Preach or teach?
 

Value-based Sexuality Education

by Alison Campbell Rate B.Ed.

Sexuality education and the teaching of values - historically this has been a minefield for schools as the concept of values has been irrevocably (and inaccurately) tied to the concept of religion. Classroom support of traditional sexual values has been overtaken by the secularisation of schools and society in general, social changes due to the sexual revolution, the influence of an increasingly permissive multi-media and the effect of HIV/AIDS on school based sexuality education.

This article examines the values component of sexuality education. It compares the two main philosophical models for teaching children and teenagers about sexual matters – the value-based and the value-neutral models. A rationale in support of the value-based model for sexuality education will be established as being the model that best meets the developmental needs of the adolescent.
 

A value-based approach to sexuality education is one in which the teaching of specific, stated values forms the context for student learning - for lesson design, choice of resources, selection of teaching staff and development of the curriculum as a whole.

The value-based model assumes:

• a specific value system is adopted by school community

• a statement of belief/position is made to students

• particular option/s promoted as ‘best’ i.e. of greater value

In other words, all teaching materials and approaches should reflect that value system and uphold it as the desired option for students.
 

Drug education is an example within the Health Education field that we can use to illustrate this model. In drug education our aim is prevention, therefore our specified stance is ‘a drug-free lifestyle is good’. This is the position that as a school community we openly value and stand by because it is clear, on the evidence, that a drug-free lifestyle is healthier and safer than a lifestyle of drug using. Thus, we design a curriculum and choose resources that not only give correct information about drugs, but which support this value position. This position is communicated openly to students as part of our endeavour to maximise each child's chances of recognising its value, and we help them learn skills and attitudes to choose that position for themselves.

We know that not all students will keep away from drugs. Some will drift in and be lucky enough to drift out. Some will get stuck in that lifestyle, unable to make genuine choices because of underlying problems in their lives that motivate them towards self-destructive behaviour.

Despite this, we don't demonstrate to the whole class the safest way of shooting up, or the best way to clean needles, just in case some do take up drugs. We know that such an approach would undermine our stated value base, that of a drug-free lifestyle. It would give all students the message that we were expecting them to be drug users one day. It would give them the message that risk taking with drugs is OK.

So, even though we are aware that some students won't be reached with pro-active drug education, we as adults and as health educators still know that to properly serve all our students we have to stand by this value system about drugs (‘harm minimisation’ advocates notwithstanding). We have to reiterate to teenagers `your best option is to say no to drugs, and this is why I believe that...'

They may choose that option or they may not, but we have provided them with a valuable role model, with reasons for saying no, and with skills to say no and stay safe.

Is it possible to relate this value-based model to sexuality education? Do we have a right to `impose' values about sexuality onto a varied school community? Which value system do we choose?

The value-based model applied to sexuality education seems to present problems.

Usual arguments against this approach include:

• We've got to present all the options

• The individual teacher's values don't/can't/shouldn't enter into classroom discussion about sex

• The school can't take a particular stance about sexual behaviour

• Our school community is too diverse

• In this day and age we can't/shouldn't preach or moralise

• Our role is to help students clarify their own value systems, not impose our own.

The heat of this sort of debate varies widely between state and independent school systems, from school to school within those systems, and from teacher to teacher in any school. Conflict can occur between teachers and parents. By and large, the popular solution in schools today to the problem that such pluralism of values poses, is to adopt a value-neutral approach to sexuality education.

The value-neutral model assumes:

• No specific value system adopted as context

• No statement of belief/position made to students

• No value is promoted as ‘best’: all options are equal - students choose on the basis of accepting consequences

A value-neutral model sounds both pragmatic and easy to present to students as it encourages them to examine all the options and values and select the one or ones they would like, rather like a smorgasbord. It can be particularly attractive to staff because theoretically no one need feel as though their lifestyle is being judged or ignored.

To assess the worth of this approach in the classroom, we need to examine:

• does the value-neutral model hold up in practice?

• does it actually meet the developmental needs of the adolescent?

Can we be value-neutral? No. Where no overt references to values surrounding sexual behaviour are made, indirect value messages are always communicated. For example, typical ‘safe sex’ information for teenagers follows these lines:

• Talk with my partner(s)

• Use condoms in my sexual relationships

• Have regular check ups

• Look for symptoms.

The unstated values within this information are that it is okay for adolescents to be sexually active and with more than one partner. The value system underlying such teaching is one that accepts and expects adolescent sex and multiple partners.

