Romance as Birth Control

I've been thinking about this topic ever since Jen Lyon (no, I didn't paste the exact blog post--get over it and look around her site!) asked this question on her blog site: How old were you when you read your first romance? What was the title the book? Now, she might not have worded it that way, but that was in essence the question.

Most of us started reading romance in our teen years, some of us were as young as twelve to about age sixteen. Some of us started with the 'sweet' romance of Barbara Cartland and the 1970's version Harlequin with Janet Daily, to the hot and sexy romance of Rosemary Rogers. One of my most favorite romances wasn't even considered a romance, Crocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters. (yes, there are two different sites here) *sigh* Radcliffe Emerson and Amelia Peabody still send chills down my spine as their romance survived through the years of archaeological digs, Ramses (their precocious son), WWI, and all sorts of adventures. Though this smattering of blog readers read a variety of romance, NONE OF US WERE PROMISCUOUS BECAUSE OF OUR READING CHOICES.

Hm, interesting. Living smack dab in the heart of the bible belt, I remember preachers, teachers, and bible thumpers droning on and on about the evils of romance. So if romance is so evil and causes girls and young women to fantasize about the perfect man and meaningful relationships, why didn't we become one of the growing statistics of teenage pregnancies?

Could it be because we wanted to believe in true love? Could it be because we learned to respect ourselves and wouldn't succumb to the a quick roll in the hay? Could it be because we really believed that there was a Mr. Right or a knight in shining armor somewhere out there? Could it be because we believed in a Happily Ever After?

Granted, this was a very small smattering of blog responders, but I thought and thought about this for awhile. With the sky-rocketing teenage pregnancy issue in this country--Oklahoma is right near the top--could reading romances be a better birth control than simply handing young women pills or condoms?

Am I simply delusional or could I have hit on something? If nothing else, I'd love to see young women and men reading more and if they happen to read romances then there truly is the power of love.

What do you all think?