Sexual Education in the United States

Sexual Education is a common controversy in politics these days. Parents and guardians want to control what their children are being taught on this subject in public schools. The two sides of this debate are abstinence-only education vs. contraceptive education. Religious lawmakers and lobbyists have stressed the importance of abstinence-only education as the only form of sexual education for students. This may seems blasphemous to people who look at some of the facts and figures found in an article from dosomething.org (sources of the article included NPR and the Guttmacher Institute.) According to this article, 35% of school districts require abstinence only education to be taught as the only option for unmarried individuals. Many teachers are prohibited from teaching anything beyond abstinence only education, even if they would like to teach contraceptive methods. Also, recent research shows that abstinence only education can actually deter contraceptive use among sexually active teenagers, which leads to more teenage pregnancies and STDs.

So why do these conservative policymakers believe that abstinence-only education is the only way to go? There are a few possible reasons. First, many strict Catholics don’t believe in birth control in any form. The bible also teaches that sex is intended only for married couples to enjoy. The Bible is so incredibly important in the daily lives of these individuals that they couldn’t stand to teach something in schools that directly opposes their beliefs. They may also believe that if parents want their children to know contraceptive methods, they will teach their kids those methods.

The reality of the matter is that parents generally don’t feel very comfortable approaching their children about sexuality and sexual education. Children have an even harder time asking questions about sex to their parents. They don’t want their parents to think that they’re having sex when they’re just curious and they don’t want to get into an awkward, long “sex talk” with their parents. That would be absolutely dreadful. The other reality here is that a majority of teenagers will have sex before they are married. If the only education they have received on this matter is of abstinence until marriage, when they (almost inevitably) encounter sex before marriage, they might not know how to use contraceptive methods correctly.

The truth is that someone needs to teach contraceptive methods to young adults, and if parents are, on the whole, failing at this subject of education, then public school needs to accept the challenge. They need to teach contraceptive methods to all students in order to protect them from unwanted pregnancy and STDs. I understand why those lawmakers feel that it is not right, or not their place to teach this subject, but I respectfully disagree.