Okay, so apparently in Australia some schools have gotten in homosexuals and brothel madams to talk about safe sex practices as part of a health studies course.

Gays to address school students

Kindy kids told gay is OK

Gay sex syllabus sparks inquiry

However, I was reading Saturday's West Australian and I read these in the Letters section where readers can send in what they think:

It's sickening

Policy-makers in schools need to reconsider their decision to introduce "sex education" as a component of high-school education. The prospect of brothel madams and homosexuals addressing students as part of their so-called sex education is sickening.

Since when have homosexual experiences and prostitution been considered healthy and worth teaching children about? This fad of "sex education" serves only to normalise and even promote immoral and perverted behaviour.

With thousands of students also being encouraged to become sexually active by this misguided policy, it is little wonder Australia has one of the highest teenage pregnancy rates in the Western world.

Anything goes

So, unhealthy lifestyles are promoted in schools under the cover of anti-discrimination motives. In the climate of today's educational philosophy everything is acceptable and permissable provided you can justify it by writing it in the current jargon of curriculum outcomes. Use words such as inclusivity, equality and empathy and you can write an acceptable outcome for anything you want to promote.

Is this news?

Your front page headline (the first link above) and susequent reports imply that there is something wrong with that. A school has asked a representative of the Gay and Lesbian Community Services to talk about being gay or lesbian and the discrimination that occurs. So what?

Imagine the headline, Jews to address schoolchildren, or even Liberals to address schoolchildren, for similar talks about what it means to be Jewish or a memebr of the Liberal party. You wouldn't see that on page one, because it's not news. But there really isn't any difference.

And some other snippets from some other letters:

... I wonder if these same schools have invited Linda's House of Hope people to educate our young people on the devastating conseqences of a promiscious lifestyle. I wonder whether people from the Abortion Grief Counselling Association are allowed to speak to our students about what they have to deal with every day. How much of the psychological, emotional, spiritual and mental health aspects of human sexuality are allowed to be taught to our students? My guess is very little.

... In a society which appears to be becoming less and less tolerant I applaud Ballajura Community College for endeavouring to inform their students about "real-life" issues. Hopefully, these young men and women will leave school with a greater understanding of minority groups and an increased tolerance for humanity in general.

Now, I could do a long and detailed report analysing all this but I gave up the analysing shit when I finished high school, so in plain words here's what I think.

I think it's great that schools are having talks by gay and lesbian people in their sex ed classes. Homosexuality is a fact of life. It's not a lifestyle choice but a way a life. As far as I know, you don't choose to like someone, it just happens, regardless of gender. So informing high school kids on every aspect of sexuality is a good thing. If they aren't informed truthfully about sex, whether heterosexual or homosexual, then the potential to be misinformed by other sources is higher and being misinformed can result in bad things happening (okay, that last bit sounds stupid but you get my point). Teenagers have committed suicide because they thought homosexuality was a bad thing or have gotten teased by others because of it. If everyone was accepting about these things then stuff like that wouldn't happen.

However I do believe that kids should reach a certain age before being educated about sex. What that age is, I don't know. Kids are growing up faster every year with younger kids acting older than they should be. Sure, educating kids about sex when young might encourage more of them to have sex but these are the kids who would be seeking information out about these things regardless so at least they will get the correct information.

And as for having a brothel madam in to talk to students, I don't think that is a bad idea either as long as she is not promoting prostitution. If people are not made aware of, let's say the seedier side of society, then they could easily fall prey to people who would exploit them. Kids are going to find out about these things anyway so just tell them the truth and let them make their own decisions

What are your opinions?