Tuesday, August 08, 2006

I watched an episode of The Law of the Playground at the weekend (taped from Friday night, very funny and well worth watching) and masturbation was mentioned. It reminded me of a snippet of conversation I overheard in a shopping mall few years ago.

A group of kids walked past as I was coming out of a shop. It was a mixed group of boys and girls, maybe seven of them, around 12 years old. I didn't hear the context, but the bit I did hear was a girl saying this:

"She can't masturbate, she's a girl!"

I had this almost overwhelming urge to catch up with them and explain. But then I realised how wrong that would be.

It struck me as strange that a young person of that age, old enough to know the correct terminology rather than the playground "wanking" which is more common, should know so little about the actual act itself.

It also scares me. If they lack such basic information about sex then they probably think that you can't get pregnant the first time, or if you do it standing up, or if you're having your period. Or if the boy pulls out in time.

It's about time we sorted out the sex education in this country. Kids are having sex younger and younger these days, and they won't be persuaded not to do it by a lack of knowledge, so we might as well arm them with the information they need to protect themselves from both pregnancy and STIs.

I also think that if sex was discussed openly and explicitly in PHSE lessons at school, girls in particular could be less easily pressured into penetrative sex as they'd know the alternatives, and they would be less likely to fall for the old "If you love me..." argument.

Quite apart from the fact that if they don't know about clitoral stimulation, they're gonna have a much less fulfilling sex life anyway!

4 comments:

  1. Good heavens, first it's well-hung hedgehogs and now wanking women. I thought it was just me that dwelt on sex too often, and then only 'cos I never get any.

    You're insatiable, girl!

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  2. My interest is purely scientific, I assure you...

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  3. I couldn't agree more. It seems that while boys are encouraged to learn everything they can about sex, girls get quite the opposite. And now it's not even as bad as when we were young. Don't worry, I won't go into the schpiel of how we trudged 20 miles to school every morning in hip-deep snow. But in those days, we didn't know thing one about sex and we had to find out everything surreptitiously.

    Knowledge is wealth, let's spread it! Great post, Anna!

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  4. That's the Anna we know and love. She pulls no punches!

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