Wednesday, June 08, 2005

Sex Ed

JP's post about the British leeches (entitled: No Need For Personal Responsibility) got me thinking. My girls are NEVER going to take sex education in school. It is a decision I've made that is final.

I'll tell you my reasons. The biggest one is that I don't want some public school moron teaching my kids about sex. How do I know if they are a pedophile or some other kind of pervert? How do I know that they don't have a feminist/pro-abortion agenda or some other opinion that I don't agree with? I would have no idea, and I will not take the chance someone is going to teach my kids something I don't want, especially about sex. It's too important.

I've heard all of the arguments in favor of sex ed, and I'm not buying them - at least for my kids.

1. But kids need to learn about sex and not be afraid to talk about it.

First of all, I don't know anyone who is afraid to talk about sex anymore, least of all me. Any questions they have will be answered honestly depending on their level of understanding. We aren't going to have "the talk." We are going to have an ongoing discussion.

2. But they need to know about birth control and condoms.

My kids will learn about birth control and condoms. But they will never be allowed to take birth control as long as I have anything to say about it. The pill is not good for women to take. I mistrust anything that disrupts an entire biological system, and I am not alone. My experience with it was cut short by pregnancy, because I forgot that they were rendered ineffective by antibiotics, and I took it for a short time after Emma was born for regulatory purposes. They always made me feel sick and that is never, EVER a healthy sign.

Condoms on the other hand, are not failsafe. I am pretty sure Emma is proof of that. But to be honest, I don't recall having the sex to get her, so she may be immaculate. Shut up. It can happen.

3. There are many children whose parents won't discuss any of this with them.

But there are plenty of parents who are, and they shouldn't be looked down upon because they prefer to handle it themselves.

If you want to hand over the most personal and important job you will ever have in your life as a parent to some potentially agenda driven pervert who doesn't know your kid from Adam, be my guest. But I won't.

I think sex ed should be purely elective. Have the kids' parents sign a permission slip and have the classes after school when they are most likely to get in trouble anyway. I don't think valuable class hours should be wasted putting condoms on fruit when most kids don't know all 50 states.

14 comments:

Zelda said...

LOL. Seeing how much sex I have should make me more than qualified. But it's more about not letting anyone else teach them their opinions, techniques, etc. regarding sex.

Jen said...

Zelda - I don't completely agree or disagree with your opinion, but I would like to point something out. You are so very concerned about someone impressing their opinions about abortion, birth control, and sex unto your children; however, you seem to have no problem believing that YOUR BELIEFS are the right ones for your children to have. At a young age, that may be fine, but as your children grow older, they need to form their own opinions. Be careful about shielding them from ALL the information just because you don't agree with it. They will hear it somewhere else and then wonder why you never shared the information with them. Do you agree with all of your parents beliefs and life choices? Probably not, and neither will your children.

Michelle said...

Zelda, I agree with you but like Angi I am the sex ed teacher here too so that isn't a worry for me... but if they did go to school then I would also NOT sign the slip to allow someone else to teach my children something so important.

Jen, I agree with you in theory but with something as important as sex education, abortion and birth control our children, even as teenagers, do not have the experiences that we have to understand all that each topic encompasses... that means that as their parents we should steer them in the direction we believe to be right until the time they are able to form those opinions on their own based on their life experiences. At 14, 15, 16 etc they don't have those experiences to draw from. As they get older and have the ability to really research they can draw their own conclusions. A little child has no idea that a car can hit and kill them if they play in the street, as parents it is our job to make sure they stay out of the street until they are old enough to understand the consequences. I think this is similar, a young teen can't know the possible LIFELONG consequences of their actions when they don't have anything to draw from. Even if they receive "education" from the schools that still isn't good enough. The capacity to think really really long term (minimum 18 years for a baby(but for most life), and life for diseases, pyschological effects from their actions etc)isn't there in most teens. Really, imposing our beliefs on them for a short period until they are able to truly form their own isn't a lot to put up with. I think as parents we know that in the long run they will all decide on their own how they feel about a given subject but when it comes to life and death issues (literally!) I don't think we can compromise.

Just my thoughts though :)

Zelda said...

