FREDERICTON -A new sex education program in New Brunswick, which includes such topics as masturbation, orgasm and oral sex, has raised new questions about the place of the birds and the bees in the modern classroom.
A growing number of parents are demanding removal of the new curriculum.
"This curriculum is an assault on the children of New Brunswick," says Dr. Carolyn Barry, a physician in the Fredericton area and mother of six children.
"Children are 10 and 11 when they start this program in Grade 6, and they are being presented with concepts of oral sex, mutual masturbation, anal sex, oral-anal sex. It absolutely contravenes our community standards."
The controversy in the Maritime province shows that although sex education is now a basic fact of life in most Canadian classrooms, it still has the power to stir deep-seated feelings about how much children should learn about sex, and when.
Barry and other parents who have expressed their outrage at public meetings around the province say the new sex-ed curriculum will create a more sexually permissive, anything-goes society.
"It will change the culture of New Brunswick," she says.
Some parents say they want a program that talks more about abstinence.
The provincial Conservative government, in a nod to parental concerns, says it will review the program to make sure it is appropriate for those between the ages of 10 and 13.
The results of the review are expected by the new year.
Meanwhile, New Brunswick isn't the only province where the explicit nature of modern sex education programs has stirred controversy.
In Port Hawkesbury, N.S., the provincial education department recently decided to make a new sex education book available to children in Grades 7 to 12, despite the local school board's objection that it is too explicit.
Also, concerns were raised about the adequacy of sex-ed programs in Prince Edward Island schools following the recent trial of a male high school athlete who was given oral sex by 12-and 13-year-old girls.
The trial revealed the girls were part of a group of middle school students who routinely performed oral sex on high school boys, most of them elite athletes.
"It's everywhere," one of the girls testified in court. "It's not really a big deal. It's just casual."
Sandra Byers, chairwoman of the Psychology Department at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, says incidents like the child oral sex ring in P.E.I. should set off alarms in schools and homes.
She says children in Grades 6, 7 and 8 are not only talking about sex, they're starting to experiment.
"We do not have a choice between kids having no information and correct information," she says. "The choice is between them having incorrect information and correct information."
Byers says the programs have to be explicit and detailed, or kids will think activities like oral sex and anal sex do not meet the criteria for "real sex."
"If we are not explicit about those behaviours, I fear that students will make the assumption there is no risk with those behaviours," Byers says.
Defenders of sex education programs say they are working in Canada.
According to Statistics Canada, there were 30.6 teen pregnancies for every 1,000 women in 2001. That is a significant reduction from the 45.5 teen pregnancies per 1,000 women in 1974.
The Sex Information and Education Council of Canada, a non-profit research organization based in Toronto, says the rate at which Canadian youth become sexually active is relatively stable.
The council says that by the time children reach Grade 9, about 20 per cent have experienced intercourse at least once.
"It is vitally important that kids receive accurate sexual health education before they become sexually active because, after the fact, it is too late," says Alex McKay, research co-ordinator for the council.
McKay says there is no question that the vast majority of Canadian parents want comprehensive sexual health education taught in schools, beginning in the elementary years and extending into high school.
But the wishes of the silent majority are often eclipsed by a noisy minority with an ideological agenda, he says.
"The heavy emphasis these people will put on the need to teach abstinence has to be looked at in the context of the ideological beliefs of those trying to push that agenda, not just for their own kids but for all kids," he says.
McKay says that in his research of Canadian sex-ed programs, he has never come across a public school curriculum for middle school or high school students that did not talk about abstinence as a way for young people to protect their sexual health.
"It is certainly not the case that children who learn about masturbation and sexual response that this somehow encourages them to start engaging in sexual activity before they otherwise would," he says. "We know that is not true."
