Sex education is way beyond several diagrams of biological “in and out” of human reproductive behaviour as it stands today. It is more than a glorified anatomy class, where you are taught; use protection to avoid infections and killer diseases as well as unwanted pregnancies, and when and how to get pregnant.

Below are five things sex education can teach us but didn’t:

1. There is more to sex than biology: Biology obviously taught us little about sex as it concentrated more on the peripheral aspect of it. It taught us how infections occur, how pregnancy works and where and when to stick it in.

However, most times when we are in the heat of passion, we don’t care about certain things; like the quality of the lady’s uterine lining as it won’t seem too relevant at the moment.

Humans are uniquely sexual creatures, hence our sexual activities are way beyond a mere biological urge; it has psychological significance and social meaning.

Humans have sex for several reasons that are beyond biology. Humans have sex more often and in more elaborate ways than every other species on the planet. We have sex for pleasure, for recreation, for passion, and for revenge.

Humans also have sex just to screw nice people and mean people, friends and enemies, sexy people and ugly people. We have sex because we are happy and because we are sad. We have sex because we are bored because we feel alone as well as because we are in love.

Sex education should account for the recreational, social and emotional reasons for sex and their consequences. It should discuss the interpersonal meaning of intercourse, setting clear expectations and boundaries, communicating desires, dealing with feelings of shame and awkwardness, and of course, being responsible for protection and privacy.

2. How to respect personal boundaries: There is a sexual shame that goes on in our culture that makes men and women hide their intentions and desires from one another, which eventually leads to communication breakdown or worse.

Consent has become an issue because in sexual situations, is usually taught as, “If a woman says no, it means no.” Good, but it completely glosses over the complexity of the issue. It continues to frame sex in the perception of a women get to decide, you have to convince them. This reinforces the perception that men must somehow prove themselves to women and women must somehow be “won over” by a man to have sex with him.

This isn’t consent, it’s mutually reinforced manipulation. Sexual intentions and desires should be stated clearly from the get-go by both parties. Not just “I want to have sex with you,” but every step of the way. “I’m attracted to you, I want to go out with you,” “I want to go home with you,” and so on. Kids should be taught that there’s nothing shameful about saying “yes” or “no” and that they should not be ashamed nor shame someone else for saying either.

All personal desires are valid just as all rejections of personal desires by another are valid. Both should be respected. It’s as simple as that.

3. How men and women experience sex differently: There are three things which are true about male or female sexualities; Men and women have innate differences in how they experience their sexualities. This should be obvious to anyone who’s ever looked at naked people. These differences, despite existing, don’t really mean anything.

The truth is that trying to cram an ideology that men and women are exactly the same in all ways down people’s throats is just as fascist and shitty as forcing the ideology of conventional gender roles and stereotypes on everyone as well. People are different. Men and women are also different. These things are not mutually exclusive.

We know men and women are different. We know this from a wide range of neurological and psychological studies. We know from studying how gays and lesbians interact with one another. We know from primatology and the obvious sexual dimorphism of our species. And we know from the subjective accounts of transsexuals who use hormone replacement treatments.

Men and women differ in some ways and both genders should be treated with equal respect for those differences. That in and of itself should be taught in sex education. What should also be taught is how sex drives differ between men and women, how women are more sexually fluid in their desires, how men are more physical and visually oriented in arousal, and how, on average across populations, across cultures, and in female-to-male transsexuals, they usually want to have sex more often and with a wider variety of partners.

4. Sex is not a reflection of your value as a person: Sex should be removed from its pedestal badge of either honour or shame in our culture. If a man is shamed for not being able to get laid and a lady is also shamed for getting laid, then men will always have the incentive of manipulating ladies into situations where consent is ambiguous and ladies as well will have an incentive to manipulate men into situations where they feel unworthy or powerless.

In the above situation, nobody wins, everybody gets frustrated, people start to lie even as some get raped. It’s no coincidence that sexual violence and divorce are highest in countries where this culture of sexual shame persists.

When your value as a human being is being judged based on the sex you’re having or not having or the marriage that you have or don’t have, then it’s easy to feel justified in saying and doing some messed up things to people of the opposite gender to get your way.

5. Great relationships mean great sex: The thing many sex education classes say about the dynamics of sexual relationships is, “Wait until you’re married,” as if putting a ring on your finger will magically resolve all insecurities you may have around your sexuality. It doesn’t, many people lament that they wish they had dated around more before they got married.

But the point is that if sex education classes can dry out teenage ears for months on end, going on about fallopian tubes, zygotes and X and Y chromosomes, why can’t they push the scientific knowledge of romantic relationships on everyone as well? One could argue that’s even more important.

What about attachment theory, emotional needs and the differences between love, lust and commitment? What about the Neo-Freudian explanation for romance? What about dealing with the anxiety of meeting someone attractive? all these should be included in sex education.

SOURCE: Markmanson