In the news today…3

Parents guilty until proven innocent? Surely not.

However, if Ofsted are to have it their way, parents who choose to home school their children will be facing Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) checks before they are given permission – to check that they are not paedophiles or abusive, etc. Which sort of makes sense, as the majority of children who have experienced one or other form of physical abuse during childhood had experienced ‘some degree of physical abuse’ by parents or carers. (NSPCC Facts and Figures page)

Only I do not think this move in particular will make them more popular, especially following the babysitting ban posed on the two female police officers, which the Children’s Minister eventually sent for review.

The purpose of this proposal seems to be to catch anybody who is a genuine danger to a child, and those who say they are home schooling, but are not actually carrying out that duty. Proper home schoolers (who potentially do a better job than some actual schools), will get caught in the middle, and people will moan.

Question is, if they want to do a CRB check, why not do it before a couple has children? After all, couples who adopt are inspected; same-sex couples are inspected; foster families are inspected, so why not heterosexual couples too? Hows’about some forward planning eh? (Apart from the fact that people will moan. Again.)

Sex Education in China

Something that I think should take up more space on politico agendas than it actually does. I may not have researched the topic quite as far some would like, so readers, be mildly patient – constrictive criticism and comment is always helpful.

Earlier this year in May, it was featured in published in media, mainly online, that China was awaiting the opening of its first sex theme park in the city of Chongqing, aiming to address taboo surrounding the subject and improve sex education. Within a week, and before the official opening of this “Love Land”, it was reported that it had closed. Reasons given were that residents were unhappy about the so-called visibility of erotic scenarios and found it vulgar.

This is all very fair. I was certainly stunned when I saw pictures of the entrance, featuring a rooftop rotating sculpture of a thong-clad pair of women’s legs.

Entrance of the park (Clickable! For a link to the Guardian's article)

For me, China may not need the blow to the stomach that this park represents, but it certainly needs some cold water in the face of the exponentially increasing cases of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).

It is not uncommon to find polar opposite on the matter.

As China welcomes more and more Western culture, and to some extent adopts it in its own media, young people have their eyes pried open to the sex culture, get curious and, for the lack of a better fitting word, excited. They want to go explore, only to find that they have very little information about sex, or more importantly, safe sex. Doing their own research is somewhat out of the question, because it is “naughty”. Yes? Even so, it is difficult not to have come across any sexual references, and so young people testing the grounds through contact with each other  are at the base (well, not quite) of the STD calamities.

The other end is well illustrated by a married couple, 22 and 24 years old I believe, walking into a clinic, asking why they could not get pregnant. It was soon discovered that they thought sleeping in the same bed would do the trick.

Li Yinhe, an expert on sexual attitudes at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said: “While disapproval of sex stemmed from religion in the west, in China it was largely rooted in a traditional focus on the family instead of individual enjoyment – leading people to deplore premarital and extramarital sex.” [Guardian, picture link]

However, people are not clueless, and while schools still stay away from the topic, some sex education clinics have precariously opened their doors in larger cities, although without accumulating much of an audience. Yet.

Personally, I do feel that the issue is in the government. Most people who can dictate what is taught in school – the best place to start spreading the word if you ask me – grew up when it was all very “hush hush”, and are now reflecting that point of view on society. So perhaps they need to embrace the love (gosh that was corny!) a bit as well.

Or parents will simply have to start having those stereotypically awkward sex talks with their children once they hit puberty, again. Haha!