Sex is everywhere you look in America. It is used to sell almost anything and is all over the TV and images we see every day. Sex is a part of everyone’s life, yet when it comes to talking about sex and safe sex, Americans get uncomfortable. Sex education in America is either about stressing abstinence or gives the basic of sex and safe sex. And for most teens their only sex education comes from school and not their parents. Many parents feel awkward to talk to their kids about sex and some just chose to ignore it. Kids grow up knowing that they’re not going to get the information from their parents and then get misguided and false information from their friends.
The documentary “Let’s Talk About Sex” by James Houston shows Americans attitudes toward sex and how that affects the sex education. The attitude toward sex is that it is wrong and can lead to STD’s and pregnancy. Most people think that people should wait until they are married to have sex. Either way, teens are not getting the support and information they need to make the right choices when it comes to sex. According to the documentary, every day in America “10,000 teenagers catch an STD, 2,400 young girls become pregnant and 55 young people are infected with HIV”. The documentary has turned into an outreach campaign to teach parents, kids, and educator’s healthy and realistic ways to talk about sex. Many parents were not taught about sex appropriately and they don’t have the tools when it comes to teaching their kids.
This outreach campaign is geared towards getting people to talk openly and honestly about sex and teaching the teens how to have safe and healthy relationships and to feel comfortable to talk with their parents. I think this is great because it is realistic and is all about helping teens make safer choices. Americans should feel more open to talk about sex because sexuality is a part of all of us. The documentary also looks at how sex is talked about by religious leaders and how they can give proper information without going against what the religion believes.
I think that sex education needs to be more informative and accepted throughout America but also needs to come from families. If everyone felt more comfortable talking about sex to one another and to children then we would all be better informed and the shame would go away. I think this campaign will help to educate Americans and hopefully help decrease the amounts of STD that are contracted by teens and teen pregnancies.
I agree with you 100%. This is a serious topic and a touchy subject. We as adults tend to shy away from topics that are uncomfortable to us. We are scared to give too much information or give too much detail. I know this first hand, because I am guilty of doing just that. I had "the talk" with my daughter years ago, but didnt know exactly what to say. It's kind of like you want to discourage them from having sex. Since then I've spoken to my daughter several times and each time it gets a little easier. We have to continuously reach out to our children and let them know they can talk to us. They need to know that it's not about abstaining from sex, but more so about being knowledgable. We have to prepare them for different situations, we have to give them the tools necessary to make wise decisions. Also, I believe that every child should have an adult(responsible adult) other then their own parent that he or she feels comfortable talking to. In a perfect world our children would be able to approach us with any topic comfortably, but this world is far from perfect. I'm grown and I still won't talk to my mother about sex... I pray that every parent takes the time to educate their children. I wouldn't send my daughter to the playground to learn history, so why would I want her learning something that could impact her life for the better or worse from anywhere but home? Hopefully she listens to us and chooses wisely. Or, maybe she'll wait until she's 30 or married, which ever comes first.
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