Rep. Alma Adams, a Greensboro Democrat, is one of four primary sponsors of the House Bill 88: Healthy Youth Act.
The bill would allow parents to choose between the standard sex ed course which emphasizes abstinence until marriage, and a comprehensive approach that provides more information about disease and pregnancy prevention.
“There’s just so much evidence that our kids do need to be informed,” Adams said last week. “It’s an issue I don’t think we’ve addressed adequately.” Source
The bill seems like a practical solution to the sex ed debate. Parents, like myself, who want their kids to receive comprehensive sexuality education can have that choice. The problem is that a lot of kids are still going to get limited information. While many parents argue that they want the responsibility of talking to their kids about sex, the reality is that few of them do. In my many discussions with people about their sexual development, only a few have told me that they feel their parents truly talked to them about sex, beyond the perfunctory “Don’t get pregnant” speech.
Last week, I talked with a young woman serving with AmeriCorps. She is passionate about sexual health and is hoping to teach more comprehensive sex ed in Charlotte-area schools. She knows how important it is. She was speaking at a local high school recently and a teenage boy asked her, “What is semen?” This is a boy who was quite possibly having sex, and yet he didn’t know what semen was!
I disagree with the argument that teaching young people about condoms is like teaching them how to use a bong. I think of it like this: We don’t want our kids drunk driving, so we tell them that if they drink, they shouldn’t drive and they either need to stay where they are or call someone to pick them up. Without condoning the underage drinking, we put the emphasis on their safety. In the same manner, we can tell our kids that while we don’t want them engaging in casual sex, if they do, we want them to be safe.
What do you think? Should parents get to choose, or do we need to have one standard curriculum for every student in the state? And if we can only have one option, which should it be?
Abstinence-Only or Abstinence-Until-Marriage. This type of sex ed program generally teaches students that premarital sex can be dangerous to their physical and psychological health. Most people who support abstinence-only education believe that if you teach teens about birth control and safer sex, it will confuse them and send them the message that “sex is OK.” Instead, abstinence-only programs provide students with inaccurate and misleading information about contraception; in short, that condoms don’t work. These programs also treat topics like homosexuality and masturbation as unacceptable behaviors.
Abstinence-First. This type of sex ed program can be a mixture of things. In general, it stresses abstinence as the best way to protect oneself from pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), but also accepts that many students are already having sex or will have sex. In this case, abstinence-first programs tell students about how to use condoms, birth control, and other safer sex practices, and how to get these methods, too. Homosexuality and masturbation may be mentioned in classes, but their treatment can vary widely.
Comprehensive. This type of sex ed program provides a positive view of sexuality as a natural part of human development. It teaches about sexual abstinence as well as pregnancy and disease protection, and provides teens with skills to ensure they are able to take care of their sexual health and make healthy, responsible decisions. It gives teens accurate information about condoms and birth control, STDs, including HIV/AIDS, and also includes gay, lesbian, transgender, and bisexual issues. Comprehensive sex ed considers homosexuality and masturbation to be normal aspects of human sexuality.
Source: Sex, Etc
The most important strength of comprehensive sex ed is that it “provides teens with skills to ensure they are able to take care of their sexual health and make healthy, responsible decisions.” Knowledge is Power!
Another important point to be made is that whatever is taught in schools, it doesn’t negate the need for parents to develop an open, honest and ongoing dialogue with their child about all aspects of healthy sexuality. Talking about sex is a parent’s responsibility – and a school’s, and a church’s, and a community’s.
