Sex-education Part 1

s.e.x-education.

by Maurice Alpheus Bigelow.

PREFATORY NOTE

Many of the lectures printed in this volume have formed the basis of a series given at Teachers College, Columbia University, during the summer sessions of 1914 and 1915, and during the academic year 1914-1915. Others were addressed to parents, to groups of men, to women's clubs, and to conferences on s.e.x-education. In order to avoid extensive repet.i.tion, there has been some combination and rearrangement of lectures that originally were addressed to groups of people with widely different outlooks on the s.e.xual problems.

Several years ago the late Dr. Prince A. Morrow announced that a volume dealing with many of the timely topics of s.e.x-education was to be prepared by the undersigned with the advice and criticism of a committee of the American Federation for s.e.x-Hygiene; but even before Dr. Morrow's death it became evident that this plan was impracticable.

Three members (Morrow, Balliet, Bigelow) of the original committee collaborated in a report presented at the XV International Congress on Hygiene and Demography. Since that time the writer, working independently, has found it desirable to reorganize completely the original outline announced by Dr. Morrow.

In accordance with a declaration made voluntarily in a conversation with Dr. Morrow, the author considers himself pledged to devote all royalties from this book to the movement for s.e.x-education.

Among the many persons to whom is due acknowledgment of helpfulness in the preparation of this book, the author is especially indebted for suggestions to the late Dr. Prince A. Morrow, to Dr. William F. Snow, Secretary of the American Social Hygiene a.s.sociation, and to Dr. Edward L. Keyes, Jr., President of the Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis; for constructive criticism, to his colleagues, Professor Jean Broadhurst and Miss Caroline E. Stackpole, of Teachers College, who have read carefully both the original lectures and the completed ma.n.u.script; and to Olive Crosby Whitin (Mrs. Frederick H. Whitin), executive secretary of the Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis, who has suggested and criticized helpfully both as a reader of the ma.n.u.script and as an auditor of many of the lectures delivered at Teachers College.

M.A.B.

TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, December 28, 1915.

I

THE MEANING, NEED, AND SCOPE OF s.e.x-EDUCATION

-- 1. _s.e.x-education and Its Relation to s.e.x-hygiene and Social Hygiene_

[Sidenote: Definition of s.e.x-education.]

s.e.x-education in its largest sense includes all scientific, ethical, social, and religious instruction and influence which directly and indirectly may help young people prepare to solve for themselves the problems of s.e.x that inevitably come in some form into the life of every normal human individual. Note the carefully guarded phrase "help young people prepare to solve for themselves the problems of s.e.x", for, like education in general, special s.e.x-education cannot possibly do more than help the individual prepare to face the problems of life.

[Sidenote: More than s.e.x-hygiene.]

Now, s.e.x-education as thus defined is more extensive than s.e.x-hygiene, which term was originally applied to instruction concerning s.e.x.

s.e.x-hygiene obviously refers to health as influenced by s.e.xual processes, and as such it is a convenient subdivision of the science of health. It would be quite satisfactory as a name for popular instruction concerning s.e.x if that were strictly, or even primarily, hygienic; but in a later lecture it will be shown that the most desirable s.e.x-instruction is only in a minor part a problem of hygiene.

I realize that this statement may be declared heretical by many of the present-day advocates of s.e.x-hygiene, because they have approached this latest educational movement from the standpoint of physical health, and especially because their attention has been drawn to the very common occurrence of pathological conditions. Nevertheless, the s.e.xual problems of our times do not all affect physical health, which hygiene aims to conserve; and the s.e.x-educational movement will be quite inadequate without great stress upon certain ethical, social, and other aspects of s.e.x. Young people need instruction that relates not only to health but also to att.i.tude and to morals as these three are influenced by s.e.xual instincts and relations.h.i.+ps. This idea will be developed later, but I antic.i.p.ate here simply to suggest the point of view of the statement that "s.e.x-hygiene" is altogether too limited as a general designation for the desirable instruction concerning s.e.x. The continued use of the term "s.e.x-hygiene," now that the scope of the desirable s.e.x-instruction has been extended far beyond the accepted limits of the science of health, is tending to cause confusion. The educational problems will be more definite and the support of the intelligent public more a.s.sured if we limit the use of "s.e.x-hygiene" to the specific problems of health as affected by s.e.xual processes and cease trying to make it include those phases of s.e.x-instruction which have nothing directly to do with health.

Two general terms, "s.e.x-instruction" and "s.e.x-education," are available as all-inclusive designations of the desirable instruction concerning any aspects of s.e.x. They are quite free from the above objections to "s.e.x-hygiene," and it is highly desirable that they should be used in all educational discussions where there is no specific reference to the problems of health. s.e.x-hygiene will be used in these lectures only when there is some direct reference to health as influenced by the s.e.xual functions.

[Sidenote: Social hygiene.]

