Sex education, both at home and in the schools, is more important than ever because now a child with a cell phone can access all the sex information they could ever consume. In fact, most people learn about sex through porn. The problem is that porn is not real sex and is setting our children up for disaster.
In Las Vegas, Nevada a group of high school students are protesting for better sexual education. What they are asking for should be a requirement for all school districts, medically accurate sexual education.
Why have sex ed?
Comprehensive sex education is the best method of teaching sex ed. The stats support that claim because any state who offer such sexual education have lower teen pregnancies and STI rates. Children who receive sex ed are less likely to engage in sexual activity and less likely to become victims of a sexual assault. I understand the reality that many communities would bring out pitchforks and torches and run anyone who suggests such things right out of town. At the very least, we should provide medically accurate information.
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart did one of their mocking news reports on this very subject. In the report a comedian, by the name of Jordan Kleppor, interviewed the students and a group opposed to the student demands. The kids wanted to know important things like:
1.Is intercourse the only way to contract an STI?
2.The pros and cons of different forms of birth control.
Jordan also interviewed women who are opposed to sex ed at any grade level. In her words “do they really want knowledge or do they really want sex” meaning they are just horny teenagers looking for sex. Sex ed is not sex! For one, it is a discussion about the all the ways you can catch deadly diseases and is not sexy at all.
The fact is, parents do not know much about sex. A professional like myself can attest to this because, in the process of becoming an expert on relationships and sex, I was shocked at how little I knew.
Parents are a huge part of the sex ed process but are limited to their own lack of knowledge. Even finding knowledge can be a problem. Researching sex does not work very well for two reasons:
1. Content filters on the internet prevent certain materials from coming up, or it will be end up with porn.
2. There are good materials on the web but how can you find them if you’re not sure what to look for?
Kids are curious about sex
Kids are curious about the world and their bodies. They are curious about other people’s bodies as well. My son, as an infant, would hold my hand and study it like it was the coolest thing he ever saw. He moved my thumb, flipped my hand over and was just amazed by my hand. As children get older it’s healthy for them to want to know about sex. They are confused about their changing bodies, feelings, and even sexual urges.
What if your child is LGBT and confused about being attracted to someone of the same sex? Who do they turn to?
Keep this in mind, the average age of first intercourse (losing one’s “Virginty”) is 17 for both boys and girls, and has been stable at that age for decades. So, the average person will not wait until their 18th birthday much less for marriage. We are not talking about fringe behavior. We are talking about a behavior everyone but Catholic priests do. By the numbers most of you reading this have had sex before 18 years of age.
Sex ed does make a difference
Uneducated teens make uneducated decisions, especially when their whole body wants do it. So we must not allow ignorance to destroy a teen’s life, a life that has not started yet.
Imagine a 14-year-old girl who did not know fellatio can be a mode of HPV transmission and performs oral sex on a boy who is HIV positive without protection and has then been exposed to HPV. This is a disease known to be the number one cause of cervical cancer and can cause throat cancer. Just ask Michael Douglas! In her mind, oral sex is not sex and since she can stay a virgin she thinks she cannot contract a STI.
Oral sex is still sex and has all the STI risks as intercourse, except pregnancy. Protection should be used when engaging in oral sex with a condom or a dental dam. The other issue is that she has no reason to think she should get tested for HIV since she has never had “sex” and will then be passing it on to each partner until she does get tested. She would have learned this information in sex ed.
We need to provide our children the facts about sex from people who know the facts about sex.
You may want your child to remain a virgin until marriage but that might not be what child wants, and short of following your child everywhere they go, you can not know for sure they are not. If there’s a chance your child will have sex, wouldn’t you want them to know how to be safe?
A sexually educated child is a child who refrains from sex because they don’t have a condom; it’s a child who understands that you don’t need to sacrifice your body to fit in or to find and show love. It’s also the teen who makes a choice to have sex because they want to and not because they are pressured or forced into it. This is why we need quality sex ed programs.