Jen - There is no way I'm going to keep my children from eventually having their own opinion. But I'm not going to ever let someone else tell them something is right when I know it to be wrong. Surely no one thinks it is a good thing for a teenage girl to be injesting hormones that completely disrupt your reproductive system, or to have an abortion. And while my daughters are my responsibility, I will teach them right and wrong according to my beliefs and opinions.

Kristin said...

Amen!

Jen said...

Let me try again, I AM NOT saying that we should not instill our children with what we believe to be morally right. What I am trying to say, is that sex ed classes should not be the ONLY voice they hear, but neither should our voice. Sex Ed class is actually NOT geared towards abortion, or the morality of sex at all(at least not the class I had in high school).
Zelda - you were home schooled, so you basically have no clue what sex ed does or does not teach. I am not trying to be brash, but please don't make an uninformed decision based on some pre-concieved idea. It is a very important subject, and it is good for some kids to get a very clear view of what it really is about, because unfortunately, not all parents discuss this with their children. It sounds like all of us that are commenting do plan on being open and truthful with our children, but you would be shocked how many kids do not get this information at school. What I remember from my class in high school was the actual science behind sex, the word abstinence about a million times, and then a very brief touch on the basics of birth control. Opinions regarding abortion and other touchy subjects was not discussed AT ALL. (Abortion was not discussed as a form of birth control).

Michelle - I agree, young kids do need our guidance, and even pre-teens and young teenagers do. However, most kids take sex-ed at the age of 16-17yrs. At this point, most kids are sexually active anyways and making those kind of decisions on their own. I plan on guiding my child through life, explaining not only my point of view, but also explaining why I do not accept other points of view on the same subject. I think it is better to confront the opposition rather than ignore it. That is what I was trying to explain earlier.

And Zelda, I obviously do not want my teenage daughter on birth control or having an abortion. I would love to believe that she will not be sexually active until she is 25!! But I cannot expect her to be abstinent until she is 25, even those with the strongest of wills have fallen earlier than they thought.

Sorry - I am a realist, I believe it would be ignorant for us to believe that none of our kids will be sexually active until they are married or until they are over the age of 22. I want my children to be armed with as much information as possible so they can make the best decisions that they can.

Zelda said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Zelda said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Jen said...

Zelda - sorry I mentioned home schooling, I thought I remembered you mentioning it yourself in a previous post. I didn't mean to reveal something that you had not meant to reveal. I apologize for that.

If it truly makes you uncomfortable that someone you know from real life reads your blog, I will simply stop visiting and commenting on your blog. It is as easy as that. Just let me know.

Zelda said...

I was tired and bitchy last night. I'm sorry. Of all our friends to find my blog, you are the one I mind the least. And I did mention being home schooled, I just don't like it being used against me in an argument. :-)

So I'm very sorry for the bitchiness. I can't afford to alienate any readers especially ones who are also real live friends who are letting me list their homes for sale. :-)

Cigarette Smoking Man from the X-Files said...

I got taught sex ed in 5th grade, well before my parents worked up the nerve to talk about it or even consider it to be necessary. We had these cartoon-like books showing "how it happens" and I remember some of my friends going "ghaaaawd, that's sick!"

I think the way it worked was, any time any of us in our early teens got to be in a situation that was borderline going to lead to sex, we'd think back on the stupid little cartoons and it would kill the erection.

Zelda said...

Cig - If I was guaranteed that outcome, I'd be all for it.


To Everyone Else: I deleted my two comments because it's my blog and I can, plus I wasn't so cool to a very good friend of mine. I think I said somewhere that I'm probably going to hell.

Zelda said...

Noonie, if I could be confident that that sex ed would be taught that way, I wouldn't have as much of a problem. But I don't know that some stupid hippie won't go around telling them that it's healthy to have a sex life as a teenager, when I want them to tell boys to bugger off (on someone else, of course).

My sex ed was taught by the Catholic Church in accordance with my parents beliefs. Besides talking about STDs and showing a graphic picture of herpes, they also spoke of it as something wonderful which was not to be engaged in lightly, i.e. before marriage. They spoke of it as being special and I think I would have considered it dirty if done outside a certain context. Regardless, it gave me the confidence to not let just any moron have at the precious.

Gooch said...

The main thing I remember about sex ed is spending the whole class praying that I didn't get called on to read from whatever text we were learning from because of the possiblity of having to say "penis" aloud in front of the whole class. You can't buy that kind of embarrassment.