What is Digg?204 Comments
- yttrstein, on 11/06/2009, -14/+150If their parents weren't idiots in the first place, this would not be necessary. Screw their beliefs.
- Junkyarddawg, on 11/06/2009, -4/+961) 15 years is too late. Seriously, wake up UK, your country has changed.
2) There is a provision that parents can have their kids opted out, so they don't have to learn about horrible dangerous things like contraceptives. - fordfox, on 11/06/2009, -0/+76I remember hearing of classmates in 7th and 8th grade who had already had sex.
I would much rather have my child's "innocence" ruined than their whole life ruined by HIV or pregnancy at that early age due to lack of proper sex education.
Beyond that, it's just another religious "debate", with one side providing clear and cogent arguments, and the other side screaming nonsensical rhetoric.
As for the parents who say they should be the ones to teach their children.. well you have roughly 5 years between 10 and 15 to teach them before the schools will do it for you! - svendm, on 11/06/2009, -1/+67http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_tee_bir_rat- ...
Teen birth rates:
USA: 64 (Age of consent: 16-18)
UK: 33 (Age of consent: 16)
Sweden: 13 (Age of consent: 15)
(The pregnancy rates follow the same pattern, btw. )
Where Sweden has the mandatory sex-ed starting at age 13 and hands out free condoms to students of age. And the religiosity is a small fraction compared to the US/UK. (so it ain't due to abstinence, that's for sure)
Your explanation? - ohreilly, on 11/06/2009, -1/+6315?
Pfft, I remember having them in primary school (with my parents being able to opt-out, of course). I was probably 11 at the time. - Suricou, on 11/06/2009, -2/+57"Right for children to be educated in accordance with their parents’ beliefs?" Where did this come from?
You can argue that parents should have a right to educate their children, and get no contriversy there - but why is this an exclusive right? How exactly does this translate into giving parents the right to shield their children from learning things said parents disapprove of?
I see much potential for abuse in such a 'right.' Political or religious extremists, for example, could use this to defend crazy schooling. "Yes, we taught our child that the jews are filthy pigs who seek to rule the world and that the holocaust was a scam - but if you tell him otherwise, you're violating our parential rights!" - jggr, on 11/06/2009, -3/+53I'll never understand America's belief that ignorance and mis-information can be in anyway beneficial. Teach facts, let the people decide for themselves.
- terminalterror, on 11/06/2009, -1/+50Just as they are too young to become pregnant or get an STD?
- Yodan1, on 11/06/2009, -3/+52Mr. Balls.
- Ulfalizer, on 11/06/2009, -1/+46Are you kidding me? If anything, it should be earlier, as most teens will already be a few years into puberty by the time they're 15. I've never understod this notion that sex in and of itself could be something harmful for children/adolescents to learn about either.
- BoneheadFarker, on 11/06/2009, -5/+45There's plenty of data that areas with a lack of proper sex education leads to higher teen pregnancy rates. Just look at what happen when abstinance-only education was pushed in the US.
- rignopolis, on 11/06/2009, -3/+40If parents did their job, this wouldn't be necessary. The problem is, many parents these days are absent - in terms of teaching their kids values. By default, the schools are left with no option but to try and fill in the gap - which is problematic for those parents who are engaged with their kids.
- IKORKYI, on 11/06/2009, -1/+36Sex education /= sex lesson
***** the submitter - hauntedchippy, on 11/06/2009, -1/+34The problem is with parents assuming that they own their children. Which is *****, human beings are not property, we had a civil war over just that.
Parents are stewards, or guardians, of their offspring until said offspring are legally adults and can make decisions for themselves. Parents who fail their children by indoctrinating them with ***** are child abusers and should be treated as such. - mlvassallo, on 11/06/2009, -0/+26Sex education is not a "Sex Lesson".
- papashawn, on 11/06/2009, -1/+27how is babby formed, old chap?
- sladek, on 11/06/2009, -0/+25English fail
- Paranor01, on 11/06/2009, -0/+25Sweden actually educates with factual truth. Not politically motivated truth.
