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Timothy talks to Jr. Martha talks to the Town
Mr. and Mrs. Smith do Sex Ed.
Home and School curriculum for Sex Ed
The poker game always started on time. Smokes. Refreshment. Food. Chips, and Cards. Always on time. Timothy Smith was late. They couldn't believe it. When he arrived his cohorts openly jeered. Sitting down quickly, he said they wouldn't believe his excuse.
"If you're not dead or bleeding from the eyes, there is no excuse!" his best friend dealing cards and observation. "It's Poker night!"
"I'm telling you, you won't believe it." Timothy continued, "You know Martha has been on this committee about sex ed at the schools?"
They all laughed. They knew nothing about it, but thought Martha a funny choice for that job. They all had an opinion. "Maybe she'll teach you something.", "He must know something, he's got three kids." " That's not proof of anything, except Martha knows something". "Two of the kids don't even bear much resemblance to Timmy." They were all getting a pretty good belly laugh out of this little exchange. Cards all around.
"Very funny, very funny. That's not the good part." Timothy explained. "She insisted I sit down with my son and give him the sex talk. Yeah, that's right, before poker, before I could leave the house, I had to tell my son about sex."
"Well now, that must have been something. What did you tell the boy?" again, from the dealer, his life long friend.
"Simple, I told him what my dad told me."
"And what, pray tell, did your dad tell you?"
"Actually, I told him more than my dad told me."
"Are you going to tell us or what?"
"Sure. First I asked him if he knew about sex. He said he did. Then I asked him if he knew where babies came from. He said he did. Then I asked him if he knew it was smart to only have a baby after you were married. He said he, being in junior high, thought he might wait a while. I then asked him if he had any questions. He said he didn't. I told him if he had any questions he could ask me. He said they had classes in school on all this stuff. I told him, good, gotta go, patted him on the back, he rolled his eyes, and here I am."
Everyone looked at their cards.
"Timmy, that was quite a talk."
"Well, it got Martha off my back."
After a few moments everyone talked. "More than my dad told me." "Mine too." "Yeah, my dad never talked about it." "Mine told me don't bring a girl home pregnant." "My old man wanted me to look at a film the army showed him before he went to Korea." "What happened. " "Nothing. Never found the film." And with that, the talk turned to sports and cards.
Martha was early. Mrs. Smith was hardly a shrew or a religious fanatic. She was not particularly prudish. While she had a life long relationship with her church, she considered herself open minded. Not liberal mind you, but certainly open minded. And practical. You could ask around. She was known as practical. She never really volunteered for this job. It kind of fell to her. What was she thinking? It sounded so simple at the beginning.
The chairman of the school board announced, "We need a volunteer group to look at the curriculum from the sex ed classes over at the middle school and the high school. We are getting some phone calls of concern from parents. If someone will just look at it and get back to us with a report, we would appreciate it." A simple announcement. It might have been, we need someone to bake brownies. IF ONLY.
The introduction to the philosophy from the curriculum was direct:
"Planned Parenthood believes that knowledge empowers people to make better choices about their health and sexuality. Our medically accurate sexuality education efforts are a significant departure for the "abstinence-only" approach that ignores the realities of premarital sexual behavior in the US. We offer a wide range of culturally sensitive, age-appropriate programs....."
Her report to the board had to be brief. Not because there were not many topics to discuss; Precisely because she was quite aware that no one on the board had any idea regarding the depth of the current teaching being conducted in the schools. This was going to be a very difficult job.
She organized her material. She prepared her handouts. She prepared her few words of observation. She told herself she would not blush. Her husband had laughed at her discomfort. "No good deed goes unpunished," he had muttered as he agreed to talk to their son. "You're only making me do this because of this mess you volunteered yourself for." At least he didn't have to talk to his daughters.
The meeting began. Various business was attended to. Her time came. The chairman invited her to stand. She distributed the materials and the hand outs.
She gave her summary:
"Ladies and gentlemen: When I volunteered to do this seemingly simple task I had no idea what would be involved. I have met with the principals of both schools, I have met with the instructors at both schools, and I have reviewed the material being presented as "materially factual" at both schools, and believe it or not, I even sought the advice and thoughts of some of the students.
I am embarrassed to admit that I have not looked into this sooner. I have two teenage daughters, and a pre-teen son. It is safe to say that collectively they probably know more than I do about many of the topics covered in the material. It is also safe to say, that there are a few things they will now accept as fact that are clearly the opinion of the authors.
This issue is not going to be resolved tonight. I could tell you about the topics that are covered, but some would say I am only trying to shock you. Believe me, that will not be necessary. See for yourself.
What should be done? I would like to suggest that you recommend that the parents of these children, in both schools, be invited to a public meeting to discuss the material, as well as the philosophy that permeates the material. I think you can count on healthy attendance!
Without setting myself up as an expert, because I am not an expert on sexuality or education, I can only offer this board my opinion, that though the material may be technically correct, and sufficiently broad to certainly inform any of our children about sexuality and its many expressions, something is missing.
The framework, or moral code, for understanding our sexuality, is specifically absent from this material. This is by design. The material is too broad and detailed for this to be absent, unless it is by intent.
One of the instructors told me that it is not the job of the school to teach what she called "morals". Whose "moral code" would she teach? And would she get in trouble? Everyone gets worried about what they think is the separation of church and state. She just teaches the material as it comes. My, my. It is pretty explicit, as it comes.
Perhaps, we as parents have not done our job. Perhaps, we have never felt competent to discuss sex with our kids. Maybe that's because we do what we were taught, and most of us were probably not taught very much.
I don't know. I am not an expert. But I do know this. Something is missing here. We need something very different than this approach and our children deserve so much better. It seems to me that our goals might be a bit higher than assuring ourselves that our teens can avoid pregnancy and STDs.
I would encourage all the board members to review the material, and if you could, visit a couple of the referenced websites. Teenwire.com might be quite an eye opener for those of us that think we're pretty savvy. I certainly learned a couple of quick insights, and I am , well never mind how old I am."
With that, she blushed and sat down.
Your Catholic Voice Foundation asks a few questions:
- Who should deliver any message concerning human sexuality to kids?
- When should it be delivered?
- Why are we allowing our schools to be used by Planned Parenthood to promote their own agenda?
- What is happening in your school? Do you know?
- Have you reviewed the material?
- Have you talked with your children?
- Have you visited the web sites they visit?
- Have you sampled the philosophy they are fed along with the information?
YCVF is committed to supporting only:
- Authentically human, wholesome, healthy, morally and technically correct sex education curricula;
- Those programs which reflect the truth concerning the dignity of the human person, the link between responsible behavior and sexual _expression, a true appreciation for the gift of the human body and the beauty and dignity of human sexuality within marriage.
In addition, we insist that parents are the first teachers of their children and that public school teachers should always act in accord with them.
Finally, it is the position of the Foundation that discussing a moral code to govern human behavior and choice does not violate any proper understanding of the separation between Church and State. To the contrary, it serves the common good.
We have been absent this specific educational environment for far too long with far too damaging of consequences.
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