Principal who alleged pregnancy pact among 17 girls in Gloucester MA was apparently full of shit.

[BurtWorm]

Gee... I wonder what that fucker's personal agenda was...

:think:


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_re_us/pregnancy_pact
...

Conspicuously absent from that meeting was Gloucester High School Principal Joseph Sullivan, who has not responded to repeated requests for comment after he was quoted last week in a Time magazine story saying the girls planned to get pregnant together.

The mayor, who also sits on the school committee, said she was not comfortable having Sullivan at the meeting.

<Mayor> Kirk said she and Superintendent Christopher Farmer have been in touch with Sullivan, and that he was "foggy in his memory" about how he came to believe there was a pact.

...

But Time posted a story on its Web site Monday that included new quotes from its earlier interview with Sullivan in which the principal said a lack of access to birth control didn't play a part in the surge of pregnancies.

"That bump was because of seven or eight sophomore girls. They made a pact to get pregnant and raise their babies together," Time quoted Sullivan as saying.

...

[havocmom]

1. I wonder if he was set up like a bowling pin

When running a school, it may be helpful to be smarter than the students who may hate you.

[rateyes]

2. Ooops.

"Don't quote me on that." :eyes:

[devilgrrl]

3. A hoax? Gee, who saw that coming?

That story reeked of BULLSHIT from the get-go.

[gatorboy]

26. I did!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=3488906#3488944

But hell, what do I know? Now where is that HEEEYUUUGE "SUCKERS!" graphic?

[LisaL]

30. And who would be this sucker?

There might be more to the story than the mayor saying there is no proof of the "pact."
http://news.bostonherald.com/news/regional/general/view/2008_06_24_Mayor_s_denial_does_little_to_KO_pregnancy_pact_story/srvc=home&position=1

[JackRiddler]

29. YUP.

[no_hypocrisy]

4. Sniff, sniff. I smell a slander/defamation suit in the air.

[rucky]

6. I don't think any of the girls were named. n/t

[no_hypocrisy]

8. If their identities can be extrapolated without much effort, they can

file suit as their reputations could be claimed to have been damaged in their particular community.

[LisaL]

18. Let me get this straight.

What could damage a girls' reputation is not that she is 16 or under and pregnant, is the question whether or not she has some sort of agreement with other girls to get pregnant? O'key.

[no_hypocrisy]

21. That about sums it up.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

5. It was starting to remind me of the apocryphal "rainbow parties" the more it unfolded

Too bad we can't have an honest discussion about teen pregnancy and sexuality without these bullshit distractions.

[Pithlet]

23. That was the first thing I thought of when I heard about this story.

I thought it was BS from the get go, just like the stories of those rainbow parties. I'll still hear people talking about those things like they really happen. :eyes:

[monmouth]

7. Perhaps covering their a$$ if sex ed was removed from the curriculum...n/t

[EFerrari]

9. How weird is that. I hope this guy goes into a new line of work

like fiction writing.

[Mythsaje]

12. I'd rather he not...

There's already enough of us out there.

:)

[EFerrari]

13. LOL! Point noted!

:hi:

[Hardrada]

14. And he obviously won't be joining me and my colleagues

who are historians.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

10. Nobody could see that coming.

:eyes:

[tulsakatz]

11. even if they wanted to make a pact........

...those things usually don't happen on schedule. So even if they wanted to get pregnant at the same time, that doesn't mean that all of the girls would have become pregnant at the same time.

[Sequoia]

15. Sometimes things like that just happen.

I remember being a kid and a quite a few women at the school got pregnant at about the same time. As for me I was preggie and my youngest sister way on the other side of the state got pregnant a month later. We sure didn't plan it. Sometimes it's like you go to work and you and your co-workers are all wearing the same colors.

[tulsakatz]

22. that's true.....

for that matter, sometimes when you get your period, several of your friends will have theirs too! And you certainly can't plan that, it just happens that way sometimes......

