In case you haven't figured out my stance on sex education yet, I am all about creating an integrated human being. Sexuality is a part of us - with all of its unique expressions. We may try to put it in the closet and only take it out when it's dark and we think that no one is looking, but somehow it will escape and there will be yet another Republican Senator with his, ah......pants in his hand! This story is as old as time and it's not going away. Perhaps it is time for us to look at the human glass of sexuality in a way that is more holistic and accepting (like they are starting to do in the UK - more on that later).
Yes, Bill Clinton DID have sex with that woman in the oval office - lots of people would have. But instead of feeling empathy toward the human condition we like to chuckle at THEIR predicament of being caught.
Oh it's all so juicy when other people are caught being sexual, isn't it? It's so naughty! And then we get to feel outrage! Sometimes I wonder if the outrage is simply jealousy. How come they get to have all of this sexual fun? Ha! They got caught! See what will happen if you do THAT!
Or perhaps it is the relief that many people feel because it wasn't them that got caught this time!
You see - you are not supposed to get caught being sexual out of the confines of what society thinks is morally sexual. Yes, we do have this special brand of sexuality that we consider "Morally Sexual," and that is where it all gets so confusing and conflated.
Sexuality and the social confines that surround it is a fluid thing. We all have so many different attitudes about sexuality and what sexual expression has to say about morality and who we are as human beings. According to sex educator Pamela Madsen (that would be me!), "Sexuality is an integral part of who we are as human beings - but our sexuality and how we express it does not define us - it is simply a part of who we are - it is problematic to view our sexuality as the measure of our morality." Yet that is what we have done through the ages.
Perhaps it is because, in the long history of being human and being sexual, sexuality was used in exactly this way - as a way to define us as moral beings and to control social order.
Human sexuality was often controlled as a way of knowing "Who’s the daddy" through the ages, enforcing spiritual purity by religious groups, and to support what is known as "family values" by modern-day pundits. Some of this law and ordering of our human sexuality has been quite successful by management standards.
The stories of retribution and punishment of those folks who have sex out of the box has been handed down from generation to generation, and many of those tales are quite frightening! Even still, sexuality has been hard to keep in a iron maiden....hasn't it? Doesn't that tell us something?
And here we land again in 2009, with this Senator or that Governor becoming an instant "Bad Man" because he couldn't contain his sexuality. Did he become a bad leader because he took part in sexual expression outside of his marriage? Probably not. But he did need to keep his hand out of the public till to finance it.
Did Bill Clinton lose all value to us as Americans because he had oral sex in the oval office? Of course not - or at least for me - of course not!
Yet, we do try to make these sexual expressions of people's humanity into some kind of a label which is used to diminish all of the other parts of what they bring to the party, don't we? We use this information to somehow diminish their morality. Do we tell people that they are immoral for being hungry and for eating?
As a society we continue to use sexuality as a moral compass and we work very hard to catch people being "naughty" so we can use that information against them. It is an interesting game that we play and we seen this again and again. Yet it is often the people that throw the biggest stones that are later found on page six of The New York Post, right?
Somehow we have not gotten very far from the days of the public humiliation stocks. Now we use newspapers as the pillars and the Internet for the dunking well.
What has been proven is that when people try to box up their sexuality they tend to leak in some very unfortunate ways. Just look at the dismal failure of abstinence-only programs, just to cite one example.
But there seems to be a light - and the light is coming from National Health Service in the United Kingdom. The NHS is telling school pupils they have a right to an enjoyable sex life and that it is good for their health. The NHS is talking about sexual pleasure being a good thing, and something that everyone has a right to bring into their lives. And they are saying this to young people! How amazing is that?
The campaign is called ”An Orgasm A Day Keeps The Doctor Away”. The leaflet says, “Health promotion experts advocate five portions of fruit and veg a day and 30 minutes physical activity three times a week. What about sex or masturbation twice a week?”
These amazing leaflets have been circulated to parents, teachers and youth workers. Apparently this program was launched after it was discovered that a teenage girls who participated in a £6million government initiative to reduce teenage pregnancies were more than twice as likely to fall pregnant as other girls.
Instead, this new program is promoting self pleasuring (masturbation), handing out condoms, and teaching kids about the joys of sex.
Don't think that this program has not come under fire - of course it has. But it's creator, Steve Slack, who is the director of the Centre For HIV and Sexual Health at NHS Sheffield, responded to critics by saying that the advice could encourage young people to delay losing their virginity until they were sure that they would enjoy the experience. “As long as teenagers are fully informed about sex and making decisions free of peer pressure as a part of a caring relationship, they have as much right to an adult to a good sex life," Slack said.
Critics have called for scientific evidence to back up the program and have made the morality stab with public statements such as, "There are an awful lot of overpaid and under-occupied health promotion officers around who are obsessed with sex."
Well, we are all very interested in sex. My blogs that have sexuality as a focus have the highest readership only second to Mini IVF! What does that tell you?
Perhaps we should all dust ourselves off and get out of whatever closet we have been hiding in. It is high time that we learn how to make friends with our sexuality and see it as a beautiful part of our lives. I am so proud of our cousins across the pond as they try to introduce this very concept to their children. Who knows, these kids may grow up to lead integrated sexual lives in a land where sexual public scandal becomes a thing of the past because sexuality will be seen as less of a scandal.
Pamela Madsen is one of the Nation's most outspoken and recognized fertility educators and patient advocates. The Fertility Advocate, Ms. Madsen's Blog has become the must read for all members of the fertility community with hundreds jacking into Ms. Madsen's funny, insightful and provocative posts every day. Ms. Madsen is the Founder of The American Fertility Association, and works with East Coast Fertility’s" as the Director of Public Education. Ms. Madsen is reaching out to women-- and men—to integrate all aspects of the reproductive continuum from sexuality, infertility prevention, protection and treatment into the general health care of all women.