Story From: Blogging America
Ever wonder what they may be passing out at middle-schools these days?
“At the dinner table, he announces, ‘Today at school I learned that oral sex is safer than anal sex,’ ” said Johnson, 53, a writer who has two other children in the school district. “This is a kid who hasn’t even been on a date yet, or had a first kiss, as far as I know.”
O.k one more tid-bit;
One titled “Woman to Woman”discussed how lesbians can protect themselves from HIV and featured an illustration of a woman spinning jubilantly in plastic wrap. Another provided graphic warning signs of sexually transmitted diseases in men, such as a thick discharge from the penis, and sores or blisters on the testicles.
All this going on and if someone wanted creationism taught they take ‘em to court? Beats me.
Graphic sex-health brochures upset parents of Irvington middle-schoolers.
Ever wonder what they may be passing out at middle-schools these days?
“At the dinner table, he announces, ‘Today at school I learned that oral sex is safer than anal sex,’ ” said Johnson, 53, a writer who has two other children in the school district. “This is a kid who hasn’t even been on a date yet, or had a first kiss, as far as I know.”
O.k one more tid-bit;
One titled “Woman to Woman”discussed how lesbians can protect themselves from HIV and featured an illustration of a woman spinning jubilantly in plastic wrap. Another provided graphic warning signs of sexually transmitted diseases in men, such as a thick discharge from the penis, and sores or blisters on the testicles.
All this going on and if someone wanted creationism taught they take ‘em to court? Beats me.
Graphic sex-health brochures upset parents of Irvington middle-schoolers.
17 comments:
Some of these schools have gone way over the top on both sides of the sex issue.
I remember back in the day when they separated the girls from the boys and the nuns told us "about that time of the month" and the priests told the boys...I don't know what they told them, but suddenly they were all snapping the straps on the back of our bras.
If you asked us what oral sex was when we were in 8th grade, we would probably assume it was "talking dirty".
Oh....for the good old days.
Things are very bad these days Mary Ellen. There are those that feel this should be presented in schools because States where it's not, are the States that see teen pregnancy at a higher level.
This world has changed and a lot of no good Representatives that we put into City, State and Federal office is changing things to the point that we cannot see where we are headed and our children are at their mercy.
But why is that phil_in_ny?
I dunno..... I worry more about those guys and gals that try to recruit children into a murderous middle-eastern cauldron. They are surely more dangerous to my children than those who tell them that oral sex is safer than anal sex (which happens to be true, even.)
I did a topic on recruits and our children already and I agree that it is very important, but so is what they are exposing our kids to in middle school now days. This is done to push abstinence that the Christian right has called for.
"All this going on and if someone wanted creationism taught they take ‘em to court?"
Yes, because creationism is an unproven theory, sex is a proven fact. This school may have went "over the top", but I think it's unfair to lump all sex ed schools with one bad one. Sex IS going to happen. Abstinence teachings, and "Just say no" programs fade to nothing, when you're a teenager in the back seat of a car, with hormones raging. And the reason, is kids don't know what to expect. It catches them by surprise, and the results are as natural as the falling rain. Sex is a natural function of the body, just as natural as any other function.
It is my personal opinion that sex ed shouldn't have to be taught in schools. Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic are school subjects. Sex is a home subject. But the sad, proven history is, that sufficient sexual education was NOT being taught at home, if any was taught at all. In many Fundamentalist homes, "Just don't do it or God will punish you!" is the sum total of education. Teen pregnancies were soaring. STD's were soaring. And, factor in parents too lazy (or didn't know enough themselves), forced the schools to try to stop a growing problem.
It's argued all the time that sex ed encourages sex. So does kissing your girlfriend on a blanket at the beach when you're dumb as a rock about sex. The crucial difference is, that the sexually educated boy or girl knows what to expect. That doesn't stop teen sex, but nothing ever will, short of getting rid of all teens.:) An informed person is always able to make netter choices.
