[PASSED] Sexual Health and Education Act

[Excidium Planetis]

Cornelia Schultz awakens from her apparent nap.

"Oh, what? What's this, a Sex Ed bill? Hmmm... Yes, I can see problems here. Problems others already addressed thoroughly.

"So to not be repetitive, I will tackle the species issue from an angle not addressed. Many here have said the age limits are inherently human-centric, or at least rely on human-like ages, and thus should not be a universal standard. But many have offered leaving ages up to nations as a solution. That is not a solution, it is merely continued specieism. Speciesism? Am I saying that right?

"Look, some species out there simply don't have sex. They are asexual. So mandating sex ed classes for species unwilling or incapable of having sex is just as ridiculous as making 10 year old... something that lives a long time... take sex ed classes. Sexual Education can not be made mandatory for all WA nations, which is why I will Repeal this $%#&."

[We Couldnt Agree On A Name]

Cornelia Schultz awakens from her apparent nap.

"Oh, what? What's this, a Sex Ed bill? Hmmm... Yes, I can see problems here. Problems others already addressed thoroughly.

"So to not be repetitive, I will tackle the species issue from an angle not addressed. Many here have said the age limits are inherently human-centric, or at least rely on human-like ages, and thus should not be a universal standard. But many have offered leaving ages up to nations as a solution. That is not a solution, it is merely continued specieism. Speciesism? Am I saying that right?

"Look, some species out there simply don't have sex. They are asexual. So mandating sex ed classes for species unwilling or incapable of having sex is just as ridiculous as making 10 year old... something that lives a long time... take sex ed classes. Sexual Education can not be made mandatory for all WA nations, which is why I will Repeal this $%#&."

Vancouvia is already drafting a repeal. I think as the the author of Rights of Sapient Species your expertise would be invaluable.

[Wallenburg]

Wallenburgian Cabinet of War - World Assembly Offices
Message from Chief Representative Mikael Ogenbond

---

The People’s Republic of Wallenburg stands in support of the importance of sexual education of developing youth. However, this resolution—while of benevolent intent—contains so many flaws that it amounts to garbage. Its requirements are often arbitrary or even ridiculous, and overall do more harm than good.

The “establishing” clause requires that all public schools educate children between the ages of ten and eighteen on sexual topics. No child needs eight full years of sexual education in order to understand the risks, responsibilities, and realities of sexual activity. Most children only need mere weeks or even days to gather the necessary information to avoid sexual mishaps. I find the required window for educating children about sex far too broad. It is far too costly, not only to the resources of the state, but also the precious time of the child, who would have far more time to learn essential literary, lingual, mathematical, and scientific skills without so much time wasted on sex education.

The first clause—the main actor and mandate within this resolution—carries the greatest number of flaws and oversights, bringing into question the author’s attention to the important details of dictating educational curricula.

• The arbitrary age requirements regarding when sexual education should begin and end, and at what age children should learn about particular subjects with regard to sexual education. This resolution would require the education of children as young as ten—an age at which almost no child has even begun to develop sexually—on several subjects of sexuality. Such young children should not be exposed to such sensitive and socially taboo topics. The standard for sexual maturity varies in every nation and culture, and cannot be adequately addressed in a piece of international legislation. It serves no purpose to educate children on having sex when they are nearly totally incapable of engaging in sexual activity with one another. The idea of teaching prepubescent children the details of sex and birth control disgusts me, and I can only imagine my colleagues share that sentiment.
• In general, these age requirements do not account for the wide variety of sapient life throughout the Multiverse, but rather only the author’s own species. These requirements could have disastrous effects, requiring infants in some very slowly developing species to learn about sexuality, and allowing nations consisting of rapidly maturing species to hold off sexual education until well into adulthood, or even past the average life expectancy. In other cases, this resolution would require sex education for children of entirely asexual species, a mandate that simply makes no sense. In Wallenburg alone, the Indevian race develops at a slower rate than the human race. Their ten-year-old is the equivalent of an eight-year-old human child. Where the concept of exposing a ten-year-old mind to the concept of sex leaves me extremely uncomfortable, that of exposing an eight-year-old child to such education makes my blood boil. In a total disregard for the racial diversity of the Multiverse, the author has failed entirely to safeguard his very intention of limiting sexual education to a certain window of sexual development.
• The resolution speaks of “STIs”, yet completely fails to define this acronym. Therefore, most member nations will have no idea what this part of the first clause intends to mandate, and must legislate without knowledge of the meaning of “STIs”.
• Additionally, this resolution requires non-human children to learn about human anatomy. While this may be benign in of itself, it further wastes time and educates countless children on a topic that they most likely will never have the slightest need to understand in their adult lives.
• The resolution mandates education on gender identity, when such a topic has absolutely nothing to do with sex or sexuality.
• Many of these requirements—especially when considering the dangers posed by the age-based nature of the mandates—stand in direct contradiction to the resolution’s additional request that “age-appropriateness should be taken into consideration when planning how to approach each topic,” further illustrating the lack of attention to the racial makeup of the several member states.

Clauses two and four create wide gaps that essentially make many of the resolution’s requirements optional. I suppose that is a good thing, considering how awful the requirements of clause one are, but this deeply undermines what little respect I had for this resolution.

• Clause two establishes a very strange parental privilege not afforded when considering a child’s enrollment in any other “mandatory” educational course. It also affords special privileges to students that often would be considered ridiculous in any other educational course. The concept of accommodating modest children flies in the face of pushing them to enlightenment and critical thinking, and the opportunity for either the child or his parent to squander public resources and the opportunity to learn by removing the child from the educational environment.
• In exempting children whose parents object to the course material, this resolution fails to grant the same rights to legal guardians, such as adoptive or foster parents, or organizations devoted to orphaned or abandoned children. This lack of equal rights for legal guardians contributes further to the overall myopia of the resolution at vote.
• The requirement that a standard health course be provided to children who do not participate in this sex education program hardly serves as a supplement to sexual education, and only further demonstrates a lack of consistency in the author’s claimed desire to improve youth understanding of sexuality.
• The exemption of all privately-owned schools from the mandates of this resolution again creates conflict between this resolution’s supposed goal and what it actually realizes. Affording private schools special exemptions would never be tolerated for such subjects as mathematics or chemistry or world history. Why should we give them leeway regarding sexual education? They should have to meet the same standards as any other school.

These two clauses together effectively exempt all students from a mandated course in sexual education, which begs the question: does this even mandate sex education? It repeatedly stresses the importance of such education, yet leaves explicit means by which essentially any child may remove himself or be removed from a course on sex education. This resolution confuses me in this manner, and leaves me uncertain as to whether I oppose it for its ridiculous mandates, or for its ridiculous exceptions to its mandates.

Basic grammar errors, such as improper capitalization, riddle this resolution, and further degrade its already abysmal quality.

Furthermore, I find it difficult to decide where the perambulatory clauses end and the real active clauses begin, as the “hereby” clause—traditionally the beginning clause to the active portion of any General Assembly proposal—has nothing below it, and only mandates “mandatory Comprehensive Sexual Education curriculum in public schools worldwide.” This leaves me in the difficult situation of interpreting the resolution at vote based on its legal construction, or based on the clear intent of the author to include several of the other clauses as active mandates.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the utter refusal of the author to even consider participating in a drafting phase or even discussion of his proposal now turned resolution underscores a terrible lack of courage and overabundance of ineptitude. This novice writer, as documented by other delegations, has stubbornly pushed this through the proposal phase several times, and has done only enough to make this resolution barely legal. Drafting and discussion between ambassadors are crucial tools to writing polished, capable, and agreeable resolutions. There is no alternative. That the author has ignored both the traditions of the World Assembly and its most vital instruments for improving prospective resolutions appalls me.

The Wallenburgian delegation is proud to be the first one to vote on this resolution, against its passage. We shall fully support any repeal of this resolution, should it smear the pages of World Assembly law with its text.

[Wrapper]

Won't somebody please think of the children!

I'd say "nice try" but not really.

What I find really interesting is that this is getting nearly universally panned here on the forum, but is passing by an almost three-to-one margin. There was no campaign for this, was there?

[Tinfect]

Won't somebody please think of the children!

I'd say "nice try" but not really.

What I find really interesting is that this is getting nearly universally panned here on the forum, but is passing by an almost three-to-one margin. There was no campaign for this, was there?

OOC:
No, but this Proposal is titled the Sexual Health and Education Act. It's majority support comes from people who like that idea, but didn't read the proposal, it's majority opposition is the same crowd as the Right to Life region, they are not the majority of players, and don't have the best of reputations.
I'd wager that most of the support comes from the aforementioned people that only read the title, and the people who don't want to be seen as the other side\.

[The Crystal North]

After reading your proposal, the government of the Crystal North wishes to express some concerns:

01: Can you please clarify what sort of sexual education you would define as "non-threatening" or "distressing"? If these criteria are what potential exemptions are going to be based on, then a definition should probably be included in the bill itself.

02: Likewise, at what point would sexual education material be considered "pornographic"? By its very nature, sexual education will be dealing with issues that blur the line between safe and pornography and a more specific definition will be needed.

03: The bill in its current form is considerably human-centric. The best example of this is the age bracket being proposed. This is clearly tailored to a human-focused anatomy and does not account for the biological differences of other species such as us.

04: Making this proposal entirely optional seems to defeat the purpose of providing comprehensive sexual education in the first place. If students are allowed to excuse themself from such a course then there is little incentive for schools to implement this policy.

For these reasons, the Crystal North will have to vote against the bill as it is currently written. However, if the author amends the bill and implements the changes listed above, the Crystal North will happily change its stance on the matter.

Placebo
Minister of Health
Democratic Republic of the Crystal North

[We Couldnt Agree On A Name]

Won't somebody please think of the children!

I'd say "nice try" but not really.

What I find really interesting is that this is getting nearly universally panned here on the forum, but is passing by an almost three-to-one margin. There was no campaign for this, was there?

I'm convinced that a campaign by opponents would put a lid on it right quick.

[Ghostopolis]

Ambassador Geist floats down to a nearby podium. Glancing about with a smile, he begins to speak.

"I want to start by saying it's good to be back, this assembly has been much too quiet as of late. As delegate of The Versutian Federation, I have cast my vote against the resolution in question. While I believe the intent behind this resolution is laudable, and even agree with its aim, I cannot support this legislation in its present form. All member nations are bound by these resolutions, whether they are a proper fit or not. This resolution should have allowed for enough flexibility that any member nation could tailor it to fit their unique situation, and not been designed with one species and one way of addressing this subject in mind. Perhaps a proper review period could have made this possible, but the author skipped even this step. This resolution is not ready."

[Vingo]

While I support comprehensive sex education, I've voted against this motion because it allows parents to pull their kids out of classes.

It seems to me that if kids can be removed from any/all sex ed classes in public schools it is neither comprehensive or educational.

School kids have a right to be taught how their bodies work, about gender identity and sexual identity, and parental phobias or religious persuasions must not function as a block to said kids right to knowledge in this area.

I voted against because this bill allows parents to remove/pull their kids from sex ed classes. This isn't, in my opinion either desirable or sensible. Indeed it effectively prevents sex education classes from fulfilling their purpose: of educating all kids, and ensuring no kid is left without a basic knowledge of such issues.

[Wiganica]

Disclaimer, I have nothing to do with this, but it was recently submitted and is close to achieving quorum. Feel free to debate. I'll TG an invitation to the author shortly.

Sexual Health and Education Act

A resolution to promote funding and the development of education and the arts.

Category: Education and Creativity

Area of Effect: Educational

Proposed by: Zenatias

Description: The purpose of this act is to ensure that all public school students of specified ages are given access to factual, educational, non-threatening material in regards to sexual education.

ACKNOWLEDGING- That due to certain cultural/religious/personal beliefs, many people encourage "abstinence-only" lessons for minors. However, "Comprehensive" Sex Education has proven to be more effective in terms of reducing the number of teenage pregnancies worldwide, and the spread of sexually-transmitted infections, as well as making minors feel more comfortable and informed about their bodies.

ESTABLISHING- That all public schools include comprehensive Sex Education as part of their course curriculum, for those aged 10 to 18 years old.

CLARIFYING- The aspects of the act

1) The curriculum must give students accurate information on STIs, teen pregnancy, reproductive rights, pubescence, sexuality, gender identity, human anatomy, and methods of birth control. For those between the ages of 10 and 13 years old, only information on pubescence, sexuality, gender identity, and human anatomy are required. For students aged 13 and up, the curriculum must include lessons on STIs, teenage pregnancy, reproductive rights, and birth control as well. Age-appropriateness should be taken into consideration when planning how to approach each topic.

2) Parents may exempt their children from the entire course through contacting the school. Children may be excused from a particular lesson if they find the material to be upsetting, offensive, or distressing. Every effort should be made to accommodate modest children who are embarrassed by course materials, such as not requiring such students to answer a given question out loud. Students excused from the required course will be required to take a standard health course instead. Students asking to be excused from a particular lesson may sit in the hallway outside of the classroom or go to a designated study hall at the discretion of the teacher.

3) This course will not advocate underage sexual activity. Instead, this course will make the children aware of the emotional and physical risks of underage sexuality, and will instruct them how to look out for their best interests. Class materials should be factual, non-threatening, and thorough. However, pornographic content is strictly prohibited; this includes pornographic videos, images, writings, and other visuals.

4) It is not mandatory for private education to systems to offer Sex Education lessons, but encouraged nonetheless.

HEREBY- Establishes mandatory Comprehensive Sexual Education curriculum in public schools worldwide.

very smart proposal. We must pass the act

[United Great Britian]

Official Statement of United Great Britian
from the office of Prime Minister David Gorge

---

The Allied States of United Great Britian would like the international community to understand their views on the issue, to that end I, David Gorge do hereby approve the release of the following statement to all delegations of nations currently present on the floor of the General Assembly:

The Allied States of United Great Britian are appalled by the fact that the delegates of such esteemed regions as The Communist Bloc would blindly vote in favor of this awful act when the flaws have been clear from the start. Furthermore, The Allied States of United Great Britian see this act as an attack against the sovereignty of all nations and against all non-human species. The Allied States of United Great Britian sees this as blatant discrimination.

If this act passes and a repeal of this act is to fail, then The Allied States of United Great Britian shall immediately leave the World Assembly to form a competing body known as the Assembly of Nationstates.

[Separatist Peoples]

I'd say "nice try" but not really.

What I find really interesting is that this is getting nearly universally panned here on the forum, but is passing by an almost three-to-one margin. There was no campaign for this, was there?

I'm convinced that a campaign by opponents would put a lid on it right quick.

OOC: not if nobody campaigns against it. I literally can't. Somebody else has to step up.

[United Great Britian]

I'm convinced that a campaign by opponents would put a lid on it right quick.

OOC: not if nobody campaigns against it. I literally can't. Somebody else has to step up.

OOC: I am currently contacting some of the powerful delegates to attempt to convince them to change their vote or at least join us here in discussion.

[Xi Xua]

Xi Xua will not accept an Act like this one and votes against it. While the idea of Sexual Education might be well-intended, this bill is compromised by various passages being too vague or too liberal. Instead of changing the Status quo, the writer tries to appeal to every political spectrum, in fact wasting all our time instead of changing anything. See the following points:

"The purpose of this act is to ensure that all public school students of specified ages are given access to factual, educational, non-threatening material in regards to sexual education."

The term of non-threatening per se is far too vague to mean anything. In more conservative learning institutes, books about rabbits and bees will be given out, as all other might be too threatening, This will mean a difference in education. We must stay clear, that the material will be taught, instead of providing a leeway for prude parents to protest against, putting pressure on schools to reduce the niveau. Additionally, to exclude private schools is another way to prevent pupils in learning, undermining this bill again.

- We must make sure, that this bill will reach all and every pupil without a way to undermine the value of Sexual Education! This means creating material centrally and including private schools, basically removing schools from the creation of learning materials completely.

"That all public schools include comprehensive Sex Education as part of their course curriculum, for those aged 10 to 18 years old."

Again, this is way too vague. Part of course curriculum for those aged 10-18 years old could mean 2 hours on a sunny summer days shortly before graduation if the school feels more conservative. Sexual Education has enough things to fill lessons for a few semesters, although the basic knowledge should be minimized and integrated into regular school courses. For the age of 10-18, this is simply teaching farmers how to hold the cow´s leash. With researches showing, that first sexual encounters starting with 12 and the median of first sexual encounters being with 16, teaching them about the risk with 18, where it won´t even be teenage pregnancy in some countries anymore is far too late, while teaching them with 10 is way too late.