Because this value system is implied rather than identified or explained openly, neither teachers nor students are invited to critically examine the values that are being transmitted. (There is also misinformation here - as none of these four steps will literally prevent the spreading of sexually transmitted infections (STIs). At best they may only reduce risk.)

Common class activities ask students to practise rolling condoms over bananas or carrots, and to come to agreement on questions such as - Who should carry condoms? How old should you be? Does a condom reduce sexual pleasure? In what types of sexual activity would a condom be used?

There are inherent dangers in activities like these. In any one group of young adolescents there will be a variety of sexual experience and emotional development, plus all the usual anxieties about sex which are part and parcel of adolescence. Some may be sexually active in destructive or abusive relationships; the majority will not be sexually active at all; some of these may be worried that they are not. There may be anxiety about sexual orientation.

The pressure such activities produce is unlikely to encourage honesty. `Agreement' becomes another word for `coercion' to the point of view of the dominant member of the group, and to the unstated value implied in the activities, which is that teenagers are expected to be sexually active. This is not a neutral position.

Hidden value messages are powerful because we tend to absorb them without being given the opportunity to examine them openly and decide whether or not we want to accept them.

Discerning hidden value messages comes easier as we get older. As adults we learn to read between the lines. The adolescent is less capable of abstract thinking, and in a normal developmental stage of uncertainty and anxiety about sexuality and identity. They are therefore vulnerable to hidden values and messages about sexuality and less likely to subject them to critical assessment.

Unstated values that imply teenage sexual activity is the expected norm sends a message to non-sexually active teens that they are ‘different’. This then clashes head-on with the big questions of adolescence: Do I measure up? Am I inferior? Do I fit in?

Value-neutral sexuality education, which in practice is not neutral at all, conveys hidden values about expected sexual behaviour and attitudes, and so feeds the adolescent's fears about being abnormal. This in turn pushes him/her towards `safe' conformity to the prevailing pressure which, in our society, is to be sexually active.

The transmission of implied values in this way puts the student at risk of exploitation, as he/she is not invited to assess their worth.

If we could be neutral, would it be a good thing? No. To aid the development of his or her own personal value system, an adolescent needs up-front, genuine declarations of values by adult role models. These can be chewed over, digested, retained or discarded as the adolescent sees fit and eventually integrated into their own mature adult identity. But without a solid ‘adult’ wall off which to bounce their thought processes, it is difficult to hone these emerging skills.

Not only is neutrality about values impossible, but if we could teach that way, we would not be aiding the psychological development of our adolescent students.
 

The 3rd assumption of the value-neutral model we must also challenge, on the basis of the available evidence about human sexuality, relationships and health. Some sexual options are clearly not as healthy as others, either emotionally or physically.

A value-neutral approach encourages decision-making about sex on the basis of information, lifeskills, values clarification and assessing the possible consequences of the various options. However, in the absence of clear direction from the teacher as to which option is best, students are left with the tacit message that all options are equal. The proviso is that they should understand the consequences of their actions, and should avoid pregnancy and STIs. (Note the moral imperative to avoid pregnancy and STIs within the supposedly `neutral' approach.)

This sounds a bit like telling a drug education class that any decision they make about drugs is okay, as long as they don't get addicted or catch AIDS through needle sharing. This is not a primary prevention approach to health education. It is promoting the acceptance of risk. Current ‘harm minimisation’ strategies in health education are flawed in just this way.
 

From where has the value-neutral approach to sexuality education emerged? The Kinsey reports of the late 40s and early 50s took the world by storm, fuelling the sexual revolution of the 60s and exerting a major effect on the direction of sexuality education in Western societies (Reisman and Eichel, 1990).

Alfred Kinsey was the first scientist to research human sexuality on a mass scale. A biologist who studied gall wasps, he applied his zoological theories to a study of human sexual behaviour. From the data he collected he put forward the theory that there was no such thing as `normality' or `abnormality' in sexual behaviour, no `rights and wrongs'.

The validity of his research was challenged immediately it was published. Although he claimed to have studied a balanced sample of over 18,000 adults and several hundred children from babyhood up, he used volunteers, not a random sample. Furthermore, of Kinsey's volunteers, 25% were criminals, including sex offenders, pedophiles and men who had had homosexual contact in prison.

Kinsey's research experiments included using sex offenders to stimulate the genitals of babies a few months old and children up to the age of puberty, for up to 24 hours at a time. He claimed his experiments showed bisexuality is the typical human condition, that 10% of the population is exclusively homosexual, and that children need and want adult sexual partners to lead them into fulfilling sexual relationships.

