sex education

Wait a Second, Am I Really Saying the Words "Ronald Reagan's Major Contribution to Sex Education?

Posted by figleaf on Thu, 2012-11-29 20:26

Photo by Flickr user
Photo by Flickr user "The Official CTBTO Photostream." Used under a Creative Commons license.

Yes, conservative jerk, twice-divorced, serial-deficit-increaser, twice-fathered-children-out-of-wedlock, and former President, Ronald Reagan made a major contribution to sex education and, for that matter, sex: kids (and grownups!) can have much healthier, more natural sex lives: "Trust but verify."

Sure, he was talking about something else. But nevertheless it's still relevant to sex education.

Here's the scoop.

I grew up thinking you're centered and well-adjusted about sex.  And to an extent of course I was.

But in retrospect?  Wow, did I grow up around some really, really terrible influences!  Lately the realization has made me question so much of what I "know" is true.  It's not that everything I know isn't true, but as I reflect on the sometimes deeply suspect influences I was exposed to growing up I find myself really, really, really wishing I'd had some kind of access to second opinions.  And third.  And most importantly varied!  Because, seriously, in my community you could find plenty of agenda-driven Bible thumping opinions, and equally agenda-driven anything-goes-baby "swingers."  But inbetween?  Next to nothing.  And really?  It all works out a lot better if your framework for sexuality to come waaay from somewhere in between and waaaaaaaay less from trying to reconcile screaming extremes.

Ugg.  Too bad for me (and a shocking percentage of the rest of the population that was born in the 20th Century.)

Anyway.

Watching my children grow up I'm... pretty sure they're not subject to the same shame/blame/denial/jpressure/ust-plain-wrong-information I was.  Largely, I think, because it's possible to get corroboration from more than one authoratative source.  Most of which, in turn are "open source" in the sense that they're public information and therefore subject to public acknowledgement, criticism, clarification, and dissent.

There are obviously more, and yes, obviously not all resources now available are 100% accurate, timely, wise, or helpful...

But the most important item, almost even more important than the actual list above would be

  • Peers who are coming of age with at least some exposure to credible sources like those above, and
  • Adults who have also been exposed to credible sources like those above.

I can't say how incredibly important this is.  Because with credible feedback from reliable sources, or even the possibility of such feedback, it's waaaaay more difficult for even "well meaning" adults and peers to pump the next generation's heads with really, really bad information.

Here's the problem.  Sex to an uninformed pre- or emerging adolescent is already in-credible, as in "unknown and often difficult to believe."  And for that reason it's hard to separate the in-credible things peers and grownups say that are generally true and equally (to them) in-credible sounding things that are just incredibly, and sometimes destructively false.  Even when they have the very best of intentions.

Actually, maybe especially when they have the best of intentions!

Anyway,


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The Bogus Two Rules of Desire and "What Do You Wish You Had Known About Sex When You Were Younger?"

Posted by figleaf on Wed, 2012-11-28 15:09

From time to time I'm asked to answer a question for Em & Lo's "Wise Guys" feature as one of their "straight married guys." The other day the question was "What do you wish you had known about sex when you were younger?"

Here's what I said:

Wow. There are probably hundreds of things I wish I’d known about sex when I was younger but the number one-with-a-bullet thing I wish I’d known when I was younger is that, contrary to the Santa Clause maxim, it’s actually as good to receive as it is to give. Really. No kidding! I grew up in the “she comes first” era which, while certainly an improvement of the earlier “she comes?” era, still had a big element of putting women on pedestals and treating them like dainty, passive, recipients rather than participants in sex. I remember being really, literally shocked* out of the mood when one partner pushed my knees apart, popped me into her mouth, then popped back up a moment later with this huge grin and said, “Oh, I just love doing this.”

At the time it simply hadn’t occurred to me that she might enjoy making me moan as much as I enjoyed doing the same for her.

Anyway, that’s the lesson: if you’re used to only giving, or only receiving, you’re missing half the fun.

Source: Em & Lo

There are so many other things I wish I'd known about sex back then. And relationships. And... ok, a bunch of other stuff too but especially sex and relationships. Because in retrospect there's so much to flinch, cringe, and outright make apologize for.  My old blog tagline remains depressingly true: "learning from mistakes so you won't have to."  Sigh.

