GALLAGHER: Bristol Palin speaks

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By Maggie Gallagher

COMMENTARY:

Is abstinence "realistic"? According to a rash of headlines, Gov. Sarah Palin's 18-year-old daughter, Bristol Palin, says "no." Thus (the media gleefully report) the young thing repudiates her famous mother's conservative values while speaking to Fox News' Greta Van Susteren.

What Bristol actually said went more like this:

Greta: "Do you have a philosophical or religious opposition to (contraception)?"

Bristol: "No I don't want to get into detail about that - I think abstinence is, like, the ... I don't know how to put it, like ... the main - everyone should be abstinent or whatever, but it's not realistic at all."

Greta: "Why?"

Bristol: "Because it's more and more accepted now ... among kids my age."

(Note: I wonder if Bristol really thinks sexual virtue is harder these days than it was, say, 30 years ago when her mom and I were teenagers. That would be circa 1979. I could tell Bristol some stories - the sexual revolution has been swinging pretty hard for a good long time now.)

Greta ask: "How do you change that?"

Bristol: "To see stories like this, and to see other stories of teen moms. ... You should just wait 10 years; it would be so much easier."