Bachelor’s Thesis 2018 15 ECTS

Faculty of Landscape and Society

Shai André Divon

Sex in the Classroom:

Approaches to Sexual Education
and their Implications for Autonomy

Alicia Earnest
Bachelor in International Development and Environment Studies
Faculty of Landscape and Society
1. Introduction..........................................................................................................2

1.1 Background and Problem Statement .................................................................2

1.2 Structure of this Paper ......................................................................................2

1.3 Issues With Addressing this Topic ....................................................................3

1.4 A Note about my Definition of Sexual Education .............................................4

2. Understanding Autonomy ....................................................................................4

3. Excluding Sexual Education and the Abstinence-only approach .......................8

3.1 Using “Biopolitics” to critique this approach ....................................................9

3.2 Consequences for Autonomy ............................................................................9

4. Comprehensive Sexual Education ..................................................................... 10

4.1 Using “Depoliticization” to critique this approach .......................................... 10

4.2 Consequences for Autonomy .......................................................................... 11

5. A Feminist Approach ......................................................................................... 13

5.1 Relevant Aspects of Feminist Theory ............................................................. 13

5.1.1 Intersectionality. ...................................................................................... 14
5.1.2 Situated knowledge. ................................................................................. 14
5.1.3 Equity over equality. ................................................................................ 14
5.1.4 Non-heteronormative, non-cisnormative perspectives, and gender roles. .. 15

5.2 Feminist Theory Applied to Sexual Education ................................................ 16

5.2.1 Gender roles and stereotypes. ................................................................... 16
5.2.2 Violence (rape, abuse, and consent). ........................................................ 17
5.2.3 Mandatory heterosexuality. ...................................................................... 18
5.2.4 A focus on pleasure.................................................................................. 18

5.3 Implications for Autonomy ............................................................................. 19

5.4 Existing Examples of this Approach ............................................................... 21

6. Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 22

7. References ........................................................................................................... 24

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 1. Introduction
1.1 Background and Problem Statement
Individuals having information about their own body and reproductive system is
crucial for them to be able to make educated, willful, and accurate decisions about their
health, relationships, reproduction, and future. However, sexual education remains a highly
debated topic worldwide, with influential politicians and activists arguing for and against
sexual education, and about what it should include.
My interest in this topic stems from my own frustration about the sexual education I
received in the United States. At a private school, I was taught the bare minimum about how
to actually keep myself healthy, and most lectures focused on abstinence. I am still, as a
student in University, learning things about my own body and reproductive system that I feel
I should have been taught long ago, and could have potentially lead to health problems. I had
always believed that I was acting with true independent autonomy in the decisions I made
about my body. However this was not the case, as I did not have all the information I needed
to make informed decisions.
This frustration has made me passionate about investigating the relationship between
sexual education and individual autonomy. The problem I am investigating is therefore that
the act of restricting or refusing to provide sexual education is being used as a way to control
populations by removing their sexual autonomy, teaching them norms, and directing their
actions. Furthermore, some attempts to keep sexual education purely scientific and apolitical
only reinforces harmful power structures that also inhibit autonomy.

1.2 Structure of this Paper

Throughout this paper I will explore prominent approaches to sexual education and
evaluate them according to the degree of autonomy they impart on students, and others who
receive this information. First, I will explore my working definition of autonomy, to set a
theoretical framework by which to analyze the outcome of these approaches. I will then look
into both the tactics of excluding sexual education and providing comprehensive sexual
education, using particular theoretical concepts with each to analyze their shortcomings, and
the implications their shortcomings have for the degree of autonomy imparted on students.
Finally, I will propose an approach to sexual education that can provide students, and all
involved in the learning process, with the tools and knowledge necessary to pursue true,
independent sexual autonomy. My goal is that by the end of my paper the reader will not only
understand why it is important to provide sexual education that has a goal of independent

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autonomy, but also why dominant approaches do not accomplish this and what kind of
approach we need to use to reach this goal instead.
I will not be focusing on a single case study for this paper. Rather, I will use examples
throughout the paper to aid the understanding and real life implications of certain concepts.
The examples will be mostly from the United States and India. I grew up in the United States
and it is where I received sexual education, so this is a context I understand well. As for
India, I participated in a field course with NMBU in 2016 where we travelled to rural
Rajasthan and Udaipur to conduct research projects on a topic of our choice. My group chose
to research how sexual education was conducted in the region and who received it. Our
experiences and findings from this project will therefore be relevant to include in this paper,
and they also contribute to my motivation to further explore the issue of sexual education.

1.3 Issues With Addressing this Topic

Considering the sensitive and personal nature of this topic, the issue of
trustworthiness must be addressed. I will be presenting an analysis of secondary data.
However, it must be noted that the primary data collected by ground level research that this
secondary data is based on may be biased. There are social hierarchies and pressures that may
prevent individuals from telling the whole truth on this topic. A lack of understanding of sex
and sexuality may also lead to the information gathered being incomplete. We will therefore
proceed with a critical realist approach. This approach is a philosophical framework for
approaching social science, when establishing ontological truths (understanding of what is
actually real) happens through epistemological understandings of truth (truth according to
what we know). Critical realism believes that an absolute ontological truth exists, but it
cannot be reduced to epistemology (Fletcher, 2017). In other words, when we use people’s
understandings of reality in order to investigate reality, we may not be able to understand the
absolute, objective truth of the situation, although some understandings can be more or less
truth like. This is especially the case when investigating the impacts of sexual education,
when individuals may be speaking about a sexual reality about which they have been
misinformed or not informed at all. We will keep this perspective in mind throughout this
paper.
I must also point out that growing up in the United States will have an influence on
my perspective and the conclusion that I will reach. I want to use different examples from
different countries to highlight the prevalence of this issue in various contexts. However the
conclusion that I will reach as a suggestion for how to deal with this issue will be influenced

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by the values that I have, due to where I was raised, my culture, and my education. I will
explain how this is so in my conclusion.