* I know, I know, use of "literal" in the context of "shocked." Yeah, yeah. I was literally shocked in the sense of "experiencing an acute stress reaction," not "muscular convulsions induced by electrical conduction." And not literal shock as in "life-threatening medical condition that occurs due to inadequate substrate for aerobic cellular respiration" either. But I digress...


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Masturbation and the "No-Sex Class:" Captain Awkward Advises Mom About Gendered Assumptions About Young People and Masturbation

Posted by figleaf on Mon, 2012-10-15 16:29

Photo by Flickr user MassDistraction. Cached as a bandwidth-conserving courtesy
Photo by Flickr user Sharyn Morrow. Used under a Creative Commons license.

Jennifer P, a.k.a. Captain Awkward takes a crack at one of the giant double standards that, despite two decades of Sex and the City re-runs, plus maybe 50 years of Cosmopolitan magazine, continues to persist about young people and masturbation.  Particularly young women and masturbation. (See also Rule of Desire #1.)

The question was from a mom who asked her teenage daughter if she'd like a vibrator, expecting the daughter to say "eww, no." Instead the daughter said "heck yeah," at which point the mom started feeling a little "eww" about it. And asked Captain Awkward for advice. The advice, is, as usual, a masterful combination of diplomacy and non-common sense, and you should go read it yourself.

What I'd like to call out, though, is her quick summary of the whys and hows of that immediate squeamishness and surprise at the daughter's enthusiasm. (Hint: it also echos reasoning used by former Surgeon General Jocelyn Elder, Oprah, Heather Corinna, and others.) Check it out (emphasis mine.)

Teenage boys are FAMOUS for spending long periods of time alone in the bathroom or their bedrooms, and everyone knows what they’re doing and laughs it off as no big deal. It’s only fair that teenage girls get that same privacy and room to become their own first and best sex partners. I think that feeling that this makes you a bad parent is that old double standard you were raised with lurking in the back of your mind, the one that says that the sexuality of teen girls MUST BE CONTAINED or else SOCIETY CRUMBLES. I think that a teen girl who understands her own desires is going to be a better advocate for herself when she does start having sex. If you feel like people in your life would be judgy, invoke privacy. There is no reason that you have to share this decision with anyone other than your daughter or seek anyone’s approval.

Source: Captain Awkward

Quick aside: I gotta say that it's probably not ok that the theory, practice, and needs of teenage boys are left pretty much unspoken as well, leaving them in a lurch of their own when the time comes for them to have sex. Most notably, whereas society acts scandalized at the inconceivability that girls might masturbate, it acts disgusted that boys do. With the assumption that no "man" would masturbate if he could instead, including by hook or by crook, "get" sex from someone else. But I digress...

I can't find the link but there's a point in one of the CherryTV round-table discussions where one of the women says something like "growing up we thought masturbation was just a guy thing." So she ended up going much longer before trying it than she might have done. One doubts she was alone.

Anyway, I have it on very good authority that teenage boys spend a great deal of time in their rooms not masturbating (don't ask me how I know but even, um, 20 times a day leaves a young person quite a few hours in between for non-masturbatory pursuits.) And so it's a bit creepy that people laughingly assume that's what they're all doing just because gender stereotypes (not to mention the dominant paradigm of men as the obligatory "sex class") insist that's how it must be.

Meanwhile I have it on somewhat less-personal authority that some of the time teenage girls spend in their rooms sometimes does involve masturbation. And it's just as creepy that so many people primly assume they don't, wouldn't, maybe even couldn't just because gender stereotypes (not to mention the dominant paradigm of women as the disinterested, rather-knit-or-talk-about-their-feelings "no-sex class") insist that's how it must be.

Instead, left to our own devices (huh, huh, I said "devices") boys and girls probably would end up distributed across bell curves that largely overlap. Better to acknowledge it than pretend it ought to be some other way.


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If You're *Really* Interested in Teaching Abstinence in School...

Posted by figleaf on Thu, 2012-06-28 12:31

Photo via Retronaut.com. Cached as a bandwidth-conserving courtesy
Colour photographs of a Square Dance, Oklahoma, 1940 by Russel Lee, found on Retronaut.com.

A lot of people seem to misunderstand that sex education isn't the same as sex instruction.

