This mother’s live-tweets of her son’s sex-ed class has gone viral.
When Alice Dreger sat in on her son’s high school sex education class this week, she was outraged.
So Dreger – a medical humanities and bioeithics professor at Northwestern University, author and super cool mum – live-tweeted the whole pro-abstinence lesson from the back of the room.
The class involved horror stories about pre-marital sex leading to depraved and destructive lifestyles, the unreliability of contraception and this take-away message: GOOD GIRLS SAY NO.
Here are some of the highlights…
Then came the paper baby disaster demonstration…
Yep, even the boys.
Her tweets went viral and have caused a stir back in her hometown of East Lansing, Michigan.
Dreger – who wrote about her experience – said she hoped her experience would encourage other parents to look critically at the sex education their teens are receiving at school, according to the Huffington Post.
“I’m incredibly glad this happened because it is causing a useful national movement of parents planning to audit what is REALLY being taught to their kids,” Dreger said.
“Forget what the curriculum says. Find out what’s true. In our school’s case, I discovered what’s really being taught is ‘good girls say no; bad girls say yes’ and ‘1 in 6 times you have sex with a condom you’ll get pregnant.'”
Now, she says she has been banned from the school because of her “potty mouth”.
It looks like that might be the last time they let a parent in to observe a class.
To see the live tweets in full, click here.
Top Comments
I agree with her and love what she did, but I do wonder if she had a daughter rather than a son if she would be so relaxed about this.
Exactly! Nobody wants their son to have some teenage girl turning up pregnant but at least he can opt out. The poor girl doesnt have that chance. Its a difficult dilemma whatever she chooses.
I tell my sons they should only sleep with someone they're prepared to be involved with for life if she does accidentally end up pregnant. As he wont have a say in what she chooses to do and some girls aim for that to happen.
Why can't she be this relaxed and have a daughter? I'm 18, my mum has always been supportive of my choices because she trusts me and knows I'm well informed. She treated me exactly as she treated my brother about this. There shouldn't really be a difference.
And boys can't just "opt out". The closest they have to opting out is to pay child support, and while that's better than having to raise a child, its still a burden.
The sex talk should be had at home too. I tell my daughter to take what they teach her in sex ed with a grain of salt, but she can come to me at any time with any questions/comments. I find that this balances out both sides. I think that the whole point behind sex ed classes is to warn youngens of the risks and dangers of engaging in sex at a young age (teen pregnancy, stds, self esteem issues, etc), and that's why it generally comes across as so one-sided. It's up to the parents to fill in the gaps. I don't want my daughter to be fearful of sex, but I do want her to be aware and knowledgeable that there ARE risks involved, and those risks can be absolutely life-changing.