Article 37

:.il rl Article 37 The SexuaB Revolufion Hits Junior High The kids are doing more than baring bellies: They're shocking adults with their anything-goes behavior Knr P,qtvreR Specialfor USA TADAY icture the mating rites of middie-schoolers. Perhaps you irnagine hand- holding and first kisses, girls trying out eye shadow, boys sneaking a peek at vulgar men's magazlnes. Now look again, through the eyes ofincreasingly concerned educators and experts: . Researchers in WasLrington, D.C., recentiy started aprogram to prevent early sexual activiry. They planned to offer it to seventhgraders, but after a pilot study decided to target fifth-graders-because too many seventh-graders already were having sex. . Jo Mecham, a nurse at a Bettendorf, Iowa, middle school, says she overhears "pretty explicit sexual talk" from boys and girls in her "conservative" community. And despite a dress code, girls come to classes looking like bare-bellied rock stars: "They'I1 leave the house totaliy OK, and when they get to school, they start disrobing." . Joey Zbylut-Birky, a middle-school teacher in Omaha, recently asked students to think about "where they feel most comfortable" as part of an assignment to write song titles about themselves. A group of giggling boys piped up with comments about receiving oral sex. The list goes on. Middle schools that used to do without dress codes now must send home exhaustive inventories of forbidden garments, from tube tops to too-low hip-huggers. Schools that used to handle crude language on a case-by-case basis now must have "no-profanify" policies. And sexual-harassment training is a normal part of middle-school curriculum. The world "is rougher, it is sexier and it has reached down to touch boys and girls at younger ages," says Margaret Sagarese, who, rvith Charlene C. Giannetti, has written several books on parenting, including the new The Patience of a Saint: How Faith Can SustainYotL DLtring the ToughTimes of Parenltng. Baby-boomer parents who thoughL that nothing would ever shock them are shocked by the way their young teens ta1k, dress and perhaps even behave, Sagarese says. "Things have changed," says Jude Swift, 52, a mother of five whose youngest is an eighrh-grade boy. "i think a greai deal of it j.s due to the media and rvhat kids see on TV, in magazine ads, ;, in lideos.... -tt's all abour beino sexv.'' ii :lii lj::;:3lff:;;::J&:sJ** :i'-*:l:l!::iJf.t-:g*;:l::a:t:t: The world 'is rougher, it is sexier'and it's harder for teens to avoid it ?6gg:*!=$**iw:*i!1l.xsi::iJ*i:i;li;g:ii:l l :i:.:: 1,1. Sr.vift, of Camillus, N.Y., says she picked up a Teen People magazine the other day and "I was amazed. It was page after page of young teens dressed in very provocative ways and in very provocative poses." Young girls "do not see anything wrong in looking that way," says Zbylut-Birky, the Omaha teacher. And, she says. "they don't see the difference between how they should look for a party and how they should look in an educatio.ol ccrrino " Boys Want to Look Sexy, Too Even boys face increasing pressure to look sexy, says Sagarese: "There are IZ-yeu-old boys going to GNC and taking all kinds of supplements because they want abs the same way girls want breasts." Of course, many girls who dress like Britney Spears and many boys who talk like Eminem don't go beyond nervous note-passing in their actual romantic lives. Zbylut-Birky, who overheard the oral-sex banter, says, "A lot of times they use that kind of language to impress their peers, but there's really nothing going on there.'' But for some substantial minority of middle schoolers, something very risky-including intercourse and oral sex-is going on, some experts say. In 1995, government researchers asked teens over age 15 rvhether. they'd had sexual intercourse byage 14;19Vo ofgirls and2TVo ofboyssaidyes.In 1988,the numbers were ll7o for giris and the same 2lVo for boys, says the Washington, D.C.-based research group Child Trends. Data for 2002 are just being collected. Another srudy, using different methods, followed 12- rc I1- year-o1ds between 7991 attd 1999 and foutd 76Vo of girls and 20Vo of boys reported sex at 14 or younger, says Child Trends researcher Jennifer Manlove. 138 Sex by age14 Kids ( i 5 and older) r,vho sav thev had had intercourie byage ia: " E grls @lsoys ffiffiffiffi 1988 1995 As for oral sex, a 2000 study from the Alan Guttmacher Institute in New York caused a firestorm by suggesting that more young teens were engaging in that activity-possibly as a way of remaining technical virgins in the age of abstinence education. That study was based on scattered, anecdotal reports of increased oral herpes and gonorrhea ofthe throat. No nationr.vide, scientific study has actually asked young teens, or older teens for that matter, whether they have oral sex. "A lot of alarm parents feel on this issue is based on anecdotal information," says Bill Albert, spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, a private, non-profit group working to reduce teen pregnancy. But some of the anecdotes are hair-raising. "The other day at school, a girl got caught in a bathroom with a boy performing oral sex on him," says Maurisha Stenson, a 14-year-old eighth-greder at a Syracuse, N.Y., middle school. When the Lights Went On Denyia Sullivan, 14, attends a different Syracuse middle school but says she's seen and heard about similar things. One time, a girl performed oral sex on a boy in the gym bleachers during a movie. "The teacher turned on the light and there they were," Sullivan says. "Everybody was lgoking and laughing." The two girls also say there's more than oral sex going on. Suliivan can think offive pregnant girls at her school, rvhich includes sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders. Stenson guesses that "almost 50%" of kids at her school, for seventh- and eighthgraders, are en_eaging in some kind of sex. "This is happeningl they are telling the truth," says Courtney Ramirez. who directs the Syracuse Way to Go after-school prosram. desis-ned to heln kids succeed in school and avoid