Based on the awful memories most people have of getting ballroom or square dancing instructions in school I suspect the threat of getting sex instruction in school would put more people off sex forever than would 10,000 moron "abstinence only" classes involving tape, gum, sweater lint, or rose petals.


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North Dakota's 2011 "Abstinence Within Marriage" Sex Ed Rule May Only Clarify that Orgies AFTER Marriage Are Still Off Limits

Posted by figleaf on Wed, 2012-02-01 00:45

Via Daily Kos, and the Huffington Post the Guttmacher Institute noted that in 2011 the state of North Dakota, restless with the prospect of abstinence only before marriage, decided to take things a little further (emphasis mine.)

A new requirement enacted in North Dakota mandates that the health education provided in the state include information on the benefits of abstinence “until and within marriage.”

Source: Guttmacher Institute

Wowzie, huh?  Sounds almost too good to be true, eh?

Well, to be fair it's only mostly true, as a little bit privacy sacrifice to Google reveals.

According to the Minot (North Dakota) Daily News last April

Rep. RaeAnn Kelsch, R-Mandan, the chairwoman of the conference committee, said the phrase "before marriage" could lead students to think they're sexually unrestricted after getting married.

"This sends a much stronger, louder message, and probably more true to the facts," Kelsch said. "Once you're married, it doesn't mean that abstaining from outside issues goes away, and children should be taught that."

Source: Minot Daily News

I'm not positive this is better.  It would indeed be ludicrous for anyone to seriously advocate abstinence within marriage.  And it doesn't look like that's what Kelsch was advocating in her wording change.  (Another story reports that her committee met 12 times to hash out the wording of that one sentence.  So it's not surprising that it might sound a little muddled.)

Instead it sounds like maybe Kelsch thinks North Dakota's children are too stupid to realize that "abstinence in marriage" implies "and monogamous within marriage."  And so she felt it was important to spell it out.

I dunno.  I assume she knows North Dakotans better than I do.  And so perhaps she's responding to some spate of post-marital swinger orgies.  My guess would be that instead she's instead just signaling conservative "credentials" in a state that's already so right-wing conservative there's just not many other directions left in which to express "concern."

So again, probably not as ridiculous as it can be made out to be... but still pretty seriously ridiculous.


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Since Most Girls Get it From Boys, and Most Boys Get it From Girls, a Suggestion for Reporting on Adolescent HPV Myths

Posted by figleaf on Mon, 2012-01-09 21:18

I'd like to suggest one small edit to Reuters health and science reporter Julie Steenhuysen's otherwise commendable article on young people's misunderstanding of HPV vaccine protection, based on one of her own previous, equally commendable article on HPV vaccine recommendations for boys.

Some adolescent girls adolescents who get the HPV vaccine to prevent cervical cancer wrongly think they no longer need to practice safe sex, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

The study, published in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, shows the need for better education about the vaccines and their limitations.

Merck's Gardasil and GlaxoSmithKline's Cervarix vaccines protect against strains of the humanpapilloma virus or HPV that cause cervical cancer. Gardasil also protects against some strains of the virus that cause genital warts.

But neither vaccine can prevent other forms of sexually transmitted diseases such as syphilis, gonorrhea or human immunodeficiency virus or HIV that causes AIDS.

And HPV vaccines can only prevent HPV infections; they do not treat active infections.

Most girls young people who get the vaccine know its limitations, the researchers said, but the vaccines are recommended for all girls young people aged 11 to 12, and overestimating their effect could increase a young woman's person's risk of contracting other sexually transmitted diseases.

Source: Reuters

Given all the hype, and given how recently the vaccine has been recommended for boys it's understandable that people are still thinking mostly in terms of HPV vaccines and girls. But the fact remains that boys as well as girls are at risk of HPV-related cancers (it's linked to penile, throat, and rectal cancer, for instance.) And it further remains the fact that (statistically speaking) by definition boys are as likely to receive HPV and other STIs from girls as girls are likely to receive them from boys. That's sort of how heterosexual disease transmission works.

Finally, call me a rebel here but while I understand the researchers surveyed only adolescent girls and so it would have been inappropriate for them to extrapolate... it's a safe bet that a comparable survey of adolescent boys would find they're at least as likely to make the same mistake.

So if it was me, while composing educational outreach materials on the matter I'd drop the adolescent boys or adolescent girls language and just make sure I was trying to reach adolescents, period.