1.4 A Note about my Definition of Sexual Education

When I use the term Sexual Education, I am referring to formal instruction received in
a classroom on the topics of puberty and reproduction. I will also talk about sexual education
that includes more broader conversations on topics such as gender and sexual consent. While
the understanding of sexual education could be expanded to informal settings (like
information received from family and peers, or from a person’s own research through digital
or other means), for the purpose of this paper I will exclude these settings from my
discussion. This is not because I find them less valid or important than formal educational
settings, but due to time and resource limitations for this paper, I must set a defined limit of
discussion. Formal educational settings are also more relevant to the discussion of sexual
education policy set out by a state.
I will also make a distinction between abstinence-only education and comprehensive
sexual education. In abstinence-only education, teaching students how to have sex is
forbidden. Students may only be taught why abstaining from sex is important, and may only
be informed about STDs/STIs and pregnancy in order to encourage them to wait until
marriage to have sex. (This approach has also recently been called “sexual risk avoidance
programs.”) Conversely, comprehensive sexual education includes information about the
reproductive process, how pregnancies happen and can be avoided, and what to do in the case
of an STD/STI. In other words, abstinence-only instructs students that they must remain
celibate until marriage, and comprehensive sexual education gives information that would be
relevant for anyone who engages in sexual activity.

2. Understanding Autonomy
Autonomy is a concept with many different definitions and dimensions. For the
purpose of this topic, I have found the most relevant understanding of autonomy to be that of
Barber and Martin (2001) in their paper “Autonomy as Decision-Making Control.” This
definition sees individuals as goal-directed, and assesses autonomy by the ability of
individuals to create their own goals, and to pursue them as they wish. They identify three
main channels of influence that external actors could have on this autonomy:
• Environment: the environment in which the individual operates.

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 • Beliefs: the beliefs held by the individual, both factual beliefs (education and
information) and opinionated beliefs - normalized understandings of right and wrong,
for example.
• Goals: the decision of which goals the individual is to pursue.

Figure 1 visually explains the interaction between these three arenas. Although the
individual (or agent) operates in the realm of their own beliefs and goals, these can be
influenced and manipulated just as much as the individual’s external environment. I will use
the channels of influence demonstrated here throughout my paper as an analytical tool to
assess autonomy in various approaches to sexual education.

Figure 1. Channels of intervention for autonomy. Reprinted from Barber and Martin
(2001)
Let us now use examples relevant to sexual education to explore these concepts
further.

Environment: The environment arena encompasses the other two arenas. It is the
space in which beliefs are held and goals are made. Environments hold particular social,
economic, and political norms that shape how the individual understands reality and their
place in it. For example, in the United States, there is a lot of focus on individuality and
economic prosperity for the individual. Young women are often expected to prioritize
education and finding a job before starting a family, and having a large income is a

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significant indication of success. However, in India, family is often prioritized above all else.
Collectivism is often valued over individualism, and jobs are often arranged through family
connections (Hui & Triandis, 1986). In these two different environments, individuals might
make different goals about education, work, family and marriage due to the differing
priorities in the environment they live in. They might also receive different information that
shapes their beliefs about what is important, and how to be successful.

Beliefs: this is perhaps the most closely related to sexual education and educational
settings in general, because it has to do with the knowledge of the individual. A young
student in school may set a goal for herself (on her own accord) to not become pregnant.
However, because she was not equipped with the knowledge and tools to know how to avoid
pregnancy, she may hold the belief that women can only become pregnant during their
menstrual cycle (which was a belief held by several high school aged students that we
interviewed in our field work in India) (Earnest, Hustoft, Moløkken Wangen, & Thorsen,
2016). The external influences on her beliefs (which is the effect of factual sexual education
being withheld from her) decreases her autonomy, as it inhibits her ability to successfully
accomplish her self-determined goals.

Goals: the influence of external actors on an individual's ability to define their own
goals stems directly from them being subject to power relations. For example, in a situation
of arranged marriage in India, a young girl’s family chooses a partner for her. A girl in this
situation might much prefer to continue her education and go to university. But if the man
that the family selected for her wants to get married and have a family instead of her going to
university, the girl may voluntarily choose to change her goals. Refusing to marry would be
an ungrateful act of rebellion, and would show disrespect to her family, so she would
prioritize her role as a good daughter, and set a goal of being a good wife instead of a student.
This is an important situation to understand, because it highlights the shortcomings of
defining autonomy as simply decision-making. This girl makes her own decision, but this
decision is shaped and mandated by her position in her social and familial setting. Therefore
we must not only pay attention to the decisions made by an individual, but also the influences
and reasons why an individual makes those decisions, in order to assess their degree of
autonomy (hence the necessity of the other two arenas).

