While out on New Year’s Eve, a comrade, knowing I watch a lot of TV, asked me if I’d seen ABC Family’s The Secret Life of the American Teenager. I hadn’t.

Not one to turn down a challenge, I watched.

The plot centers around around a 15-year-old girl who has sex while at band camp (American Pie anyone?) and gets pregnant. Of course everyone around the school finds out before the girl tells her parents. To further complicate manners, Amy’s parents have just separated, adding more tension to the home.

In addition there’s a good amount of soap-opera-style drama in this show. Amy Juergens (the 15-year-old mentioned above) had sex with Ricky, who’s also hooked up with Adrian (the school slut), whose mom is having an affair with George, Amy’s father! And there’s Grace Bowman, whose mom Kathleen used to be married to George.

Need a flow chart? I thought so.

There’s some star power in this series. Molly Ringwald plays Ann.  I remember Molly from all those John Hughes “I-hate-my-parents” movies from the 1980s, and now she’splaying someone’s mom. Josie Bissett (Melrose Place) is Kathleen Bowman. And Steve Schirripa, best known for playing Bobby Baccalieri on The Sopranos, is Leo Boykewich, “The Sausage King.”

Oh yeah; I almost forgot this plot twist. Ben Boykewich (Leo’s son) is in love with Amy and wants to marry her even though he knows the baby isn’t his.

The show does a good job in discussing teenage pregnancy and all the issues it raises. For example one of Amy’s friends, Madison, is Catholic and as such cannot fathom the thought of Amy even considering an abortion. The program also raises the double-standard often present in these kinds of situations. The male involved can still attend school, lead his life, etc., while the girl is often shamed into hiding and left to make a lot of decisions on her own.

If you have teenagers, this may be a program you view with them. If you’re a parent of younger kids (like me), after watching, you may strategize how to keep them in the house until they turn 21.

On the heels of the July National Institutes of Health report that teen pregnancies rose in the United States for the first time since 1991, a new study from the RAND corporation shows sexual content on television to be strongly associated with teen pregnancy.

Are we surprised? Every parent I know routinely contemplates the over sexualized content of our media and the youth it targets, but what are we really doing about it? I hear mothers and fathers alike complain that little girls’ fashion includes bare belly buttons and plunging neck lines, yet many of these same parents admire the scant frocks and willingly open wallets to indulge a daughter’s desire for hardly-there swimwear and skirts with little more than a hem.

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