An interesting article about kids and sex. The focus seems to be on the fact kids are being pressured to have sex sooner, but it seems to me these are still the same issues I had as a teenage, just a little younger. And the problems the kids are facing are the same.

I’ve got 10 and 11 year old sons, and I try to be open with them about sex. I’ll answer any question they ask and even probe if they seem to be talking about something related. But I’ve learned most of the time they don’t want too many details.

The classic story is when my eldest asked his mother how babies are made. The started at a high level, a mommy and a daddy who love each other and want to make a baby.

But that didn’t answer to his satisfaction. Then the got more biological and said a dad’s sperm and a moms egg get together and the baby grows in the mother’s stomach for 9 months.

Still didn’t do it.

Finally she just told him the mechanics of sexual intercourse. He thought is was gross and not what he really wanted to know. Turns out he wanted to know how the DNA from the parents gets together and form the new DNA.

Our friends had a similar experience with their young kids. You just have to make sure you understand the question.

Also as this article points out toward the end, understanding the question means you have to define sex. Parent’s have a certain definition of sex, and kids have “President Clinton’s definition”.

I really like this quote from the very end:

“I always say, you know, as far as I’m concerned, sexual intercourse is the most fundamentally powerful behavior there is on the face of the Earth. It’s a behavior that has the ability to do the three most powerful things there are, all at the same time. It has the ability to give life, potentially take life away and to change it forever. That’s unbelievably powerful and therefore, it shouldn’t be in the hands of anybody who isn’t an adult, in as many ways as they need to be an adult. It’s not for kids.”