Talking to Your Teen About VD (ca. 1972)

this leader allows the projectionist to complete adjustments before presenting the film this voice has the same intensity and tone quality as the narration which follows you've got what how could he do something like that he's probably ruined himself Al life now I hope he didn't tell anyone else we've got to keep it quiet guess we should take him to the doctor but let's make sure he doesn't report it if he reports everyone will know it's not our fault is it maybe you should try to talk I think it's too late I really should have spoken to him sooner you know he never tells us what's on his mind never did maybe we just didn't listen they're talking about venial disease it's not a crime it's a disease there are thousands of scared kids like this walking around with v if we discuss it openly we can cure it even prevent it well I think we're guilty about anything that involves uh sexual uh activities well I think we were all brought up uh in a generation where it was difficult to talk about normal sexual Affairs abnormal sexual Affairs surely any disease affecting the sex organs or even the organs themselves I hope we're coming out of that Dark Age how wide and deep is the gap between Generations listen to this group of teenagers in an unrehearsed discussion they and Dr Chara were filmed at different times and edited for this presentation so easy that was really great you know don't know [Music] today I I'd like to start out by uh talking about Communications among yourselves and your families and I'd like to throw out a question and and see how you react to this what are some of the differences between the way you would talk with your parents and your friends if you tell your friend something and you say you want it confidential then it'll stay confidential but not if you tell your parents and your parents usually don't understand what you mean anyway or they'll say oh that's not important but it is or to you it is if you tell your parents something confidentially they'll tell it confidentially to their best friend and they'll do the same and it's all over town I always cocktail parties you know plus the fact parents don't have the same problems that we have the kids you can talk to cuz they have they're in a lot of the same situations that you are you have no trouble you know talking to them because they understand you more than your parents the things that I go through as a teenager now are not the same things that they went through as a teenager and they are not able to to accept what I'm going through one gets syphilis in the same way that one gets ghea by intimate sex organ contact even if you've got young parents who are like in their 30s they were still were teenagers more than 20 years ago and they grew up back you know way back in the Dark Ages was so long ago that you know everybody tends to forget this has nothing to do with morals uh the church and the home can still do their moralizing and should there are some important moral aspects of this problem but they don't do anything for the disease problem those things can be kept I think clearly separate they may remember but it's just it's not the same type of problem I don't think it's that they've forgotten things if you're 16 or whatever and you come home with with a straight F report card or or pretty poor report card I mean they're not going to tell you well I had report cards like this one semester I got 3 DS and they're not going to say that they're going to say well why can't you be like me or your father I got straight A maybe they didn't like Joo down the block who did better they if they didn't do so well in their childhood they may not talk about themselves and say why don't you be like him he got straight A my grandmother shipped out all my mother's stuff to our house and I was looking through all the report cards and she didn't do so hot think that some of the things that we go through today they didn't really the same situation wouldn't have come up yeah like sex like now sex is more open today back then it wasn't it was taboo oh s on the penis a rash a lot of these symptoms a discharge and and the women particularly uh may or may not be venial but these are important symptoms they've got to be checked and this is why you can't treat these diseases in the drugstore you got to know what you have before you know what to take for if I bring up drugs or or alcohol or sex or anything it's automatically assumed that I the reason I'm asking is because I'm doing it we don't run you know we don't talk about drugs and alcohol that much in the house but I don't think that if we ever really did get into a really deep discussion my parents would automatically assume she's you know using drugs they just I don't think they would they seem to think that you're involved with it or that you're getting involved with it and you can't really discuss it because if they think you're involved in it they're going to be terribly scared and upset and everything you can't just discuss it they have set morals and set values and they expect you to take after them and as soon as you bring up a question like something in about drugs or about sex and it doesn't fit into their morals you know they they get really upset and they want to know why and you just end up getting into quite a argument or something a lot of times the kids will know more about it like say drugs uh the only thing the parents know is what they've been fed by the sheriff's office or something or other some propaganda and the kids the kids know even the kids that aren't involved know more of what it's about and the parents do and they know what the parents are going to say and there's nothing really to discuss well I'd like to see VD education fitted into a more general program of thorough health and sex education so that it isn't just thrown in cold but is understood deeply and thoroughly by all kids going through school and starting at very early ages perhaps uh early junior high or or before where where my mother would read something in uh local