Take Action: New HHS Website Misinforms Parents!

As advocates for parents, caregivers, and young people, we want to express our deep concern about www.4parents.gov , a new government website launched on March 25, 2005 by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Intended “to help you and your teen discuss important, yet difficult, issues about healthy choices, sex and relationships,” 4parents.gov presents fear-based, biased, and inaccurate information as fact. In addition, it does not address the needs of many youth, including sexually active youth, youth who have been or are being sexually abused, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth.

As an organization that believes that parents and caregivers should be the primary sexuality educators of their children, SIECUS is working in collaboration with 145 national, state, and local organizations to respectfully request that HHS:

Temporarily suspend 4parents.gov from public view.
Form a task force of a wide-range of experts in the field of public health, sexuality, and parent-child communication to review its content for medical accuracy and ensure that the presentation is comprehensive in scope—addressing abstinence as well as sexual activity—without judgment.
Revise the content to be more inclusive of all young people in a manner that empowers and supports parents in their efforts to convey their own values and beliefs to their children.
Provide a wide-range of resources to reflect the diversity of views in this country.

For a more complete explanation of our concerns about 4parents.gov, please see the letter that SIECUS and our colleagues sent to Secretary Michael O. Leavitt.

You too can help! As a parent, grandparent, mentor, or guardian for whom this website is intended, we ask you to view www.4parents.gov and form your own opinion. If you agree with our concerns, we urge you to take action by completing the form below.

Ideally this email form would be directly sent to Secretary Michael O. Leavitt. Unfortunately, he will not release his email address to the public. Instead, SIECUS will collect your letters and deliver them to the Secretary.

Your voice is instrumental in helping the government realize that 4parents.gov is shortchanging the very parents it was intended to serve.

Take action right now!

First Name	Last Name
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This is the text that will be sent to Secretary Leavitt: Dear Secretary Leavitt, As a parent, I am writing to express my concerns regarding HHS' recently launched website 4parents.gov. While I applaud your attempt to help parents such as myself talk with our children, I am disheartened with the way in which 4parents.gov approaches abstinence, sex, and relationships. Specifically, I am concerned that this new website: Dictates values and ground rules to parents. Relies on fear and shame instead of open and honest communication to foster dialogue between parents and their children. Lacks the full range of information that can empower parents to identify and share their own values, messages, and beliefs. Distorts the needs of America's youth (almost half of whom have already had sexual intercourse according to recent CDC statistics). Ignores the needs of sexually active youth, youth who have been or are being sexually abused, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth, as well as the parents of these young people. Fails to provide sufficient resources for parents who want background information on various topics such as puberty, or direct these parents to a multitude of websites and materials that could provide such information. To support the mission of HHS to lead all of America to better health, safety, and well-being, I ask that HHS: Temporarily suspend 4parents.gov from public view. Form a task force of a wide-range of experts in the fields of public health, sexuality, and parent-child communication to review its content for medical accuracy and ensure that the presentation is comprehensive in scope—addressing abstinence as well as sexual activity—without judgment. Revise the content to be more inclusive of all young people in a manner that empowers and supports parents in their efforts to convey their own values and beliefs to their children. Provide a wide-range of resources to reflect the diversity of views in this country. While the intention of helping parents talk with their children about these important issues is honorable, I hope that action is taken to improve 4parents.gov instead of continuing to shortchange the very parents it was intended to serve. I look forward to your response. Sincerely, Your name will appear here

For more information, contact [email protected].