Sex Education's Role in Preventing Violence: A Social Control Essay

This essay examines the vital role of sex education in schools as a means of social control and violence prevention. It highlights the alarming statistics of sexual violence, including abuse and assault, and argues that comprehensive sex education can equip students with the knowledge and skills to ...Read More

Running Head: Sexuality and Social Control
Sexuality and Social Control
Essay
System04104
2/15/2020

Sexuality and Social Control
1
Sexuality and Social Control
(Sex education in schools and its role in violence prevention)
Education about sex is not common in every school and it is also not generally practised by
schools for educating the children. Sexual violence is a crime and it cannot be ignored by any
government, country, or nation because it does not only affect the mentality of community
rather it also force a nation to bear heavy economic costs, effects our criminal justice system,
effect public healthcare system, and also impact the education system as well. There are large
numbers of organisation all around the world including United Kingdom (UK) are committed
to prevent sexual violence by various sex education programs and initiatives. However, sex
education plays an important role in prevention of violence at school level. Sex education
helps the students to understand the need of sex and shows how it positively influences them
to see sexuality. Sex education in school not only helpful in preventing the sexual behaviour
of students rather it teaches them how to value their own bodily autonomy, ask for consent,
and identify the unhealthy relationship behaviour (Krebbekx, 2019). The essay analyse the
benefits of sex education in schools and discusses that how it can prevent the violence in the
society. The essay also focuses on the importance of sex education and perception of people
about it. It describes how sex education can help the society to control the sexual and
criminal offenses and educate children to control their immature sexual behaviour.
It has been found that one in every three girl or women report sexual abuse and it mostly
happens with intimate partner. Apart from this, these types of cases can be easily seen in the
schools where boys and girls involve in intimate relationship or they want to involve in a
sexual relationship with their partner. School is a place where large numbers of violence
recorded every day but it is also a place that can prevent violence and can help in changing
social norms (Scully, 2013). Sexual education can also help in eliminating violence and help
the society to change social norms about sexual activities. Sexual abuse, exploitation, and
rape are some common criminal violence that can be easily seen in everyday newspaper and a
large number of cases recorded every year all around the world about this sexual violent
behaviour (Ybarra, Strasburger, and Mitchell, 2014). In such a scenario, sex education in
schools can help the students to understand the reality of their bodily function and also help
the student to prevent any type of violence that they can face in their life in future. In most of
the countries sex education is considered as a part of pop culture and a classroom of teens

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generally feel shy when they asked about condom or sexual knowledge. They even do not
like to talk about their physically changes and this issue and shyness of student prevent them
to get the sex education that can help them to avoid future cases of sexual abuse and
exploitation in their life. The sex education not only helps to get some insight about how sex
works rather it also help to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections and
diseases such as HIV-AIDS (Rowlands and Walker, 2019). Most of the scholars think that
providing sex education to the young and teen generation shift their views on critical issues
related to critical issues like consent, abuse, and sexual assault. It is really a difficult situation
for the teachers to convey the sex education to children and if children cannot talk openly on
the matter of sex then it is really difficult to aware them about the future concern of sexual
molestation and sexual abuse (Ybarra, Strasburger, and Mitchell, 2014). The major thing that
is crucial to know in sex education in schools is to convinced society and students that how
sex education can help them to encounter sexual issues and help the children to learn the
difference between sexual assault and respectful physical touch. However, some of the adults
or even parents of children understand that children can learn these things by their own and
they do not need such kind of explicit help, but it is not true. Sex education not only helps
education to prevent sexual valance rather it also help them to decide what is good or bad for
them, knowing their right to give consent, and avoid abusive or physical relationship (Heise,
2010). However, the illiteracy about sex in schoolchildren forces them to unwanted
pregnancy and increase the number of cases of physical and sexual abuse and molestation.
There is still large number of steps and initiative required to provide sexual education to
school students to stop social violence that occur because of involvement of children in
sexual activities and sexual offences (Janks, 2014). It has been noticed that large number of
sexual violence cases registered in which teenagers involves and they even do not have any
knowledge about the sexuality. The large number of sexual offences recorded at school level
and it is the responsibility of teacher to educate children to face the sexual offence in their life
and make them ready that how they can avoid and prevent any kind of sexual offence in their
life or prevent people from sexually molest them. Comprehensive sexuality education in
schools is an important means of fighting with sexual violence and brings social changes in
which sexual violence can easily be prevented (Alemansour, et. al., 2019). It is really
challenging for a school to choose an effective teaching method that can effectively sexual
violence. However, it will be good if teacher find a method that has no effect on means such
as waste of time, waste of money or effort. However, it can be said that still researcher and

