Directive vs. Non-Directive
According to Thomas Lickona’s "Where Sex Education Went Wrong"
"Growing up in a highly eroticized sexual environment- a legacy of the sexual
revolution- American children are preoccupied with sex in developmentally distorted
ways and increasingly likely to act out their sexual impulses." The proof is
in the widespread sexual harassment and teen sexual activity that we have witness
throughout the years in our schools.
Many schools have adopted the Comprehensive Sex Education program, because it seems
like a "realistic" compromise, but according to Lickona, upon closer examination
reveals fundamental problems.
- It sends a mixed message. Abstinence is presented as the safest option, yet "protected
sex" is offered as a safe, and "responsible" second option. The "emphasis
is made on making your own decision, rather than on making the right decision."
- An abstinence message is further weakened when schools provide how-to condom
instruction and/or distribute condoms. This action signals approval of protected
sex and undermines the abstinence is the best decision message.
- As stated earlier, condoms do not make sex physically safe. Condoms have a 10
percent failure rate in preventing pregnancy. While, the average condom failure rate
for preventing AIDS is 31 percent. Many sexually transmitted diseases can transmitted
by areas of the body that are not covered by contraceptive barriers (ie. Chlamydia,
HPV).
- Condoms do not make sex emotionally safe. Low self-esteem, a sense of being "used,"
self-contempt for being the "user," and loss of reputation are all "destructive
emotional and spiritual effects that can come from having temporary, uncommitted
sexual relationships."
- Nondirective sex education undermines character. From a character education standpoint,
this model does not give unmarried teens compelling ethical reasons to abstain from
sex until they are ready to commit to another person. Instead, they are learning
that they are "responsible" if they are using contraception. Additionally,
it does not help students learn the "character quality of self-control"
and promotes the societal problem of "sex-out-of-control." It also doesn’t
develop an ethical understanding between the relationship between sex and love.
So, by the measures of ethics, education and public health, this nondirective
sex education has not succeeded. "As a result, schools are turning increasingly
toward directive sex education-just as the national character education movement
is embracing a more directive approach to promoting core ethical values as the basis
of good character" (Lickona 1993). The directive approach, which was discussed
earlier, stresses sexual abstinence as the only medically safe and morally responsible
choice for unmarried teenagers. As shown by the statistics presented, condoms do
not make premarital sex responsible, cause they do not make it physically or emotionally
safe, or ethically loving.
For links to pages which show why contemporary public school sex education does not
work:
http://www.hi-ho.ne.jp/taku77/papers/sex.htm
http://www.personal.psu.edu/faculty/n/x/nxd10/sexuality2.htm#sex
ed
http://www.missouri.edu/~c641884/ISCS7.html
http://www.mfc.org/pfn/56-96/sexed.html