The Queerty blogger who admitted he wants public schools to teach about gay marriage, was wrong about one thing. He made a big deal that such education would not include instruction on gay sex. ("b-f***ing 101!").
But here's what Helena, Montana proposed to teach sixth graders about sex:
""Understand that sexual intercourse includes but is not limited to vaginal, oral, or anal penetration; using the penis, fingers, tongue or objects.""Understand gender identity is different from sexual orientation."
Will he join with me in saying that's wrong? He's an honest man, enquiring people want to know.
(I apologize for the crudity, but when public schools propose to teach this to 10 years olds, what choice do we have?)
28 Comments
Considering the things I learned about sex and reproduction at girl scout camp (from other campers, when I was in 3rd grade), I personally wish they would have taught specific sex education earlier. I was VERY confused by the time my sixth grade finally got to sex ed and sexual reproduction.
P.S., I went to a Catholic school. They taught us very specific sex education. We learned (in boy-only and girl-only classes) the mechanics of sex AS WELL AS the consequences of sex: diseases, pregnancy, etc. That blunt honesty kept me a (technical) virgin until I was 21 years old.
It's time for people to start remembering that kids know a lot about sex, more than we like to think they know, and that WE as adults and caretakers have a responsibility to make sure that they have ACCURATE information about the dangers BEFORE they get old enough to want to try it out for themselves. And once they DO hit the experimental age, we have another responsibility to make sure they know how to do it safely!
Kids are going to have sex. That's what they do. It behooves us to make sure that they know they have options!
And that has NOTHING to do with gay marriage.
I'm with you on the first part -- that much detail is too much, at that age. But what's wrong with learning the difference between sexual orientation and gender identity? At sixth grade, there will already be kids who feel like they were born as the wrong gender, and it would be great for them to know they're not alone.
Montana does not have gay marriage or even domestic partnerships, and already has a constitutional amendment restricting marriage to opposite sex. Does NOM support any further enactments there?
Perhaps what this example shows is that the debate about what and when kids should be taught about sexuality will go on regardless of whether gay marriage is legalized or not?
Andrew, as long as gay marriage is not legalized in a particular state, the parents have the ability to protest the schools' efforts to teach young children how to have unsafe sex.
Once gay marriage is legalized, as we've seen in Massachusetts, the schools can say "Sorry, gay sex is just like all sex, you have no right to object to detailed descriptions of any sexual practice whatsoever!"
Maggie, you demean yourself and lose so much credibility with this continual harping on the red herring of teaching gay sex in schools. In my 35 years in education I've never encountered another teacher who taught students how to engage in straight, let alone, gay sex. Specific sex education programs may address the mechanics of sexual intercourse particularly in response to questions raised by students but the topics are not part of any lesson plan I've seen in core content areas. Your implication is that marriage equality will unleash a wave of noxious, puerile and salacious details upon
America's most vulnerable. Pure bunk and you were called out on this by Maine's Secretary of Education and Attorney General. Anyone can find a "Queerty blogger" or offer a slanted, self-serving opinion of an education concept to kick the red herring down the road. This argument only scores with others who are misinformed.
Richard -
It's not about teaching them to engage; it's teaching them that it exists. The kids can take care fo engagement themselves, and the younger we teach them, the younger they engage.
What kinds of questions do you think the word, "homoSEXual" raises? If kids are taught that men and women get married and have babies; what do you think the kids ask about when it is suggested that men and men get married? Do they have sex? How do they have sex?
It's tough enough being a straight kid dealing with normal sexual activity ad a means of reproduction. They should leave this teaching to the parents anyway. Like I teach my kids: the anus in an exit not an entrance; putting things inside there damages your body. It serves no purpose.
Richard, you demean yourself and lose so much credibility when you claim that I was not exposed to the sex education I had in public school.
Nice red herring in claiming you didn't know a teacher who taught students how to engage in sex. It was never a local teacher. It was an informational video, complete with diagrams and animated simulation.
Disappointing that any school board would consider erotica on par with real education, especially with children lagging in reading, math, and sciences. How about spending our tax dollars on a real education, instead of social engineering? It's fair for age-appropriate materials to be presented to kids, with parental consent, as to how babies are made, but anything else is inappropriate. Teaching homo-erotica is just plain predatory, and should be considered illegal, as it is little better than exposing children to pornography. Shame on the school board in Helena.
The only acceptable "safe-sex" message which should be taught to children is abstinence before marriage, and then complete monogamy in a man/woman marriage.
