Experts stress need for sex education
JAKARTA (JP): Experts reiterated the need for sex education in the schools to counter the impact of erotic media on unprepared young readers.
In a discussion on Saturday on sex exploitation in the mass media, Zubairi Djoerban of the Pelita Ilmu Foundation, a non- governmental organization campaigning for HIV/AIDS prevention, and psychologist Ami Siamsidar Budiman of the Indonesian Planned Parenthood Association (PKBI) agreed that children should be prepared with the right information on sex.
"It's impossible to completely abolish pornography in the media... the only way is to prepare children," Ami told The Jakarta Post after the discussion at Al-Azhar Mosque in South Jakarta.
The discussion's organizers included the Institute of Family- Friendly Media and Al-Azhar's Youth Islamic Study Club.
"Unlike what many people think, sex education is not going to teach children how to seduce men or women... but it's going to teach them about their organs, their functions," Ami said.
She said the present situation was ironic. "There's no sex education in the schools, but mass media provide children with detailed sex stories with erotic pictures. This will certainly cause a negative impact on children."
She said PKBI's suggestion that sex education be provided in the schools, raised in the 1980s, was turned down by the government and religious leaders. Parents also voiced objections, she said, adding that sex education was considered "too risky" for children.
Informally, PKBI provides sex education through extracurricular activities at schools which agree to host its programs and at its centers in 24 provinces.
"I understand (the objections)... even the term sex education worries parents. Considering the sensitivity of the term, it can be changed to health reproduction," Ami said.
Zubairi said he received a report a few weeks ago which revealed that 50 percent of first and second year students at a junior high school outside of Jakarta had viewed pornographic movies.
The students watched the films in their houses during their vacation when their parents were not at home, he said, noting several of the films were "borrowed" from parents.
Zubairi expressed concern that a number of students said they preferred to watch the movies with girlfriends or boyfriends. One of the students even took his younger sibling to watch the films, Zubairi said.
He said parents were confused when their children asked them why they were angry when finding them watching pornographic movies.
"For parents, it's not easy to answer questions like, 'what's a blue film', or 'what's wrong with watching a blue film,'" Zubairi said.
According to surveys conducted by PKBI in 1996, their was a high incidence of abortion among women between the ages of 15 and 24, which it attributed to a lack of sex education. Among the areas with the highest number of abortions were West Java with 101, East Jakarta with 41 and Bali with 421.
"These figures reflect a lack of access to sex information. Some of the girls were even under 15," Ami said.(ste)