Social hygiene in its complete sense means the great general movement for the improvement of the conditions of life in all lines in which there is social ill health or need of social reform; but it is often limited to the s.e.xual aspect of the unfortunate and unfavorable conditions of life, and it has been proposed to adopt the term "social hygiene" as a subst.i.tute that avoids the word "s.e.x" in s.e.x-hygiene. For this reason it has been incorporated into the names of several societies that are interested in s.e.x-hygiene (_e.g._, the American Social Hygiene a.s.sociation). Probably the relation of s.e.x-hygiene to the so-called "social evil" has suggested the use of social hygiene in its most limited sense. It will be unfortunate if this usage becomes so prominent that we think of the health problems of society as chiefly s.e.xual, for the larger outlook of Ellis's "Task of Social Hygiene" is desirable. Likewise, the phrase "social evil" in the sense of s.e.xual evil misleadingly suggests that the only evil of society is the s.e.xual one, but this evasive designation is being supplanted by the more definite and franker word "prost.i.tution."

It should be noted that "social hygiene" as a subst.i.tute for "s.e.x-hygiene" is narrower in that it does not include the personal problems of health as affected by s.e.xual processes. This is a serious omission, for certainly all s.e.x-hygiene taught before the later adolescent years should be personal and not social.

[Sidenote: Phases of s.e.x-education.]

The relation of s.e.x-hygiene or social hygiene as a limited phase of s.e.x-education is shown by the following outline:

{ s.e.x-hygiene (personal, | for s.e.xual health { social) | { | { biology (including | for att.i.tude { physiology) of | regarding s.e.x, { reproduction | and for important { | scientific facts { | In the broadest { heredity and eugenics | for s.e.xual conduct outlook, s.e.x-education { | leading to race (or s.e.x-instruction) { | improvement includes: { | { ethics and sociology | for s.e.xual conduct { of s.e.x | { | { psychology of s.e.x | for s.e.xual health { | and conduct { | { aesthetics of s.e.x | for att.i.tude

[Sidenote: s.e.x and reproduction.]

Since the original purpose of s.e.x was perpetuation of plant and animal species, and since in the study of biology the idea of s.e.x is ill.u.s.trated and developed by examination of the reproductive processes in various types, it has been customary for many writers on s.e.x-education to use the terms "s.e.x" and "reproduction" as if they were synonymous. This is no longer so in human life; for while reproduction is a s.e.xual process, s.e.xual activities and influences are often quite unrelated to reproduction. In fact, most of the big problems that have made s.e.x-education desirable, if not necessary, are problems of s.e.x apart from reproduction. It therefore seems clear that, while studies of reproduction are prominent in s.e.x-education, they should be regarded as introductory to the problems of s.e.x, especially for young people.

-- 2. _The Misunderstanding of s.e.x_

[Sidenote: Objection to word "s.e.x."]

Some educators have expressed the wish that some one might suggest a satisfactory subst.i.tute for the terms "s.e.x-hygiene" and "s.e.x-education," omitting the word "s.e.x." This word and its companion "s.e.xual" are objectionable because they are a.s.sociated in the minds of most people with vulgar interpretation of the physical aspects of the beginning of individual life, and much of the opposition to the proposed s.e.x-instruction in home and schools is evidently based on the feeling that the very word "s.e.x" involves something inherently vulgar.

[Sidenote: Definite words necessary.]

It is probable that many decades will pa.s.s before the majority of intelligent people cease to feel that the words "s.e.x" and "s.e.xual" have had such vulgar a.s.sociations that they should be kept out of our everyday vocabulary, but I can see no hope of developing an improved att.i.tude towards the s.e.xual aspect of human life if we continue to admit that we are afraid of the necessary words. It seems to me that in one decade there has been a great advance in that the scientific writers and speakers on problems of s.e.x have been using words which definitely and directly express the desired meanings, and have avoided the suggestive circ.u.mlocutions which characterize many modern realistic novels. One who does not already appreciate the serious impressiveness of cold scientific language in discussion of s.e.xual problems should take one of the indecently suggestive paragraphs from stories in the most notoriously vulgar of the fifteen-cent magazines, and translate the meaning of the paragraph into direct and definite words. The result will be complete loss of the stealthy suggestiveness which has made concealed s.e.xuality so dangerously attractive to the type of mind that revels in the modern s.e.x-problem novels. We want no such suggestive concealment in a scheme of s.e.x-education, for it aims at a purer and higher understanding of s.e.x in human life. We must have direct and definite and dignified scientific language, and among the necessary words none are as essential as "s.e.x" and "s.e.xual." We must use them freely if att.i.tude towards s.e.x is to be improved; and their dignified and scientific usage will gradually dispel the embarra.s.sment which many unfortunate people now experience when these words remind them that the perpetuation of life in all its higher forms has been intrusted to the cooperation of two kinds, or s.e.xes, of individuals.

Thus viewing the objections which have been raised against the use of the word "s.e.x" in the educational movement, I have s.h.i.+fted my first stand with the opposition until now I favor the frank and dignified use of this and similar words on appropriate occasions. I believe that those interested in the search for solutions of the vital problems of s.e.x should quietly but systematically work to include the words "s.e.x"

and "s.e.xual" in the dignified and scientific vocabulary needed by all people to express the newer and n.o.bler interpretations of the relations.h.i.+ps between men and women.

