Big Hollywood » Blog Archive » In Defense of Obama’s Safe School Czar (Sort Of) – or I Was A Teenage ‘Lolito’:
"Which brings me to the fracas over Obama czar number five hundred and… well, who’s counting. The conservative blogosphere has been in an uproar because Kevin Jennings – the (deep breath) Assistant Deputy Secretary of the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools at the U.S. Department of Education, or “Safe School Czar” - failed, in 1988, while still a mere teacher, to advise a 15-year-old boy (according to some reports, he might have been older) to stop having sex with adult men (in particular one man the teenager had met in a public restroom). Instead, Jennings reminded the boy to “play safe,” and use condoms.
To be honest, I don’t see what the big deal is. Based on his own experience, Jennings probably figured it was no use trying to convince the boy to stop seeing the man – take it from me, that would have had the exact opposite effect – so the more practical tack was to urge the kid to at least protect himself, ASAP, as Jennings did. Let’s not forget the high suicide rate among gay youth; twenty years ago, that teenager surely needed somebody to talk to."
"Which brings me to the fracas over Obama czar number five hundred and… well, who’s counting. The conservative blogosphere has been in an uproar because Kevin Jennings – the (deep breath) Assistant Deputy Secretary of the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools at the U.S. Department of Education, or “Safe School Czar” - failed, in 1988, while still a mere teacher, to advise a 15-year-old boy (according to some reports, he might have been older) to stop having sex with adult men (in particular one man the teenager had met in a public restroom). Instead, Jennings reminded the boy to “play safe,” and use condoms.
To be honest, I don’t see what the big deal is. Based on his own experience, Jennings probably figured it was no use trying to convince the boy to stop seeing the man – take it from me, that would have had the exact opposite effect – so the more practical tack was to urge the kid to at least protect himself, ASAP, as Jennings did. Let’s not forget the high suicide rate among gay youth; twenty years ago, that teenager surely needed somebody to talk to."