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The thing I most wish I'd had (although this is a comparatively small piece of what's needed) is acknowledgement that some people don't want sex. Growing up asexual before most people (including me) even know the word meant all I got was a whole lot of, "Of course you desperately want to do this, but don't do it." The pushing of abstinence gave me a useful shield, but it wasn't worth the deep-down sick feeling of "something is very wrong with me."

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Very curious if you’ve heard about the Our Whole Lives curriculum, developed by the Unitarian Universalist Association. From what I understand, it’s a comprehensive, progressive, radically inclusive sexuality curriculum for grades K-12. I didn’t have the privilege of attending OWL classes myself (it was still called About Your Sexuality in the 90s, and I didn’t have a ride to where it was), but friends who took it came away with the most extraordinary information! Now I’m looking for a local (NYC) offering for my first grader, bc he sure af won’t get anything like it at his school.

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Sexual education is essential for everyone; I cannot imagine how awful it is for a queer person. In 1960, in a Catholic high school, a PRIEST! spoke to my class. I never had an honest idea of human anatomy until enrolled a nonreligious college. A terrible psychological bent on an essential human act.

I hope that your message succeeds, and that you succeed as well. My Philly high school no longer exists. Thank god!!!

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I came out much later in life and after I already had a daughter. I also came out as bi - so the combination of having a daughter (aka being a breeder) and identifying as bi made it really hard to date (in Boston in the early 2,000’s). Adding to that the fact that I had zero idea about girl-on-girl sex and the only options for learning about it seemed to be very male gaze centric ... to say my anxiety was at a high would be an understatement.

And it’s something that has never left me. Living much of the last decade in the south, in mostly smallish towns, where it’s tough to meet other queer people, I haven’t exactly gained the experience I might otherwise have. Now I’m close to 50 and still feel insecure about girl-sex, even tho most days I’m fairly certain I’ve only identified as bi (as opposed to a lesbian) because it meant I could still date and/or hookup.

While I can’t imagine a sex ed class being the thing that filled this gap, I definitely think a more comprehensive approach, such as you discuss, would normalize so much and make it easier for people to explore and ask questions.

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Tyler, thank you for writing such a thoughtful piece. Looking forward to spending more time with you here this week!

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This was an arresting piece. Thanks much for posting it. Being many years past secondary school, I was immediately struck by the rightness of your thinking and by the image of the mumbling, embarrassed and very old-fashioned gym teacher who taught us sex ed. How sad that so little has changed since my school days. I’m looking forward to your next posts.

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In Britain we had Section 28 laws for some of my secondary/high school education, basically the same as the Don’t Say Gay stuff, so not only was my school’s sex education not at all queer, it was actively homophobic (I’ve known I was queer since I was 14).

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Thanks so much for both of these posts - they gave me the needed kick in the pants to email my kid's school to find out about their curriculum and contact the local UUs to figure out how to get on their list for OWL. We've done our best to be open and chill about all things body related (I have vivid memories of reading the "menstruation" section of one of those It's So Amazing books to my kids at bedtime - their choice!) but I'd like to be more intentionally inclusive and cover queer experiences more accurately and helpfully.

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