Dumber the kids (by dumber, I mean uneducated), higher the pregnancy. - WhiskeyLemur, on 11/06/2009, -2/+27If parents are involved in their kids' lives, I sure as hell hope they have had "the talk" with them by the time the kid is 15 - and at that point, what does it hurt to have the school provide additional information? I guarantee that the vast majority of the parents who are objecting to it are doing so on religious grounds. It has nothing to do with parental involvement as such.
- mrsteveman1, on 11/06/2009, -0/+25Well here's an absurd but more relevant example.
Parent teaches kid that the stove isn't actually hot and won't burn you, but refuses to let kid near stove until they turn 18 because that's what they "believe in".
What do you suppose will happen the first time mommy and daddy aren't looking? - RodgerE1, on 11/06/2009, -1/+22Dugg for Ed Balls
- BrewBeau, on 11/06/2009, -1/+18Bad reasoning. This is why juries aren't filled with people who knew the victims. Of course, when you have a child it's natural to not want them to grow up because you want them to be your little baby forever. But, at some point, logic should kick in and you should concede that there are things that your kid(and every kid) should know because it benefits society as a whole.
- o76923, on 11/06/2009, -1/+18The mean age of first sex in the US is 16 with 95% falling within 2 years on either side. I can't imagine the UK is too different.
- nullmind, on 11/06/2009, -2/+19Remember, sex is immoral and unnatural.
Nice slant on the title. "Sex Lessons" != "Sexual Education". Slant for the bury. - Suricou, on 11/06/2009, -1/+18Let them both provide. It's called redundency. Don't depend on either.
- Fhwqhgads, on 11/06/2009, -1/+17@Suricou:
Exactly. There should be no "right" to brainwash children into believing ***** like sex is bad, gay people are bad, Jews are evil, believe the bible or burn and be tortured forever in hell, etc. - pstroll, on 11/06/2009, -6/+21The sex ed teacher at my high school took one look at my face and gave me an 'F'
- Junkyarddawg, on 11/06/2009, -1/+16It's already been leaked that an opt-out will be added. Don't worry, the religious kids will be just as clueless as to how babby is formed as they are now. Well, actually what their religions want to keep them from knowing is how to make sure a babby ISN'T formed, but same difference.
That's not the real story. The real story is the enormous divide between catholic and muslim dogma and the actual world the kids live in - and the worrying power of the religious lobby. - WhiskeyLemur, on 11/06/2009, -1/+161. Don't be absurd - when people say "sex education," NO ONE is talking about taking your boy to the local brothel.
2. 15-yr-olds know just enough to get them in trouble. Even some adults have some retardedly medieval notions about contraceptives - what does a 15-yr-old know about what STDs do to your body, the failure rate of condoms, or the fact that drinking grapefruit juice could lower the effectiveness of the birth control pill? - bsmang, on 11/06/2009, -0/+13Waiting till they're 15 is certainly a little too long, but at least it's compulsory.
- chrysrobyn, on 11/06/2009, -0/+12I had sex ed in primary school, but it was more about biology than anything else. I didn't learn what a condom was, or that the word "abstinence" existed. It was about what a man and a woman looked like if you cut them in half with a chainsaw. Then, if you took a single sperm cell and a single egg under a microscope.
Sex ed really shouldn't go by that name until there's an artificial penis and a condom. At that point, parents of boys can "opt-out" of learning what girls look like. - mrsteveman1, on 11/06/2009, -1/+111: This is not in America
2: Religion is not a get out of jail free card - theonlywizdum, on 11/06/2009, -0/+10cwmather, Sheltering your kids from anyone who has different views than you is not helping them. They should be allowed to see both sides so they can decide for themselves. Just because a teacher holds certain views, does not mean that your child will be forced to believe the same way. During my years in the public school system I had Atheist teachers, Christian teachers, and even one Hindu teacher.
- XBebop, on 11/06/2009, -1/+11Who would like to come up and demonstrate this with me?
- Skurt, on 11/06/2009, -3/+12Did he use his dick to write it on your face?
- Angostura, on 11/06/2009, -0/+9cwmather. So, as a matter of interest at what age did you educate your kids about sex and relationships ... and what did you tell them?
- the8thbit, on 11/06/2009, -0/+9They need to do way instain chimbley sweep>
- hauntedchippy, on 11/06/2009, -1/+10Damn those bloody American freedoms applying in the United Kingdom!
