The Feminist Journal

    Utah is typically considered a safe place to raise children because it is free of the high rate of violent crime that terrorizes its closer counterpart cities like Las Vegas Nevada. Now before you go shaking hands with one another in congratulations, Utah does have another problem. A bigger, and in many ways scarier problem. Utah, according to Fox 13 news, is 8th in the nation for child abuse and holds the number one spot in instances of sexual abuse. Alarmingly, not only is Utah seeing high numbers of sexual abuse cases but it is also rapidly seeing growth in the rates of STD infection throughout the state.

 

In an article written by Daphne Chen of Deseret News, Chen presents numbers given by the Salt Lake City Health Department stating that rates of gonorrhea infection have gone from less than 200 in 2011 to an alarming number of over 1,000 cases by 2015. These numbers are disturbing and have many wondering why we have these problems, and more importantly, how do we combat them? The answer, of course, is mandatory comprehensive sexual education for all. Most people agree that some form of sexual education is good and necessary, but there are varying opinions on how much should be discussed with our children and from what standpoint. In Utah, the topic has become especially controversial as four of the major school districts teach an abstinence only sex education curriculum and the rest teach abstinence based, but is this really the best option for our children in these times of increased STD and sexual abuse cases?

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    Comprehensive sexual education means more than just discussing how the human body works and what a condom can do to protect you against unwanted pregnancy or infection. It also means discussing consent and how to differentiate appropriate and inappropriate/unwanted touching. Young children and teens are some of the most vulnerable of our population when it comes to sexual assault as persons aged 12 to 34 years old are the most likely to be victimized. One way that this can be prevented is by teaching the correct names of a child’s body parts from an early age.

 

Several sources, including RAINN, list this as one of the key steps in preventing sexual abuse, or helping a child who has experienced it, yet there are many children who don’t know the names for their anatomy unless and until they engage in a sexual education course. This leaves them unable to vocalize if an assault against them has occurred. Another important element in the Utah curriculum is healthy and unhealthy characteristics of relationships and sexual behaviors, up to and including sexual assault. If we are talking about sexual assault after it has happened, it is already too late. We need to discuss it with our youth so they can recognize it and prevent it, and the best way to do this is through comprehensive sexual education programs.

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    According to an article by Kathrin F. Stanger-Hall and David Hall, Abstinence- Only Education and Teen Pregnancy Rates: Why We Need Comprehensive Sex Education In The US, “The United States ranks first among developed nations in rates of both teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.” This is troubling to many as STI’s are not only painful and humiliating but they can also be lethal, and the consequences of unintended pregnancy can be difficult for young parents to deal with. According to the Hall’s article, states that used abstinence only or abstinence based approaches to sexual education had the highest rates of teen births and abortions compared to “zero level” states—states that did not mention abstinence at all. Despite these informative statistics, Utah still maintains its policy of abstinence only and abstinence based sexual education in schools. Many people attribute this to the fact that the dominant religion of the state of Utah preaches abstinence only and many high-profile members of school boards and the legislative body are members of this dominant religion. In an article outlining a bill to change Utah’s policy on sexual education courses in schools published to the Salt Lake Tribune’s website in 2016, the house minority leader Brian King discusses his concern over the rising rates of chlamydia infection in youth and attributes it to poor sexual health education. “Knowledge is power and I don’t believe in keeping our kids ignorant,” King is quoted saying in the article. Unfortunately, the bill did not go through due in large part to the conservative nature of Utah’s legislature.

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    While a big fear of the conservative community is that a more comprehensive sexual education may encourage youth to have sex a Myths and Facts sheet produced by the Advocates For Youth, a group dedicated to providing youth the information they deserve in relation to their sexual health, begs to differ. Advocates for Youth claims that comprehensive sex ed. programs can actually delay initiation of sexual activity, or reduce the amount of partners that a sexually active teen may take. Not only that but Advocates for Youth wants to take down the harmful projection that abstinence only programs work. The fact sheet provided by Advocates for Youth cites a study showing how students who attended abstinence only programs consistently were in the same age range at first sexual encounter as those who attended non-abstinence only based programs, demonstrating a lack of proof for the myth that abstinence only teaching is the way to go.

        

    In a time of rising rates of STD infections and increasing cases of sexual abuse, there really is no time to allow an older and more conservative generation to dictate an abstinence only education to the youth of this state who face the dangers of disease and assault. Comprehensive sexual education offers so much more than just the know-how of how to use a condom. Comprehensive sexual education can delay time of sexual initiation, give our children the words to discuss their bodies and things that have happened to them, as well as the knowledge to have an enjoyable and safe sexual life in the years ahead of them. The youth of this state deserve the keys to their bodily autonomy and Utah deserves to be the safe place that we all imagine it is, and that starts with us.