Do Young People Need Sex Education?

Do young people need sex education? According to the Madhya Pradesh government they do not.  What they need is YOGA. In accordance with this divine attitude   the chief minister of the state, Shivraj Prasad Chauhan has directed the education department to stop what is known as the “Adolescence Education Programme” which had been introduced two years ago to instruct youngsters about the “facts of life”. What upset the  sensibilities of the student wing of the Congress in MP, who turned the screws on the government,  were apparently graphic pictures of the human anatomy reproduced in the teachers’ handbook. “Sex education,”  the moral custodians of the state are now growling,  “has no place in Indian society.” The entire meeting on the issue lasted twenty minutes.

 

Obviously neither Chauhan nor his colleagues have heard of the Maria Gond tribe living in central Madhya Pradesh itself. Not that you can blame them because safeguarding the standards of decency is a full time job and leaves our moral custodians little time to read about, less alone to get first hand information from sections of society which might have a lot of useful knowledge to share.The Gonds do not use text books depicting graphic illustrations to teach their children about how sex works. Till recently members of this tribe were in any case illiterate.  The Gonds follow a rather more practical  method of educating youngsters about the laws of sexual attraction. The “Ghotul”, a kind of meeting place devised to bring together boys and girls who have reached puberty, probably doesn’t need much elaboration here. It’s enough to say that this ingenious method allows youngsters to live together for a few years, experiment with sexual relationships until they are ready to choose their partners and settle down to marital responsibilities which include bringing up children.

One of the main strengths of Hinduism in the past has been its flexibility and openness to life. But the rise of the Hindu fanatic in the past couple of decades has gradually eroded this spirit of generosity.  Taboos and bans surrounding sexuality are probably among the worst that you can think of, because they amount to interference and  regimentation of  the very energy which keeps us alive. Of course fanatical Hindus are not the only ones to blame for the repressive atmosphere we live in, in the world. Fanaticism in general, regardless of the creed or religion it is associated with, threatens to stifle us gradually to death. Fanaticism – or the blind adherence, that is,  to beliefs which leave no room for an open and mature  inspection.

I don’t want to go into what sexual freedom really means, at this point, (that’s the subject of a whole new topic!) but I will say at least this much. I think that the spread of liberal values and the ability of each individual to make an informed choice regarding his or her  sexual conduct,  would  drastically reduce violence and aggression, reckless macho driving on the roads, the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases, rape and other perversions and generally make for a happier and more peaceful society than the one in which we live today. This would happen because sexual freedom would not function in isolation but would necessarily reorganise a whole lot of factors in our lives which today are not even deemed worthy of our attention.

 

A lot of people in today’s world might not want that though. We have got used to, maybe even come to enjoy living in a society based on violence, exploitation and  cheap thrills,  the need for which would diminish with true sexual freedom. If you ask me,  I think the entire economic and industrial structure of society would be turned upside down. (What would the arms manufacturers do if human beings everywhere overnight lost their interest in destroying others and themselves? What would happen to the plethora of manufacturers who thrive  on the sense of fear and insecurity in the world? And where would the advertising industry be if individuals just followed their inner wisdom rather than other people’s expectations of them!) 

 

A whole lot of us would be afraid of ending up bored and restless  without the excitement that violence brings with it. So as it happens,  most of us will just go on doing what we do, which is to toy with theories and concepts and longwinded arguments about changing society, leading nowhere. This is supposed to be a lot of fun I gather. I must really be in the minority who don’t understand why. Oh well, I guess I can live with that.

(Here is the original report in the Indian Express March 17th 2007)
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/25871.html

Uma 

 

 

Comments

[Dwight Aranha]

Hi Uma,

I would really like to find out who started the 'sex-ed' program in MP. It becomes clear to me that in the face of the 'collective madness' it is the individual voices that need to be listened to. The fact that a sex-ed program was actually started and ran for two years shows that such individual voices exist!

Thanks!

Dwight-Paul

[Chaitanya]

Gripping.

We'd need a pretty big cultural revolution to erode all the restraints on personal freedom.

We'd need the existence of a God to take on the role of tipping the rationalists vs idiot-fanatics scales.

I offer to fill the position. But like all past Gods, I need a loyal following first.