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Julie Sunday on Teen Sexuality, Teen Pregnancy, and Access to Birth Control: The Titanic as Metaphor

Posted by figleaf on Wed, 2011-12-28 16:54

Sex educator Julie Sunday offers the following pithy summary of an analysis by Professors Kathrin Stanger-Hall and David Hall of state sex-education policies and rates of teen pregnancy and birth.

Sex education matters, yes, but access to services is more important. Teens do not have sex for the purpose of avoiding pregnancy--they have sex because sex is fun. If adults and policymakers want teenagers to use birth control, they will--but we have to teach them how to use it and help them figure out how to get it instead of erecting [heh] insurmountable barriers to keep them from avoiding pregnancy and spreading STIs.

Teen sexuality is like the Titanic--the ship is definitely going down. We can either play music and pretend we're not sinking or provide life jackets and get the people off the ship already. Considering that the House's recent budget proposal included renewed funding for the terrible, horrible, no good very bad Community Based Abstinence Education program (Read: federal government gives money to religious organizations to provide "education" in public schools and make cheesy PSAs), this country is still letting the ship sink without enough lifeboats for everyone.

Source: How to Have Sex in Texas

It's an interesting, sort of back-handed twist on the Titanic metaphor but I think that's about right.  The idea, incidentally, isn't to make birth control and sex safety materials available so that teenagers (or anyone else) will have sex, it's so that those materials will be available if or when they do.


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Holly Pervocracy on the Very Enjoyable Elephant in the Sex-Education Policy Room

Posted by figleaf on Wed, 2011-09-07 19:30

Happy belated blog anniversary for Holly Pervocracy, who kicks off year number five by reminding us that when it comes to even progressive sex education there's still a rather enjoyable elephant in the room:

When I had my first sex ed class, they told me that the man would get an erection and put it in the woman's vagina. (They did not tell me about other configurations, which is kind of a shame considering how much those other configurations have become a part of my life. It's like taking an Auto Shop class that has a moral stance against any discussion of the radiator.) What they didn't tell me was why people would do such a thing. To have kids, okay, and... peer pressure? Low self-esteem? Media glamorization? Dealers?

By the time sex ed rolled around again, I'd gone through puberty. (And gotten an Internet connection.) I understood quite well now. And I also understood that the teacher, being post-pubescent and married herself, probably was also familiar with those funny feelings that make you want to do the baby thing. And yet those funny feelings didn't come up at all in sex ed class this time either. In a room full of people who more or less all knew full well what it feels like to have a boner or get wet or masturbate or have a wet dream, we spent an entire semester pretending to wonder why people would do such a thing. Peer pressure, perhaps...

This stalwart denial of the bleeding obvious is still following me around as an adult. Almost every discussion about sex--even the ones by the "good guys"--seems to footnote pleasure if it doesn't ignore it altogether.

Source: The Pervocracy

Yup. Because when we're finished impounding sex by overloading it with various social, political, evolutionary-psychology, and (heaven help us!) economic overtones it's almost an afterthought that we mostly do it because unless you're outright doing it wrong it feels really, really good.

And yes, as a matter of fact there really are a lot of ways to do it wrong -- not least thanks to the myriad elements we overload it with -- but if only we had some kind of well-developed social institution, maybe one that begins with "educa" and ends with "tion," that we could begin giving people in age-appropriate measures that would help them not only avoid doing it wrong but actually doing it right.

Nah, that's crazy talk.


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The Two Rules of Desire and How to Have First-Time Sex Instead of Just "Losing" Your Virginity

Posted by figleaf on Fri, 2011-08-19 10:38

An anonymous guest-blogger at Em & Lo has written the best, most useful useful and myth-busting sex-related post I've read in a very long time.

As a 21-year-old virgin I thought sex was going to be the most overwhelming, painful, awkward, terrible, awful experience ever.  Why did I think this?  Because friends, magazines, and blogs all over the place said so. Not so! Yes, cashing in your V-card is a big deal: your first experience can set the tone for how you approach and engage in sex for years to come. Which is exactly why you shouldn’t stress and fret about the impending deed for weeks or months (or even years!) beforehand like my boyfriend and I did. If you follow these 10 prep rules, then when you’re ready, you can relax and just do it

Source: Em & Lo

You really, really want to go read the post for details on the ten prep steps she recommends but here's the simple list:

  1. Make sure you’re with a partner that you trust completely
  2. Admit it’s your first time
  3. Share your expectations with each other.
  4. Get your protection lined up beforehand.
  5. Speak up in the moment.
  6. Related to #5: Even if you think it’s a stupid question – ask!
  7. Be sensitive to your partner’s concerns.
  8. It’s okay if you laugh!
  9. Lower your expectations.
  10. Help the sex feel great.