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 These arenas are not “all or nothing”, and one could argue that complete autonomy is
impossible, as environment is constantly shaped by external actors and influences, and
knowledge (beliefs) is not free of value or historical context. It is therefore more appropriate
to assess autonomy in degrees, or extents. It is not a matter of deciding if an individual is
autonomous or not, but rather, the degree of their autonomy. Their final definition for
autonomy is then “[a]n agent’s degree of autonomy, with respect to some goal that it actively
uses its capabilities to pursue, is the degree to which the decision-making process, used to
determine how that goal should be pursued, is free from intervention by any other agent”
(Barber & Martin, 2001, p. 345).
Ultimately, the goal of sexual education should be a maximized autonomy of the
individual, as it will allow individuals to break free of oppressive hierarchies that direct their
actions. This includes not only students receiving instruction in a classroom, but every
individual in society that could be exposed to this new information. (Teachers will also learn
these new perspectives and dimensions to sexual education, and this conversation will spread
from classrooms into the communities that surround them, making it not only relevant to
students.)
If we categorize different prominent approaches to sexual education in order of the
degree of autonomy that they provide the individual, we can create the separate categories of:
no or abstinence-only sexual education, comprehensive sexual education, and a feminist
approach to sexual education. In the following sections I will explain how each of these
categories increase respectively in the degree of autonomy that they impart on the individual,
with the feminist approach placing autonomy as an end goal in itself.
Now that we have understood what autonomy means and how individual autonomy
can be influenced, we will look at the who and the why. Who might be involved in interfering
with the sexual autonomy of the individual, and why would they want to do that?
As I have defined sexual education as formal instruction received in a classroom
setting, the ‘who’ we will look at is school leadership, and state level policy makers that
decide whether or not - and to what extent - sexual education should be provided.
The question of ‘why’ is a bit more complicated. Why, despite endless studies
suggesting that providing sexual education leads to lower rates of STDs, unwanted pregnancy
and delayed sexual activity for minors (Kirby, 2002; Kohler, Manhart, & Lafferty, 2008;
Stanger-Hall & Hall, 2011, to name a few), would policy makers argue for the exclusion or
limitation of sexual education?

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 3. Excluding Sexual Education and the Abstinence-only approach
In this section, I group together abstinence-only sexual education, and the refusal of
teaching sexual education whatsoever. This is due to my definition of sexual education.
Abstinence-only education does not actually provide accurate or holistic information about
the topics of reproduction and puberty. Conversely, the goal of abstinence-only education is
to withhold this information and convince students that they must not engage in sexual
activity. Therefore I will group it together with the approach of not providing sexual
education, as both approaches refuse to teach students about sex in itself.
Recent studies show that a majority of Americans actually support comprehensive
sexual education programs (Bleakley, Hennessy, & Fishbein, 2006). However, only in the
past decade has the United States begun to provide federal funding for more comprehensive
sexual education programs and research initiatives, and it remains vastly underfunded in
comparison to abstinence-only programs. In order to receive federal funding for an
abstinence-only program from the United States, the program must include the following
goals set out by the Social Security Administration (2010):
• Teaching an expected social standard for sex
• Improved health, avoiding unexpected pregnancies, STDs/STIs, and other health
problems
• For individuals to attain self-sufficiency before engaging in sexual activity

Throughout our research in India, we interviewed teachers who expressed their

opinions on why sexual education should be limited. To quote one particular teacher from a
school in rural Rajasthan, girls should not be given this information because they will start
“running into the forest to have sex” (Earnest et al., 2016, p. 17). Other prominent actors in
India have also spoken out against sexual education, including the Minister of health in 2014
(Jha, 2014). In an Indian context, restricting sexual education often comes with the following
goals
• Improved health, avoiding unexpected pregnancies, STDs/STIs, and AIDS
• Upholding “Indian Values,” including religious and cultural values
• Population control in a rapidly growing country

We can see now that in both contexts, the goals of restricting sexual education can be
summarized as wanting to reach certain ideals of culture, religion, health, wealth, and
population growth. In pursuit of these ideals, policy makers and teachers then dictate the

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knowledge that individuals receive about their own body and reproduction. This is how the
limitation of sexual education can be understood as a form of biopolitics.

3.1 Using “Biopolitics” to critique this approach

In his book Biopolitics: an Advanced Introduction, Thomas Lemke (2011) defined the
core aspect of biopolitics as “a politics that deals with life” (p. 2). He clarified that although
the term has gained recent popularity, it has a long history, and has been applied to
discussions ranging from asylum policies, abortion rights, stem cell research, AIDS research,
etc., as well as by varied groups of people, “by committed marxists and unapologetic racists”
(p. 1) alike. In all of these cases, biopolitics aims to “govern individuals and collectives by
practices of correction, exclusion, normalization, [and] disciplining” (Lemke, 2011, p. 5).
If we look back to both the goals of an abstinence-only sexual education and the
justification in India of excluding sexual education, we can see that limiting sexual education
to attain these goals is a form of biopolitics. In the American abstinence example, individuals
are taught that one should reach ‘self-sufficiency’ before engaging in sexual activity. This is
teaching and normalizing a certain ‘societal expectation for sex’ that economic independence
and education should be prioritized over sexual relationships. In the Indian example,
information is excluded to direct people’s decisions, and in both examples, breaking these
norms are ‘corrected’ or ‘disciplined’ by the surrounding environment that also adheres to
these norms, through shaming or otherwise expressing disapproval of the individual’s
actions. In this way, it is important to remember that biopolitics can be both a strategy
applied in a top-down direction from policy makers deciding what should be normalized and
what should be excluded, as well as a self-reinforcing phenomena supported within a general
population that ‘disciplines’ others for making the wrong decisions.

3.2 Consequences for Autonomy

In both these examples, the environment in which the individual operates is molded to
adhere to certain norms, their goals are directed by what norms they are taught and what
discipline they would face if they strayed from these norms, and their beliefs (knowledge) are
constructed by others through the withholding or limiting of information on the topic of sex.
Therefore, to exclude sexual education or to provide abstinence-only education interferes
with all three arenas of autonomy, and leads to a very low degree of autonomy at the
individual level. Not only does it remove individuals’ autonomy to define and pursue their

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own goals, it sets out specific goals for them that they ought to achieve. These goals, rather
than autonomy, become the aim.

