between how to best prepare America’s teens when it comes to the facts of life is one that will most likely continue for years to come - in the meantime maybe the officials in VA should put their feelings aside and all meet for a date to see Jason Reitman’s latest film Juno when it’s released later this winter, the film has been getting a ton of positive buzz since it played at Toronto earlier this fall: