Brook Position Statement - quality of sex

We support an holistic, rights based approach to sex, sexuality and sexual health and believe that we should be talking openly and confidently with children and young people about relationships, emotions, love, trust, sexuality and sex, including sexual pleasure.  

Brook’s position on the quality of sex

Brook believes that the quality of sex amongst young people is a public health issue that needs urgent attention.  Whilst we welcome a public policy focus on teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections young people tell us they are constantly told about the negative aspects of sex without any discussion about the quality of sex and how they might enjoy it in the future.

The UK has an uncomfortable attitude towards sex, and this is never truer than when it comes to young people and sex.  A mythology exists, fuelled at least in part by the media, that young people have sex at a much younger age than they actually do, that teenage pregnancy rates are rising and are higher than they ever were, and that sexually transmitted infections are rocketing out of control.   None of these statements is accurate.

The facts are;

• the average age of first sex is 16(1)
• teenage pregnancy rates are at their lowest for almost 30 years at 40.6 per thousand 15-17 year olds in England and Wales(2)
• there has been a notable decline in some STIs in younger adults in recent years.   Between 2008 and 2010 in England, diagnoses of genital warts cases in women and men aged 15-19 fell by 13% and 8% while those of gonorrhoea fell by 13% and 14% respectively.(3)

Brook believes that talking to young people about the quality of sex is crucially important.    Young people tell us that adults – parents, educators and health and social care professionals – focus almost exclusively on the negative consequences of sex and generally fail to balance this with discussion about sexual pleasure, emotions and qualities within relationships. 

As a result children and young people, who grow up in a highly sexualised culture, are exposed to confusing mixed messages. On the one hand, sex is everywhere. On the other, real, quality discussions about sexual choices, consent and pleasure are starkly absent. 

Evidence shows that in countries where they have a more open and positive culture about sexuality and sex, young people are more likely to have sex for reasons that most reasonable adults would consider the right ones; because they were in a trusting relationship or because they felt they were ready.

And when they do have sex they are more likely to use contraception, practise safer sex and regret it less than their UK counterparts.

In contrast evidence, including empirical evidence from our clinical, support and education work shows that many young people in the UK have sex for reasons that most people would consider unfortunate;  because they were drunk; because they wanted to find out what it was; because they thought their friends were.

In addition Brook sees a significant number of young people who are unsure whether they have had sex, what it is and whether they want it anyway.  The younger they are, the more likely they are to regret it.

It is clear common sense, backed up by evidence from our services including the Ask Brook Information Service, that where (young) people have the knowledge and skills they need to make active choices about their relationships and sexual activity, they are more likely to protect themselves against the negative emotional and physical consequences of coercive, undecided or unwanted sex.

It is on this basis that Brook is arguing for a more grown up dialogue about young people and sexual health.  Brook believes we must take a holistic, rights based approach to sex, sexuality and sexual health, which in practical terms means talking openly and confidently - at home, in school and the community - with children and young people about relationships, emotions, love, trust, sexuality and sex, including sexual pleasure.

If we fail to do so will we continue to perpetuate our peculiar culture and leave in its wake another generation of young people for whom sex is often not fulfilling, but unrewarding, unsatisfactory and much less than they deserve.

References

1 K Wellings et al, Sexual behaviour in Britain: early heterosexual experience, The Lancet, Vol 358, December 1 2001
2 Conceptions in England and Wales 2009., Office for National Statistics 2011
3 Health Protection Agency, STI annual data tables England 2001-2010, HPA, 2011

Publication date: November 2011