newspaper and she'd say oh well here's this Eagle Scout who uh went off and took LSD and then he killed his sister and he's in a mental institution what do you think of that oh those drugs are terrible they ought to shoot people or something and you can't help but agree with her and then then they'll walk off very satisfied and say well we've taught him I mean that's you know and then what he learns in school that'll supplement that they're going to assume that you're involved in it if you're older than 12 and even so they you know what they're going to say and they know what you're going to say and it's just going to be a rerun yeah but take something like alcohol and suppose they have drinks also they can't say it's definitely wrong because they do it well kids are almost always wrong as far as as far as parents are concerned a lot of times my parents and I you know have fights over who's right and who's wrong but it's not like they're totally blocking out the possibility that I'm right because a lot of times I am and they finally see it well my parents think that I'm too young to know anything you know if we get into an argument I'm not old enough to be smart enough you know I don't have enough knowledge yet because I'm only 16 well I think there's one point for the parents because they have more experience you know a lot of the things they've lived through already so they know what happens as a result of certain things but you know which the experience is something that kids our own age do not have and I feel that sometimes this really helps but I think a lot of times they really do know really do know what's going on you know we're I don't know we just don't want to go to them and you really don't want to go to them and tell them everything that happens because you don't want to really want to hurt them as far as you're concerned it's considered funny but your parents take it seriously like it's the greatest tragedy of the world or else they don't take it seriously enough like something to you could be really really serious and they'll just kind of brush it off as not that you know serious or anything garia is a discharge it means a discharge from the gonad from the generative organs it's a disease that causes pain and discomfort and discharge from the generative organs of people if something is very important to you and it's Earth chattering parents are kind of afraid to accept it and if you tell them something uh they won't believe it or they just pretend that you didn't say it and they try not to believe it and that's something you know if you tell a friend a very serious problem like that uh and you tell them that you mean it they're going to believe it and they're going to think about it but parents are sometimes too scared of it I mean your friends are objective you know they can if you have some sort of problem you can you know say this is what's happening and you know what do you think with your parents I mean they're emotionally involved with you like they they're worried about your welfare in most cases with me it depends on which which kind of reaction that I'm feel like dealing with at the time whether I feel like you know having people shrieking and crying and screaming in the case of my mother or whether i' I'd prefer to be greeted with just a Stony stare from my father so in the mo in most cases I just avoid talking to them at all costs like if I told my mother in confidence and then she'd tell my father because I don't know well he's included in the confidence according to her but so I don't really say anything really serious to either one of my parents but not so serious things I'll talk to my father cuz my mother just carries on for hours on end about everything I think it would probably have to be my father because he's less infected with this I'm the parent and you're the child type thing and maybe it's because of his job my mother used to be a teacher and he's got a different job he can be more objective about things like that uh my mother takes too much of a domineering role and my father can really and discuss things and and listen to someone else's point of view uh and things like that but in general like uh Cameron said with a really serious problem I wouldn't discuss it with the in in the male in the man it's an infection of the front por of the penis the tube that lines the penis becomes inflamed becomes very painful to pass urine and there is a whitish drip at the end of the penis which indicates trouble and in general men go and get treatment because they're very uncomfortable as far as serious problems go I don't think I can talk to either of them but when it comes to something like you know schooling or college or or something that's important to me but not but not a serious problem I suppose I could talk to my father better because he he seems to understand more with women the situation is unfortunately quite different can we take a look at this uh chart what this is actually is a female cut in half and I'll just show you uh what we're talking about so that we can describe what happens in gharia begin with this is the outside and this is the inside this is the tube through which the penis passes this is the womb this is the tube and ovary this is the tube through which the urine passes this is the bladder this is the rectum it's the backbone now in garia the cells lining the tubes into which the penis enters in Intercourse the birth canal if you will the vagina are of a type that the ganara organism does not uh grow well on so that in a w in a woman the organism sets up its infection here in the mouth of the womb in a man if you remember the infection is different it is in the canal here that that through which urine passes this also can occur in in women the organism also can and often does in women infect the uh area in the rectum in in uh uh later stages of Gonorrhea this infection in the mouth of the womb which the woman feels not at all this is not a sensitive area she doesn't isn't aware that she's infected can spread up through the womb out into the