I empathize with the Oklahoma dad on this one. My problem with the school “grocery list of sex acts” poster is that it is indicative of what Sex Education has become. It’s gone from telling kids where babies come from, to…hell I dunno…information about vaginal rejuvenation, vajazzling, shrimping, snowballing, strawberry nut-logging and any other degenerate activity that masquerades as and does a faulty, flawed imitation of what sex IS, what sex is FOR, and the Good that it should, ideally, spring from (Love.) Before anyone breaks out the tar and feathers, let me say this: Socrates (in Gorgias) brought up, among other things, the subject of good pleasures vs. bad pleasures (or more accurately, the subject of whether all pleasures/rewards are good, and whether all pains/punishments are bad.) My question is this: all jokes aside, is oral sex, at its most fundamental, a good pleasure or a bad one? I classify it as a bad one. Doesn’t it feel so good that it’s on a pleasure-level somewhat above that of actual sex? Now add in the luxuriousness of it, the ease of it, the casualness of it, the speed of it, the laziness of it (all depending on whether you’re giving it or receiving it, of course) and then top that off with…the exchange/Capitalism aspect of it (I give, you get, you give, I get; I’ll do you then you do me) and just how transactional and demeaning/disheartening/demoralizing it is to the very idea of sex. Sex and Sexuality have become blurred: Sex-Ed is now Sexuality-Ed. Now, think of what a corruption, degradation it is of the entire point of sex, which is procreation, with some pleasure thrown in (if we’re doing it right, that is) to make us wanna keep doing it, for the sake of evolution and propagation of the species…oral sex, and most if not all other fetishizations of things sexual and aspects of / add-ons / work-arounds to sex, all just get us focused on the easy, feel-good stuff, no-strings-attached, no hassles man, If It Feels Good, Do It…as opposed to what Sex is intended for. It’s like this fracturing of reality…a detachment from and alienation from What Is…in favor of What Is Not. Substitute “prostate stimulation” or “female ejaculation” or “fisting” or “auto-erotic asphyxiation” or Japanese Blow Job Gameshows or whatever you care to for my example about “oral sex” and it still fits. All these things are like heroin to sex’s um aspirin, perhaps. They are not Good pleasures at all. They are pleasures that one may relish and bask in, but they are ultimately like the person who, in Socrates’ example, is the Happiest Man Alive because he can scratch himself to his heart’s content. Is it really worth it, coming to depend on and be addicted to a kind of mockery of the sex act, a subversion of the procreative act, a feels-so-great-that-it-makes-everything-else-pale-in-comparison sex substitute, when you could stick to the genuine article and not have to worry about becoming jaded or fixated or whatever? The “Genuine Article” should be the subject of Sex Education, and safe sex. 101 stuff. Not an episode of Sex in the City, or Entourage. Which brings me to the point of all, which would be: do we really want to be telling 13-year-olds about oral sex? Anal sex? Something that feels so good that you’re hooked after the first orgasm? An act that you can substitute for that thing that’ll cause a (gasp!) pregnancy (i.e. the point of sex) if you do it, an act that is so easy and feels so good and which reduces Sex (and by consequence, Love) to an exchange of scents and secretions and sensations to be sought after, a “Mr. Goodbar” as it were; yet another incredibly-pleasurable thing to chase after moment to moment and to objectify? Get the fix, crave again, get the fix, crave again, etc etc. It’s like Julie said in Vanilla Sky: “I swallowed your cum: that means something!” It means you’ve got a damned screw loose is what it means, Julie! Hell, even Tom Cruise knew that much. We may all love a good blowjob, but a good blowjob isn’t love. It isn’t sex. It’s sexuality. There’s a big difference. Sex-Ed is for kids at or around the age of menarch / puberty. That’s reasonable. Sexuality-Ed is something else entirely. Not for kids at all.
I think this is what I (and possibly the Oklahoma father in question) find most frustrating, nay, enraging: the teaching of what is, essentially, a perversion and corruption of what Sex is all about, under the guise of Sex Education.
Most of us are against underage (18) smoking, drinking and drug use: we don’t want kids getting accustomed to or addicted to something that’s bad for them, before they’re able to do it responsibly, if at all. But we all turn a blind eye (or wink it slyly) at the idea of underage sex, or underage sex substitutes, which can affect the lives of teenagers just as much, and which can (in some cases) change the very direction and focus of their future lives. That needs to change. It’ll be tough. Because almost every aspect of our society subtly (and sometimes not-so-subtly) encourages and is even tittilated by the idea of it. Budding sexuality is a turn on: if nothing else, it reminds us of our own, years ago, and we’re inclined to let sleeping dogs lie. But these dogs aren’t sleeping.
Here’s a thought: if you think Sexuality-Ed masquerading as Sex-Ed is perfectly acceptable for Middle Schoolers, or even Jr. High or High Schoolers, then you should have no problem with 12 & 13 year-old girls having vibrators. And 12 & 13 year-old boys with Fleshlights.
Sounds really, really wrong, doesn’t it?
That’s. The. Point.
Let the mocking commence.