[ContraBass Black]

25. That might not be coincidence.

http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_306.html

[LisaL]

17. The school has 17 pregnant girls, 16 and under.

The allegation is not that all of them got pregnant on the same day. In fact "Time" is reporting some of these girls started requesting pregnancy tests in middle school.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1817272,00.html

[graywarrior]

16. You really have to live in Gloucester to understand this

It was an island at one time. Cut off from the mainland for decades of winters. Get my drift?

[Rockholm]

32. We are still an island.

Separated from the mainland by two bridges.

[LisaL]

19. I don't know who is full of what.

"Time" is now calling this a "pregnancy plot." Apparently some of these girls started requesting pregnancy tests in middle school.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1817272,00.html

[kiva]

24. And it doesn't sound as if girls or babies will have an easy time of it.

"Pathways for Children CEO Sue Todd, whose organization runs the school's on-site daycare center, told TIME on June 13 that its social worker had heard of the girls' plan to get pregnant as early as last fall. She noted that some of the girls involved had been identified as being at risk of becoming teen mothers as early as sixth grade, when they began to request pregnancy tests in middle school. "What we've seen is the girls fit a certain profile," Todd said. "They're socially isolated, and they don't have the support of their families."

I don't think it matters whether or not these girls made a pact, or whether or not someone spoke out of turn--these girls are still pregnant, which is truly sad.

[karynnj]

35. That is sad -

If they are socially isolated and the pact did happen, one explanation might be that the group of girls who supposedly made this pact was the only group they felt they belonged to. The attractiveness of the idea might have been the delusion of a commune like future of all the girls as friends with their cute little babies around them. The group in essence could be a replacement for the family that they view as unsupportive. There have been things written that some isolated troubled girls see in a baby someone who would love them completely (and who they would love unconditionally). If your life is black and you see no normal path to a happy future, this idea - which in reality is a truly bad idea, could look better than the alternatives.

[lonestarnot]

20. Another sofa king we todd it! Board appears to be filling up with their news.

[guyalapatie]

27. Passing the buck to pregnant teens?

I live about 20 minutes from Gloucester. I have family raising children in MA. Is there any place in the country where they can be taught and watched over by people who will take responsibility for their own actions, or should I just tell them to head for Canada now... this is painful.

[LisaL]

28. What are you saying?

These teens got pregnant, didn't they?
Who exactly would be responsible for their actions?
Everybody else but them?

[BurtWorm]

31. Update: One of the girls says, "There was definitely no pact...it was just a coinicidence."

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2008/06/24/so_called_pregnancy_pact_in_mass_town_questioned/

So-called pregnancy pact in Mass. town questioned
Email|Print|Single Page| Text size – + By Melissa Trujillo
Associated Press Writer / June 24, 2008

GLOUCESTER, Mass.—The story made headlines almost immediately: High school girls in this New England fishing town had made a pact to get pregnant.

Now the account is under fire. One of the teenagers who became pregnant during the school year and the city's mayor disputed the pact theory originally stated by the high school principal.

"There was definitely no pact," 17-year-old Lindsey Oliver told "Good Morning America" on Tuesday. "There was a group of girls already pregnant that decided they were going to help each other to finish school and raise their kids together. I think it was just a coincidence."

Oliver said she and her 20-year-old boyfriend, Andrew Psalidas, a community college student, were using birth control and her pregnancy was unplanned.

Mayor Carolyn Kirk also denied a pact existed after a closed-door meeting with city, school and health leaders on Monday.

"Any planned blood-oath bond to become pregnant -- there is absolutely no evidence of," Kirk said.

Absent from that meeting was Gloucester High School Principal Joseph Sullivan, who has not responded to repeated requests for comment after he was quoted last week in a Time magazine story saying the girls planned to get pregnant together.

...

[raccoon]

33. Shucks, it's too late to rec this. THanks for posting. nt

[Carnea]

34. Alright we did the nose but they are still witches. NT