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# Every child should be a wanted child
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/every-child-should-be-a-wanted-child/
- Published: 2008-06-24T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-24T19:58:39.000Z
- Author: David Pisarra
- Tags: Opinion, Santa Monica, #archive-import

SEX. THERE, I SAID IT. PEOPLE HAVE IT. Rather regularly and frequently without thinking beyond the moment.

Some people use it for recreation, like others exercise or ride a bike. Some use it in the confines of a committed relationship to communicate with each other. Some are completely indiscriminate in their choice of partners. Straight, gay or somewhere in-between, there is a wide variety of what people do, and what others think people do.

It is a constant discussion among some people, and others are absolutely against any type of talk about it. They don’t want to know what other people do, how they do it, and how often.

For men, there is a great deal of bragging about how much, how often, with whom. For women, not so much.

The general consensus seems to be that it is a natural expression of our humanity, and that we shouldn’t be ashamed of it. Yet there is also a profound and pervasive sense of anxiety in discussing it. We have major battles about what can and can’t be taught in schools to our children.

Usually it is the parents who are least likely to discuss sex with their children, who are most against having the schools teach anything about the actual process and the emotional implications; let alone the fact that pregnancy can result from a one-time, 30-second coupling. It is these prudish, usually fundamentalist, church going, sexually repressed people who kick up the most dirt when the subject is broached.

The people who feel that all sexual activity outside of marriage is a sin are the ones who try to regulate the behavior of people they don’t know.

They try to keep others in the blissful state of ignorance as to what is appropriate sexual behavior between consenting adults. They feel that their moral strictures about what is right and wrong, ought to apply to all people.

I thank them for their concern, but frankly wish their desire to live in ignorance was kept to themselves. This ostrich in the sand mentality about sex, sexual diseases, and oh yeah, that little thing called pregnancy, is really not serving people well.

There are in recent years, approximately 1.7 million children born to unwed parents nationally. Many of these parents are in committed relationships, but a significant percentage of them are not. More importantly, many of these children are not planned for, and the parents are not prepared to be parents.

Which is why I think since we live in such a nanny state that we have to have fluoride in our water, because so many of us cannot remember to brush our teeth twice a day, then we should also have a contraceptive developed and put in the water.

Yes, I’m serious. It should be a contraceptive that has an oral antidote, and that antidote should be readily available at all pharmacies, and it should be given away freely to any person over the age of 18, and under 18 to those people who have a letter of consent from their parents.

This is not about restricting the rights of the people to have children. I think anyone who wants to have a child should have the right.

But I thoroughly believe that every child should be a wanted child. This little step, the mere act of having to stop and go to get an antidote, I believe, would reduce the number of children that are unwanted.

Now I’m sure the fundamentalist loony right will have a field day with this, saying that it is interfering with God’s plan. But if it reduces the number of women who obtain abortions, which in California was 208,430 in 2005, then that would be a good thing.

Nationally at the current rate, 1 in 4 women will have an abortion by the time they are 45\. Of the women who have abortions, 86 percent are unmarried and 57 percent are economically disadvantaged.

In Los Angeles County there are approximately 8,700 children in some version of state foster care, and another 9,400 in family/friend of family care, which is county supervised.

If as a society we can make people buy car insurance for “their own good,” limit the drinking age, put controls on smoking, and put additives in water, why can’t we do something about the one thing that we know is going to happen, that has lifetime consequences, and puts a huge strain on our economy?

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 24, 2008.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/062408.pdf?ref=smdp.com)