4. Comprehensive Sexual Education

Next, we will look into a second level of sexual education which is the most prevalent
approach to sexual education in both the United States and India, in the situations in which
sexual education exists at all.
Comprehensive sexual education can be a very broad umbrella term, and can refer to
many different approaches. Initially the term gained support as a way of reaching goals of
healthy populations better than an abstinence-only approach, by addressing sex and sexuality,
and even speaking more broadly about relationships, consent, and welfare (Helmich, 2009).
However, actual implementations of this approach have not usually included these broader,
more complex issues, and “current definitions of comprehensive sexuality education focus on
the prevention of teenage pregnancy and transmission of STDs and HIV, as well as protection
from abuse and information about puberty” (Helmich, 2009, p. 10).
With this approach, sexual education is usually taught as an aspect of biology class. It
teaches students the names and functions of body parts relevant to reproduction and puberty,
often in gender-separate classrooms. It covers (heterosexual) intercourse and impregnation,
as well as how STDs and STIs can be transmitted. Its final emphasis is to use this scientific
understanding of reproduction and disease to explain to students how they can best protect
themselves from these problems (Helmich, 2009). By excluding societal and relational
aspects of sex and sexuality, this approach effectively depoliticizes sexual education. But
what does that mean exactly, and what are the implications for those receiving this
education?

4.1 Using “Depoliticization” to critique this approach

Often, in response to controversial topics, a middle ground, “safe” option is to focus
on health, and use a depoliticized approach (for example, Skinner, 2012). Let us first
understand the definition of depoliticization.
In his paper “The Anti-Politics Machine,” James Ferguson (1990) investigates the
failings of development projects in Lesotho. He explains that development agencies looking
to funnel funds and coordinate projects into a ‘poor’ country must find a way to justify
intervention in the name of development, and prove that their intervention will actually
improve the situation that it sets out to address. However, the tools and blueprint plans that

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these organizations use to tackle poverty are not able to address social and political issues in
developing countries like Lesotho, such as exploitation of labor migrants and land grabbing
by South Africa. These are ethical, historical, and racial issues that are complex and sensitive,
and that a foreign organization has no strategy to address. Instead, they reformulate the cause
of the problem in Lesotho to be about agriculture, and argue that they can help Lesotho by
providing tools and funds for improving agriculture in order to reduce hunger and poverty.
This way, they effectively avoid the messier political issues, and find an apolitical avenue by
which they can enter Lesotho with their development projects. However, the aforementioned
ethical, historical, and racial issues still lie underneath the problem of poverty in Lesotho, and
plans of how to feed the population better do not penetrate to this root level. This is the
example that Ferguson uses to define his understanding of depoliticization. But how can it be
used to explain comprehensive sexual education?
In order to gain the support of advocates of a more conservative approach, it is
suggested that “the issue of sexual education has become depoliticized in recent years”
(Jefferies, 2017), which is why the approach has not included all the complex social aspects
that it aspired to originally. Sex and sexuality, just like poverty and hunger (although they are
concerns of health and economics respectively), are not only apolitical phenomena that exist
in a vacuum independent from historical and social context. Providing students only with
biological facts of reproduction and claiming that it arms them to be able to make safe and
autonomous decisions about their sex lives and relationships, has the same type of
shortcomings as providing the people of Lesotho with agricultural tools so they can ‘save
themselves’ from the issues of poverty and hunger that arise out of exploitation by South
Africa. Though these solutions may vary in their degree of relevance to the problem, they
both miss the crucial aspect of addressing the environment in which these issues exist.
One way to understand this in the context of sexual education, is to consider consent.
A student may know her body well, and know how to avoid pregnancy and diseases.
However, this knowledge may not help her much in a situation of non-consensual sex. If she
does not have the communicative tools to discuss her consent, or if she is not given the
opportunity to do so at all, her goals of using contraceptive methods to avoid pregnancy may
be compromised. Furthermore, her goals of emotional health and wellbeing may be
compromised by this traumatic event.

4.2 Consequences for Autonomy

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 To understand the inadequacy of this approach in regards to enabling sexual
autonomy of the individual, let us look back at Barber & Martin’s chart (Figure 1) mapping
out the arenas of autonomy. If we look at the “goals” arena, this approach is an improvement
from the abstinence approach as it does not explicitly teach norms or goals as an objective.
The aim of comprehensive sexual education is not to instruct students to make a certain
decision - to train them to choose to avoid sex - but rather to inform them of what could
happen if they do make the decision to engage in sexual activity, and how they can go about
preventing unwanted outcomes. Instruction usually focuses on pregnancy and STD/STI
prevention, so in that sense it is teaching the students that they should have a goal of avoiding
these consequences of sex, but it still allows the students the information they need to be able
to set their own goals. However, due to the emphasis on pregnancy, this approach almost
only includes information about heterosexual sex. Heterosexuality is often considered to be
the norm, and even the only option in some cases. Students are automatically assumed to be
heterosexual. Therefore, even though teaching societal sexual norms is not a specific aim of
this approach as it is with the abstinence approach, it reinforces mandatory heterosexuality,
which can ‘coach’ a student towards what their sexuality should be, and might cause them to
tailor their goals accordingly. So although this approach enables a greater degree of
autonomy in the goals arena than the abstinence-only approach, improvements can still be
made.
This approach is also a major improvement when it comes to the ‘beliefs’ arena of
autonomy. Beliefs in this context also include knowledge, and whereas the previous
approaches to sexual education exclude most (if not all) knowledge of sex and sexuality,
comprehensive sexual education can provide a thorough understanding of one’s own body,
and how one can use it to achieve their goals. However, because this approach often lacks
practical information that would benefit students of sexual minorities, these students are put
at a disadvantage in comparison to their heterosexual and cis-gendered classmates (meaning
students whose gender identity and physical sex correspond. We will discuss gender identity
later). Nonetheless, it still does a better job than abstinence-only sexual education in
providing basic information that is necessary for students to make informed decisions.
The arena that this approach fails to address, however, is environment. The
environment arena is where the politicized social phenomena shapes our interactions and the
reality of our sexual lives. The student may be able to define their own goals, and may be
equipped with the knowledge and beliefs to pursue these goals, but they do not have adequate
understanding of the arena in which they will pursue them.

