Posted on Thu, Aug. 28, 2008

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Sexuality videos take the low road

Just in time for the new school year, Planned Parenthood is trying to educate teens and young adults about sex.

One of its chapters based in Oregon has created some new Web-based videos that are part of its "Take Care Down There" campaign. If you're inclined, you can find them at the Web site www.takecaredownthere.org.

One thing that was way "down there" were my expectations, and they were thoroughly met by the series of videos.

The gist of the message in the videos is this: People are going to have sex -- all kinds of sex. So we need to be educated so we don't catch a disease. Oh, and if people don't want to have sex, they shouldn't be forced into having it. That seems to be one of the few moral boundaries that Planned Parenthood acknowledges.

I do understand that, in its own warped way, Planned Parenthood is trying to help people. But it does so by promoting various forms of sexual activity with little reference to issues beyond getting a sexually transmitted disease or getting pregnant. You'll not hear much about people suffering emotional distress from casual sex, or that marriage offers the best context for sexual intimacy.

The videos, which are intended to be humorous, feature a series of young people either talking about sex or engaging in sex (nothing visually graphic, though). As they talk, a frumpy middle-aged man wanders by and offers sex advice. In one video, he tells two ladies to support their friend who, instead of going to a party with them, wants to stay home and masturbate. In another video, he interrupts two men having oral sex and chastises them for not using a condom.

Fortunately, someone else is also offering sex advice. Her name is Miriam Grossman, author of the book I wrote about last year titled "Unprotected." She has a decade of experience as a campus psychiatrist at UCLA, and this year wrote a new booklet titled "Sense and Sexuality: The College Girl's Guide to Real Protection in a Hooked-up World." It's available at the Web site www.cblpi.org/senseandsexuality.

"You've been told that exploring and experimenting -- as long as you're 'protected' -- can be safe, satisfying and beneficial," Grossman writes. "Don't fall for it. It's easy to forget, but the characters on 'Grey's Anatomy' and 'Sex in the City' are not real. In real life, Meredith and Carrie would have warts or herpes. They'd likely be on Prozac or Zoloft. Today a woman cannot have so many partners without paying a price."

Many of us, including men, have already paid a price. I've hurt people and been hurt, too. We all know people trapped in dead-end relationships in large part because they went too far, too fast. It's time to make better choices.

Planned Parenthood's "Take Care Down There" takes the low road; let's not follow its lead.

"You're in control, it's all in your hands," Grossman writes. "The distress that often follows casual sex is 100 percent preventable."

Brent Castillo appears in Opinion on Thursdays. Reach him at bcopinion@gmail.com.

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