Jill McDevitt explores why something as natural and necessary as sex is so taboo
OCTOBER is Family Sex Education Month, a good time to reflect on how notoriously crappy most parents are at teaching something as important as sexuality to their children, and a good time to make attempts to be less crappy for your kids. What do you wish your parents taught you about sex, but didn’t? One person I surveyed answered, “the emotional side.” Another said, “their values and expectations of me,” while a third mentioned, “I just wish they taught me about sex.”
Children are thirsty for guidance from their parents – guidance about sexual values, feelings and behaviors is no exception, yet parents become extremely uncomfortable with facing this particular responsibility. In a culture as sex-negative as ours, I totally understand where the discomfort comes from. I offer consultations for parents on how to make the “birds and bees” conversation with their kids easier, but here are a few tips to get you started.
1. When referring to your child’s genitals, use proper anatomy terms. It’s not a who-ha, pee-pee, or “down there.” When you teach the other body parts like nose and knee, you don’t give them nicknames, so why the genitals? Calling it something else is step one in a long line of unfortunate, shame-filled messages that say, “This part of your body is so dirty, I can’t even say the word.”
2. Have the same rules and expectations for male and female children. Let your son cry; let your daughter help fix the clogged sink. When they’re older, give them the same curfew and rules about dating. Equal gender roles are important for development and future relationships. They are more likely to be respectful in these relationships because they were raised valuing all genders.
3. Never force your child to kiss or hug anyone hello or goodbye, even Grandma. They may be small, but they have the right to an autonomous body.
4. Be “age-appropriate” but realize that your understanding of what is age-appropriate is probably several years off. Teaching about periods at age 9, waiting until 13 to bring up sex, and lecturing about condoms while dropping your kid off at the college dorm is a day late and a dollar short. If you haven’t talked yet, it’s better to start late than not at all, but ideally sexuality conversations should start much sooner than the child will actually need the information, so by the time they do, they are prepared and confident in their knowledge and values.
Jill McDevitt holds a master’s degree in Human Sexuality and is currently completing her PhD, which will make her the only person in the country with three degrees in the field. She is the proprietor of Feminique Boutique on Church Street. Her book, Fighting the Crusade Against Sex: Being Sex-Positive in a Sex-Negative World, is due out in November.
