Forget traditional sleepovers full of facials and chick flicks, sexual sleepovers are the latest fad – or so The Huffington Post Blog says.
The Huffington Post’s Soraya Chemaly asked parents in her latest article, “How Do You Feel About Sex and Teenage Sleepovers?” She argued that parents should encourage them, unless they “just like porn and think it's a fine substitute.” Chemaly schemed, “Why would you create a situation where your children are forced to hide, sneak around, be dishonest, be uncomfortable, take unnecessary risks and make uninformed decisions about their physical and emotional health?”
Drawing inspiration from the book “How To Think More About Sex” by Alain de Botton (perhaps more well known for authoring “Religion for Atheists”), Chemaly built her argument. “Why not teach children,” she asked, “how to have sex well, the way you teach them how to do other things?”
Chemaly claimed many authors focused on the topic as of late – a topic the U.S. still views with “outraged horror.” She set the scene for parents, encouraging them to embrace “This idea, that parents of teenagers would encourage them to bring over their partners, have a nice dinner, then toddle off to bed together.”
But that wasn’t enough. Playing the guilt card, Chemaly teased, “Are you a ‘responsible-sex-is-good’ parent, or more in the ‘scare-them-silly’ camp? It seems logical to me that the same way I try to teach my kids to exercise, sleep well and be good people, I would teach them to have healthy sex and sleep with other good people.”
Unlike “socially conservative mythology,” she said, “approaches that are positive about sex do not lead to licentiousness, STDs, abortions and despair.”
Chemaly placed Amy Schalet, author of “Not Under My Roof: Parents, Teens and The Culture of Sex,” on a pedestal within the article for comparing American parents, educators, and teenagers to their counterparts in the Netherlands where dads and moms speak openly and, “often allow their teenage children to engage in sex with their partners in their homes.”
For references, Chemaly also directed readers to several informational sex sites for teens that cover everything from “sexual/reproductive healthcare services” such as contraception, pre-natal, and abortion care (yes, those last two were listed together) to LGBT support and mental healthcare.
Chemaly’s message fits right in with Hollywood’s messaging to teens in movies like “The To Do List” which taught how “sometimes sex is just sex” and the routine teen sexting culture outlined by The Daily Beast.