risks. Roth oirls 2rp nFer edrre etnrs in thp nrnmam "Youths are really getting involred in things a whole lot sooner than we thought," Ramirez says. Ariicle 37. The Sexual Revolution Hits Junior Hiqh But other experts say that without good, current numbers on nationwide irends, they can't eyen say with any confidence that early sex is increasing. "It could be gettiag worse, it could be getting better, we jusi don't know," Albert says. One problem is that the best government studies are done infrequently. Another is that researchers-and the public-are squeamish about asking detailed sex questions of young teens. And when they do ask, they aren't sure youngsters always understand the questions or answer trutMully. Albert's organization will try to fili in the gap later this year with a report based on data from around the country. But many educators and parents have heard the alarms and are acting now. Krystal McKinney directs a program that offers sex education and life-skil1s training to middle-school girls in the Washiagton, D.C., area. Since the 2000 Guttmacher oral sex report, she and her staff have redoubled efforts to make sure that girls understand the risks. "We have kids who think you can't get diseases from oral sex," she says. "Kids think they know everything, but we challenge that." With the youngest teens. clear information is crucial. says Xenia Becher, a mental health educator at the Syracuse afterschool program. Recentiy, she says, she asked some 13- to 15-year-olds to define sex. "They had trouble coming up with an anslver," she says. "Some said it had to be between a male and female and a penis and vagina had to be involved. "So I asked, 'What about if two men were involved?' 'We11,' they said, 'I don't know what that is, but it's not sex."' Becher also trains parents to discuss sex lvith their kids. She tells them that their voices matter, even in a sex-soaked culture. "When you get down to what's right or wrong, popular culture is going to have an inflnence, but the stronger internal voice comes from you," slre says. Becher admits that setting limits and encouraging independence can be a real balancing act. When her own 13-year-old daughter dressed for a dance in a pair of "those nasly hip-huggers" and a short top, Becher says, she asked her to think how she'd look when "she was waving her arms around on the dance floor." Brit she didn't make her daughter change. "You've got to pick your battles," she says. Parents Shouldn't Back Off "Kids really do care what their parents think," says Kristin Moore, president of Child Trends. 'They don't really want their parents to back away. But a lot 0f parents do back away at this age." Some parents, she says, are so intimidated by a child's hostile behavior and demands for privacy that they give far too much ground. "Somerimes parents are home during a party but have no idea what is going on at ihe party." Mark Gibbons, an Augusta, Ga., father of two girls ages 8 and 12, says that he and his rvife are doing everything they can to stay invoived. They try to talk to their daughters about everyrL;-- ((\\/-'.,^ r^1,1 lr---t that it mav cOmelimes be embaffaSS_ i-^ l-.,.+ +L^! ,, ^'J -^.L^- *L^,. ^ -* +L^:-:-T^-*^-:^- f-^* ..^ ,' ]rl_y. uuL Lil4L \vq u t4Ltlst urs) L^ BrL rilctI lllIUlllldLlul ltulil u:, lLc says. I L L39 F:j,:r,:l Etd ANNUAL EDITIONS "I talk to them a1l the tjme," says Lauryn, a seventh-grader who takes classes for gifted and talented kids. She does say that she prefers to discuss boyfriends with her mom. Nevertheless, when Lauryn has friends over, Gibbons says he keeps his ears open. lVhen she's instant messa-eing on the computer, he says, "Every once in a whjle, I'11just wander over there and ask who she's talkiag to. Aad I do look at her little directory and make sure ali those user aames are people that I know. We try not to show that lve're being nosy, but we are." Gibbons also chaperones middle-school dances. It's a window into his daughter's larger world-one that, even in a community of "pretty well-behaved kids," can be shocking, he says. "Some of the dancing they do is kind of risque, to say the least." Lauryn says she appreciates her parents' involvement: "I believe it does makes a difference.. .. I have never gotten into trouble." And she says she does know kids who are getting into sexual trouble. "At some of the parties I go to, people playing 'Truth or Dare' wili say that they've already 'done it,"' shg says. Meanwhile, Gibbons says he recently got a ren-rinder that it is never too early to discuss sexual values. Third-grader Tayler "came home and said one little girl took a boy behind a ftee and they were French kissing.... I said, 'Weli, do you think that is wrong?' She said, 'Yes."' But while parents are right to watch and won-v, some may be worrying too much and enjoying too liltle about their children's pubescent years, says Sagarese, the parenting author. "I can't tell you how many parents have come up to me at speeches and they are apopiectic that their daughter is kissing. They feel Like the fusr kiss is a runaway train that will iead to AIDS or pregnancy." Her co-author, Giannetti, says, '?arents need to take a deep breath and a step back and remember what it was like to be a young adolescent-" Sometimes, Sagarese says, a first kiss is just a first kiss-and the same lovely rite of passage it was in a more innocent time. ti : t=ffi:;15;:;igia:i151;:5;:?g?:t4r-:41E:=sr€ ::iarlff;:::: ". :ry:511: T:i;.S3€li;jit=1'g-i.!:;:::i-:.1e From USA Toda1, Nspsp6p.r,1v{mch 17, 2002,pp.1-2. @ 2002 by Kim Painter. Reprinted by pemission of the author. 1dt\ 1-What is the "fall-out" or perceived consequences of more liberal sexual expression at a younger age? 2-Do boys have the same challenges as girls in terms of body image but express it differently? 3-Do you think teen sexual activity is as high as youth's perceive or do they "know someone" who has been involved? 4-Should researchers be able to ask detailed sexual experience questions of youths and adolescents? 5-How can parents really influence sexual behaviour?