His work is now challenged as being fraudulent, being heavily biased towards `proving' the normality of his own sexual preferences. However, his reports were taken up enthusiastically by gay activists seeking to change social attitudes towards homosexuality, and by pedophile organisations which used his results to promote their preferences as normal. The media also took Kinsey up enthusiastically, channelling his conclusions about human sexuality through to the general population. The founder of Playboy magazine, Hugh Hefner, paid a glowing tribute to Kinsey in his first edition, saying Kinsey was his inspiration (Reisman and Eichel, 1990).
 

Another important factor in the emergence of the value-neutral approach to sexuality education came from the Western Behavioural Science Institute (WBSI) in California, USA. Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers and W.R. Coulson, were psychologists trained in the methods of non-directive psychotherapy, an approach appropriate for counselling, as it is client-centred, and the values of the counsellor are not imposed on the client.

However, during the late 60's and early 70's Maslow, Rogers and Coulson developed the idea that the non-directive approach could also be applied to the classroom. They theorised that a non-directive approach would assist young people to decide what they wanted to do in the area of sex and drugs.

At that time, Coulson later reported, the popular idea was that recreational drug-use was a good thing. The sexual revolution, fuelled by Kinsey, also caught up with them, carrying with it the idea that children needed more sexual freedom; that whatever adults do, children ought to be allowed to do too.

Drug education and sexuality education at that time, in their dominant forms, were based on the thinking and writing of these three psychologists from the WBSI. They suggested that children can and should make their own decisions about drugs and sex without guidance from either parents or teachers. To give guidance was seen as an imposition on the young person's freedom and rights. Consequently, the techniques of values-clarification were developed, as opposed to the teaching of specific values. Teachers were trained not to `lead' in these areas, but to `facilitate'.

Coulson, Maslow and Rogers all eventually concluded, quite individually, that they had been wrong to try and apply this non-directive therapy approach to the classroom. Carl Rogers did not raise his own children non-directively although he advocated it to the nation. In Coulson's words, "we tried to talk a whole generation of parents out of giving their children guidance" (Coulson, 1988).

Nature has made it quite clear that drug-use is not healthy. Nature is also making it clear that sex is not for children or adolescents. The sexual `freedom' experiments and theories of the 60s and 70s have backfired when we consider the serious decline in the sexual health of adolescents, indicated by the high incidence of sexually transmitted infections, pregnancy and abortion for this age group in Australia, as in other developed countries.

In Australia, the overall pregnancy rate for 15 – 19 year olds is calculated at 44 per thousand (Singh and Darroch, 2000). This includes the birth rate - 18.1 births per 1,000 females aged 15-19 (ABS, 2000), miscarriages, and the abortion rate - 23.9 per 1,000 (Alan Guttmacher Institute, 1999). An estimated half of all teen pregnancies are aborted (Adelson, 1995), giving Australia the second highest teenage abortion rate in the Western world, but it is widely believed that the number of abortions to adolescents is underestimated due to the limitations of abortion data collecting.

The value neutral approach to drug education disappeared in the 80s and early 90s with the emergence of programs such as the Drug Offensive and the Quit campaign - very obviously value-based and promoting abstinence from drugs as the preferred value. (Unfortunately we are now seeing a watering down of this position as Harm Minimisation theories negatively influence Drug Education programs in schools.)

In contrast, the non-directive or value-neutral model clearly dominates in the area of sexuality education through the media in general, and also in the majority of specific education resources. Adolescents are offered a range of options from which to choose with the implication that each is equal, and they can decide. The notions of direction and guidance, sexual restraint, etc, tend to be linked negatively to words like `religion', `repression', `intolerance', `moralistic' and `judgemental'. They are not seen, as Coulson (1988) puts it, as the means of protecting adolescents and giving them the freedom of healthy limits during their most vulnerable developmental years.

The ‘value-neutral’ model is both unrealistic and unhelpful, and so we return to the alternative - the value-based model.

Clearly, our guidelines must be the promotion of the values that will best protect young people during the vulnerable years of childhood and adolescence, particularly those young people who are most at risk, ie: those who are unable to reason, and those who have underlying emotional issues which make them vulnerable to risk-taking lifestyles. For all adolescents we must promote the safest option.

On the evidence, the option that offers that best protection for an adolescent from physical and psychological risk, is to postpone sexual involvement at their stage in life and to lay the foundation for a mutually faithful lifetime relationship.

