“When learning about sexual health in my school, I felt free to ask questions without judgement.”
Of all the questions and opinions that were asked on the YPAR survey, this is one of the ones that I keep coming back to. That might be because I find it deeply sad that 68% of the people surveyed did not feel that they could ask questions about sexual health without judgement. It’s probably that and also that I jump to wanting to figure out how we can fix that. Fearing judgement is a big reason why all people don’t ask questions, and something that is often inherent in youth-adult relationships. If that keeps young people from asking for information they need, that’s a huge problem. Is that because of teacher discomfort or a need for facilitation training? Or is it symptomatic of a larger social discomfort with talking about sexuality topics or how adults interact with young people?