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Friday, February 15, 2013

Health and sexual education (and my opinion) part 1

A lot of controversy has been going on here in Croatia (but also the rest of the world) regarding health and sexual education being introduced to Elementary and High schools. There are two main sides colliding in the middle, the ones that are FOR (mostly non-Christians and youth) and the ones that are against AGAINST (mostly Christians, and conservative parents).

Arguments of Against:
 - too early exposure to sex
 - homosexuality is taught as something normal and an acceptable lifestyle
 - masturbation, contraceptives are also taught as something perfectly okay
 - abortion is mentioned
 - And probably some more which I am not aware of

Arguments of For:
 - not lying to the children and teens
 - giving the correct information unlike Internet (or the bible..)
 - giving them a chance to be responsible
 - presenting them with knowledge that they should know and is useful for their future life
 - giving them a chance to be themselves, showing them it is okay and normal

My personal opinion, is that Sexual and Health education definitely should be in forced into the public school system. All the reasons against, I find foolish. Keeping things from your child will not make them love you more (quite the opposite) nor 'protect them' from harm. It will do just the opposite. They will come by false and incorrect information on the playground, from classmates and most often on the Internet. And then they will be a danger to others by going around and spreading the false information to other kids and teens. Or even experimenting without knowing the consequences and being prepared for the aftermath. I think a healthy and an honest child/parent relationship should be present in every family, where there is no 'forbidden' or 'taboo' topics. If my own child wants to know more about polygamy, homosexuality, or mastrubation I will gladly talk to him/her about it.
There is no reason not to. Hell, if he/she wants to talk about pedophilia, I would. I think that kids and teens should be aware of what is out there in the world. They should be prepared.

Regarding the early exposure to sex, I think many parents (and other adults) are in misconception about today's youths knowledge. They seem to think we haven't got a clue about some particular things. As in sex, sexual positions, protection, oral and anal.. so yes, things. But to be bluntly honest, WE DO!
Hell, I knew about these stuff since I was a kid. I mean seriously, I remember being like nine-ish and talking (and giggling) about sex with my friends. And I also remember the stupid questions we had and misconceptions about things. And I kinda wish that there was somebody to answer and explain all the burning questions I had. I had a pretty open relationship with my mum though, but it wasn't cool to talk to your mother about these things. It was a bit awkward (even though we did talk quite a lot, hah). I was never told that the stork brought children, I was told straight forward about women's and men's baby making systems and blah. And I'm quite glad for that. I really dislike that whole lying scheme.

Homosexuality - I understand that Christianity is strictly against it but they have to understand, they do not run the world nor that all children and parents are Christian. I honestly think that the Church shouldn't be so involved in running the country. It's only a religion and nothing else.
Love is a sexual and mental attraction between two mature human beings. Not only between a female and a male. If people can date and fall in love regardless of their nationality, race, religion.. then why can't it be sex too? I think kids/teens should be taught it is okay to be attracted to the same sex (or both), it is okay to be genderblind, it is okay to be born in the wrong body, asexual or anything else. And that homophobia is not okay. Because if we're going to discriminate against LGBT people then we might as well go back to the 1840s and discriminate against women, Afro-Americans.. etc

Mastrubation - Most natural thing a human can do. Is said to be useful for future when you're going to be sexually active because you get to know what you like. It's just a part of discovering yourself and defining who you are. But of course Christians are against it because it's 'impure' or something along those lines. Derps. It's impossible the pope never played around with his.. 'holy rod'. At least as a teenager! For god's sake, if priests aren't allowed to marry and shag then they should at least have the pleasure of satisfying themselves in person. I mean come on.. this one is just bullshit.

Abortion - I don't really have an opinion formed on abortion yet. I think a victim of a rape should definitely be allowed to abort but I don't know about others. I mean, you're basically the owner of that baby in side you, right? And if you want to stop your pregnancy, it's your choice and nobody other's. But then again, that baby has rights too.. It's complicated.

