The Opinions - The Most Important Lesson in Sex Ed Isn’t Actually Sex

Episode Date: February 27, 2025

When Hillary Frank took her middle-school-age daughter to see “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.,” she was surprised to learn that the fictional Margaret had more sex education than her daughter. In this episode, Frank reflects on what she wishes she learned in health class as a teenager and how we might improve sex education in schools across the country.Thoughts? Email us at [e-mail] can find transcripts (posted within 24 hours) and more episodes of “The Opinions” at nytimes.com/column/the-opinions.This episode of “The Opinions” was produced by Jillian Weinberger. Edited by Kaari Pitkin and Alison Bruzek. Fact-checking by Mary Marge Locker. Mixing by Carole Sabouraud. Original music by Pat McCusker, Efim Shapiro and Carole Sabouraud. The show’s production team also includes Derek Arthur, Vishakha Darbha and Kristina Samulewski. Audience strategy by Shannon Busta and Kristina Samulewski. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This is The Opinions, a show that brings you a mix of voices from New York Times opinion. You've heard the news. Here's what to make of it. My name is Hilary Frank. I'm the host of the podcast The Longest Shortest Time, which is a podcast about parenthood and reproductive health. Almost two years ago, when my daughter was in the seventh grade, I took her to see the movie adaptation of Judy Bloom's classic novel. Are You There, God? It's me, Margaret. Hello, girls. I'm Mrs. Webster, and I am here to speak to you today about your changing bodies. So in one scene, Margaret is sitting in the auditorium of her New Jersey school, and all the girls in her class are watching a film strip. There's this warbly guitar track, and then you hear this woman's voice.

All girls are unique, but sometime between the ages of nine and 16, one very special thing happens to every girl. menstruation. So when I was watching that scene, I thought it was funny, and I thought, like, how far we've come since the 70s. But my daughter didn't think it was funny. Instead, she leaned over and she whispered to me, this is so much more than we've gotten. And I looked into how much she had gotten. And it turned out she hadn't just gotten less sex ed in 2023 than the fictional Margaret had in 1970, my daughter had actually gotten zero sex ed.

And so because of that, at the beginning of my daughter's eighth grade year, I went to the vice principal to ask why they hadn't been teaching sex ed. And he was actually a lot more receptive than I expected. He looked into why the health teachers weren't teaching sex ed. And it turned out that, you know, most of them are gym teachers. And they said, hey, we want to do this, but we don't have the proper training to do this, and we're not comfortable teaching it without that training. Of course, I had already had conversations with my daughter about puberty and the physical aspects of what is normally taught in sex ed. But the thing that I really was hoping that she and her classmates would get in school was education around

consent, because I think it's important within a community, that everybody has the same kind of understanding of what the norms are around consent, how to have healthy relationships. Sex Ed is mandated by law to be taught in the state of New Jersey. And on the list of what is required is that they have to stress abstinence, they have to include instruction on sexual orientation

and gender identity, and they have to include instruction on consent. I was actually in my 40s before I fully grasped the concept of consent. I grew up in Connecticut, and the sex ed I got there was, in retrospect, pretty comprehensive. But when we talked about consent, there was only one word I remember hearing, and that is rape. And I was imagining something visibly violent, you know, a struggle with a victim audibly saying no. The Me Too movement was eye-opening for me. It completely changed the way I thought about consent.

Rise up for the women of the world. For the women of the world rise up. I started to rethink some of the experiences from my youth. I realized that a relationship that started when I was a teenager was not just messy, but in fact emotionally abusive. And then I realized that an encounter that happened shortly after I graduated from college wasn't a mistake, which is what I had been calling it, but in fact, sexual assault. So after the Me Too movement really broke, I started to wonder if I had gotten better consent education when I was a kid, would I have been able to spot the red flags earlier? Like would I maybe have broken up with my boyfriend on one of our first dates when he threw. dog poop at me and said it was a joke. Would I have recognized that that was emotional abuse?

Would I have understood that when he got aggressively jealous of other guys, that he was being controlling, not romantic? And then on top of that, I sometimes also wonder if the guys who had harmed me might have behaved differently if they had gotten better consent education. My daughter's generation has come of age after me too. So they're familiar with terms like sexual harassment and sexual assault and emotional abuse. And they've watched predators face consequences for their actions. Less than 24 hours after a Washington Post article alleged Charlie Rose sexually harassed female employees for years, a 75-year-old, is out of a job. But her generation, Gen Z, has also watched some perpetrators of sexual violence rise to power.

and some of them hold the most influential jobs in the world. It couldn't have happened. It didn't happen. And she would not have been the chosen one. My daughter's 15 now. She's a freshman in high school. And she eventually did get a little bit of sex ed. In eighth grade, after I spoke to the vice principal,

the health teacher did talk to the class about basic reproductive systems. And then a guidance counselor came and, and gave a presentation on consent. And all of this is better than nothing, but it also feels inadequate. Consent education is essential, and it cannot just come from teachers who are squeamish about teaching it.

One idea would be to put more of this work into the hands of the teenagers themselves. There's actually a program happening right now in middle schools and high schools around the country. It's through an organization called Safe Bay, that's SafeBae, which stands for Safe Before Anyone Else. And according to Safe Bay's research, teenagers are far more receptive to consent messaging that comes from other teenagers than from adults.

And Safe Bay encourages schools to do something pretty innovative, to not just silo sex ed to health class, but to incorporate it into all kinds of other classes like literature and history. I'm just a parent. I don't have any experience in advocacy. So this is something that really anybody can do in their community. Find out, like, what are your kids learning? What do you want them to be learning? What does your state say they must learn? And is the school complying with that? And I encourage people to not only ask those questions, but to, try to get something changed, maybe through the Board of Ed, maybe by contacting an organization like Safe Bay that can help install a club at your kids' school. And so I hope what people take from this story is the idea that we need to have these conversations with our kids. And if they're not happening in your school, advocating for that. If you like this show, follow it on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts.

This show is produced by Derek Arthur, Sophia Alvarez Boyd, Bishaka, Fiby Lett, Christina Samuelski, and Jillian Weinberger. It's edited by Kari Pitkin, Alison Bruzek, and Annie Rose Strasser. Engineering, mixing, and original music by Isaac Jones, Sonia Herrero, Pat McCusker, Carol Saburo, and Afim Shapiro. Additional music by Amin Sahota. The fact check team is Kate Sinclair, Mary Marge Locker, and Michelle Harris. Audience Strategy by Shannon Busta, Christina Samueluski, and Adrian Rivera. The executive producer of Times Opinion Audio is Annie Rose Dresser.