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How Should We Teach Sex?

Research output: Contribution to Journal/MagazineJournal articlepeer-review

Published
<mark>Journal publication date</mark>11/1998
<mark>Journal</mark>Journal of Philosophy of Education
Issue number3
Volume321
Number of pages14
Pages (from-to)437-450
Publication StatusPublished
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

In the face of differences about how sex should be taught to young persons, and consistent with a liberal principle of neutrality, educationalists can adopt one of two strategies. The ‘retreat to basics’ consists in teaching only a basic agreed code of sexual conduct, or a set of agreed principles of sexual morality. The ‘conjunctive–disjunctive’ strategy consists in teaching the facts of sexual activity together with the various possible evaluations of these facts. Both strategies are beset with significant and insuperable difficulties. Perhaps one should presume only to teach sex in a way that maximises the foundational liberal ideal of autonomy.