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scholars are trying to find such type of teaching method that can be effective and cannot
affect the productivity of teachers (Bradford, et. al., 2019).
School can be place for changing social norms by providing education to the students about
nature of the violence and also educates student that how they can face the tough situation in
life. The major challenge for a teacher in providing sex education in school is to ensure a safe
learning environment, which should be free from stigma, discrimination, and violence
(Sheppard, 2020). Providing such type of environment in a school is really a challenge for
management and teachers in an educational institution and without this type of environment,
one cannot provide a better sex education to the children. Educating children about sexuality
not only enables them to face the sexual problems in their life rather it can also help them to
get aware about various sex related infection and sexual transmission diseases (STD)
(Santelli, et. al., 2016). Educating young boys and children is the only way to prevent gender-
based violence. As per an estimate, more than 246 million children are subject to some form
of sexual harassment, sexual abuse, bullying or gender-based violence in the way to school.
More than 25% children face physical sexual violence, while 36% of children face emotional
violence (Schneider and Hirsch, 2018). Educating children about sexual offenses and
providing awareness in the class about good touch and bad touch definitely help these
children to prevent such type of cases.
Sexual violation cannot always be considered under the legal definition of sexual assault or
sexual offence in the courts. There are wide range of sexual issues that happens because of
aggressive sex behaviour and violent behaviour of male of female partner. However, many of
these kinds of situation raises when one person is not ready to involve in physical relationship
while other is aggressively want to involve in a physical relationship with sex partners or
even with wife (Banerjee, Ferrara, and Orozco, 2019). Women are the major victims in house
of sexual violence and they even do not want to talk about this because they are dominated by
their male partner. In such a situation, sex education in schools helps the teenagers to
understand the importance of consent of their life partner or their lovers. Selection of perfect
timing for involvement in a sexual relationship can also help to minimise the cases of sexual
assault and help the women to stay safe and secure even in their own house and with their
own people (Reynolds, 2019). It has been seen that in most of the sexual violence, the
relatives or friend of a girl or women involved who involve in sexually harass or rape. Sex
education in schools can help the teenagers to identify such kind of people and their

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behaviour and file a complaint against him to their parents or in a police station. This will
definitely help the society to control such type of criminal cases that are related with sexual
offence and sexual harassment. This would also help the society to improve the health and
wellbeing of people in the society by protecting their rights and freedom in their own life
(Miller and Halpern, 2014).
Many people think that sex education only limited to sex but it is not true. Sex education
helps the children to promote health and wellbeing and promotes human rights and gender
equality. Sex education in school helps the children to live a productive and safe life. It also
focuses on eliminating gender-based biased and promoting human rights in people (Buston,
Wight, and Hart, 2020). It has been seen that most of the children feel shy in sharing their
personal sexual issues and even they cannot talk about their physical and emotional changes.
It is also noticeable here that parents play a crucial role in sex education and if parents do not
talk with their children openly, then sex education cannot be accomplished or successful.
Therefore, participation of parents in sex education is really important and without
involvement of parents, any initiative of schools or government cannot be succeed. One of
the major challenges that is relate to sexual harassment at public places like bus or train can
easily be avoided through sex education in schools (Bodnar and Tornello, 2019).
The major problem related to sex is that it can transmit large number of infections and disease
one person to another person if it is not done with appropriate safety and security. It has been
also noticed that schools generally failed to provide a common environment for both girls and
boys for sex education, which is very important for sex education (DeGue, et.al., 2014). It is
important to notice that campus based sexual education program helps the attitude of children
including boys and girls. It also helps them to aware what is wrong and what is right during
the body touch. The school can play a crucial role in changing the mentality of society who
opposes sex education in schools. It has been seen that most of the parents oppose the sex
education in schools because they have stereotype about it and they think that their daughters
and son can learn these things by their own. One of the most negative results of lack of sexual
education in school is that students cannot understand the importance and need of sex rather
they just use the sex word for entertainment and fun (Broussard, Eitmann, and Shervington,
2019). In such a scenario, they also involve in unsafe sex and intimate relationship with
homogenous gender. The education related to refusal skills which is necessary to prevent rape
and forced sex relationship is compulsory for women to avoid such type of criminal offense.