It baffles me that kids are taught what to do in case they drink poison, or their body gets cut, etc., with no objections, yet education about another equally important bodily function is so demonized. That tells me ignorance of the subject is railing against it, not reasoned thought.
Great argument The Future Was Yesterday, and I concur with most of what you have said. Most Sex Ed today is controlled by the fact and teaching of abstinence, being gay is wrong and not believing in passing out condoms to the teens or adults.
This is a control education brought to you by those that think the safest sex is no sex and they refused to hand out free condoms and have fought so very hard to keep the morning after pill out of the way of young teens as well.
Hey LT--
I don't have kids so I may not be qualified to speak here but, I think, if I were in middle school and had heard about AIDS -- which I'm sure they all have by that age -- and didn't know how to avoid getting it, I'd be scared to death.
I would as well two crows; When I first read and saw this story at Within reason I thought it would be nice to help inform others about said actions of Sex Ed in schools.
When I cross post this topic at made the decision to run it as it was and not change anything.
I only included the video as I always do with most topics and I hope that it was informative.
All this going on and if someone wanted creationism taught they take ‘em to court? Beats me.
LOL Larry! Ya, on the one hand people go ballistic over seeing Janet Jackson's breast and yet what I see on television sometimes pales in comparison.
It's a weird weird world we live in.. ;)
Hi Anajo, I stated to exclude the phrase; "All this going on and if someone wanted creationism taught they take 'em to court? Beats me."
But I said that I would run the entire post and I have. About Janet Jackson and what is on TV, what I got from this is the Christian Right has a hand in this.
They are asking that this type of information be shared in our schools and abstinence be taught in reference to this as well.
I agree with some of the previous commenters: military recruiters and "Jesus Camp" type cult groups are a lot more dangerous than graphic sex education manuals.
I agree as well Tom, but I also point out that this was about Sex ed. I've spent time with the post on said subject of military recruiters. At some point I guess I should have reposted that post as well and maybe looking a little deeper into the Jesus camp topic again.
It's sad that the minority of our nation's schools who do pass out such materials become the "poster children" for schools everywhere. Our town's middle school would not distribute such materials, and I know of none in the eastern half of Oregon that would. I don't believe the distribution of this kind of sex-ed stuff in schools is either wise or necessary.
I think one reason we see such things as this in the news is that the anti-schools crowd tends to push such reporting. It's kind of like the AP's upcoming stuff (they are preparing it as I write) on how "teachers are involved in having sex with their students". Of the four million of so teachers in the U.S., there are a handful of them who do things they should not do with kids, probably representing a fraction of a fraction of a percent of all of us who teach. It is probably a very similar percentage to that of the general population that engages in such activities. I don't think teachers are any more inclined toward such things than society is as a whole.
However, those with an anti-public-schools agenda will be behind the reporting of the few incidents and will see that it becomes conventional wisdom that teachers are bad people.
I have to wonder how we ever have gotten to THAT point in this country, where the "schools are bad" mantra becomes conventional wisdom. A lot of that crap is fostered on rightwing media programs because the opinions are being pushed by people who don't want governments involved in educating children.
Some of this sorry state of affairs has also been fostered through too many successful lawsuits against schools, taking away the schools' rights to punish students... this has created a "students rule the school" environment in a lot of places because the kids know they can often do whatever they want without consequence, and that their parents won't do much to stop them either. Their teachers can't do much to stop them because of all the potential legal hassles. Lots of conservatives can't tolerate any kind of system in which there is no punishment, so they don't like public schools anymore because of this.
From my personal experience, I have seen too many parents who do not provide discipline or a routine for their kids, who send these kids to school, and who then complain when the kids get in trouble at school. In the same way, some parents don't talk to their kids about the birds and the bees, but they get mad when the schools see that it isn't getting done and then go ahead and do it maybe because they see it as yet another thing the kids need that they're not getting outside the school environment.
