As a fashion photographer, I shoot a lot of pictures that contribute to the sexual imagery that confront youth every day in America. While American teens live in a society that uses sex to sell everything from lipstick to laptops, they are rarely afforded opportunities to discuss sex in an open, honest way. Because of my work in many different countries and cultures, and my involvement in a project called Move For Aids, I became interested in the issue and decided to take a deeper look at how America's inability to talk about sex really impacts teens.
I was really shocked by what I found. Every day in America, 10,000 teens catch a sexually transmitted disease, 2,400 teen girls get pregnant, and 55 young people are infected with HIV. Also consider these cold, hard facts:
But I wasn't just shocked by the statistics but also by the fact that most people are unaware of how bad the situation really is and also how valuable open communication and education can be in alleviating the problem.
After processing what I had learned, my mission became to bring these shocking facts to life through film and in the process offer some real solutions to try and improve the situation. That film is called Let's Talk About Sex. For three years, I traveled through the United States and Western Europe on a journey to understand common trends on sex and sexuality, and to profile young Americans who have been directly affected by the current lack of honest, open conversation. These teens are powerful advocates for change, navigating the real world with little guidance about sexuality, and occasionally facing devastating consequences as a result.
The film highlights the price young people pay for a culture where fear, shame, and denial too often undermine education, communication, and basic common sense. It looks at a broad swath of the American teenage experience -- from a teen in Atlanta, GA who discusses the disconnect between the virginity pledge movement and the reality of teen's lives, to college students talking about the "hook up" culture of college, and a young gay man who was infected with HIV at age 17 talks about the impact the lack of sex education and information has on gay teens.
Let's Talk About Sex concludes in Oregon, where some of the lessons learned in Western Europe are helping to create practical solutions. The differences between Europe and America are staggering. If the U.S. were able to achieve the sexual health outcomes on a par with the Netherlands, American teens each year would experience 600,000 fewer pregnancies, 350,000 fewer births and 63,000 fewer abortions. The annual savings for American taxpayers would reach $505 million.
The Internet and modern life have changed the playing field for teens. Now more than ever, we need to stand up and make sure young people have honest, reliable information and communication around this issue. Sexuality is such a big part of who we are, and I believe that most people want to talk to their children about it but they just don't know how. Let's Talk About Sex was created as a tool for parents, educators and community leaders to initiate healthy, age-appropriate conversations about sexual health across America. Only a community effort will really solve this problem, so please join me in getting this important message out.
The film can be seen on TLC, April 9th at 10 PM EST / 9 CST. More information on the film can be found at LetsTalkAboutTheFilm.com
Natalia Rose: Empowering Women To Take Control Of Reproductive Health
My own mother, certainly no prude, left it up to our family counselor to deliver the message about the opposite sex. She was an educated woman that thoroughly believed in birth control. She saw a direct correlation between early, unwed pregnancies and college drop outs. TG that someone had my interests at heart and knew the psychological, biological and sociological factors that are a natural course of life. It's hard enough to grow up and we don't have villages to raise our children in our culture, nor should they. PASS THE ERA.
I am totally opposed to punishing with prison time any teenager. As adults we have not even had a national debate, nor examined, as you say, the blatant sexual advertising across all brands and industries. To wonder why our kids are texting body parts is naive. They are a reflection of our society's messed up approach to sex.
What we should not be doing is ruining young people's lives with ten year prison sentence. Guess who will probably end up in jail more?
Also, I think we need to stop coddling our children. Only a 100 years ago, 15 and 16 year olds were crossing oceans, starting families. Our kids are bored and we are doing an injustice by pretending their hormones aren't raging.
I think the sexting is their way of acting out against the horrrendous double standards.
Adults need to clean this up.
True or not, it all that seems to support the fact that the cat is out of the bag and it's way too fat to stuff back in! Conservative moralists have once again taken the losing side on this issue by trying to pull back support for this obvious advancement of human progress and thinking (which is essentially due to the liberation and growing equality of women); the real answer is to educate and channel behavior to harness this natural expression of human sexual liberation to the needs and benefits of civilization............rather than waging a continuing hypocritical struggle against the inevitable.
Nature, may one day present a case that this perceived "immoral behavior" is worthy of retribution. But then again, nature may not! Either way, nature gave men and women the ability to challenge all obstacles and boundaries and to learn from their mistakes (something that religion tries to take away). Bet on the human will. It speaks it's message freely every day, and ultimately it relies on its unique gift of intelligence to both protect itself, correct itself, and survive. NO Reapuglycant intervention required for human manifest destiny or survival, please!
Anything that addresses the problem in a positive light should be attempted. Making it a "sin" has been worthless.
In high school in the 1960s the girls had no sex ed. The boys were told how great sex feels and we'd hear them across the hall hooting and howling. Our hygiene teacher passed around a hundred year old book showing a young boy sitting on a chair, naked, with his hands folded in his lap. We looked at it solemnly and all left the room confused.
Back in those days terror of punishment, shame, and a "reputation" kept the girls chaste. Well, most of us.