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 Furthermore, the example of non-consensual sex highlights an important point. A
girl’s emotional and mental health is not necessarily one of the goals outlined at the state
level, where most of the focus is on lowering rates of pregnancy and STDs/STIs. Wellbeing
is assumed to be an outcome of lowering rates of these unwanted outcomes, but it is not an
end goal in itself as the other goals are. However, this girl facing the situation of rape may
not become pregnant, or contract an STD/STI. In this situation, the state-level goals of a
comprehensive sexual education are technically achieved. But the infringement on the
autonomy of the individual has led to grave, traumatic consequences for her.
Therefore, although this approach to sexual education is an improvement over
refusing to provide education whatsoever, it still imparts a lower degree of autonomy on the
subjects of this information. Furthermore, we need to proceed with an approach that defines
autonomy itself as the end goal to be accomplished, not apolitical medical achievements.

5. A Feminist Approach

As we have now seen, both the tactics of excluding sexual education and providing
sexual education that only discusses the biological facts of reproduction both result in limited
degrees of autonomy for the individual. They also result in unequal degrees of autonomy for
students with different sexualities and gender identities, benefitting some students more than
others. I propose that a feminist perspective be incorporated into sexual education in order to
address these discrepancies.
When using the term ‘feminist theory,’ I am talking about a lens through which one
can analyze social phenomena. Feminist theory has evolved and expanded since the old wave
feminism that focused on women having the same respect and legal rights as men. It is a very
broad theory and its interpretations vary. Here, I am talking specifically about new wave
feminism and its emphasis on intersectionality, situated knowledge, equity over equality, and
non-heteronormative and non-cisnormative perspectives. By understanding what these
concepts are and what they address, we can understand how an approach that utilizes feminist
theory might be more equipped to tackle the issues that threaten individual autonomy. Let us
first explore these concepts.

5.1 Relevant Aspects of Feminist Theory

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 5.1.1 Intersectionality.
Intersectionality is an important concept within feminist theory. It states that every
individual sits at the intersection of their multiple identities (their gender, race, sexual
orientation, nationality, economic class, etc.) and all these identities shape how certain
situations affect them. For example, a policy that requires girls to stay in school longer might
be beneficial to a richer family, but might actually do harm to a poorer family that depends
on their children earning income as soon as possible. Feminist theory asks us to address how
policies or change might affect people from different groups differently, and to not make
‘gender blind’ or ‘color blind’ decisions, or to make a decision on behalf of one entire
gender, or one entire ethnic group, etc. as the individuals within these groups differ from each
other, due to the other aspects of their identity.

5.1.2 Situated knowledge.

The understanding of knowledge as ‘situated’ means that knowledge is influenced by
the social position, privileges, disadvantages, and viewpoints of the person holding the
knowledge. As we mentioned before with intersectionality, each individual sits at the
crossroad of their multiple identities. When pursuing or receiving knowledge and
understanding, where one sits can influence how they receive the information, what it means
to them, what knowledge might reach them, and what special knowledge they may possess
that others in different positions may not.

5.1.3 Equity over equality.

The distinction between these two concepts is often illustrated by a drawing of three
people of different heights standing on the outside of a fence, trying to watch a baseball game
that is happening on the other side. The tall person can see over the fence just fine, the
medium-height person is just a few inches too short to see over the top, and the short person
cannot see over the fence even if they jump. To use the concept of equality to address this
problem, one would simply give each person the same size box to stand on. No attention
would be paid to their individual heights - they must all receive the same treatment. Once
they stand on the box, the tall person can see although they did not need the help of the box to
do this, the medium-height person can now finally see over the fence, and the short person is
still too short too see the game, even with the help of the box. The boxes then only helped the
medium-height person, but not the very short or very tall person. It would seem more fitting
to not give a box to the tall person as they do not need it in order to see the game, give a

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regular sized box to the medium-sized person, and give a much larger box to the short person.
This would be an equity approach to the problem. This approach is not blind to the fact that
these three people have different needs, and adjusts the size of the help that each person
receives to the size they would need in order to stand at the same height as the others. In this
sense, equality means equality of treatment despite differing needs, and equity means
assessing different needs in order to accomplish an equal outcome. New wave feminist theory
tends to favor an equity approach.

5.1.4 Non-heteronormative, non-cisnormative perspectives, and gender roles.

Heteronormativity is the assumption that heterosexuality is a default. It is basing
understandings of sex and relationships on the study of heterosexual couples. It has certain
expectations of the two ‘opposite’ genders that are interacting with each other, and believes
that every relationship must consist of those gendered expectations, and only those. For
example, when speaking to a homosexual couple, someone with a heteronormative
perspective might ask “Who is the man of the relationship? Who is the woman?” This is
because due to this perspective, one side of the relationship must be masculine and one must
be feminine in order for it to be recognized as a functioning relationship. A non-
heteronormative perspective does not assume heterosexuality as the default for all humans. It
also does not assume an even distribution of masculine and feminine qualities in a
relationship. A relationship can be held between individuals who both have masculine
identities, both have feminine identities, have identities that switch, etc.
Cisnormative understandings of gender do not make a distinction between gender and
sex. One’s gender is determined by their genitalia, and this cannot be changed nor
questioned. This non-separation gives rise to an entire cisnormative culture where an entire
set of qualities (personality traits, assumptions of ability, etc.) is assigned to the individual
based on their genitalia. For example, we often talk about men being naturally violent, and
therefore expect someone born with male genitalia to be more violent than one born with
female genitalia, and throughout their life we express this expectation, encourage it, and
reinforce it.
New wave feminism makes a distinction between sex and gender: sex being the
biological qualities that an individual is born with, and gender being the identity that an
individual assumes. Gender is also understood as a spectrum instead of a binary. This
spectrum stretches between more feminine and more masculine expressions of gender, and an
individual may fall on any point within this spectrum, may change where they fall in the

