(More Than) Grrrl Power! Girls Studies at UCF

My first real “sex ed” class was in fifth grade. They split up the boys and the girls and separately taught us about our “parts”. We watched a movie about getting your period we saw very simple diagrams of male and female bodies. They gave the girls pads and deodorant. That was it. Then in 7th grade we had a slightly more educational lesson in science class. We saw better pictures of “the parts” and heard a very scientific explanation of were babies come from (and then a very graphic description of the birthing process). We weren’t really told anything about condoms or birth control, basically we were taught that the only appropriate time to have sex is when you are married and ready to have a baby. I do remember being given the opportunity to write down any questions we had about sex onto slips of paper so that our teacher could answer them later, without the embarrassment of actually asking them aloud. However, to my knowledge those questions were never actually answered. In the 11t...

Written By: Elizabeth Nesbitt Until taking this class I never thought about all the battles women have had to fight for equal rights. I forget sometimes about what is going on in the world, because I tend to focus on my problems and don’t look at the bigger picture. I was shocked when I read chapter seven. The informed consent law (also called Woman’s Right to Know” laws.) is in thirty three states in one form or another. (pg.132) This law is a joke in my opinion. To believe they write a law to tell women when they go to get an abortion that they must be reminded and talked to like a child. I find it unbelievable that people actually link abortion with breast cancer. (pg134) The virginity movement really stretches their cause to use breast cancer as a scare tactic shame on them. I am showing my age now, but I do not remember attending abstinence-only classes. I do think sex-education is imperative and should be mandatory in middle school. I believe we should teach in sex education clas...

As I mentioned in my post from last week I received a mish-mash of sex education depending on the state where I lived. I went through middle school in San Antonio, Texas where abstinence-only education was taught. What I remember of that sex education experience is one or two days dedicated to more scientific "where do babies come from?" teaching. No discussion was started about us, the students, actually having or thinking about having sex. At the same time I grew up in the Catholic Church where sex education classes meant teaching the value of sex in marriage. There sex was mired in mystery. It was something you couldn't do so there wasn't much to learn about it. I learned about contraception when I moved to Massachusetts and attended high school. There condom use was discussed but the phrase "But the only way to be 100 percent sure is to be abstinent" was repeatedly used. The sex-ed classes were co-ed however I remember one string of classes where we watc...

I honestly cannot remember if my high school taught abstinence only education or not. I remember being a Freshman, learning all about drugs and STD's, abuse and rape, but I do not remember if they really taught us about birth control. We certainly never had to put a condom on a banana. Many, many of my classmates became pregnant before graduation- almost 30 a year according to the school nurse. Abstinence-only education is too dangerous, and I wish people would start realizing that. It's just like Jessica Valenti argued when she was discussing the FDA's 3 year long approval of emergency contraception (and also the HPV vaccine)- everyone seems terrified that, if these things are available to young women, that they will go buck-wild and start fucking everything that moves. This argument means there is a lack of faith in the way parents are raising their daughters, and that women, as Valenti points out, are seen as incapable of making their own decisions. This proves to be a d...

"We must abandon the idea that women's bodies are inherently shameful, and that women's sexuality needs to be restricted (97)." Yes, exactly, thank you Jessica. I have never paid much attention to this abstinence education push and certainly never knew about these purity balls. When I started reading "The Purity Myth", I wanted to scream, "why can't a woman want sex?" what is wrong with that. I woman can and should enjoy sex and not be ashamed of that fact. As a strong, independent woman I feel that we should live our lives with a little more self interest. We should do as we please without considering what others might think of us. We should have sex and enjoy having sex. As I continued to read I came to realize that, as much as my inner feminist rebels against the idea, I am shackeled by the idea that women are the gatekeepers. As a product of my society, I have always viewed it as the woman's responsibility to fend off the males...

As I wrote in another blog, I was deep into the True Love Waits movement when I was a teenager. It was mostly my church that facilitated it, and I honestly can't even remember the sex education I got from my high school. I'm only twenty; that in itself should tell you how well we were educated. Luckily, I was well-read by the time I decided to have sex, and knew enough basics to know that I should probably talk to someone before I made that decision. So many girls I know though, especially from that period of my life, are lost when it comes to sex. One of the girls that I was best friends with got pregnant with a significantly older man and never finished college, getting married to him instead (she's now working on getting a divorce and will be a single mother of two little boys). Another didn't realize that it wasn't okay for her boyfriend to "put his ... you know, all over me, when I'm trying to do stuff" (her words). She didn't know that he sho...

Although I can barely remember my sexual education classes, I’m pretty sure I did not attend abstinence-only classes. I do remember abstinence being stressed as the best option. It all just seemed to textbook to me and statistical. At the time I just felt like what we were being taught was just so foreign to what was going on in my life. How wrong was I! One of the major ways to get the word out in our communities and beyond that abstinence-only education teaches sexist gender roles, would be to point out that young men are not being taught the same ideals. Just as Valenti points out through out the book, young men are taught they just can’t help it when it comes to sex. This is something that I think would be easier said than done because to get this message out would mean tackling sexist gender roles that exist in every aspect of life. It would require a total shift of the ideals that society and the media has put into everyone’s head. Also it is about trusting young wome...