FPATT backs Shamfa on sex ed

Sports and Youth Affairs Minister Shamfa Cudjoe
Sports and Youth Affairs Minister Shamfa Cudjoe

THE Family Planning Association of TT (FPATT) yesterday supported Sport Minister Shamfa Cudjoe’s recent call for sex education in schools as she denied such conversations encourage pupils to become wild and reckless.

Cudjoe’s remarks had been condemned by a group calling itself the TT Council of Evangelical Churches. which said parents. not schools. must teach children about sex, and which complained schools might teach about LGBT behaviour.

As an FPATT statement yesterday urged comprehensive sexuality education (CSE), Newsday asked FPATT chairman Prof Rose Marie Belle Antoine whether FPATT supports LGBT issues being taught within sex education.

Antoine replied, “FPATT is committed to equality and human rights. We don’t set out to define the word ‘sexuality’ narrowly. It is a very broad concept. It does, of course, include gender and can include LGBT rights in a broad brush, but it is not all the FPATT is singling out about what should be taught in relation to sex and sexuality.”

Saying some people might view "sex education" very narrowly and as teaching people how to have sex, she said, “But we talk about ‘sex and sexuality’ to ensure the public understand it is a broad-based approach that would include safe practices, safe sex and abstention as a key issue.”

Antoine said the region has high rates of sex and teen pregnancy, so youngsters should be taught beforehand about understanding their bodies and their rights as sexual beings. She said sex education is best provided in a structured way by responsible entities such as schools, maybe with workshops and training by the FPATT, with these educators being aware of the realities of the society.

“Those parents who think their children don’t know about sex and sexuality or will not find out, I think they are living in a fairytale land. And they will find it out from very irresponsible sources, such as via the Internet and all of that, or on the street. So it is really counterproductive for some of the churches – not all of them – to say sex education is somehow encouraging bad or immoral behaviour.”

The FPATT statement said CSE creates healthy and responsible sexual and reproductive health behaviours among young people.

The association backed Cudjoe’s view that talking to youngsters in fourth and fifth form is too late, as many would have had their first sexual experience before the age of 13 and continue to have unsafe sex with multiple partners, so risking unfavourable outcomes.

FPATT said common teen pregnancies in the Caribbean show that open and honest conversations about sexual matters with trusted adults are severely lacking at a time when they are most needed.

“Why is there such continued objection, from those who should know better, to empower our children with the appropriate and correct information, the only tool they can use to protect their vulnerability?”

CSE covers the same topics as sex education, but also relationships, attitudes towards sexuality, sexual roles, gender relations and the social pressures to be sexually active.

“The school should not displace parents and their responsibility, but the school can support parents, who often feel ill-equipped to broach subjects of sex and sexuality,” FPATT concluded.

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"FPATT backs Shamfa on sex ed"

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