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spectrum, or may not identify with any specific gender identity whatsoever. These non-
heteronormative and non-cisnormative perspectives are important because they reflect the
reality of the human experience. Many humans are not heterosexual and not cis-gendered, so
to only pay attention to perspectives that deny those realities will not provide a holistic
understanding of reality. We must pay attention to perspectives of all realities.
New wave feminism also questions how much one can assume about a person's
abilities and personality based on their sex. It does not deny that males are often stronger and
more violent, but it begs the question of nature vs. nurture. How much of ‘male’ and ‘female’
qualities are a result of the biological facts of one’s sex, and how much are due to how they
are coached to be by a society that reinforces stereotypes? In this sense, the issue of males
being violent is not simply some objective, scientific fact of nature that we cannot question.
Some of its basis might lie in biology, but it is also a social phenomenon that we can analyze,
criticize, and address.

5.2 Feminist Theory Applied to Sexual Education

Now that we have understood these crucial aspects of feminist theory, let us look into
what a feminist approach to sexual education looks like. In her article Beyond Plumbing and
Prevention: feminist approaches to sex ed, Helen Lenskyj (2003) outlined particular topics
that a feminist sexual education would include, and how it would use the terms listed above
to address: gender roles and stereotypes, violence (and consent), compulsory heterosexuality,
and sexual pleasure. Let us look at each of these individually, and what covering them in
school would mean for students.

5.2.1 Gender roles and stereotypes.

As Lenskyj asserts, “The problems resulting from unprotected heterosexual
intercourse […] have a central place in most existing sex education programs, evidence of the
generally reactive rather than proactive approach. Yet even in teaching the mechanics of
contraception, a program that fails to recognize power relations between the sexes is unlikely
to succeed” (Lenskyj, 1990, p. 225). She means that even approaches that go into detail about
how impregnation happens and how one can avoid it, will fail as long as they are
depoliticized. A feminist approach would investigate and present the gendered expectations
that are a part of pregnancy avoidance. Girls are often expected to take care of their own
contraception and take responsibility for avoiding pregnancy. In the United States, it is
common to say “she went and got herself pregnant!” when someone is expecting. This subtle

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use of language is a revealing indication of to whom we assign the responsibility of
pregnancy. Even though this phrase could be used as either a positive exclamation or a
shameful slander, in both cases it implies that the female was the sole pursuer and the sole
cause of her own pregnancy - no other parties were involved.
A double standard then arises where women are placed with higher expectations to be
cautious, minimize their number of partners, or abstain altogether, as sex is more ‘risky’ for
them since they can become pregnant. Men, on the other hand, are not expected to be as
cautious, and have less pressure to minimize their number of partners. To accomplish a
society where all parties involved share the same responsibility for protection and pregnancy
avoidance, we first need to acknowledge and tackle our different expectations for men and
women. A feminist approach would expose these gendered expectations and emphasize more
equal responsibility.

5.2.2 Violence (rape, abuse, and consent).

A large aspect missing from comprehensive sexual education is often the topic of
violence, rape, and abuse. Although some curriculum can cover the definitions of rape and
abuse, too few discuss the real life complexities of the issues. Without discussing and setting
a firm understanding of what rape and abuse can be in real life, students are often left with
what they define as a ‘gray zone.’ Perhaps a boyfriend coerces his girlfriend into having sex.
Is it really rape if they are dating? Perhaps a man is forced into having sex. Can he really be a
rape victim if he is a man? If these scenarios are discussed in the classroom, students can
develop a deeper understanding of the concept of consent, and formulate a sound stance on
these questions. Without this discussion occurring in the classroom, students’ opinions on
these scenarios can only be shaped by gender stereotypes and dominant, often harmful
discourses about gendered expectations of sex (like that girlfriends are obliged to please their
boyfriends at all times, or that men always want sex anyway so they cannot possibly be
raped).
By basing an understanding of consent on a critique of these discourses and
expectations, students would not only be able to define more clearly what is and isn’t
consensual and minimize what they consider to be in the “grey zone,” but also be more able
to recognize a harmful situation that they might be in. Encouraging students from a young
age to set their own definitions of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ and encouraging them to speak up for
themselves or seek help when something is not right would be an important part of this.
However, as I mentioned earlier, this education must also be to the benefit of the community

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around the students, as teachers, family members, and other community members must enter
the conversation about sexual violence as well in order to take children and peers seriously
when they speak up against something that is happening to them.