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Apart from this, unwanted pregnancy is another result of unsafe sex in which students do not
know how and when they should involve in an intimate relationship with their sex partner. It
is necessary to understand for the children that sex is a basic need of people but it can only be
possible if both partners give consent to each other for making intimate relationship. The
other thing that is really a problem in the society is called “feminism” (Leung, Shek, Leung,
and Shek, 2019). People generally ignore the importance of women in the family and even
they do not consider the consent of their wife or sex partner when they make sexual
relationship with them. It is one of the hidden and biggest crimes in the society that should be
eliminated. This is only possible if the schoolteachers can help the girls to understand their
rights and importance of consent while making relationship with their sex partners. This
social crime can only be eliminated if both boys and girls understand their rights and
considering consent of each other before making any physical relationship. The concept of
heterosexual affair is another result of lack of sex education in children (Kulakci-Altintas and
Ayaz-Alkaya, 2019). Teenagers need sex education to not only prevent and avoid any sexual
offence and crime even they need sex education to live healthy in their life. Sex education
helps the young people to choose their life partner smartly and helps to decide when and how
they should involve in physical relationship with their sex partner (Iyer and Aggleton, 2015).
The main purpose of sex education in school is to aware young children about the body
structure of men and women and also acquires the knowledge about birth. It also helps them
to understand the roles and responsibilities that are associated with their gender by acquiring
them sex education (Schneider and Hirsch, 2018). The major support of sex education is to
provide information about the gender role and also sets a foundation for a healthy relationship
with friends, lover, and their personal relationship. This helps the youngsters to understand
what is right and what is wrong in sexual relationship and how they can manage this type of
situation. It is necessary to prevent all level of sexual violence in the society and improve the
health and wellbeing of people in community. The sex education in schools, especially in
teenagers helps those to aware about the environmental and system level strategies as well to
take actions against sexual violence in the society. Sexual violence in the society has a broad
termed in which a person harass, assault, or rape other person. Sometimes, it has been seen
that people use weapons to harass and sexually humiliate a person (Hollander, 2014). In
simple words, it can be said that people involve in sexual violence in desire and entitlement
of sex. The major thing before providing sex education to boys and girls is to know how these
people are encouraged to bond over aggressive sexuality or sexual conquests. It has been

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found that lack of sexual consent from the partner is the major reason behind sexual offences
in a society. To prevent this type of sexual offences, sex education can help the teenagers to
know and understand the need of sex of their lover or sex partner. This type of sexual
relationship not only help the body to stay healthy and fit rather it also helps to live a happy
marriage life as well in future (Finneran and Stephenson, 2013).
One of the major reasons of sexual violence is that youngsters received wrong and conflicting
information about sex and relationship from variety of sources. It has been also noticed that
even parents do not want to talk about sex and other issues related to sex with their children.
To avoid sexual violence, it is necessary for the parents to talk openly with the children and
ask them to aw=quire proper knowledge about sex rather than incomplete or negative
information. This would definitely help the children to change their perception about sex and
physical relationship, which further help the society to minimise the cases of sexual abuse
and harassment in their life. It is really important for the parents to provide proper
information to the children about sex and honestly talk to them about their opinion about sex
(Espelage, Low, Polanin, and Brown, 2013). Sex education should not be only limited to
schools or teachers rather parents are equally responsible for providing proper information to
their son and daughters. To eliminate the incidents of violence in the society, it is really
necessary for youth to change their mind-set and avoid the biased view about sex. To avoid
the sexual violation such as sexual harassment, sexual abuse, and rape, it is really essential
for schools to build a society by providing adequate knowledge to the students about these
issue and various sexual crimes in the society (Rabbitte and Enriquez, 2019). Sex education
not only helps the youngster to avoid the sexual disease even it also help the society to
control and limit the number of cases related to physical and sexual offences. The
involvement of educational institutes in sexual education programs will definitely help the
society to develop as a peaceful place for the people where no people involve in sexual crime
or violence (Fine, 2018).
In conclusion, it can be said that sex education in schools can help the society to minimise the
number of cases related to sexual harassment and sexual abuse etc. Crime related to sexual
offence generally created in the mind of people when they discriminate about the gender
based on their body structure. However, if schools can create an environment for the
youngsters where they can learn how they can tackle issues related to sexual assault. The
school can also help them to learn about various sexual transmission diseases that happen

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because of unsafe sex or relationship with partners. This will help them to live a happy and
healthy life. Apart from this, sex education in schools can also help them to learn about how
to refuse for sex proposal and also help them to realize how important consent of a sex
partner is before doing intercourse. However, there are many benefits of sex education in
teenager students but there are few barriers that can restrict the schools to provide better sex
education to these students such as their shy nature, absence of sex education environment,
behaviour of parents regarding sex education, and lack of arrangement in the classrooms. To
ensure a healthy a prosperous society, which is free from sexual offences and crime, it is
really essential that school, teachers, parents, and various sex education organisations work
together and provide better education to the teenagers in the schools.

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