Sex Ed as a young ace

[Olive-oil]

Day one- 

On Monday we were learning about who to tell about any sexual or romantic areas in our lives such as parents, siblings, friends, religious officials etc... All we did by the end is “learn” about how we should talk with others about our personal sex life (or lack there of). There was no mention of not having sex or of not wanting to or of telling someone no. We filled out a chart with assumptions of what a friend or family member would say if we told them we are pregnant or what they would do if we had a gay friend (Ya the curriculum literally asked if we would stop hanging out with someone if they were gay, assuming that we already had prejudices against lgbtq+ community...). I am already fed up with this class.

 

Day two-

Today we talked about gender. Well we talked about cisgender and we briefly glanced over transgender when someone said “I thought transgender is when you get surgery.” Then that was it. It fucking left at that then we filled in a sheet of stereotypes. It literally asked us to put Male and Female stereotypes in columns. Then we go to guessing the gender (GUESSING THE FUCKING GENDER) of pictures of people only using descriptions. Then it ended. We glossed over what makes you transgender, reinforced stereotypes in cis gender roles without anything to refute them, and  there was no mention( I repeat no mention ) of non binary. Met another ace today though. One of my friends from middle school who has sex Ed at the same time in a different class. He has the same worries that I do about this curriculum. Told him about Avon and hopefully he will get around to checking it out. 

  

(Finished day two on 5/21/2019 will update daily on the lessons)

[CajunAce]

wow. just wow. I'm almost glad that my school completely skipped sex ed besides learning human anatomy and STDs...

 

I've actually been reading a webcomic that has a lot of sex ed stuff but is actually informative and has good representation. There's even an ace character.

[Bruce Wayne]

I remember that in some social science classes at high school, I have heard teachers only talking about men and women with no mention whatsoever of non-binary people. Also, that same person claimed that "every woman wants to marry a man" and that "every man wants to find a good job" (wt...?). That person, a psychologist, also said things like "boys don't cry" or that "girls turn lesbian after they have been hurt by men" - the last one really enraged me as not just an ally, but a member of LGBTQ+ community. To this day, I regret not standing up in that class and saying "Why are you even saying these things, dolt?" Luckily, I deliberately simulated being ill when I was 14 when there was sex ed class at the elementary school. So I never had to listen to any of that stuff. That was years before I discovered this website and learned about aceness, though. 

[Karst]

The sex ed course at my school wasn't great, but at least we learned about recognizing and escaping an abusive relationship.

[Anthracite_Impreza]

I read stuff like this and realise we have so much left to do 😓

[naakka]

I only remember learning by heart a complete list of STDs and their symptoms (just why??), how to use condom with banana and how you don't have to have sex even if your boyfriend wanted to. The most confusing part for me was "you'll just know when the time is right for sex". Like, still waiting for that 😅

[Fluffy Femme Guy]

1 hour ago, naakka said:

"you'll just know when the time is right for sex". Like, still waiting for that 😅

Yup!

@Olive Oil
At least you know that you're ace this early on, I didn't begin to figure any of this out till I was 28.
It certainly alienated me during my school years. I was never repulsed by sex-ed or anything like that, but I found it strange how into dating/sex most were.

[Liana]

In my school the sum of it is basically being told “your bodies are changing”. Boys and girls were seperated for it, so I can’t say if girls got more useful information or not. There is a class that is supposed to go in depth about that stuff and serve as sex Ed, but the class is optional in my school and I really don’t see how I’m going to need to know the information. I think that my AP classes accidentally served better at giving that information without meaning to. I’m only aware of what a condom is becuase it was mentioned as a product of the Second Industrial Revolution in my AP World History Textbook. I first heard about erections in my AP Biology class from an assignment that was titled “My Dog is Broken”, which went over the cell pathways that causes it (I was 16 at that time). My Psychology class this year gave too much information with a chapter that was on the “psychology” of sex, with only 1 page in that chapter actually on psychology while the test was physiology. Along with this, I had to read about the Master’s and Johnson study on the human sexual response cycle. I’m still not sure why I needed to learn this stuff.

