On Film, Real Life Pregnant Teens Spark Moral Debate

By David Crary

NEW YORK – In the new hit movie “Juno” and now in real life with Jamie Lynn Spears, 16-year-old girls get pregnant and decide to bear the child rather than opt for abortion. For social conservatives, it’s a challenging story line – they condemn the teen sex but hail the ensuing choice.

“It’s a double-edged sword in the Christian community,” said Bill Maier, a vice president of the conservative ministry Focus on the Family.

“We should commend girls like Jamie Lynn Spears for making a courageous decision to have the baby. On the other hand, there’s nothing glamorous or fun about being an unwed teen mother.”

In “Juno,” the spunky heroine continues attending high school even as her belly swells, and she scouts out a married couple who want to adopt the baby.

Spears, the star of “Zoey 101″ and the younger sister of pop star Britney Spears, has said she plans to raise her child in her home state of Louisiana.

The news about Spears was greeted with mixed emotions by Leslie Unruh, a Sioux Falls, S.D., activist who has campaigned against abortion and for abstinence-only sex education.

“When I heard the story, I felt sad at first,” Unruh said. “Already her life is not the norm of other 16-year-old girls.

Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, said both “Juno” and the Spears pregnancy demonstrated to teens that there are costs to engaging in sex.

“Too often, sex is presented as having no consequences,” she said. “In both of these cases, the girls are pretty much admitting that they made some wrong choices, yet they are acting responsibly now that they’re facing the consequences. That’s a mature response.”

“Juno” is the latest in a series of recent movies in which the heroine, faced with an unexpected pregnancy, chooses not to have an abortion. Others include “Knocked Up,”"Waitress” and “Bella.”

Dr. Vanessa Cullins, vice president for medical affairs at the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said these story lines – generally with upbeat endings – oversimplify the tough choices facing real-life girls and women. Each year, more than 1 million of them in the United States opt to have an abortion.

“Hollywood is in this for money and entertainment,” Cullins said. “They are shying away from having the characters fully explore all their options when faced with an unplanned pregnancy.”

National statistics released earlier this month showed the teen birth rate on the rise for the first time in 15 years.

While Jamie Lynn Spears may have the financial resources to raise her child in comfort, psychotherapist Linda Perlman Gordon of Chevy Chase, Md., – who has written about teenage girls – said daunting emotional challenges likely await.

Originally published by David Crary Associated Press .

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