Thanks to T&S for the link to a Salt Lake Tribune article about teens rallying in Salt Lake City for sex education. What I found most intriguing is that these teens are picketing with their parents, the very people who should be teaching them sex education.
If the parents aren’t doing their job, maybe they are the ones who need to take Sex Ed.
All people including adults need to be educated about sex. If we don’t do it in school how will anyone learn it? It is amazing how many adults are stupid. I seemed to be the only person I knew who checked out books from the library and studied before getting pregnant so I would be educated about my health and the health of my unborn baby.
I am very happy that my schools had some sex ed. My schools didn’t teach me everything about sex, history, chemistry, math, economics, health, etc. but my schools attempted to give me a basic education that every member of our society deserves.
I completely agree that parents should be educating their kids. I’m guessing that the parents who showed up are, in fact educating their kids. But society as a whole benefits when that education is extended to teens (and preteens!) who don’t have those kinds of parents.
Hence the last sentence of my post, jjackson.
What if I was to suggest that those parents who attended the rally may be abdicating their role in teaching values, virtue and chastity and instead want the state simply to supply their kids with free contraceptives to eliminate the headaches that will come without instilling proper values to their children.
I agree sex education is valuable but I will say that not teaching the how to about sex is as careless as not teaching the moral values and relationship skills surrounding sex.
This is a very complex issue, especially for those who still believe in chastity before marriage. The same approach will not work for every youth.
I see one of the problems of teaching virtue and chastity is leaving the impression that sex is dirty, sinful and forbidden. This is simply not the case as most parents want their kids to ultimately have sex and supply them with grandchildren.
When the honeymoon comes it is really important, in my opinion, that couples have all the facts about sex before them.
Anyone contemplating marriage should visit their local public library and speak to a competent health professional.
As a parent who has young children it is a conversation that I want to be an open, honest one. I feel that children need to be taught that when you are married it is OKAY and NORMAL to have sex, not dirty, sinful and forbidden.
I am LDS and was raised LDS, I to this day have NEVER gotten “the talk” from my parents. They felt that we kids didn’t need to know until right before we got married, someone should’ve slapped them. I also grew up in a town very similar to any small town in Utah, our school curriculum did NOT include sex-ed. And forget asking your family Doctor about sex, mine was my Bishop. Instead of being taught by my parents or school or doctor, I learned about the birds and the bees from friends, books, t.v. and my own personal experience. Really not the ways I want my children to learn about sex.
I am not saying schools should hand out condoms saying if you do it use this. I am saying that parents need to work with schools to educate their children on the consequences of having sex. And parents NEED to do their jobs and teach their children at home about sex. Stop hiding sex under the rug and making it a taboo subject.
I had a talk with my parents about all this and they still feel they made the right choice by not giving any of us the talk. Seriously! Every one of their children had sex before marriage, you’d think they would see that as the result of their lack of teaching about sex. Sex should never be something to be embarrassed to talk about, I have been married for 7 years and I still have trouble just saying the word, it was THAT taboo in my parent’s house. I only hope I am able to teach my children about it in a way that they will know that sex isn’t dirty, it is meant for marriage and is okay & beyond normal.
I’ve always said Utah is a weird place. Yet another example. Who’d think in this day and age that they wouldn’t have this in school? Bizarre
It is much better when kids get a normal education about sexuality, and not learning everything by themselves on their own mistakes.
It’s sad if it came to this. I think parents hesitate to talk about sex with their children because they don’t want their offspring to start their sex life too soon. Maybe they think that talking about sex when the kid is 13 might have that kid wish to experience this new stuff as soon as they can.
I also believe parents are wrong if they think that way, because they will start sooner or later, and, if they don’t know anything about sex, they won’t protect themselves.