[Skittles87]

I had sex ed in the early 00s and it was basically "Penis goes in vagina. You can get pregnant and also diseases." There's obviously still a way to go, but it sounds like things are improving!

[uhtred]

My sex ed (back in the...... 70s)   was basically, penis goes in vagina. Married people who are in love have sex.  Here are all the terrible diseases you will get if you have sex before you are married. 

[paralibrarian]

yikes. I have a daughter who is 17. due to weird scheduling when she was a freshman in HS, she totally missed the class that supposedly taught sex ed. in a way, i think she is learning more and more accurate information from her friends and the internet than she would from a class. i realize that may sound bizarre, but here we all are, right? don't worry, i'm going to make sure she know what's what before she gets into anything. 

[iyote]

I had a Sex Ed class 2-3 years ago.  It was pretty repulsive to me, but it did have LGBTQ+ stuff, although some of it was outdated.  

I remember that they had this handy little diagram:  

...They tried. 

I just felt really out of place, partially because of sex-repulsion and partially because of the disregard for ace people.  

 

As a young aro as well, one thing I remember was that there was a portion about non-abusive and abusive relationships.  We'd be given a scenario and then asked to stand in different parts of the room corresponding with options for what we'd do.  

I chose "break up with them" every time because it was the only thing I could imagine doing in that situation.  

[naakka]

On 6/3/2019 at 9:07 AM, iyote said:

I chose "break up with them" every time because it was the only thing I could imagine doing in that situation.  

Sounds like a reasonable answer when you don't want that relationship to begin with 🙃

[Limpet]

Ooh, we had sex Ed today. We had to put- you know what I think this is gross so I’m putting it in the spoiler tag thing. 

Spoiler

We had to put a condom on a plastic model of a mans... thing. 

Not fun. There was no thought that any of us might never do it, it was just like “here is a thing you will do at some point but please not now you’re 14 that’s illegal.”

[Pidge_Holt]

6th Grade

1. It was okay, nothing to graphic, or sexual. Just periods and breasts, and don't have sex and sent nudes.

2. then we asked anonymas questions, mine was: Is it normal not to feel sexual attraction? My teacher said I would grow into it, and that everyone feels it. I cried.

[uhtred]

It may seem like sex education isn't great, but the alternative can be much worse. Some parents never teach their children anything at all about relationships and sex, and the lack of knowledge can lead to a wide range of serious problems. 

[Nick2]

They separated us male /female.  The girls went off with a nun.  Us guys followed a priest to the boiler room where he had us sit in a circle.  Then had two at a time put on boxing gloves and fight it out.   We asked the girls later what they did.  They told us they learned to not wear shoes that were shinny because a boy could see up their dress and if they kissed a boy they would get preg.

 

So there you have it....in a nutshell.  Class dismissed.

[Rynn]

There was no mention of gay people or anything gender related in either of my sex ed classes (elementary school 2005, middle school 2008). Though funnily enough, that first class was given by a gay man, and he did talk about how he figured himself out at some other point. He was far from the only gay teacher I had, and I had classmates with two moms and stuff like that. So it's not like it was a conservative era or place. It really should've been mentioned.

 

We did some diseases and how the human body developed. And then we had to watch some rather graphic stuff. Not at all fun.

 

So, terrible as the experience of op is, it's already an improvement?

[Zagadka]

Sex ed seems to have advanced considerably since I went through it in the 80s. We got taught some mechanical things about where babies come from, and that's it. They didn't even teach how condoms work. I've heard that some sex ed programs these days are expanded to include things like self care and hygiene for girls. I'm all for expanded education about that kind of stuff, even though it was never useful to me. Most people really need it, and unfortunately it is held back by... I don't want to say "prudes", but I guess I just said it. I don't believe in encouraging sex, but kids are going to naturally be frisky anyway, and they need all the help they can get. We got almost nothing. Especially nothing on gender questions.