“What’s missing? Anti-racist sex education!”, found in Volume 14 of Sex Education published in 2014, was one of the limited articles and research projects I could find on anti-racist education in combination with sex education curriculum. The paper focuses on sex education in Canada, however, I found the topics discussed relevant to U.S sex education policies. The United States curriculum for sex education is approximately 10 years behind Canadian policies that continue to grow stronger, more inclusive, and comprehensive.

The article begins by defining racism and arguing for including anti-racist theory education into sex ed curricula. Excluding race in topics of sex education, thus exluding minority communities from the discussion,  can be seen as an act of racism.  Anti-racist theory in sex education works to “challenge the education institution to see students as more than neutral, context-free youth and to expose the ways edcuation shaped and continues to shape race, class and gender on all students” (Whitten and Sethna, 415.) Although sex education curriculum in Canada, and the new California sex education act, have both worked to be more inclusive of LGBTQIAA topics, anti-racist perspectives are rarely included.

The article goes over the history of sex ed in Canada, which is very similar to the history of sex education in the United States. Sex ed began as a priority of the home and focuses specifically on controlling young peoples sexual behavior by teaching preventative sex practices and portraying sex in a negative light. When schools began teach sex education the curriculum was incorporated into health and physical education. The curriculum has become increasingly more inclusive, but, although working to include different sexualities and genders identities into the mix, have yet to come up with a specific anti-racist program. Most programs in Canada, including the new program in the U.S, tout ‘culturally sensitive’ sex education programs. These, however, are problematic as they “often rely on ethnic and racial stereotypes of groups, portraying racialised peoples as monolithic and static and decontextualising their experiences from a history of colonization, racialisation, and persistent inequity” (Whitten and Sethna, 416.) These programs often promote the idea of the difference in sexual practices in minority  communities as stemming from the absence of factual health information rather than social inequity and issues of access.

The article continues to define race, ethnicity, and multi-culturalism. Multi-culturalism being another factor that sex education programs must overcome in order to be truly inclusive. “Multi-culturalism falls short both by refusing to recognize the existence of social stratification based on the intersection of gender, class, race ethnicity, (dis)ability and other social oppressions (Whitten and Sethna, 419.) While celebrating differences can be a good thing, not acknowledging the history of racism, colonialism, and imperialism is not.

The article ends by presenting a through argument for inclusion of race in sex ed, and provides research analysis involving the coding of sex education curriculum in order to see the real amounts of inclusion involved in the sex ed programs children are given when in Canada.

This article was especially helpful to me as a lot of the problems Canada faced in 2014, California is facing in 2017.

Amanda Whitten, Christabelle Sethna. 2014. “What’s missing? Anti-racist sex education!” Sex Education, 14 (4).