Gender identity IS different than sexual orientation! They are two completely different things. Please, please, PLEASE read this!
http://www.apa.org/topics/sexuality/transgender.aspx
This education only normalizes deviant behavior and justifies the formation of secondary school "Pride" clubs. This is where vulnerable students with low self esteem are led to experiment with depraved and unhealthy sexual practices. No wonder marriage is under attack.
Mike, do you really teach your kids that "the anus in an exit not an entrance; putting things inside there damages your body. It serves no purpose"? I can only imagine the pretext under which you present that lesson. Again, your comments speak volumes to your innate hate.
"Nice red herring in claiming you didn't know a teacher who taught students how to engage in sex. It was never a local teacher. It was an informational video, complete with diagrams and animated simulation." So, Gothelittle, I guess you agree with me. I also haven't seen those "informational videos, complete with diagrams and animated simulations". Does NOM give those to you?
In short people, you speak from a limited area of knowledge . Stop complaining from a distance. Dig deep enough and anyone can find some obscure report of gay sex education. Better yet, get into the schools; stop throwing those red herrings you hope will stick. The bogeyman is only in your minds.
"Does NOM give those to you?"
Er, no?
Some administrator in my fifth grade class gave them to my teacher, who popped them in the VCR and turned down the lights and hovered in the back of the room.
Do you realize yet that you started by saying that this never happens anywhere ever at all and to even suggest it is lying, and now you're saying that if you dig deep enough, anyone can find at least one instance of it happening?
"Mike, do you really teach your kids that "the anus in an exit not an entrance; putting things inside there damages your body. It serves no purpose"?"
Actually, putting things in there does damage the body. Medical lesson here... the anal tract does not have the flexibility of tracts meant to receive objects. It tears more easily. It is also so very absorbent that if a soldier is suffering from extreme dehydration in the field, they actually stick the water bottle up there rather than risk putting in an IV. This is said to be one reason why diseases are transmitted anally at a far, far, far higher rate than vaginally.
Furthermore, the tract loses elasticity and develops scarring if objects are repeatedly put into it, leading to anal leakage and a mix of unpleasantness that doctors called "gay bowel syndrome" until they were told that they couldn't use the word "gay" to describe a condition that results from years of anal sex.
So are you suggesting that trying to warn our children of the risk factors for anal leakage is in some way hateful? What's the next hate crime, teaching them that smoking causes lung damage? After all, that's discriminatory and bigoted towards smokers, isn't it?
What other medical knowledge do you wish to withhold from our children for the sake of your sexual desires?
Carry wood...another one who speaks with absolutely no basis in fact but is "absolutely sure" that GSA (Gay Straight Alliances) teach gay sex. Our GSA would howl at the notion that you would see them as vulnerable with low self-esteem. What a meeting that would be.
People, please consider. These kids (gay and straight) are educated, thoughtful, firm in their own convictions and nobody's fool. To them, your retorts come across as demeaning, uninformed and marginal. These kids don't seek your approbation. In truth they couldn't care less; they know who understands and supports them. They simply want you to keep to your own counsel. Like all kids, they dream of a better world and a chance to find love. They dream of an opportunity to settle into a relationship with the one, true person. They dream of a marriage to that person and a chance to build a home. Don't bother with the: "But they can have that with a person of the opposite sex". No, they can't and for anyone to suggest that is to deny who they know themselves to be. More and more of us are coming to their support in this. You can choose to get in the way but it won't stop them from making their case and the world will listen.
The problem is school systems decide on their own that they are going to teach sex education at a young age, as if it had nothing to do with morality. Certain topics are best left to the parents to teach when they consider the appropriate time for their own children is. We certainly don't teach religion in elementary school, not philosophy per say. So why should we teach morality? Sexuality without teaching morality can only be at the animalistic levels. And civilization is exactly the opposite.
There is a way to teach secular subjects in Public Schools, but it won't be easy to define what the concet of "secular" is. Christians and everyone need to come to terms with the concept of the word "secular" - it is fundamental for civil/political work - and it means knowledge that is held in common (in certain circles) because it is knowledge derived logically from SHARED premises. Without shared premises, we can never have a discussion. What remains is just to vote and let the majority decide. It is up to society to decide what is acceptable secular knowledge - and even science is a business, and so certain unverified dogma can creep into what is considered secular. In essence the whole debate between Liberals and Conservatives (whatever those terms mean) is a debate about deciding what "secular" knowledge is, in our times. And it includes what society believes about homosexual behavior.
