Teen Sex

Last week, parents were horrified that children - their children - as young as 12 are engaging in sex. And these children have multiple partners, and they're having (unsafe?) sex for things like phone credit, money and even chips. Yes, chips (fries). Things are that thick.
Even so, where are these men who using these children like this?!

For a whole day, this survey that made the front page of the papers was the talk on radio and TV. And what my friends and I are thinking is, are they really that shocked?!

Now, I don't know whether these parents have been living in caves or been in denial or simply blind, but am not surprised. We know that in this world of

technology, these kids are going to be involved in sex in one form or another - it may not be the physical part of it but certainly, they are no saints!!

When every TV show has sex in and sex-related material in its content - language or the act itself - did these parents actually think that their kids were pure? Come on! I'm shocked they're shocked!!

Kids as young as 11 are engaging in oral sex, and to them, it doesn't qualify as sex. More so, they consider it safe sex.
There are no sex education classes in this country, and sex almost seems taboo as a topic amongst parents and their children. They don't tell, we don't ask. We talk about sex and sexual issues with friends - relying in second hand information and others' opinions.

At their age, when we were twelve, we didn't know what the sex was.
Innocent games we played back then, 'Cha Mama, Cha Baba' (playing a family - mother, father, children), are not so innocent anymore. Some time back on radio,
We shied away from boys. If a boy had the AUDACITY to look at you funny, there was no blushing. It was war.

At university, while still mooching off our folks, we do have sex. Safe sex, yes. But the primary concern is not STDs or HIV, its pregnancy. That's right.

You think of how your parents will kill you if you were to get pregnant - the farthest thing on your mind is gonorrhea or syphillis or herpes. 'It couldn't be as bad as telling dad am preggers'. Right.

African parents are generally conservative. Subjects like sex are almost taboo in households - at least thats how we grew up. The most you'll tell your child about sex is 'don't have sex, you'll get pregnant'. And that's it.

As we grow older, we decide that things will be different with our kids - your mum or dad never gave you the talk on the birds and the bees, and you vow not to do the same to your children. Surprise! Surprise! You're now the mother who tells your daughter that her vagina is a 'button', or God knows what it is you call it.

Parents, open your eyes a little more - this is not the 1970s, the 1980s or the 1990s. Your children are exposed to so many things through so many channels that you can't keep up with. The 21st Century has gadgets you never did have - cellphones, Internet, Internet on cellphones, YouTube, Facebook.
If you do not teach your kids about sex, if you don't tell them about it, if you don't teach them what they need to know, they'll go looking for answers elsewhere - in all the wrong places.