Tag: Sex Education

Now More Than Ever, It’s Time for Universal Menstrual Education for Gender Equality

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Ninety-two percent of high school students reported needing a new pad or tampon during school. Yet, period poverty, a lack of access to menstrual products due to economic circumstances, impacts students’ ability to safely address menstruation.

“Some girls find out about their periods when they actually get them. It’s just never talked about in schooling.”

Sexual Abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention Points to Subordination of Women and Girls

The recently released investigative report on the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) mishandling of clergy sex abuse allegations is damning. Research suggests a strong correlation between perpetrator beliefs about gender, social context and sexual abuse.

“Why should it be up to the men to decide what constitutes justice for the women and children, while the women are expected to abide by the decisions made for them?”

What My Ancestors Might Think of This Moment in U.S. History

I read the draft decision by the Supreme Court in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and wondered what my ancestors would think of us—the U.S.—at this moment.

I knew immediately what one might think. Her name is Lillie and her story motivates my work as an obstetrician-gynecologist and as an advocate for sexual and reproductive rights globally. She would say that history is repeating itself after learning little from its past.

Colleges Must Fill the Sex Ed Gap Left by High Schools

When it comes to preparing youth to lead healthy, sex-positive lives, we know that the state of sex education in our middle and high schools is dire. And although teaching sex ed is often considered the responsibility of middle and high schools, colleges often end up dealing with the fallout related to this lack of education.

Many first-year U.S. college students enroll in a college in the state where they live, so it’s especially important for states with lackluster high school sex ed to address it at the college level.

‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bills Groom Children for Sexual Abuse, and May Even Violate Title IX

“Don’t Say Gay” bills don’t protect children—they play into the hands of child abusers, while also putting school districts in violation of Title IX. Denying a school district’s right to define a curriculum based on evidence-based research plays directly into the hands of predators who want, very much, naïve and disempowered children to prey upon.

If the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Met the Dynamic Mrs. Dennett—Sex Ed And Censorship Would Be So 20th Century

Like other fans of Amazon’s The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, I’ll be binge-watching when the fourth season of the hit series finally drops on Friday, Feb. 18.

I can’t help but wonder if the fictional Midge Maisel was influenced by the real-life Mary Ware Dennett or what would happen if they met. From 1915 through the 1930s, Dennett’s pioneering battles against U.S. government censorship helped pave the way for the freedom of speech Mrs. Maisel relies on and fights to expand.

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Kids Learn About Sex From Porn. Comprehensive Sex Ed Could Help Change That.

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For decades, Howard Stern has used his celebrity status to normalize porn and misogyny. Last month, Billie Eilish, only 20, made a shocking revelation on Stern’s show: “I used to watch a lot of porn. I think it really destroyed my brain.”

Eilish is right—research shows conclusively that pornography is harmful for young people and, indeed, all brains. But kids take to porn because they find the sexual education offered by their schools and parents to be unhelpful and unreal.