So in conclusion for the AGAINST side, you should play by the ridiculous rules and expected nothing in return. Or God's love and a path to heaven, right? Pfft, you should live your own life the way you want to live it. As long as you're not hurting others with your lifestyle (as in an axe murderer) then you should be allowed to do whatever you like. You are here right now and that's what matters. I personally don't believe in Heaven nor Hell. I think I'm going die someday.. and that's all that is to it. And even if my soul /does/ go somewhere, it will be proud to be there. Because my soul lived a happy, full life by it's own rules. My soul wouldn't feel regret. Not one tiny bit.

So, as I was saying for the FOR side, I think that we should give some credit to kids and teens. They might know some stuff but they don't know everything. And I think that professionals teaching them more about perfectly normal things in life, is exactly what we need. Example; If teens know where to easily get access to free condoms, there will probably be a less pregnancy and STDs rate. Because otherwise, they'd be to embarrassed to buy some (or can't afford any) and would take risks.
I think, making something 'forbidden' or 'secret' totally backfires on you. If you tell your teen, don't smoke cigarettes, you can bet your pretty little ass he/she's going to go ahead and do exactly that. It's all about being rebellious. It makes you feel cool and like an adult. I would know. I am a teenager myself. And I know when I've tried some things I wasn't exactly supposed to, I felt fucking wonderful. And now that I'm relatively 'allowed' to do so, it isn't as fun anymore.

This rant is not over. But I'm sleepy so I'm just going to post this and head off. I'll update later.
Thank you for reading.

2 comments:

  1. Hehe. I wouldn't be into those "sexual education" if I were you. I mean, I've been in primary school and high school long time ago but also in Holy Christian Country (Poland) and I know how those lessons looked like that time. Our teacher was a virgin-like lady who called penis "THIS THING YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN", she showed us programmes about how bad masturbation is (I still can't understand what is wrong in lowering your libido without hurting anyone) and that we shouldn't have sex before getting married -_-'
    I hope Croatian goverment has better idea IF they're going do organise such a lesson.
    Well, in my opinion, Christian religion just can't understand they should develop. Our society starts to understand people are equal (FINALLY) but religion doesn't. The pope is going to change but the new one still won't change anything. Seriously, if a gay believes in god, is he still worse than a husband who hits his own wife?! And why the hell she can't divorce him (obviously, I mean church divorce)?! I must say: I'm a homophobe. I know that and I try my best to fight it (I'm doing really good because I'm type of a person who doesn't care what other people do and I expect other people to leave me alone). I know it's because public opinion keep telling us they're different. Doesn't matter if they're Catholic and keep telling us it's bad or not - as long as we're gonna treat them as something DIFFERENT it won't change.
    Abortion - as I already said: I don't care what other people do. But I know lots of stories about women who had to do abortion (for example because it was her 5th child) so I can understand there are many different situations. Not so long time ago one of parties in Poland wanted it to be strictly illegal (luckly all other deputies were against that) - now you can do abortion if you've been raped, the child is very sick and you can die or if the child is going to be diseased.

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  2. I suppose it really depends on the programme and the teacher. I do hope our Sexual and Health educators are going to be at least a bit professional and call the penis by its proper name xD
    But anyway, I think SH should be taught by somebody objective. We should get all the facts straight, arguments for and against and then we can decide what we want to do with that. It's no use if some old lady is going to be shoving her personal beliefs down our throat, you know? Well that's okay, you can be against homosexuality but be respectful about it and I'll respect that. I really try to do my best when talking to conservative Christians and homophobes but if all you do is blame all the bad things happening it the world on homosexuals, then we have nothing to talk about. It's like blaming Global Terrorism on all the Muslim people. It's a bloody stereotype. Just because a couple of muslims were once terrorist, doesn't mean they all are.
    Anywho, thanks for the comment. I appreciate feedback.

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