Jessica

Vozel

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December 24, 2007

Lesson One: Jamie Lynn Spears Didn’t Get Pregnant By Herself

In the maelstrom surrounding the news of 16-year-old Jamie Lynn Spears’s public pregnancy, everyone seems to be searching for a lesson. 

Nickelodeon – the children’s network that produces Spears’s popular television show “Zoey 101” – applauded Spears’s decision to “take responsibility,” presumably because she decided to have and raise the child. Those who are against abstinence-only education cite this young girl’s pregnancy as proof of its defects. Others say Spears’s unexpected situation proves that American young people are on a moral downward spiral. 

Still others, such as celebrity blogger extraordinaire Perez Hilton, chose the obvious route and commented on the “trailer trash” nature of the Spears family that has proliferated even the seemingly innocent Jamie Lynn. One thing is missing from all of this frenzied speculation, however: Spears’s boyfriend and father of her child, Casey Aldridge.

Sure, we know his name, and that he is a 19-year-old, down-home southern boy that Spears met in church. But of the reactions to Spears’s pregnancy, it is Jamie Lynn who receives the brunt of the sympathy and the vitriol. Of course, this reaction could be chalked up to Aldridge’s lack of celebrity and Spears’s plentitude of it, mostly thanks to her older sister, Britney. Celebrity or no celebrity, however, the insults being fired at Jamie Lynn – most bluntly or discreetly referencing her sexuality in a degrading manner – do not extend to the male counterpart in this situation. 

Such is not an uncommon phenomenon, even outside of the celebrity sphere and especially in regards to young pregnancies. Pregnancy, unplanned or not, is still firmly entrenched in the realm of woman. I can name a handful of young girls who were pregnant in my high school while I attended there, but not one of the fathers, even when they were fellow classmates, stick in my memory because they were not stigmatized in my small hometown the way their pregnant girlfriends were. While the pregnant young women were called all manner of epithets similar to the ones being hurled at Spears, the consensus about the fathers seemed to be, “Oh, boys will be boys.” 

The lessons being pushed here seem to apply to young girls especially – do not allow boys to have sex with you, and if you do, you must do the “responsible” thing and keep the baby. I’m all for responsibility as an essential component of sexuality, but there are no specific messages aimed at young men that remind them that they contribute half of the genetic material that makes a child and should take responsibility both in preventing pregnancy and taking care of the child should an accident occur. 

Also, the media and the public in general should be wary of generalizing Spears’s pregnancy for the sake of teaching a lesson. The experience of having a child is variable, and to unequivocally call what Spears is going through a “very difficult” situation, as Nickelodeon did in their aforementioned statement, is not taking into account that she has the financial means to support her child and the maturity that comes with being in show business from a young age. Many adult women cannot say the same.

But it’s also dangerous to idealize her situation, especially given her visibility amongst young people. Spears made a choice that was hopefully her own, and one that is right for her, not necessarily for all young women (and men) who find themselves pregnant before they’re ready.

There are lessons to be learned from Jamie Lynn’s pregnancy. One, young men have as much responsibility as young women in teen pregnancy. And two, many of the other lessons being pushed as a result of this pregnancy are contingent upon situation and shouldn’t be applied universally.

© 2007 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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