Sex Education to Minors, is There Hope?

Long after the election fever and the swearing-in of the newly elected 15th Philippines President Benigno "Pnoy" Aguino III, the issue regarding the plan of the state department of Education (DepEd) for the integration of sex education at the public primary and high school levels have not yet cooled down. Countless opinions continue to appear at the Philippine newspapers and tabloids with regards to the pros and cons of the said issue.

Foremost for its staunchest stand against the implementation of the said sex education is the ecclesiastical hierarchy arguing that sexuality is a strictly family affair and that family as a basic autonomous social Philippine institution, must be protected from 'undue" state interference. This is also the church's way of protecting its own turf in the field of morals.

While some argued that the so-called "religious opposition" to sex education is just to raise a furor from something that is supposed to be an action over the failure to teach the children of what sex is all about whom the latter got the wrong notions of sex from what have been seen in the proliferation of sex in the internet.

Since most of the Filipino parents are pre-occupied with their pursuit for family economic needs in as much as the issue about sex education in only a backburner. until such time that one of their children suffers an unwarranted pregnancies and had to stop schooling just so because she got pregnant.

The plan of integrating sex education at the public primary and high school level is just but apt for the changing time. Or could it be in consonance with the government's "Reproductive Health Bill" which is still pending at the Philippines Congress and or with the United Nation's campaign against population explosion.

The state's DepEd had plan to pilot-tested its education program but has drawn reactions from legislators of one of the state's region. The Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) have expressed vehement objection about it, because its modules are still unknown and so with the benefits it could give to the ARMM people. And that it should be rational in considering the religious belief and cultural traditions of its Muslim populace who are sensitive to sex discussions especially among the minors.

The proclamation of the new Philippine President who made a landslide victory against its rivals in the last election, merely pledged for honest and effective governance, bring hope the many issues and problems left by his predecessor.