Defunding Abstinence Only Sex Ed

[Zah]

So I’m totally behind the times here but I thought it was worth sharing this good news: http://www.teenvogue.com/story/obama-cuts-abstinence-only-sex-education-2017-budget . So good to see some common sense in sex ed funding! Fingers crossed that the money is used to develop some awesome, sex positive programs instead.

[Curiosity]

@Zah its fantastic to hear, I do hope it makes a positive change and shifts towards accurate information being provided. Here is a talk from the CEO of “The new sex ed” program in the States. The statistics she talks about are alarming 
https://youtu.be/Y4-__tsWRh0

[mak_trouble891]

OMG!!!! @Curiosity did I really just hear that woman say that the information in sex ed doesn’t have to be medically, technically or factually accurate in all states? :0

[MsBlueStreak]

@mak_trouble891 – I’m familiar with the speaker and her multiple TEDx talks… yes she did say that. In some states the conservative types encourage the phrase “sex outside of marriage will make you pregnant and kill you” (note the absolute in that phrase).

Try this story on how damaging abstinence only is: http://www.refinery29.com/2016/02/104006/abstinence-sex-ed-america
Or these statistics on US Sex-Ed: http://http//www.refinery29.com/2016/08/119974/sex-education-statistics-infographic

And the one that really made me mad about abstinence only Sex-ed… this slide from Sex-Ed Horror Stories: http://http//www.refinery29.com/sex-ed-horror-stories#slide-2

[Kit]

So just to confirm, abstinence isn’t taught in Australia, right?

[MsBlueStreak]

Well my rather embarrassed PE teachers (who got stuck with the sex-ed classes too), all advised not having sex until we were at least 18, and that waiting for marriage was a good idea. I pretty sure it wasn’t part of the syllabus, but was still flung upon us with a lot of guilt and shaming (I also don’t think any of them had taken their own advice during their youth) – and when combined with the pregnancy lecture….

The thing is having teachers not ready for the conversation, or who bring their own personal hang-ups into the lessons, teaching the subject can be seriously damaging to the students involved (I just hope that classes have changed a bunch since I went through them).

[NickiPower]

@MsBlueStreak it’s interesting about having memories of teachers not ready for the conversation, we’ve been discussing that over on the Sex education is not relevant to pupils’ lives thread

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