Our personal reaction to such a statement will be affected by our own needs and experiences, our fears and our politics. However, whatever our own position, we must consider this in the light of the needs of the student. A teacher might use drugs or tobacco at home, but he or she would be negligent as an adult, as a teacher and as a health educator, to give any other message to adolescents other than smoking and using drugs are not the healthiest options.

Likewise, in the area of sexual behavior and lifestyle options we must emphasise the difference between tolerating diverse views and esteeming them equally. Our goal must be to explicitly concentrate on conveying a single message to adolescents - how and why to postpone sexual involvement. Clearly it is negligent to promote any other value message to adolescents about sexual behaviour, either directly or indirectly, other than the option to wait, to say no. Any other lifestyle involves risk.

Apart from the high risk of pregnancy and STIs previously noted, there is the potential for emotional damage from each broken relationship being carried into subsequent relationships. “The tragic legacy of teenage heartbreak, disillusionment and cynicism also has to be taken into account” (Stammers, 2000).

Studies report up to 70% of girls who lost their virginity before age 16 later expressing regret that they had not waited until they were older (Wellings et al, 1994; Dickson et al, 1998). From the relatively little work that has been done on the psychological impact of teenage sex there appears to be a link between teenage sex and a higher risk of depression and attempted suicide than for teens who have retained their virginity (Orr et al, 1991; Adcock et al, 1991). The Latrobe University “Rural Mural” research project showed boys nominating the need for more discussion around sexual values, and girls keen to obtain information and develop skills to resist the pressure to have sex (Hillier, Warr and Haste, 1996).

In Gallagher and Waite’s (2001) review of the scientific evidence on the consequences of marriage for adults, the authors demonstrate that the emotional, physical and psychological health of individuals, families and society as a whole is enhanced by marriage. Their research indicates a strong correlation between pre-marital sexual relationships and cohabitation, and subsequent extra marital affairs and divorce.

The provision of guidance towards postponing sexual involvement, plus life-skills and correct age-appropriate information, is clearly vital in helping adolescents achieve optimal marriage and family relationships in the future. This sort of information and guidance is missing from many publications aimed at teenagers and the teachers of teenagers.
 

Correct information is important, and that includes information about contraception. The emphasis is on the word `correct'. Common misinformation put forward in teenage magazines and life-guide books is that the Pill is 99.7% effective. The condom is widely advertised as providing `safe sex'.

There are two problems:

• failure rates

• the adolescent context

(1) Failure rates -
Failure rates for the Pill are established via clinical trials, which produce a method failure rate, that is, the number of pregnancies that occur as a result of a failure of the method, not an action of the couple.

In sexual relationships, human behaviour is always the overriding factor, so the failure rate in practice is the relevant consideration. In any one year, out of 100 couples using the Pill, about 8 can expect to become pregnant (Fu et al, 1995).

Condoms are tested under laboratory conditions to establish a method failure rate. Condom manufacturers state a method failure rate of about 2-3%. Already we are not getting a `safe sex' guarantee. But the failure rate in practice is much higher. In preventing pregnancy, condoms have a standardized failure rate of 14.7 percent over the course of a year. Family Planning Victoria quotes figures for condom failure rates as 5% for “perfect use” and 15-20% for “typical use” (“Unwanted Surprise”, 2003).

A study published in Family Planning Perspectives looked at condom use amongst sexually active teenagers over the course of a year. For teens living together, condoms users experienced an unplanned pregnancy over 50% percent of the time. For teens not living together, condom users experienced an unplanned pregnancy over 14-23% percent of the time (Fu et al, 1999).

Another factor when looking at the condom as a form of STI prevention, is that failure rates for condoms are generally measured by the number of pregnancies that occur despite using the method. Pregnancy can only occur on a very few days of a woman's cycle, whereas the organisms that cause STIs can be passed on any day. Therefore the consequences of a condom splitting or slipping off during intercourse are even greater in terms of exposure to STI.

Furthermore, condoms are not a barrier to one of the most common STIs among sexually active adolescents, the Genital Wart Virus. The warts are highly contagious and as the whole male genital area can be affected, a condom is not sufficient protection. The US government withdrew a 2.6 million dollar grant to study condom use because “an unacceptably high number of condom users would have been infected in such a study (Frosner, 1989).

(2) The Adolescent Context -
We might well say, but isn't safe sex education better than nothing? Isn't it more realistic? After all, they're all doing it anyway.

Despite general media representation to the contrary, teenagers are not all ‘doing it’. Recent surveys indicate that sexually active secondary students are in the minority.