[Sidenote: No "s.e.x" studies.]

Of course, this does not mean that s.e.x, either as a word or as a fact of nature, should be over-emphasized with people who are too young to appreciate the fundamental facts of life. As already suggested, it is not desirable that any parts of the curricula for schools should be known to the pupils as "s.e.x" studies; but we need such terms as "s.e.x-hygiene" and "s.e.x-instruction" to indicate to teachers and parents that certain parts of the education of the children are being directed towards a healthy, natural and wholesome relation to s.e.x.

[Sidenote: "s.e.x" and "love."]

It is absurd to suppose that the free, dignified, and scientific use of the word "s.e.x" is going to make people more sensual, more uncontrolled, and more immoral. There is much more reason for fearing the free use of the word "love," which has both psychical and physical meanings so confused that often only the context of sentences enables one to determine which meaning is intended. In fact, many writers and speakers seek to avoid all possible misunderstanding by using the word "affection" for psychical love. Now, in spite of such confusion, and the fact that to many people the word "love" in connection with s.e.x suggests only gross sensuality, we continue to use it freely and it is one of the first words taught to children. Why then do we not hear protests against using the word "love"? Simply because we have been from childhood accustomed to the word, first in its psychical sense, and it is only later that most of us have learned that it has a sensual meaning to some people. In short, familiarity with the word "love" in its psychical sense has bred in us a contempt for those who mistake the physical basis of love for love in its combined physical and psychical completeness.

[Sidenote: Meaning of s.e.x.]

To many it is surprising to find that the word "s.e.x" has never been used in such degraded connections as has the word "love," and that it has not been half so much misunderstood. There is no obvious vulgarity in the lexicographer's definitions of the word "s.e.x." It simply means, as the science of biology points out so clearly, that the perpetuation of human life, and of most other species of life, has been intrusted to pairs of individuals which are of the two kinds commonly called the s.e.xes, male and female. Why nature determined that each new life in the vast majority of species should develop from two other lives has long been a biological puzzle, and most satisfactory of the answers given is that bi-parental origin of new individuals allows for new combinations of heritable qualities from two lines of descent. However, such a biological explanation of the relation of the two s.e.xes to double parentage is of relatively little practical significance in present-day human life when compared with the fact that out of the necessity for life's perpetuation by two cooperating individuals there has grown psychical or spiritual love with all its splendid possibilities that are evident in ideal family life. Moreover, the influence of s.e.x in human life has extended far beyond the family (that is, that group of individuals who stand related to one another as husband, wife, parents, and children), for it is a careless observer indeed who does not note in our daily life many social and psychical relations.h.i.+ps of men and women who have no mutual interests relating to the biological processes of race perpetuation. Of course, the psychologist recognizes that far back of the platonic contact of the s.e.xes on social and intellectual lines is the suppressed and primal instinct that provides physical unions for race perpetuation. However, this is of no practical interest, for, as a matter of fact, the primal instincts are quite subconscious in the usual social relations between the s.e.xes.

[Sidenote: The larger view of s.e.x.]

There is grandeur in this view of s.e.x as originally a provision for perpetuation of life by two cooperating individuals, later becoming the basis of conjugal affection of the two individuals for each other and of their parental affection for their offspring, and finally leading to social and intellectual comrades.h.i.+p of men and women meeting on terms which are practically free from the original and biological meaning of s.e.x.

Instead, then, of trying to keep s.e.x, both word and fact, in the background of the new educational movement, I believe it is best to work definitely for a better understanding of the part which s.e.x plays in human life, as outlined in the preceding paragraph. Hence, in these lectures I shall never go aside in order to avoid either the word or the idea of s.e.x; on the contrary, I shall attempt to direct the discussion so as to emphasize the larger and very modern view of the relations.h.i.+p of s.e.x and human life.

[Sidenote: The many-sided bearings of s.e.x.]

In this first lecture I want to make it clear that the role of s.e.x in human life is vastly greater than that directly involved in s.e.xual activity. I shall in several lectures touch the big problems from the standpoint of the s.e.xual instincts as these play an important part in social, psychical, and aesthetic life even if they are rarely exercised, physiologically, or if, as in millions of individuals, they never come to mean more than possibilities of s.e.xual activity for which opportunities in marriage do not come. I am especially anxious to avoid the narrow viewpoint of numerous writers on s.e.x-hygiene who seem to overlook the fact that s.e.xual functioning is only a prominent incident in the cycle of s.e.xual influences in the lives of most people. Human life, and especially marriage, should no longer be regarded from the mere biological point of view as for the sole purpose of reproductive activity. It is a far more uplifting view that the conscious or unconscious existence of the s.e.xual instincts, with or without occasional activity, affords the fundamental physical basis for states of mind that may profoundly affect the whole course of life in every normal man and woman.

Supplementary to this section on the "Misunderstanding of s.e.x," I suggest the reading of Chapters I-VI of "s.e.x" by Geddes and Thomson, the "Problems of s.e.x" by the same authors, and Chapter VI in "The Wonder of Life" by Thomson.

-- 3. _The Need of s.e.x-Instruction_