tubes and ovaries and cause severe permanent damage to these organs these internal organs and all this thing is inside way deep inside that's the problem with ganaria in the female and also it's very hard to treat because it is so far inside hey I I'd say it would have to be both because if it was a serious matter the first one I talked to would drag the other one in anyway anyway but seems my father isn't home all that often I usually wind up talking to my mother but I don't find it any easier to talk to her than my father I wouldn't even begin to talk to my father we just there's too much conflict you know he hasn't really accepted me as as a girl but like one of the guys and so we just don't talk and my mother's National Pastime is worrying so I don't talk to her you know she just she takes everything to heart you know if the infection happens to hit this little passage where urine comes there may be burning on urination but there may not if it just sets up in here or in here only in late stages does she feel deep severe pain but early nothing well I feel that I could talk a lot more with my mother because she tries to be more open and subjective to my problems where my dad has a lot more set values and does not like to deviate it all from them set things about you know sex premarital sex is definitely out or anything with drugs or smoking alcohol's a little different they're kind of half and half about that but he's very very strong against like VD he' be totally against he would he would I he kick me out of the house or something I come up with something like that I think they probably thrown me out or something even just discussing it is just it's a forbidden hidden subject in our house and it's the disease itself would would get them and the way I and the way I got it would just totally oh they just go bananas and that would just totally Revolt them it would be too much of a shock it wouldn't be getting it wouldn't be VD itself it would be how I got it when when she gets what is called a tubo ovarian abscess a real real big severe infection in the tubes and ovaries yes there's pain then but that's uh some weeks or months after infection all that time she has been very infectious from this infection here in the mouth of the womb of which she had no indication or only a very slight discharge which for many women is essentially normal the last thing I'd ever do is tell anybody in my house um I think I'd like to go to my parents I'd like to be able to share that kind of thing with them but I think that not only would their opinion of me change like just at that moment but an overall opinion like somehow you know in the future like that was one thing that might lead to another and and their whole opinion of me would change when we spoke about the complexity of gner in the female and female don't come to you you have to get them in and tell them that they have been exposed to a male and therefore they probably have Gara if you're sure what you're dealing with uh there are a number of drugs but they vary that are effective one is a variety of kinds of penicillin the other is a various types of M drugs so these are potent antibiotics they must be taken in proper quantities for proper length of time and checks have to be made to sure that the cure to be sure the Cure was complete the first person and probably the only person that I really talked to about it once you know a test came up positive would be my my partner and tell her you know that she has it and get us both you know treated and dealt with think the idea of the other party is very important that's probably one of the first things that crossed my mind because this kind of thing can travel in like a huge chain to can involve any number of people I think i' discuss it first of all with my brother because I feel that you know he's somebody that I know will keep everything confidential but yet he's he knows enough that he he'd be able to give me some good advice about it and and I'm sure I I go and get it treated and then maybe you know later like maybe a couple months later then go and try and tell my mother or maybe even both my parents but I would never tell them before to the male if it's uh if the infection is allowed to go for too long it causes scarring of that tube inside the penis if that scarring in later life uh as it often does become severe uh it causes interference with the passage of urine a very extensive and damaging problem it also may cause sterility in the male and chronic infection in the glands number one I wouldn't tell my parents at all because that would totally you know just wreck them my mother would be absolutely repulsed I think I would go tell my sister and then she might say something like go to a doctor but I have like a death death wish you know about doctors I'm just afraid of them you know I haven't been to one in like 5 years and nothing could make me go to one so I probably just sit home and vegetate and wait till it you know went away an oer a sore a so-called Shanker in a period of several weeks later after that disappears there is a a rash on many parts of the body there may be falling hair this rash typically affects the palms and soles of the feet syphilis can affect every organ of the body in many many different ways so that one could talk for hours about the kinds of damage syphilis can cause and syphilis causes its damage over a period of many many years the original sores and rashes go away but later severe damage to bone to muscle to kidney to heart to liver to brain all these things can occur severely I would definitely get it treated and um eventually I think I'd like to tell them but I think it would have to be either several years later or when I'm in a more secure position to be able to say well you know you remember when I was 16 years old and uh I got VD and then it they would be removed move from it they'd have it wouldn't they wouldn't have the immediate reaction they'd you know be able to say well I'm glad you know it's all over with but I wish you could have come you know to me then