Being Gay Isn’t About Sex.
Teaching children about different forms of love doesn’t need to involve sex.
I was watching YouTube clips the other day when I was supposed to be working, and I came across one that discussed the idea of exposing children to a Pride march. A teacher had taken her Primary School class to the local Pride march and panellists on a UK chat show were chatting about the morality of it.
What got to me was the first person to speak, a star of a UK soap opera who herself has had relationships with both men and women, immediately stated children of that age shouldn’t be exposed to sex.
Wait, what?
Since when did going to Pride automatically mean children are exposed to sex of any description? This feeds into a cultural assumption that I have come across many times that being gay is about having sex with men (or women, of course, if you’re of the lesbian persuasion). How hard is it to understand that it’s about who you fall in love with? Who you make an emotional attachment to. Do people just cling onto their long-held opinions like a tennis player grips their racket rather than open themselves up to actually learning and understanding?
Physical attraction and sexual desire are all part of it, much as they are for anyone and any couple, but it isn’t everything. It’s about so much more than that. It is this assumption that being gay is purely about wanting to sleep with the same sex that helps feed into an idea that being gay is ‘dirty’ or some sort of delinquency.
Thankfully, there was someone else on the show who provided a voice of reason; stating that taking children to Pride has nothing to do with sex, it’s about exposing them to love and acceptance.
THANK YOU!
Exposing children to different forms of love (not sex) at a young age sets them up to grow into open minded and accepting adults who understand that different people live different lives, and that’s fine. It’s the lack of understanding that often causes misconceptions and perpetuates homophobia and hate.
They will understand that being gay is feeling towards the same sex as heterosexuals feel towards the opposite sex. It’s that simple. Plus, kids like rainbows and there is nowhere that has more rainbows than Pride. Or Unicorns. So yes, take your kids to Pride. Just don’t show them porn and we’re good.
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