The 2003 Sex in Australia study carried out by the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society, La Trobe University, revealed half of young people aged 16 – 19 are virgins (Smith et al, 2003). For those of this age group still at secondary school – the 16 and 17 year olds – the non-sexually active percentage would be higher.

Previous research has shown self-described “sexually active” teenagers may have had intercourse only one, two or three times (Vic Health Project, 1992). This is a significant distinction to bear in mind as it does not indicate a "lifestyle", but some isolated experiences.

Previous studies by Family Planning NSW have also shown a high level of coercion of young teens into sexual activity, that close to half had been pushed into sex when they did not want it (North, 1992). This is reflected in current research, with over a quarter of sexually active students reporting having unwanted sex, naming the effects of alcohol and pressure from partner as the most common reasons (Smith et al, 2002).

The description “sexually active” is itself misleading. Oral sex and genital touching have become more common amongst school aged teenagers. Mutual masturbation has been heavily promoted for years through school based sex education and teenage magazines as a “safe sex” alternative. However, there remains a psychological barrier to describing oneself as sexually active if intercourse has not taken place, preventing young people from recognising the continuing risk of STIs and emotional hurts through these activities. The young teenager is vulnerable to exploitation if fear of pregnancy is removed as a reason to say no to unwanted sexual activity and they know of no other ‘acceptable’ reason for choosing otherwise.

Is 'safe-sex' education the answer in any real sense for these adolescents?

Non-sexually active students are without doubt in the safest lifestyle. They are not served by promoting the impression that most teenagers are "doing it" or soon will be, and that condoms and contraception provide a ‘safe sex’ option. They need correct information about the limitations of contraception, (particularly for their age group). They need to learn about the nature of relationships, the adolescent’s search for identity and overwhelming desire to belong, and how to safely navigate through a changing time of life. They need the adults around them to promote values, attitudes and life-skills that will help them maintain the safest possible lifestyle by saying "no - I'll wait".

Note that the amount and degree of detail about STIs and contraception needs to be presented appropriately, according to the age and cognitive development of the student, and with due consideration to the student's sense of privacy. For example, requesting students to examine and practise rolling on condoms would, as well as conveying a message about expected sexual involvement, also be an intrusive exercise. Moreover, if they are `concrete' thinkers (not yet able to think in the abstract) they are unlikely to translate the lesson into a real life situation.

Sexually active adolescents are in an at-risk lifestyle, whether or not they are using contraception. Research shows that they are unlikely to be using contraception correctly or consistently. The Family Planning Perspectives study into teenagers and contraception referred to above revealed half of all contracepting teenage girls living with a boyfriend experienced a contraceptive failure within a year. Fifteen percent of all contracepting teenage girls who did not live with a boyfriend experienced a contraceptive failure within a year (Fu et al, 1999).

A strong positive correlation has been shown between increasing use of condoms at first sexual intercourse and higher rates of teenage conceptions. Contraceptive failure is a major factor in teenage pregnancy (Pearson et al, 1995; Carnall, 1996). A 1999 Australian National University survey of 1500 pregnant teenagers aged 15-19 found that not only had almost half been using some form of contraception when they conceived but that 62% of them had been pregnant before (“Condoms Fail Teens”, 1999). Dr Terri Foran, Medical Director of FPA Health in Australia commenting on a French study of contraception failure rates confirmed “contraception has an inherent failure rate in certain groups of people. In the case of adolescents [the failure rate of the Pill] goes up to between 16 and 18%. They traditionally miss several pills per month” (“Contraception less reliable than you think”, 2003).

Research indicates a high proportion of sexually active adolescents are propelled into sexual relationships and into unconsciously actively seeking pregnancy by underlying problems such as family breakdown and depression. Here the sexual activity is a vehicle for expressing anger, frustration, for acting out, or is a cry for help. Long term studies of nearly 800 girls from New Zealand and the US revealed the absence of the biological father from the home was “an over-riding risk factor for early sexual activity and teenage pregnancy” (Ellis, 2003). Dr. David Elkind, a US psychologist and professor specialising in child and adolescent studies states in his book Parenting Your Teenager in the 1990s: “Contrary to popular opinion, most young people engage in sexual activity for psychological rather than hormonal reasons” (Elkind, 1993).