Individuals with same-sex attraction are free to find their own true love and make a life together. But they are not free to term the relationship a marriage, and redefine the term for all of society. There is nothing hateful about it. Marriage is neither gay nor straight. Marriage exists for the purpose of joining a man to a woman, and the man and woman to their own offspring. That is the all of it. Marriage is obviously not for everyone. Certainly we all hope to associate with the loved-ones of our choice, but not all of our loving relationships fit the description of marriage.
Ok, Richard.
First you say that no teacher anywhere ever teaches students how to have sex.
Then you say that a instructional video on sex used by a public school must have been given them by NOM. (what the heck, man? NOM didn't even *exist* when I was in elementary school!)
Then you say that anyone can find an instance of an elementary school teacher teaching children how to have gay sex if they just look hard enough.
Now you're saying that Gay-Straight Alliances absolutely, positively do not teach children how to have gay sex, and we're all unreasonable for saying that they do.
Except that the original post didn't even mention GSA's.
At this point you're acting like a fellow brought in for running a red light who suddenly starts blurting out "What dead bodies? What meth lab? What bank robbery?"
You might want to consider stopping now before you embarrass your side further.
marriageequality=oneman+onewoman, let's put your two posts together. On the one hand, "The only acceptable "safe-sex" message which should be taught to children is abstinence before marriage, and then complete monogamy in a man/woman marriage." On the other hand, "Marriage is obviously not for everyone" and "Individuals with same-sex attraction are free to find their own true love and make a life together."
Given this, what kind of "safe-sex" message do you want taught to children with same-sex attraction?
#18 - I know this is hard for liberals to understand, because it is one of the big differences between conservative thought and liberal thought, but I'll do my best to lay it out for you.
Conservatives believe that there are many things that we should not openly affirm and celebrate through government institutions, but we also should not ban people from doing them in our free society.
Liberals generally don't work like this. Either it is to be fully and openly embraced, or it is to be utterly destroyed. Hence the ongoing belief that opposition to same-sex marriage equals a desire to hunt down and horribly murder anyone who confesses a same-sex attraction.
Our laws should not prohibit individuals with same-sex attraction to find their own true love and make a life together.
However, that does not require us to openly advocate and support the lifestyle with special government-funded benefits.
There is nothing wrong with a school teaching the students that abstinence before marriage and monogamy in a man/woman marriage is the safest way to have sex, both from a medical and psychological viewpoint. That doesn't require us to impose the death penalty for homosexuality.
Children with same-sex attraction should be taught that they should not engage in any sexual behavior before they choose to enter into an opposite-sexed marital relationship. If they truly love their "true love," they won't engage in any sexual behavior which will put the other individual at risk. Does that mean that if their true love is the same sex, that they be celibate? Yes, it does. The only safe sex is in a man/woman marriage.
BTW, "making a life together," can mean living a life of chastity, while being close friends. They don't have to share bedrooms, or other intimate spaces. Can it be done? Yes, it can.
I personally think that sodomy should be illegal, again, AS IT WAS A MERE 10 YEARS AGO. Homosexuality belongs behind closed doors where it has been for nearly all of history.
As they say, "out of sight, out of mind." How many young people would be spared a homosexual lifestyle if homosexuality was not talked about, if homosexual activities were against the law?
Nowadays, a boy gets a "man-crush" and he is encouraged to label himself as a homosexual. What a tragic outcome.
Fascinating how NOM attacks Queerty but sidesteps the original argument that it lied in its commercial.
Mike Brooks - You seem to get more ignorant with each post.
The great posts from Gothelittle, Mike Brooks and marriageequalit=one man/one woman really reinforce the blog and the subsequent attacking posts show just how demented the opponents are.
At one time is public schools that actually taught you healthy things. I remember being taught not to smoke or use drugs. The logical thing would be for the schools to teach is not to engage in homosexuality and do not engage in anal sex for your own health.
But reading the bonehead posts from these demented elites says it all. If you teach this truth about health then you are a bigot and full of hate. How dare you love your own children and not want them to be exposed to this. How dare you do not want your children to be exposed to sexual diseases. Better to get sick and die then be hatefull. These posts show us NOM supporters what we are up against. Sadly we have those in education who want to spend our tax money to get our children to engage in this perverted behavior. If a health teacher teaches his students no anal sex as it leads to premature death and disease he is fired for teaching them health.
This is why this fight is worth fighting. The future of our children depends on it.
As a Christian, I am so disappointed with Maggie for using swear words. There is no excuse for that.
Who actually used the words Renee? I think it's accurate reporting. I'm just glad they didn't put the whole quote in there.