Sunday, May 20, 2007

Stay off sex or have safe sex?























I refer to the above article ‘Stay off sex or have safe sex?’ This article talks about sex education and response from teenagers aged 21 – 24, discussing on how the issue of sex education should be brought across to youths now. From recent statistics, out of a total of the 2, 703 reported HIV-positive cases in Singapore, 22 are in the 10 to 19 age group, with another 483 in the 20 to 29 age group. Singapore International Youth Council founder Bernise Ang noted that abstinence message could be harmful despite its good intentions as it does not reflect reality.



From responses of the various teens, it was noted that one great obstacle to educate the youths mind is due to the open-mindedness, no ‘fear factor’ and rebellious mentality of youths. Many deem that these trends are observed due to the younger generation are becoming more experimental and sexually active at a younger age.



I feel that the very trigger to such a trend that should be noted is the increasing number of boy-girl relationships (BGR) – even in primary schools, where such cases are becoming more and more common. The very concept of ‘love’ was not brought across in the right way to begin with. We should understand that as a child starts to enter teenage years, emotions start to set in. Many are unable to deal with these emotions and starts to get into a BGR. They feel satisfied that they are able to share their feelings with each other, and deem these feelings as love for one another when they are merely infatuations. With all these wrong concepts of ‘love’, comes into place the development of these relationships with reference to sex education. Youths talk about sex, and how sex means the very essence of love and devotion to each other. They feel that they are matured enough and therefore are able to analyse and make their own decisions on issues of sex.



But I beg to differ.



Instead of claiming that youths are becoming more matured, I feel that this very occurrence of the trend describes otherwise – that youths are becoming more childish. Being unable to understand what love actually is, disregarding all consequences of having sex are just part of these signs of being immature. Rushing through the decisions and being rebellious only reflects that the youths indeed, are unable to analyse their situation. Promoting safe sex only give teenagers the impression that it is all right to have sex, but nothing is done to allow them to understand the misconception of love and sex. I agree that we should not focus on creating HIV-risk awareness, and instead, we should guide youths in their ways of thought on love and sex, and implementing new approaches that encompass what the teenagers want to know.

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