The first comprehensive trade history of sex ed in American schools--and an impassioned call to reform sex ed into a powerful tool for reproductive justice and social equality The U.S. has some of the highest rates of STIs and teen pregnancies in the industrialized world. A comprehensive sex education curriculum--which teaches facts on contraception, prophylactics, consent, and STIs--has been available since the 90s. Yet the majority of states require that sex education stress abstinence, and 22 states do not require sex ed in public schools at all. In Because sex ed is not mandated at the federal level, these battles have played out locally throughout the decades: through rigged school boards, administrative oustings, court cases, unjust firings, scare tactics, and threats. Myers also shows how the religious right has worked to narrow the discourse around sex ed, often dictating the terms of debate almost entirely. What we teach young people has serious ramifications for reproductive justice, LGBTQ+ rights, gender equality, and public health. Sex education lies at the intersection of these hugely important cultural forces, yet it has been largely invisible. This book illuminates its potential--and its power.

Autorentext
Margaret Grace Myers is a writer, researcher, educator, and former bookseller based in Maine. Her writing has appeared in The Cut, Lady Science, and the Gotham Gazette, among other publications. She holds a BA from Skidmore College, a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School, and an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Goucher College.

Klappentext

The first comprehensive trade history of sex ed in American schools—and an impassioned call to reform sex ed into a powerful tool for reproductive justice and social equality

The U.S. has some of the highest rates of STIs and teen pregnancies in the industrialized world. A comprehensive sex education curriculum—which teaches facts on contraception, prophylactics, consent, and STIs—has been available since the 90s. Yet the majority of states require that sex education stress abstinence, and 22 states do not require sex ed in public schools at all.

In The Fight for Sex Ed, writer, advocate, and historian Margaret Myers shows us how we got here. While the earliest calls for sex ed came from a coalition of religious leaders and doctors at the turn of the century who sought to control the prevalence of STIs, the advent of antibiotics and modern condoms meant that abstinence was no longer good public health policy. The religious right, however, continued to frame it as such, using its impressive machinery to replace scientific facts with conservative Christian values.

Because sex ed is not mandated at the federal level, these battles have played out locally throughout the decades: through rigged school boards, administrative oustings, court cases, unjust firings, scare tactics, and threats. Myers also shows how the religious right has worked to narrow the discourse around sex ed, often dictating the terms of debate almost entirely.

What we teach young people has serious ramifications for reproductive justice, LGBTQ+ rights, gender equality, and public health. Sex education lies at the intersection of these hugely important cultural forces, yet it has been largely invisible. This book illuminates its potential—and its power.

Inhalt
Preface: Then and Now

CHAPTER 1
Dr. Prince Morrow and the Birth of Sexual Health Advocacy in America

CHAPTER 2
Ella Flagg Young and the First Sex Ed Lectures in American Public Schools

CHAPTER 3
Fit to Fight: Syphilis and WWI

CHAPTER 4
Thomas Parran and “The Next Great Plague to Go”

CHAPTER 5
Ellsworth Buck’s Drive to Educate New York City

CHAPTER 6
World War II

CHAPTER 7
The Birth and Boycott of the Sex Ed Film

CHAPTER 8
Sex Ed and Family Life Education in the 1950s

CHAPTER 9
The First North American Conference on Church and Family

CHAPTER 10
The Birth of SIECUS

CHAPTER 11
The Religious Right Comes for SIECUS

CHAPTER 12
The New Battles of the 1970s

CHAPTER 13
A Decade of Federal Action

CHAPTER 14
Curricula Wars

CHAPTER 15
AIDS

CHAPTER 16
The Rise of Comprehensive Sex Ed

CHAPTER 17
The A-H Definition

CHAPTER 18
Trump, Biden, and Today

AFTERWORD
The Future of Sex Ed

Acknowledgments
Notes
Index