Therein lies the problem as I see it. People expect the schools to feed their kids, babysit them, and sometimes even clothe them and pay for some of their medical things, all in addition to educating them. Those schools and districts who feel like they desperately need to save the kids of the world and educate them about EVERYTHING need to take a step back and look at the big picture. No matter how much of its responsibility society now refuses to acknowledge when it comes to education, there are some things our schools simply need to steer clear of. Schools and districts can save themselves a lot of headaches and money by leaving the sex-ed stuff to the parents. If the kids end up not learning from their parents, then it will be one more thing the schools won't be blamed for.
I think religion is one of those things that also needs to be taken care of outside the public school setting... a religious upbringing, if a family wants such, needs to be taken care of at home within the family. Instead of "protecting" kids from the public school environment by homeschooling them or whatever, I think parents need to allow their kids to be exposed to the public school setting, as it is more representative of the way things work in today's world. But if parents want to keep their kids away from school life because they think public schools are influenced by Satan, I think it's their decision (and possibly their problem).
In the same way, I think teaching kids about sexual matters should also be taken care of at home, within the family. It should be a private kind of thing. And if a kid hears other kids talking about sexual things at school and wants to know what those kids are talking about, for heaven's sake, they don't need to go ask the school nurse. They need to ask their parents, and their parents need to talk to them about it.
Evolution versus Creationism? I have a hard time believing in either scenario, personally. There is more science behind evolution, so I don't have any major problems with it being taught in public schools, whereas I do have a problem with Creationism being taught in public schools. It seems to me that with the scientific research that has been done re. evolution, much of which supports the theory, believing that evolution is at least possibly true requires less of faith and more acceptance of fact and reason through analysis and synthesis of facts. I think public schools need to teach information based on fact, not faith alone. And there is some fact in biblical matters which I would suggest could and should be taught in schools as history or as cultural material (i.e. this is what Christianity is, this is what Islam is, these are the books these religions use, these are some of the ways the adherents of these religions practice their beliefs, this is how these religions have influenced world history, etc.) but I would object to our local public schools teaching something that was based on a belief in anything unproven without hard evidence. And I think religion fits that category.
Sorry, but if people want to teach kids about God, salvation, the miracles, an immaculate conception, and resurrection, the place for that is in church, at Sunday School, at a private church school, or at family bible study time. Otherwise, I don't think students in our public schools would be as easily taught to use such useful things as the scientific method, reasoning, and critical thinking skills.
I don't go quite as far as the bumper sticker that says "Don't pray in my school and I won't think in your church" because I know a lot of people of faith who are very reasonable about all things having their time and place. However, I would be one of the people taking a teacher to court if he or she took it upon himself to teach Creationism as proven scientific fact.
And I would also be taking a school or district to court, or supporting such a move, if it thought it was responsible for distributing materials such as those you mentioned to 12- and 13-year-old kids.
Good post, as always you stimulate all kinds of thought and discussion! Thanks.
Great comment Snave, that's about all that I can say. I agree with everything said from your comment.
I do wish that you would visit my other site every now and then. Let's Talk About It
hey, Snave--
unfortunately, many parents just don't teach their kids about sex. this isn't a new phenomenon, either.
back in the 1950's when such things were left exclusively to parents, mine were fairly liberal as Baptists went-- but, they didn't feel comfortable talking about sex and, just avoided the issue.
what little I learned I learned from my friends in our respective back yards -- by far the WORST place to learn about anything of any importance to our later lives.
given that atmosphere, I'm not surprised the schools stepped in to fill the void -- especially in light of the staggering rate of teen pregnancy during the late 1950's early 1960's.
if our country would outgrow our Puritan beginnings, our kids would benefit. but we haven't yet done that.
Someone might expect that we could get this Sex Ed thing right in 2007-but no. But back in the good old days we were not a country of 350,000,000 folq.
With population explosion you get chaos everywhere, schools included.
That's what we are giving "the children"--chaos, brought to us by our good friends in govt. and business.
It's the adults who need Sex Ed first.
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