- We must make sure, that quantity and time of the material must meet the need, if we want to have this bill to have success. The best way would be to include the first part - pubescence, gender identity, and human anatomy - into 5th Grade as biology lessons, half a semester long of one lesson a week. The rest - STIs, teenage pregnancy,sexuality, reproductive rights, and birth control - should be included into 7th or 8th Grade the same way, included into biology class for half a year.

Parents may exempt their children from the entire course through contacting the school. Children may be excused from a particular lesson if they find the material to be upsetting, offensive, or distressing. Every effort should be made to accommodate modest children who are embarrassed by course materials, such as not requiring such students to answer a given question out loud. Students excused from the required course will be required to take a standard health course instead. Students asking to be excused from a particular lesson may sit in the hallway outside of the classroom or go to a designated study hall at the discretion of the teacher.

This is another way of undermining the lessons. Not only will parents pull out their kids out of this lessons due to their own religious, worldly or otherwise beliefs, now the students will have the same chance. If you explain a group of pre-teens or teenager, they do not have to listen to the lesson, then they won´t. From a class of 20, 6 will be excused due to their parents, 10 will wait outside on their own and the only few left inside will be marked down as "too emberrassed", rendering the whole lesson useless. Forcing them to attend a standard health course again undermines the meaning of school as a place of learning, wasting everyone´s time, especially since there was no explaination of "standard health course".

- We must not allow any student to be excused of Sexual Education! All lessons taught at Sexual Education has to be equalized to other lessons, otherwise there is no meaning in this bill at all! Sexuality might appear shameful or embarressing, but the whole point of this Education is to remove that stigma.

This course will not advocate underage sexual activity. Instead, this course will make the children aware of the emotional and physical risks of underage sexuality, and will instruct them how to look out for their best interests. Class materials should be factual, non-threatening, and thorough. However, pornographic content is strictly prohibited; this includes pornographic videos, images, writings, and other visuals.

Again, there is no definition of pornographic and non-threatening. As for pornographic, while there has to be drawn a line with showing adult films, simple pictures of naked humans are neccessary if you teach human anatomy or later on sexuality. Additionally describing intercourse and other kinds of sexual act might be needed for lessons regarding sexual identity.

- We must make sure to prevent usage of vague wordings in this act. The best change would be to forbid material not provided by the centralized board of schools instead.

4) It is not mandatory for private education to systems to offer Sex Education lessons, but encouraged nonetheless.

HEREBY- Establishes mandatory Comprehensive Sexual Education curriculum in public schools worldwide.

[/quote]

-This Act establishes no mandatory Sexual Education at all, there are various loopholes where schools, parents and students can simply remove themselfs from this Act, or if not possible, to sabotage the whole lesson. Additionally to that, the whole Education is not described any further, opening the position to decide on decent education to people with inedequate knowledge, false conviction or - worse - even people with harmful intentions. This Act must fail and then be rewritten, using clear language, timelines and description of used material. While we must respect people with conservative worldview and more prudely religion, we must make Sexual Education the equivalent of other classes or it will fail. And we cannot make amends in classes due to students religion, otherwise we could remove history lessons in favor of creationism.

[Jiakros]

OOC: Yes.

IC: We here at Jiakros consider this an intelligent decision, and support it heavily. We hope that we can finally enforce truth on right-wing states.

(Signed by Adrian Ahlstrom. Emoticons removed)

[Separatist Peoples]

OOC: Yes.

IC: We here at Jiakros consider this an intelligent decision, and support it heavily. We hope that we can finally enforce truth on right-wing states.

(Signed by Adrian Ahlstrom. Emoticons removed)

"Which nearly ignores the issues this has for states without ages of majority or consent that line up with those in the law. Or species with different lifespans. This is a fucking mess that nobody should support."

[Xi Xua]

OOC: Yes.

IC: We here at Jiakros consider this an intelligent decision, and support it heavily. We hope that we can finally enforce truth on right-wing states.