5.2.3 Mandatory heterosexuality.

According to Lenskyj, “there is little critique of the heterosexist bias within the sex
education field” (Lenskyj, 1990, p. 222). This is largely because the goal of comprehensive
sexual education is not necessarily the sexual well-being and prosperity of the students.
Rather, it is the prevention of pregnancy. Therefore, homosexual relationships need not be
addressed. (Comprehensive sexual education also has a goal of preventing STDs/STIs,
something relevant to students of all sexualities, but since teachers can simply assert that
contact between genitalia can transmit disease without needing to specify what genitalia, the
topic of homosexuality does not need to be brought up, and is therefore avoided.) Not only
does this focus put more pressure on students to conform to the norm of heterosexuality, it
puts students of sexual minorities at a disadvantage. As demonstrated in the equity vs.
equality example, students who all receive the same information regardless of need will end
up in an unequal situation. Attention must be paid to the fact that students of different
sexualities need different information, and all this different information must be provided.
This is not to say that students should be separated and instructed differently - rather, this
means that all students should receive information about different sexual orientations, in
order to challenge the assumption of heterosexuality as the default, and help students
understand others who are different from them. A feminist approach and its emphasis on
difference and context-adjusted equity can provide this.
It would also use the concept of situated knowledge to add new voices to the
curriculum. Heterosexual teachers may not be aware of the best way to teach and speak to
students of sexual minorities, as they have never found themselves in a personal situation
where this knowledge was needed. Homosexual and queer authors or teachers might be better
suited to address topics about and for sexual minorities.

5.2.4 A focus on pleasure.

Incorporating the topic of sexual pleasure into sexual education is perhaps the most
controversial suggestion mentioned in Lenskyj’s paper. However, I believe that equality in
pleasure and enjoyment of sex is arguably the biggest indication of individual sexual
autonomy. Various studies confirm the apparent “satisfaction gap” between men and women

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when it comes to pleasure in sexual relationships (Conley, Moors, Matsick, Ziegler, &
Valentine, 2011). Stereotypes of pleasure and orgasm being more difficult, complicated, or
even impossible for women have left many women behind in terms of pleasure. Both in the
United States and in India, girls are bombarded with horror stories about how painful, bloody,
and uncomfortable sex can be - and is supposed to be - especially the first time. Much less
time is actually spent teaching girls how to make sex enjoyable - it must simply be accepted
as the painful, necessary evil it is. These stereotypes eventually present a ‘catch-22’ situation.
Girls are not informed about pleasure, only about pain, so they do not know what to do in
order to avoid pain, and therefore end up having painful experiences, which they then inform
others about. These stereotypes therefore often serve as a way to control female sexuality.
Focusing on pleasure would be an avenue to enhance female experience of sex, close
the ‘pleasure gap’ between men and women, and enable women to break free of this control
over their sexuality. It would also normalize conversations about pleasure, and encourage
men to respect women’s pleasure. Pleasure and enjoyment being an end goal of sexual
education would challenge the issues that arise when only apolitical health accomplishments
are the goal. Avoiding unwanted pregnancy and diseases would of course contribute to this
pleasure, but an emphasis on pleasure and autonomy as an end goal would address other
issues as well, such as rape, safety, and happiness.

5.3 Implications for Autonomy

As we can see, a feminist approach therefore not only teaches the biological facts of
reproduction and puberty, but also sets a heavy focus on the “environment” aspect of the
autonomy diagram (Figure 1). Armed with this awareness of the realities of sometimes
invisible social forces - like power relations, heteronormativity, myths and gendered
expectations - individuals would be more prepared to act on their beliefs and goals in an
environment that they can critically analyze, understand, and even challenge.
I would like to make my final case for preferring this approach to sexual education
based on the distinction between practical and strategic needs. In her paper “Gender Planning
in the Third World: Meeting Practical and Strategic Gender Needs,” Caroline Moser (1989)
defines practical and strategic gender needs as two separate types of needs that women have
in development contexts to both survive and challenge the systems in which they operate.
Although these definitions were specifically referring to women in development contexts, I
believe this distinction of needs is a relevant way to understand what a feminist sexual

19
education provides that the others do not, and how it relates back to the original goal of
individual sexual autonomy.
Practical needs are needs that an individual or group has in order to survive and thrive
in the situation that they are in. In Moser’s definition concerning women in development, this
could be, for example, food for a woman to feed her children, or technologies that would help
her complete housework more efficiently and less stressfully. Strategic needs, on the other
hand, are needs that one has in order to challenge and change the situation they are in. It
would be a platform for representation for women in development contexts. It would be for
example, the ability to influence society so that housework is recognized and respected as a
‘real job.’
In regards to sexual education, practical needs would be basic understandings of
biology, and tools to handle the sexual reality of the world as it is. This could be everything
from condoms, to the pepper spray a girl carries in her purse to fight off rapists. Strategic
needs, however, would be to change a society that sees men as naturally violent sexual
predators, and women as naturally vulnerable victims. It would be to discuss, to debate, and
to demand more responsibility be put on males when it comes to pregnancy, for example. It is
very important to note that neither Moser nor I claim that one type of need is more important
than the other. It is hard for a woman to fight for sexual equality when she does not have
access to contraceptives that can protect her health. And only providing women with
contraceptives and practical resources without challenging the social structures and discourse
that contribute to her sexual oppression will only keep her trapped in place. It is important,
for example, for women to be prepared and know what to do in case she is attacked, and at
the same time, we must do what we can to investigate what leads to women being attacked,
and how we can challenge that.
As we have explored above, comprehensive sexual education can provide students
with what we could call their practical sexuality needs. But a feminist approach goes further
and addresses their strategic sexuality needs as well. If we reflect back on the chart of
autonomy from Barber and Martin (Figure 1), strategic needs are needs that address the
“environment” sphere of the chart. Practical needs can help students define their own goals
and pursue them through their beliefs. But strategic needs are needs the student has to
understand and challenge the environmental arena in which they operate. Therefore, a
feminist approach to sexual education is the approach that best addresses all three arenas of
autonomy, and ensures the greatest degree of sexual autonomy for the individual.

