A set of UN sex education guidelines for children is drawing fire from many groups in the US and around the world for being explicit and graphic for young children and damaging to cultures and religions. The guidelines, prepared by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) over the past two years, recommend that governments, education ministries and school systems provide students with more sex education at an early age. For example, the guidelines suggest that teachers begin discussing masturbation with children aged 5, with a more extensive discussion for those between 9 and 12. The document, to be distributed to school systems and teachers around the world, is also denounced as being too broad to fit all cultures. These groups criticised recommending discussions about “the right to and access to safe abortion” and post-abortion care with children aging 12 to 15. Others slammed recommending discussions about homosexuality and describing sexual abstinence as “only one of a range of choices available to young people” to prevent disease and unwanted pregnancy. Criticism has also caused one of the key participating and donor agencies, the United Nations Population Fund, to pull back from the project and ask that its name be edited out of the published material.
UN SEX EDUCATION GUIDE
A set of UN sex education guidelines for children is drawing fire from many groups in the US and around the world for being explicit and graphic for young children and damaging to cultures and religions.
