IS IGNORANCE BLISS?

I’M A LITTLE confused as to why the Government is receiving praise for their supposed new “thrust” in “promoting abstinence” in schools, and my confusion is based on two reasons. The first is that I distinctly remember about a year ago, when the topic of “sex education” in schools was pushed to the forefront by a certain dreadlocked young man who distributed condoms to secondary school students, the government all of a sudden decided that all schools would be receiving sex education in an effort to curb the spread of sexually transmitted infections, unplanned pregnancies and abortion. The second is – how is “promoting abstinence” in schools a “new thrust”? As far as I know, no sex-ed classes have been introduced to any of the nation’s schools, and thus all forms of sex-ed are, as they always have been, solely and rigorously abstinence-based.

This all came up recently when Health Minister John Rahael’s wife accompanied ten young Trinbagonians to Louisiana for a convention on abstinence earlier this month, where young people were given information on abstinence, sexuality and the virtues of saving sex for marriage. The team returned with a renewed interest in promoting abstinence in schools. This is hardly any kind of “thrust” in a new direction. It was not too long ago – a little under eight years – that I myself was in secondary school, and from what I remember, all of our sex education was abstinence-based. Sex before marriage is a sin, we were told. Your body is a temple, we were told. Men will call you whores if you sleep with them and then nobody will marry you, we were told. Sex is dangerous, it can kill you – but save it for your one true love who you will marry! – we were told. Talk about contradictory messages!

Oh wait, how could I forget…? I must add that other than keeping us in the dark about sexuality, my particular secondary school also decided it would be a good idea to show us a graphic and lengthy video, full of close up pictures of bloody aborted foetuses and women whose abortion permanently damaged their reproductive organs, leaving them barren and scarred for life. That video left all us poor 13-year-olds scarred for life instead! I understand that as a Catholic school it must teach Catholic values, one of which is that abortion is a sin, but was the video in any way a deterrent from sexual intercourse? Ask the girls in my form who were pregnant by the time they sat their O’Levels.

Puberty, by medical definition, is the phase in one’s life where your body becomes ready for reproduction, when we move from being innocent children into fully functioning sexual beings, which is why it is particularly ironic, and dangerous, that puberty is the time in your life when no one will tell you anything, when your hormones are making you crazy, and all you ever hear from your school is “sex before marriage is a sin” and that if you do have sex, you will either go to Hell, get pregnant or get AIDS, whichever comes first.

Many believe that sex education is something that should be taught not in schools by teachers, but by the individual student’s parents or spiritual leaders since many families have many different values and beliefs. But how many curious 13-year-olds out there today are going to go to their mother or father and ask them the questions they are dying to get answered? Mummy, can I get a disease from performing oral sex? Daddy, what’s pulling out? Mummy, do you know when a woman is most fertile during her menstrual cycle?  Daddy, what’s premature ejaculation? Mummy, how do you take the pill? Yeah right! They’d most likely quicker get two hot slaps than a straight answer to some very important life questions!

The problem is that young people today – while more exposed on a daily basis to sexually explicit material and less innocent – are still quite ignorant as to the ins and outs of sexuality because no one will level with them. The schools won’t do it because they believe teaching them about sex will make them go out and have sex, which is flawed logic, since many are already sexually active at a young age regardless of all the “abstinence thrusts” in schools. The parents won’t do it because it makes them uncomfortable, mainly because the parents, most of whom have never taken birth control or even purchased or used a condom, are more ignorant than their kids!

So what do young people do? They go out and do it anyway, because it’s human nature, because it feels good, because it’s exciting. The problem is they do it stupidly, they are not careful, and they find themselves in some very sticky situations that could have been avoided if someone had simply educated them. When I say “sex education” I do not simply mean showing youths how to use a condom or how to take contraceptives. I mean teaching them firstly about their own bodies, about the changes their bodies are and will  be going through, and also about the opposite sex’s body (which is what we are most curious about anyways!). I also mean teaching them about relationships – not just saying like a stuck record to save sex for marriage. I mean teaching young men and women how to be with the opposite sex, how to have a healthy relationship, how to set limits, how to say no, and if you say yes, how to be smart about what you do and how you do it.

While I do believe it is absolutely necessary to give human sexuality education to all secondary schools, I also believe that abstinence is certainly the best bet. However, it is not the only bet, nor is it the most realistic bet. Many young people will not choose to abstain until marriage. People who choose not to abstain do not deserve to be kept in the dark, called sinners or denied important information about their own bodies, about their sexuality, and about the very real consequences of their actions. They deserve information, they deserve education, and they deserve the same respect as the virgins! Abstinence-only education is an obvious failure, and must be incorporated with a well-rounded programme on human sexuality, with all its delights and dangers, if we really want to affect the youth’s behaviour, and prevent them from screwing themselves over.