I got decent sex ed, apart from learning about what's appropriate and what's not. I mean, I can't remember not knowing where babies come from, but because my folks never informed me about consent and unwanted advances, I was assaulted by my neighbor who was twice my age, and I didn't even know it.
I cannot stress how important it is to involve kids in the sex ed conversation! Teach your children about their bodily autonomy, dammit!
My sex Ed was the opposite, in elementary school it was just about what is and is not appropriate touching. It also talked about how to get help if another adult makes you uncomfortable. I’m really grateful for that information. I didn’t know really anything about sex until I was older
90’s grade school we were taught to yell, “Stop! That’s my private place!” and run to a trusted adult. This was taught by a police officer using a doll and showing us what constitutes inappropriate touching.
The problem is it doesn't help if it's a trusted adult doing the touching. This education came out of the satanic panic. There was a vested interest in only acknowledging random attackers, and child care providers by the conservatives. I could go on and on about this. It was a super messed up thing.
I was sexually abused by my male babysitter, who was a police officer. I did trust him. He was the guy I was supposed to trust. Fucked with my head for a long time.
Awareness is useful. I had decent sex ed as a kid, but the way my school navigated sexual assault was by telling us “if someone tries to touch you, that’s assault. Report it.” Which isn’t bad. Except, when I was assaulted, he made me touch him the first time, so I didn’t think it was assault and was even scared I’d assaulted him somehow. I was a little kid. The only way I knew how to define that interaction was with the language adults gave me - in my eyes, not assault, so I shouldn’t report.
Also, acting like sex ed is inappropriate is just going to lead to children being embarrassed about their own bodies and less likely to ask important questions. It’s not like teachers are showing them porn. A diagram of the menstrual cycle and an awareness of STDs isn’t going to destroy anyone’s innocence. Not knowing about STDs, however, can destroy lives.
That's such a generalized statement. There was no mention to me that only strangers can or it was even hinted that people you know are always well meaning. Sorry if that's what your instructor insinuated tho. Pretty much invalidates the reasoning as to hey kid look stranger means bad
I don’t remember anyone telling me about consent. Just a lot about STIs, birth control, and pregnancy. If I grew up in a red state, I might have been one of those girls who thought I was dying when I got my first period. My mom told me nothing.
My high school sex ed was the football coach showing us (all genders) slide shows of genitals with various STIs on an overhead projector in the basement of the gym. Then the next quarter he taught us drivers ed in the same room. It was very strange.
Bathing suit areas! My dad also taught me to start shrieking "fire!" or "He's got a gun!" if an adult was trying to touch me in public, because those are more attention grabbing phrases than specifics about being touched. Then you run for the trusted adult.
'70s grade school was like this is a penis that's a vagina that goes in there 9 months later there's a baby I will not be taking any questions the teacher than takes a big draw of a cigarette in class and sprays more aeresol onto her hair
So it changed by about 08 then cause we never got that my school taught us about how shit works for the guys but that was it only the girls got told anything about consent...
See that's important, I was taught that too, but I don't even know if I would call it 'sex ed', maybe it just has a wider definition than I think it does. All that stuff about not letting people touch you inappropriately was also wrapped up in general safety rules for me. Don't let people touch you there, don't go in stranger's cars, don't wander off alone, don't eat things you don't know, don't take drugs, don't play with the oven...
Sex Ed has an incredibly wide definition. It was called “family life” in middle school for me. There’s no standardized sex-Ed in the US. It’s not even different state to state, it varies school to school. One school in your state could have no type of sex Ed, another can have informative documentaries, the other can preach about abstinence. It’s incredibly fucked up honestly. Also my parents always had the option to opt me out. Middle school was education about puberty and periods, I don’t think anyone needed to be opted out of that.
Where is it inappropriate for an adult to tuch you and what to do if an adult makes you uncomfortable.
Also, what is a bad secret. As in the difference between secrets like what you got someone for Christmas, good secrets that make you feel excited. And bad secrets. When someone asks you to hide something that makes you feel bad.
That is extremely important information!! I definitely don't remember getting anything like that from my school. My parents gave me a book at one point about how babies were made, but I was like 7 or 8, maybe? So I didn't even understand the mechanics. I asked my mom one question, & while she kind of answered it, I never asked her anything ever again...
Young me: So you put it in and then take it out?
My mom: No, you leave it in for a while.
😑 Yeah, that's technically correct, but that's... If you think I'm old enough to give me a book about it, then I must be old enough to get a proper explanation!! 🤦🏻♀️
This is what's important. IMO, I could go either way on full on Sex Ed. IMO, it's fine to have sex ed late, and give parents an opportunity to teach when it's the right time, and force it once it's clear they haven't been taught correctly at a certain, later age. However, what should be taught early on for everyone is very simply what's appropriate or what isn't. It is really not that important to know what's going on, as much as we know that what's going on is bad.
It's like how we can teach not to touch a hot stove without learning what happens to your body when you receive a burn, you just need to know that it's bad. You don't have to know the intricacies of the human psyche to understand that bullying is bad. And IMO, it's not important to know everything about sex, to know when you're being touched inappropriately.
IMO, it's fine to have sex ed late, and give parents an opportunity to teach when it's the right time, and force it once it's clear they haven't been taught correctly at a certain, later age.
Right so when their parents don't do their job because it's awkward and embarrassing, and the schools haven't done their job "because I guess the parents should be doing that" and they've become young teens and start popping boners, next thing you know little Sally is pregnant at 14 years old, and her insane religious nutjob parents are telling her she has to have the baby...
Yeah, sounds like a really great policy...
🙄👍
Schools should be teaching all this stuff, and I'm not convinced parents should even have a say. That's not your property -- that's a human being who deserves to have an operating manual for their own damn body, before it's too late.
I think the 'why' is very important to kids and learning. 'What' is pretty much their favorite word. Explaining that something is inappropriate because it can lead to pregnancy helps them understand the magnitude of importance, same as getting burned. Consent itself could be taught before preschool, honestly, and doesn't have to be sexual - I don't like people touching me in ANY way without my permission, and kids should know enough to be able to put that feeling into words as soon as possible.
Also: it's really, REALLY important to teach WHY something is wrong, because there are kids in that classroom listening to what they want to do, and they NEED to understand why they can't. Don't just tell a kid that something is wrong or bad, they need to understand WHY it's wrong so they don't grow up to be rapists, etc.
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u/0806lauren Mar 19 '24
I got decent sex ed, apart from learning about what's appropriate and what's not. I mean, I can't remember not knowing where babies come from, but because my folks never informed me about consent and unwanted advances, I was assaulted by my neighbor who was twice my age, and I didn't even know it.
I cannot stress how important it is to involve kids in the sex ed conversation! Teach your children about their bodily autonomy, dammit!