Human Sexuality

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) released its annual State of the World Population report. This version focused on the need for all societies to invest in adolescents' health and rights. The report informs us that there are over 1.2 billion adolescents who are on the verge of entering adulthood.Theses young persons are largely in schools and they are at a very important stage in their own development and in the shaping of the world of the future. To this end, the UNFPA report stresses the need "to increase knowledge, opportunities and choices" so that young people can make the decisions that will guarantee them healthy and productive lives, "so that they can contribute fully to their communities and to a more stable and prosperous world."In order to get to this point, the UNFPA report encourages all Governments to give young people accurate and honest information on reproductive health and on human sexuality. Indeed, it should be self-evident that adolescents need a multidisciplinary approach to the complex dynamics of human sexuality and the variety of relationships that emerge from this complex. Schools must therefore be seen as very important institutions in the formulation and dissemination of the knowledge that is needed to encourage the deepest understanding of human sexuality.At this juncture, there is no point arguing that sex education should be left entirely to the family ­ whatever its form. In discussing where adolescents get their information, The State of the World Population 2003 asserts that "in most cases parents are not the primary source of information although young women may rely on their mothers for information about menstruation and pregnancy risks."Within this broad framework of changing family dynamics and the diminishing role of many traditional institutions, the time has come for a serious discussion on the role of schools in the education of young people about human sexuality. In the October 12, 2003 edition of The Sunday Gleaner, assistant news editor Garwin Davis reported that the Reverend Canon Ernle Gordon has called for a broadening of sex education in Jamaican schools. This broadening, he proposes, should include discussions on all aspects of human sexuality, including homosexuality. The proposal that homosexuality should be discussed in the sex education curriculum of all schools and at the appropriate age level would be seen as merely "good common sense" in many societies, but not so in Jamaica. Canon Gordon's suggestions and his plea for tolerance are being challenged by many and varied voices.The time has come for all Jamaicans to start an honest dialogue about all the social and political issues that continue to wreak havoc at the level of the individual and on the wider community. Instead of being distracted by the antics of those who are determined to "bury their heads in the sand" in order to pretend that the variations in human sexual orientation is of no consequence to our young people, we need to listen to questions that adolescents and the youth are asking. We also need to take time out to attend more closely to the related issues that have been raised by the Rev. Canon Gordon, Mr. Howard Hamilton and Dr. Peter Figueroa. These persons, amongst others, have clearly shown the link between the social and psychological barriers of discrimination, stigma and ignorance.They have also articulated their concerns about the rapid spread of sexually transmitted diseases, the prevalence of teenage pregnancies and the isolation of many individuals who have no way of validating their sexuality in a harshly heterosexist and intolerant society.THE ROLE OF SCHOOLSThe role of schools must, of necessity, be revisited from time to time. These institutions are expected to make a difference in the lives of all the young people who pass through their doors, therefore schools must be active agents in the transmission of honest information on all aspects of the human condition. Therefore, in schools, no sexually related topic should be too controversial to discuss. Public health knowledge and sex education must be based on scientific research and findings, not on the political and moral agenda of church and state players.In this framework, schools should be expected to develop a meaningful and intelligent curriculum on human sexuality. In such an educational programme a wide range of topics would be accommodated. This kind of programme would force sex educators to rethink the traditionally narrow band of information that passed for "sex education" or "family life" education.No longer should sex education focus on the biological aspects of the reproductive process and the established notions of "boy meets girl" scenario. Teachers would have to stop tiptoeing around issues of celibacy, abstinence, contraception, condom use, and other vital information. They would have to be honest and forthright and stop denying youngsters their basic right to the kind of information that will assist them in avoiding life-threatening sexual scenarios. Young people need to have a good understanding of the complexity of human sexuality, in order for them to understand fully their personal sexual identity and any related confusion.

HOMOSEXUALITY IN SCHOOLS

The suggestion to include an honest discussion on homosexuality in sex education in our schools must not be seen as an effort to "teach people how to become homosexual". It is an effort to get us to a place where we can be tolerant of the variations in the human family. Indeed, it is an effort to remind us that variations of colour, gender and ethnicity have been used to isolate individuals and groups for a very long time. In this process we have become very intolerant of differences, and historically and contemporarily we have oppressed and repressed generations of humanity.Canon Ernle Gordon is merely trying to get us to use the influence of the school to reverse the long debilitating process of the exclusion which has resulted in so much pain globally. Let us not forget that intolerance is deeply imbedded in a very long history of dominator and dominated, oppressor and oppressed, coloniser and colonised, and other forms of universal unequal relationships.Montrealer, Lise Noel, in a seminal work entitled, 'Intolerance: A General Survey demonstrates the insidious and pervasive impact of intolerance by locating the position of oppressive forces in the following description:The oppressor has no apparent existence ... rarely seen, rarely named, he is unique nonetheless in having a full existence; as the keeper of the word, he is the supreme programmer who confers various degrees of existence on those who are different from himself.In other words, the oppressor is powerful enough to marginalise and oppress people on the basis of race, colour, gender, class and sexual orientation.Noel reviewed the role of all major institutions, including the church, in the repression of the human spirit. She concluded that "the mind can sometimes grasp the tragedy of an individual, and sometimes statistically comprehend that of a community, but the drama of each and every individual hidden behind these statistics surpasses understanding."So because we can never fully put ourselves in the place of the "other", the struggle against all forms of intolerance must continue.Without knowledge and critical skills we will continue to discriminate against all those who deviate from the 'norm' of the 'dominant'.Our children are entitled to knowledge based on what is really happening in their society. They need the "full deck" of information on human sexuality, the dangers of risky sexual behaviours, and enough knowledge to comprehend the reality that the human family has always been characterised by both heterosexual and homosexual orientations. With knowledge and critical skills, our young people will be able to articulate and deal with some of the most controversial issues that confront them daily.Dr. Glenda P. Simms is the Executive Director of the Bureau of Women's Affairs