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DL Opinion
As a non-parent, I accept that my views on adolescent sexual education might not mesh with people concerned about their offspring diving into experiences they may not be ready for. The advent and growth of sexting alone is a terrifying prospect for parents suddenly confronted by their child’s burgeoning sexual exploration, and it’s understandable – if unreasonable – that some people want to ignore it for as long as possible. But healthy sexual choices are best made by people who’ve been encouraged to have a healthy, open dialogue around sexuality in all its complexities. And unfortunately, this dialogue still appears to be largely missing in Australia’s education institutions.
Earlier this year, sexual health experts argued that Australia’s sex education system was in drastic need of an overhaul. Professor Catherine Lumby, who has spent the past two years working on an Australian Research Council project called ‘Young People, Sex, Love and Media’, expressed concern over the high degree of confusion felt by sexually active adolescents grappling with the issues of consent and pleasure. Professor Lumby’s research shows that girls feel pressure to be sexually active from a young age while boys have different anxieties about sexual expectation and appropriate behaviour.
In the same article, journalist Jill Stark spoke to Stef Tipping from the Centre Against Sexual Assault. Tipping is the co-coordinator for CASA’s secondary schools program. Tipping says staff involved with the centre’s six week sexual assault prevention program still encounter the kind of double standards which see sexually active girls and boys separated into ‘sluts’ and ‘legends’. She says these attitudes still lead to confusion around matters of consent.
Worryingly, new research coming out of UK shows there’s also an inadequacy around sex education in a world where hardcore pornography is easily accessed by teenagers. Researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine interviewed a sample size of adolescents across three British locations for a study which focused exclusively on the ‘expectations, experiences and circumstances of anal sex among [heterosexual] young people’.
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