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5.4 Existing Examples of this Approach
It is important to note that although this approach may be considered revolutionary, it
is far from new. There are examples from all over the world of special curriculum courses
that include aspects of feminist sexual education.
Although there is no state level mandate for sexual education that specifically
mentions these aspects in the United States, private schools are able to create and approve
their own syllabuses that do cover them. One example is the “Sex and Sexuality” course at
the Friend’s Central School in Philadelphia. In an interview in 2011, the course’s teacher
explained that he covered everything from “sexual orientation [...]; safer sex; relationships;
sexual health; and the emotional and physical terrain of sexual activity” (Abraham, 2011).
Students in the course reflected that they appreciated the focus on relationships and how to
communicate with other students about sexual preferences, and tackle sticky and even
embarrassing situations. The teacher also spends a great deal of time discussing and
analyzing the casual language we use to talk about sex. In the New York Times article that
covered his interview, the reporter starts out by explaining how he was discussing the terms
‘first base, second base, third base’ that youth frequently use to talk about different ‘levels’ of
sexual encounters. He was discussing with the students how language like this presents
sexual acts as a game, where there is an active pursuer, and a passive person that the pursuer
‘accomplishes’ these acts with, the former usually male and the latter usually female. His
point is to highlight to students how every day phrases and slang can shape how we actually
envision and normalize how sex works. These students are now armed with the analytical
tools to be critical about their own assumptions about sex and relationships, and to be
mindful of how they might be influenced by dominant discourses.
In India the situation is a bit different, as very few aspects of even comprehensive
sexual education are covered in class, and the information students receive is often
inadequate (Basavaraj & Chakraverty, 2017). Here, it is often non-governmental
organizations that take on the task of introducing these concepts. One example is an
organization named TARSHI (Talking About Reproductive and Sexual Health Issues). Based
in Delhi, they conduct workshops and training all over India for everyone from health
practitioners, to humanitarian organizations, and even schools that request a presentation
from them. Their lessons focus on “the basics of anatomy and physiology, conception,
contraception and abortion, HIV and AIDS, understanding sexuality, sexuality and gender,
varieties of sexual behavior, young people’s sexuality, reproductive and sexual rights, child
sexual abuse, sexual minority issues, sex work/prostitution and trafficking, and pornography

21
and censorship” (TARSHI, n.d.). This extensive list includes many topics that are extremely
controversial in India. Still they run awareness and advocacy campaigns fighting for the
inclusion of these topics in sexual education.
These are only two specific examples from the countries I have been using as
examples, but programs like these are emerging worldwide, from online discussion platforms
from Palestine (Taylor, 2013), to supplementary sexual education programs in Norway
(Skeiv Ungdom, n.d.), similar to the example from India. Organizations and initiatives like
these are not necessarily using the name ‘feminist sexual education,’ but the framework they
are using is a feminist approach to sex and sexuality (whether they decide to use the word
‘feminist’ or not) to better prepare students for the real life situations they will encounter. We
can clearly see that despite dramatic variations in culture, history, and religion, a desire for
more thorough and feminist sexual education exists throughout the world.
However, these initiatives that exist now are initiatives taken by private and/or non-
governmental organizations, or even by individuals. They are very important advocates for
revealing the need and justification for this approach to sexual education, and starting a
conversation about what such an approach should consist of, but they will still only reach
certain target populations (such as the students at schools that hire organizations like
TARSHI, or people with internet access). To provide this education for all, and not just for
some, states must revisit their mandates for the curriculum of sexual education, and integrate
the suggestions of these organizations into public school curriculum.

6. Conclusion
As we have progressed through this paper, we have seen that new terms and concepts
emerged with every new approach that I presented and discussed. The abstinence-only
approach only raised the concepts of pregnancy and STDs, and by the end of the analysis of a
feminist approach, we were introducing numerous concepts including intersectionality,
violence and even pleasure. This lies at the core of the success of the feminist approach. Sex
and sexuality is a topic more complex than simply intercourse between two heterosexual
individuals. Sexual relationships are shaped and characterized by platonic relationships,
familial expectations, and individuals’ understandings of their own bodies and preferences.
To fully and appropriately address the subject, we must therefore use an approach that
addresses these more complex issues
I must first be self-critical to how my proposed solution is affected by my perspective.
My focus on individual liberation is highly influenced by my upbringing and cultural

22
background. I am from a culture that values individualism over collectivism, for better and
for worse. Had I been raised in a culture that valued collectivism and family/community
welfare over the individual, I might be coming to a different conclusion. I hope to have
demonstrated that the issue of sexual education is a world-wide concern. Ground-up
initiatives are emerging all over the globe, which indicates a desire for a broader, more
complex sexual education. Throughout my research on this topic, I have therefore discovered
that this desire is a near universal shift. However, a feminist sexual education focuses on the
experience of the individual, and imparts the highest degree of sexual autonomy on the
individual, which is an approach that may not be accepted universally. One must assess the
particular impacts and issues that may arise from using a feminist approach to sexual
education across different contexts.
Keeping in mind my cultural bias, the feminist approach to sexual education is my
final suggestion. State level policy makers must recognize this shift in sexual education. The
specific tactics of how to incorporate this theory will depend on the structure of educational
policy and legal processes in different countries, so I make no specific suggestion on how this
is to be done. However, states must use the suggestions from the aforementioned non-
governmental organizations and individual initiatives to construct and implement new sexual
education programs and curriculums for schools to follow, in whatever way is legally
possible and appropriate in their context. This will by no means be an easy shift. Sexism and
discrimination against sexual minorities exist everywhere in the world, and a feminist
approach will be met with belligerence by populations who do not believe that homosexuality
should be accepted at all, for example. However, this approach is the most fit to not only arm
populations with the knowledge and tools needed to challenge these powered social systems
that keep them at a disadvantage, but also to start a conversation with those who hold
discriminatory beliefs.

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