(Signed by Adrian Ahlstrom. Emoticons removed)

It doesn´t enforce anything, parents can still opt out, schools can and the whole process is a vague as possible. How is it different from what we have now?

[Lychgate]

WA Chapter, Office of International Representation, Department of the Interior, dated 11031 S.F.

Despite the fact that this proposal managed to achieve quorum and garner a 4000+ vote plurality within the first 24 hours in the voting hall, it is, as many others have stated, completely human-centric. Not to engage in another argument, but rather to showcase additional evidence, the WA Chapter of the Office of International Representation hereby notes the following about GA Proposal #359:

-Does not even mention cross-species breeding
-Fails to account for the possibility of LGBTQ students and a possible desire to remain unaffiliated with predominantly heterosexual sexual education classes
-Completely ignores asexual students and species
-Continues to constantly mention teen pregnancies and other P-13 material, yet desires to "educate" children as young as ten years old, many of whom have not entered a pubescent stage and/or are not mature enough to handle those facts
-Disappointed by the absence of a "peer pressure" factor, in which an embarrassed child refuses to leave a sensitive-material class on the grounds of being made fun of by his/her/its peers
-Ignores gender neutral students
-Fails to accomodate for homeschooled children
-Desires universality in sexual education, yet limits the effects of the proposal to public schools only, ignoring private, prep, boarding, and religious schools

As stated by Department of the Interior Premier Yagli Opperit and the WA Chapter of the Office of International Representation

[Holy Jakelandion Empire]

Why is this even debated? Of course not, I will leave the WA if this is passed, because my Christian schools will not accept this. I always hated Health class, especially the stuff.

[Separatist Peoples]

Why is this even debated? Of course not, I will leave the WA if this is passed, because my Christian schools will not accept this. I always hated Health class, especially the stuff.

"Go for it. Your resignation won't affect anything. Even when we disagree with the proposal, the C.D.S.P. is always happy to see this particular form of emotional blackmail against the author rooted out. Frankly, I'm surprised the legalization of gay marriage and abortion by the WA didn't chase you out sooner."

[Amundea]

Why is this even debated? Of course not, I will leave the WA if this is passed, because my Christian schools will not accept this. I always hated Health class, especially the stuff.

Madame Kelley Estevez, Amundean ambassador:

. . . Stuff? What stuff?

[Islamic Meritocratic Transoxiana]

Why is this even debated? Of course not, I will leave the WA if this is passed, because my Christian schools will not accept this. I always hated Health class, especially the stuff.

Speaking for all Muslims on NS, we stand against this evil act with every grain of our bodies and souls. The WA has no more right to do this than I do of asking the WA to impose our moral code on the West. (And if this resolution passes, which at this point, seems likely, we shall respond by declaring all education in Transoxiana private, with a tuition fee of 1 milliliter of air. We call upon all of our brothers in faith, Muslim or not, and humanity to respond in the same way.)

[Anaximander]

Hi,

Anaximander is new to the General Assembly and was not aware when applying for membership that the Assembly was a forum for making school board level decisions at a global level. It seems to contradict the basic political fact of having sovereign Nations if these Nations are compelled to conduct social micromanagement in a globally uniform way.

That said, this particular resolution compensates for its sweeping scope by being of virtually no effect in practice. It would not affect Nations which already have compulsory sexual education on so its only effect would be on Nations which do not compel sexual education. These Nations could easily recommend to their own populations to have their children not attend the courses that these Nations are compelled under duress to provide, as exemption is allowed under "Clarifying (2)" . In this case, the only children attending would be those whose parents believe in the kind of sexual education addressed in the resolution, precisely those parents who would be willing and able to provide this sexual education in a more comfortable and trusting environment, the home, in a way that is suited to each child.

[Sepland]

Sepland's representatives to the WA are concerned that this resolution has an exception provision. Health education should not be an option, and it is not in Sepland.

While we vote yes on this resolution in the hopes that reactionary nations will see a defeat, we will push for mandatory health education for all!

[Normlpeople]

"Since this garbage is passing" Clover said "We've already distributed 'opt-out' forms to every student, to be signed and returned immediately. As the entirety of our student populations parents will have 'contacted the school', we can be in compliance without wasting resources on this racism."