Concentrating on preventing conception is treating a symptom rather than a cause; it does not address the issue of why teenagers are having early and unprotected sex (Neville, 2003; Stammers, 2000). These adolescents are unlikely to use contraceptive/safe sex information correctly due to these unconscious motivations. (See Teen Pregnancy: Real Causes, Real Prevention on this website.) Also, due to these complicating factors, they are more likely to be `concrete thinkers', unable to make the necessary abstractions about behaviour and consequences in order to correctly use contraception. Decision-making is likely to be problematical for them.

Indeed it could be said that the discipline of contraception is the hardest discipline sexually active teenagers will ever have to learn and they must learn it at a time in life when they are naturally most disorganised and undisciplined. The younger a girl is at first intercourse, the longer it will be before she seeks contraception. Furthermore, if her partner is 6 or more years older the less likely she is to use contraceptives (Manning et al, 2000). Clearly power and manipulation issues will be evident in relationships involving the emotionally immature and psychologically needy.

Knowledge and access to contraception are clearly not the issues. They are not solving the problems of teenage pregnancy and STI. Safe sex education doesn't meet the developmental needs of the adolescent and in fact promotes the acceptance of risk.

All teenagers, whether sexually active or not, deserve correct, age-appropriate information about the limitations of contraception. They need encouragement and empowerment to embrace the safest possible lifestyle. They need to know they have the right to say "No!" when they feel under pressure. They need opportunities to discuss and role-play effective strategies to use in pressure situations.

Other essential elements include thorough coverage of the emotional and situational factors in new and established relationships that may influence sexual responses and behaviour, including the interplay of drugs, alcohol, romantic settings, recent losses, and so on. Those not yet emotionally or romantically involved in a relationship may be totally unprepared for the potential force of a sexual advance.

A study published in the Journal Adolescent and Family Health analysed the decline in pregnancy rates amongst teens during the 1990s in the US and concluded that abstinence, not condom use, is the primary contributor to lower birth and pregnancy rates amongst teens (Mohn, Tingle and Finger, 2003). Teenagers need to have the safest option – abstinence - presented and reinforced in dynamic, creative ways; not ignoring their need for information and their desire to argue, but always returning to the goal of postponing sexual involvement.

Non-sexually active teenagers in the school classroom need to know they are not alone. Some teenagers with underlying problems will need access to effective counselling, probably long-term, to sort out the issues that may drive them towards sexual involvement and pregnancy, or indeed other risk-taking behaviours.

Not even the most effective teacher using the most effective program will prevent some teenagers from sexual experimentation and the problems this can bring. We accept this when we teach about drugs, smoking and alcohol too. We can, however, still give these teenagers, along with the whole class, a comprehensive, encouraging, pro-active sexuality education, and we can look for opportunities to refer those with deeper concerns for counselling.

On the evidence, the promotion of contraception/safe sex as a viable option for adolescents is not realistic. It is an adult reaction to past social upheaval and current social problems but it does not match the developmental abilities of the adolescent or meet the needs of either the sexually active or the non-sexually active young person. Nor does it discharge our responsibilities to actively promote the health of the adolescent and protect the young from exploitation.

Information and discussion about contraception or condoms should never undermine the primary goal of postponing sexual activity, and promoting lifestyles that will ultimately benefit relationships, marriages and families in the future. Postponing sexual involvement for the sake of future health and relationships should be the over-riding goal of a Health and Human Relations course.

This value, which protects the health of the individual, families and society, should and can be the stated context of a primary prevention sexuality education program in any school. It should guide curriculum development, and ideally, teachers who are committed to teaching within that context should be the ones to take it on, as their personal values will inevitably be transmitted to the student.

There is clearly a difference between tolerating diverse views and esteeming them equally. Dr Trevor Stammers, expresses the sense of this obligation unequivocally when he states: “Just as doctors who smoke should advise their patients not to do so on the basis of the overwhelming medical evidence that it causes harm, so should all healthcare professionals, irrespective of personal sexual experience, promote the message that it is medically unsafe for individuals under the age of 17 to have sexual intercourse” (Stammers, 2000).

Promoting the value of abstinence for teenagers shouldn’t be confused with teaching religion. Commentators who write off abstinence education as just another tactic of the religious right are allowing their biases to cloud their judgement. Abstinence education is clearly a contemporary health issue that crosses both cultural and religious boundaries. It fulfills our obligations towards the health and protection of the young. It makes sense.

A Health and Human Relations course which ultimately seeks to protect the physical, sexual and emotional health of the adolescent, which supports and upholds the family, and prepares adolescents for healthy marriages and parenting, will have the highest probability of acceptance among parents across the school community.

This is not preaching, it is good teaching practice.

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Updated Dec 2008