September 9, 2004 6:15 AM

Ignoring reality will not change reality

Texas again debates whether sex ed is too sexy

High school is the last chance for many students to get this information and some of our children’s lives will literally hang in the balance.

  • Susan Moffat

We have seen what this ‘comprehensive’ style sex-education is really about — selling sex to kids. Students need to know that abstinence until marriage is not a mere suggestion, but an expectation.

  • Jim Sedlak

Houston & other Texana

Parents and educators argued this issue when I was in high school, and it would appear that we are no closer to a resolution today. Here in Texas, the battle lines could not be more sharply drawn. I’m going to betray my bias here in my description of the two sides in this battle, but hey, it’s my sandbox.

On one side, you have though who grimly oppose any sort of sex education outside of abstinence. Apparently, the prevailing theory here is that what kids don’t know about, kids won’t try. Hmm…OK, meanwhile, here in the real world, kids continue having sex. Imagine that. Whodathunkit?? These folks may be trying to drag us kicking and screaming back to the 19th century, but simply wanting something to be a certain way will not make it so.

On the other hand, are those who seem to at least have a grip on reality. No, sex education is not about selling sex. It’s about giving kids the tools and information they need in order to make safe, sound, intelligent decisions about sex. Now more than ever, kids need to understand what they’re up against. Withholding information is hardly the best way to accomplish that.

Abstinence is a good idea. There should be no dispute with that. Few teenagers have the emotional makeup to deal with the issues associated with a sexual relationship. However, too many adults have forgotten their own teenage years. Now that kids are surrounded by sex 24/7/365, the temptations are far more prevalent and dangerous than anything my generation had to face. Teaching abstinence is a good thing, but from a practical standpoint it cannot be the beginning and the end of the educational process. No matter how well or how often we teach abstinence, some kids will succumb to the temptations. After all, some of us did- or have we forgotten about those long-ago days when our hormone-addled brains ruminated on sex 26 hours a day? If our children our not educated, how can we expect them to make intelligent decisions?

I think both sides of this argument have some valid points to make. However, the abstinence-only crowd will, by their stubborn insistence on embargoing any sex education save for abstinence, end up robbing our children of information that could well save their lives. In this day and age of AIDS and HIV, knowledge is not only power- it could also save lives. Denying that information to children is unconscionable and it could well place our children at risk. Is that really what we want?

blog comments powered by Disqus

Technorati

Technorati search

» Blogs that link here

About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on September 9, 2004 6:15 AM.

Hey, at least it won't be our problem was the previous entry in this blog.

Maybe we could sneak a few Frenchmen into Florida? is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.

Contact Me

Powered by Movable Type 5.12