Again, each item makes sense enough.  Her explanations make them even better. Go read them.

What I love about the post is that any one of those items, let alone all ten, dismantles almost everything that makes stereotypical virginity "loss" disappointing or worse.  More to the point, if you use any (or preferably all) of your 10 items first-time sex can become the beginning of something new rather than the end or “loss” of something irreplaceably valuable.

It's probably no surprise that I've noticed the interplay between the standard narratives about virginity "loss" for women and both of the bogus Two Rules of Desire. Of course sex for the first time is supposed to have all kinds of symbolic value and of course the pragmatic experience for women is supposed to be over on the negative side of the dial! Inside the dominant paradigm that drives the Two Rules, women aren't really supposed to enjoy sex in the first time, the adjustment from "naturally" never having sex to having it is supposed to be about as jarring as a fish getting hooked, and thanks to rule #2 she's certainly not supposed to be enthusiastic -- instead she's supposed to be chastely "submitting" in order to seal some kind of transactional deal for love, support, or duty.

Note: If you were to transpose a few adverbs and adjectives in the blogger's introductory paragraph you've got the corresponding v-card myth for young men.  But what I really like about her list is that each of those items would benefit for men and boys for their first times as well.

And one last thing: That list of 10 ways to make your first time positive is also a list of 10 great reasons why it’s ok to wait. First because why do something when you’re not ready, and second, when you are ready why settle for anything less than making it good for you?


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The BDSM Community is a Great Source for Concrete Advice on Applying "No Means No"

Posted by figleaf on Mon, 2011-06-27 21:19

Note: Still on a happily hectic family vacation on the awesomely laid-back Greek island of Lesvos and so posting and comment moderation will continue to be sparse.  Today or tomorrow we're going to try and get over to Skala Eresou, which in addition to being Sappho's birthplace is also supposed to have an awesome beach.

It's really great to keep spreading the message that "No means no" and as a slogan "no means no" is memorable and effective. But a slogan isn't really adequate for helping people navigate real-world situations: you also need real-world illustrations and examples. Sarah Sloane offers an example from the BDSM community that ought to be part of mainstream Relationships 101.

Keep in mind that you do not need to have a reason to say no – you are entitled to say no for any reason (or even no reason) at all. It’s YOUR decision whether to play or engage in sex. You also do not need to give them a “rain check” or tell them maybe another time unless you want to – in fact, in my experience it’s been worse for me to tell them “maybe” instead of just saying no and leaving it alone.

When I came up in my leather community, I was taught that one of the things that bind us together is a sense of respect; part of that is respect for ourselves and our ability & power to say no, and part of it is respect for the other person that we’re talking with. Honesty – not the blunt, hurtful kind, but the compassionate kind – will be something that both you and the person that you’re being honest with can live with.

Practice saying no – to your mirror, to friends, in writing – and use those practice sessions to feel more comfortable and confident when you say it. When you’re in a position where you’re not sure what to say to the other person, tell them that – and ask them if you can get back to them. Take the time you need to make a decision; it’s a very rare situation to have a potential play session with someone that you will literally never see again, so there’s no need to pressure yourself into deciding. And when it comes down to it, remember that no means no – and if the person in question spends time trying to talk you into it, or becomes defensive, then that should be a clear indication that it’s not someone that you wanted to play with in the first place.

Source: Fearless Press

It's almost a cliché in social theory that minority or alt communities will be more accurately aware of their differences and similarities than will the mainstream culture they're embedded in. And that therefore they may have useful insights that the mainstream culture would benefit from. Cliché or not, the BDSM community really has necessarily invested considerable time pondering issues of peer pressure, consent, and maintaining mutual respect. Of course, Sloan's case demonstrates that, being human beings, BDSM people often need active coaching and sometimes frequent reminders. But, being human beings, everyone else frequently needs those same reminders as well.

Via Viviane's Sex Carnival


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