- toxicityj, on 11/06/2009, -0/+9I hate that teens are off screwing around that young. To me sex is something you do with someone you love and at age 15 you're too stupid to know what that is. BUT! I would rather them know how to do it safely than ignore it and hope they don't get pregnant/STD/etc.
- Suricou, on 11/06/2009, -2/+11Except this is British, not American.
I don't think it'd count either way though - it isn't punishing religion directly. It's punishing truancy, and there is no problem with that. True, some of this truancy is motivated by the parents' religion - but if you make an exception, you're effectively saying that the parents are above the law. - Scira, on 11/06/2009, -0/+8I first learned a little bit about sex from a friend when I was 13. I never saw a vag till I was 16, and never really learned about sex until we got the internet, when I was 17.
I never got a sex ed class, the closest thing I had was a 1 week anatomy class in middle school, the kind where boys only learned about boys, girls only learned about girls, and they still had to send home an opt-out letter!
And if you are wondering, the internet is a bad, bad place to learn about sex, and I am a bit messed up from it. - SystemicThought, on 11/06/2009, -0/+8I have an idea. Make them go to sex ed. The parents can tell them "The homosexuals and people who use condoms and have sex before marriage that you're hearing about are all going to hell." I don't see how learning that contraceptives exist and that penises go in vaginas and that some penises go in male anuses will hamper their parents ability to teach them their religious beliefs.
On another note, at my private catholic school, we had sex ed, in which at one point I think the teacher concluded with "If you ever have sex before marriage, use a condom. But sex before marriage is wrong, and you shouldn't have sex before marriage. So you'll never need to use a condom because you'll never have sex before marriage. But if you do, use a condom." - localzuk, on 11/06/2009, -1/+9It doesn't matter what some parents think - all those things are part of life in the UK. The children will come across those things in their day to day lives, so should be educated about them.
Not educating them leads to ignorance, bigotry and stupidity. - Zippo, on 11/06/2009, -0/+8Christ, I went to a Roman Catholic school growing up, and sex-ed started at Grade 2. I was called "Health Class". We learned about the human body and sex organs at the age of 7 and by the time grade 5 came around, we were taught about intercourse. Health class continued on till grade 9.
- FrankFutter, on 11/06/2009, -0/+7you get no respect...
- XBebop, on 11/06/2009, -0/+7^^A girl got pregnant in my 7th grade class. Though, my town has a horrible teen pregnancy rate.
- WhiskeyLemur, on 11/06/2009, -2/+9There are certain things which adversely affect the well-being of your child.
To take an extreme case - there was a story about parents whose infant died from starvation (maybe it was malnutrition, which isn't exactly the same thing) because they were new-age morons and fed him soy milk, which doesn't contain all the things a growing human needs. They were, if memory serves, indicted and found guilty of criminal negligence.
The same, imo, should apply to parents who refuse to treat their children for basic, curable ailments due to "religious beliefs." And for parents who refuse to vaccinate their children without pressing, REAL medical reasons - allergies, for instance, as opposed to some paranoid delusion that their kid will "acquire" autism.
The same should go for parents who expose their children to unnecessary risk of STDs and pregnancy because they are naive (read: stupid) enough to believe that "my little angel would NEVER do something like that!!!" when nature, not to mention copious amounts of evidence, show otherwise.
There's a time and place for religion - but goddamn it, the welfare of your child should take a higher priority!! And if the two are in conflict, maybe you need to take a good, hard second look at your religion's doctrines. - Deathalicious, on 11/06/2009, -1/+8The only sex education you'll ever need:
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/266937
"The Puberty Pals: What the heck is happening to my genitals?"
NSFW, obviously. - waydee, on 11/06/2009, -0/+7Sex education was done at 12-13 for me when I was at school in Scotland, the full ugly health teacher doing the condom on a dildo routine.
I don't remember it being something parents could opt out of, maybe under special request. - JonTheGoose, on 11/06/2009, -2/+9Part of me thinks that it's not the governments business to teach kids about sex. It should be the parents responsibility to educate their own children on the matter but then crappy ass parents don't educate their kids at all which leads to irresponsible sexual activity, teen pregnancies, STDs etc which makes me think sex education should be standardized by the government but it's not the governments business to...*head a'splode*
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