Reflection V
In the article Risking
a relation: sex education and adolescent development, Jen Gilbert discusses
issues relating adolescent development and sex education, drawing from the work
of Winnicott and Sandler. Sex education clashes with our adolescents' efforts
to construct their identites, enjoy and experiment with their developing bodies,
and explore relationships.
I remember sex education when I was in high school. The
classes focused on many negative aspects of sexual health without any focus on
sexual emotions. The material highly emphasized the risks of having sex and
seemed to ignore all of the positive results. In fact, I don't ever recall one
of my teachers saying that having sex feels good. I also don't remember them
advising how sex can be fun. Instead, they showed pictures of sexually
transmitted infections and diseases and told us the chances of becoming
infected unless condoms are used or one remains abstinent. Sex is everywhere -
it's used in movies, television, and advertisements. It's also a stereotypical
means to grant women immense power - I never learned any of this in high
school!
What about issues regarding people who are straight, gay,
lesbian, bisexual, and transgender? Why are people gay? Can someone really be bisexual? I wouldn't know from
being straight and I was never taught this in high school. What I have learned is
from asking friends or reading on the Internet. Can you imagine how it must
feel to be a high school student who is gay, but hasn't come out, or who are
receiving negative attention? Focus on these topics are highly relevant and
were absent from my sex education classes.
Gilbert briefly discusses a story about a young gay man,
named Christopher, who's lover is infected with HIV. Christopher decides to
have unprotected sex with his partner in the name of love and wants to become infected. His test
returned negative and a counselor simply provides a routine speech about safe
sex and leaves him with brochures. Is this a result of poor sex education? It
seems so based on the reaction from the counselor. I wonder how many people
become infected with diseases because of similar reasoning.
People are extremely sensitive to their sexual emotions. I
can still remember friends who dated on and off for years. They broke up at
least once a month, which added unnecessary stress to their lives. I'm sure
their raging hormones played a huge part in this, but maybe sexual education
didn't address emotional issues like these in their classes. Perhaps they
simply didn't understand how to talk through their frustrations. How different
would their relationship be if they were taught why they might be experiencing what they went through? It's
entirely possible that they would still be together today or stayed apart after
the first breakup.
My sexual education classes focused on the negative aspects
of sex. Ideas such as why or how sex can be fun, emotions, or the sexual
orientation of adolescents were absent. High school classrooms seem to be the
only place where positive discussions about sex are 'taboo'. Everyone is
exposed to sex starting at an early age due to the nature of advertising,
movies, and television. It should be something that we are open to discuss in a
classroom environment where we not only educate the students on the risks, but
promote the positives as well, such as why we enjoy it or how we can be more sensitive
to the sexual orientations of others.
