Do Christians support sexual health education for teenagers

[Zoii]

Sexual education covers a broad range of topics including:

· An understanding of sex physically and behaviourally

· How to prevent sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).

· Symptoms of STDs and services available to offer assessment and management

· Sexual trauma eg rape, sexual harassment, resource centres.

· Pregnancy
This topic doesn't just apply to western nations but also to other regions such as Africa where AIDS is at an epidemic level.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

I'm so sleepy at the moment my brain cannot construct a decent post, but I did want to go ahead and respond briefly. As a Christian teen from a dedicated Christian family, I can answer with an unequivocal yes that Christians (not all, but certainly many) do believe in equipping teens with knowledge about their bodies, which must entail comprehensive sexual health education encompassing all of the bullet points you listed. The spring quarter at my school starts in the morning, so it's going to be a bit busy but I'll try to pop back on at some point this week and write a bit more about why I believe it's so crucial. I've written a few posts on the subject in the past, so perhaps at the very least I can copy and paste them here. It's a good thread topic!

 

[Paidiske]

I think you'll find that most people who'll post in this forum do.

I've certainly come across the attitude from some people that sex education is somehow a bad thing; that knowing too much will lead to bad behaviour or a distrust that the education is going to come suitably value-laden; but I don't think that's a very mainstream thing in general.

 

[Dave-W]

Zoii - there is no single or simple answer to your question.

While many now are open and seeing the advantage of teens having a full knowledge, there are still huge pockets of those that believe that ignorance is bliss; and that all sexual thought, feeling and interest does not exist prior to marriage, unless there is inappropriate content or fornication involved. Those people firmly believe that sex ed ONLY serves to incite sexual desires; and with no education there will be no desires.

 

[Zoii]

And you believe that Dave?

 

[Dave-W]

And you believe that Dave?

That was what I was raised up to believe; but no, I do not believe it at all.

For starters, it was not my experience at all. So I read up on it and found that most sexual desires and thoughts are hormonally based, not educationally based. IMO any theory of sexuality that ignores that fact is doomed to failure on multiple levels.

 

[RDKirk]

I think you'll find that most people who'll post in this forum do.

I've certainly come across the attitude from some people that sex education is somehow a bad thing; that knowing too much will lead to bad behaviour or a distrust that the education is going to come suitably value-laden; but I don't think that's a very mainstream thing in general.

At this point, I do believe that the lessons being taught in many public schools are laden with social and moral values that I don't share, however I do believe there is a great deal about the physical matters of sexuality, the medical aspects, and the moral aspects that ought to be taught--and that such teaching is biblical.

Dave is right in post #4 about some people, and I agree with him that those people are wrong. One can't teach the Bible without teaching about sex and sexuality. But there is morality also involved, because sexuality folds over into how one relates to other human beings, male and female.

 

[Dave-W]

One can't teach the Bible without teaching about sex and sexuality.

It is funny. IN high school my best friend was Catholic (while I was Pentecostal) He believed the Bible had NOTHING whatsoever to say about sex, beyond "Thou Shalt Not.... "
That shameful subject could not be even be mentioned in a HOLY Bible.

 

[Zoii]

What about teaching the use of condoms or other safe sex practices

 

[Paidiske]

It's mostly Catholics who have a problem with contraceptives, but people I know who went to Catholic schools tell me they got taught about them anyway. I think I read somewhere that it's required by the government that any school that gets funding here covers certain basics in this regard (as with other elements of the curriculum). (Sorry, that's a bit vague, but I can't remember where I came across that now).

So if you really were serious enough that you wanted your child to be ignorant of condom use, you'd probably have to home school in Australia. I think.

 

[PloverWing]

I also have come across the belief that if you don't give young adults much information about sex, then they won't think about sex. There was an element of that in the religious tradition I was raised in. (Ignorance didn't make me stop thinking about sex; it just made me afraid. )

For myself, I think giving young people lots of information about sex is good and important. The sex education classes at the school my kids attended covered most of the topics you list, and I was very pleased. (The classes also included detailed information on contraception and how to use it, an important subject for teens.) My husband and I had conversations with our kids about many of these topics as they were growing up, and we continue to have conversations now that they are young adults.

 

[FireDragon76]

Even I as a teenager understood the value of sex education and at the time I was a conservative Protestant Christian (and quite aware that me and my peers were bundles of raging hormones without a lot of "life lessons"). Some people just think ignorance is bliss, until their teenager gets pregnant or they get an STD and they wonder how it could happen to their kid.

 

[Armoured]

So if you really were serious enough that you wanted your child to be ignorant of condom use, you'd probably have to home school in Australia. I think.

There was a time here in Oz that condom basics were even covered in PSAs. I remember this one from the side of buses in Canberra;

There was a period in the late 80's where pretty much every school and government service office had a poster of this guy somewhere;

 

[Paidiske]

I do remember, at the height of the AIDS epidemic, TV ads promoting safe sex - there was one with a couple in bed, and then the voice over said something about how you were sleeping with everyone your partner had ever slept with, and the camera panned out so you saw many beds in the shot - I was young, it must have been the eighties? But yes, you're right, it was hard to entirely miss.

I found it on YouTube!

Probably easy to gloss over as a parent, if you were of a mind to do so, though?

 

[DarthNeo]

IMO, the church does a HORRIBLE job teaching anything about sex other than "wait until your married." I have been extremely open and blunt with my children when it comes to talking about sex - they are 22 and 18 and both still virgins - so I believe my method must have worked. I spoke to both my daughter and my son about their roles in sex - that my son needs to show his wife love in several way OUTSIDE the bedroom and if my daughter wants to help keep her husband from looking at inappropriate content or other women, meet his sexual need, even when you don't FEEL like it sometime (of course there is much more than that, but those are CRUCIAL for a healthy sex life)!

 

[Armoured]

I do remember, at the height of the AIDS epidemic, TV ads promoting safe sex - there was one with a couple in bed, and then the voice over said something about how you were sleeping with everyone your partner had ever slept with, and the camera panned out so you saw many beds in the shot - I was young, it must have been the eighties? But yes, you're right, it was hard to entirely miss.

I found it on YouTube!

Probably easy to gloss over as a parent, if you were of a mind to do so, though?

I remember that one, too.

I remember being terrified by the Grim Reaper campaign as a kid.

I was 9 when these ads came out.

 

[Paidiske]

I don't remember that one. I turned 7 in 1987, so I wonder if I saw it? I must have asked my parents when I saw this stuff, but I can't remember how they responded. I do remember mum using her nursing textbooks to explain sex to me; they had very detailed anatomical diagrams!

 

[Dave-W]

Some people just think ignorance is bliss, until their teenager gets pregnant or they get an STD and they wonder how it could happen to their kid.

When I was in high school there was a girl I had a HUGE crush on. She was born in NZ, and her dad moved the family to the US and opened a music store selling pianos and organs. She was about my age (maybe a year younger) but her older sister who had just graduated h.s. turned up pregnant. Her parents were it a huge quandary over it; how could she do such a thing, where had they went wrong, etc. So her dad had a rather stern talk with ME. We never actually dated; and after going to college, their store closed and I totally lost track of them.

I kinda got the vibe that the "ignorance is bliss" was their operating mode.

 

[Dave-W]

I don't remember that one. I turned 7 in 1987,

So you are right between my oldest daughter and the twins ....

 

[Dave-W]

There was a period in the late 80's where pretty much every school and government service office had a poster of this guy somewhere;

That is hilarious!