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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
I love the joke in your book that defines a "conservative" as a "liberal with a teenage daughter." But a lot of boomer parents that I know, while they may realize that they are perpetuating a double standard by expecting their children to practice more conservative sexual behaviors than they themselves did, justify that expectation because they still feel very strongly that sex has changed because of AIDS.
Well, sex has changed because of AIDS. But the question is: What are we going to do about that? A good example is to look at the gay, middle-class urban communities during the height of the AIDS epidemic during the '80s. Their strategy was to use a sexually open culture, a culture of enormous sexual creativity, and lots of public discussion about sex (and even public sex!) [to combat AIDS].
A sexually open community was able, through that very openness, to stem the tide of the infection. Now when we see who is getting HIV, it's people who live in communities that are often repressive about sex, certainly repressive about homosexuality, where people are outside of the institutions where they might be able to get good sexual information.
You point out in your book that a lot of the kind of sexuality education that you advocate -- emphasis on pleasure, open knowledge -- was fairly prevalent throughout the '80s. I found it strange to notice that sex ed seemed to be more informative and open during the Reagan years than it was during the '90s.
There is always a lag between political activism and results. In 1981, the American Family Life Act [which advocated abstinence -- called chastity at the time -- as the basis of sex education in public schools] was put on the docket in the House of Representatives. It was from then on that the religious right began -- in Washington and in local communities -- its very successful campaign against sexuality education. The Reagan administration gave these people a platform that they had never had before, and all of these agencies -- health, education, welfare -- were headed by people who were against sex education.
You had more influence from the religious right in Washington, and a very sophisticated and smart grassroots movement, which often consisted of a tiny minority of people in a community. But many people were complacent, in the same way that I think many people in the pro-choice movement were complacent about abortion rights, and they didn't stand up for sexuality education.
It's a hard thing for anyone in the legislature to, say, stand up for talking about masturbation in school. So you had no defense, and a very strong offense against sex ed. We began to see the results of that later in the '80s, and certainly in the '90s.
Should we even try to continue to keep open sexual education in the public schools, given the near-impossibility of reconciling everyone's politics? Why not send children to outside programs in their community, like Planned Parenthood, who aren't censored by the politics of the community and the school board?
Among mainstream sexuality educators, there has been the suggestion that maybe we should give up on the public schools. I think that's very ill-conceived. Most people will go to public school. It's hard enough for community organizations to fund anything. At least, if there is good education in the schools, every kid will get a little bit of information. But it's also very important to have other sources of information for kids that they can access by themselves -- in the library, on the Internet, etc. And you also have to take care of the vast number of kids who are not in school -- who have dropped out, or are not living at home, or whatever.
There's a big difference between the sexuality education that goes on in mainstream public schools and the education that one would get at a community organization like Planned Parenthood. It's not only because people outside of school have more freedom; it's also because the kind of people who enter those jobs tend to come from an activist, rather than a professional background. Many of them are gay or lesbian, or youth activists. They have a different attitude right from the get-go about sexuality education.
Sex education has a conservative history. It's main goal has always been to stop kids from having sex. Even progressive sex education has often had that as a goal.
In your book, it seems to come out that sex education directed at gay kids might be even better than that which is directed at straight kids, in that gay kids who look to community organizations have adults who are extremely concerned that they have the best resources available.
Yes, well, if only the gay kids weren't getting beaten up in school.
But it is true. One of the things I say in my book is that at least a gay kid comes out as having a sexuality, and thus you have to deal with them as a sexual person. I think the best sexuality education, and the best attention to the whole child and the teen, has often come from the gay and lesbian community.
You can say to straight kids, "Don't have sex until you get married," but if you tell gay kids that they can't get married, there is not much they can do. Actually, I suppose the right is still saying to them, "Don't ever have gay sex until you die." But for those mainstream educators in the middle, to deny the existence of those who might be gay in your classroom is certainly not serving every student's need.
