Sex Ed(itorials)

"Nobody wants some sicko drilling a peephole in their locker room wall or private hotel room

Two sex-oriented op-ed pieces in one weekend!

On Saturday Atul Gawande wrote about how we as individualas and communities need to take greater "do it yourself" responsibility for creating an environment in which people can educate themselves about contraception , pregnancy, and talk openly about their own sexual practices. Click here to read my discussion of his piece.

This morning's New York Times has another editorial supporting sex-related legislation that might help young people. Specifically, it deals with legislation making its way through the New York State Senate and Assembly that would mandate safe houses and treatment instead of juvenile detention or jail for teens caught engaged in prostitution.

"Sexually exploited children can be helped by the law or victimized by it, depending on where they are from. An Eastern European child smuggled into this country as a sex slave is offered protection under the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act. An American child who flees abusive parents and ends up selling her body on the streets is labeled a criminal and sent to the juvenile equivalent of prison.

That, thankfully, would change under a new law being considered by the New York State Legislature that would reform the juvenile justice system so it protects rather than punishes exploited children." (Read more)

The New York Times had two important editorials in the past three days dealing with important issues of sex and policy.

Today's took up the case, again, of Genarlow Wilson, the young man in Georgia who is still serving time in prison for the consensual oral sex he had when he was 17 with a girl who was two years younger. Specifically, the Times chastises the DA in the case for continuing to focus on the rape that occured at that party (of which Wilson was acquitted) and even circulating the video tape that was made of the rape, as part of his lobbying effort against Genarlow Wilson's release.