Sex education: always good for a laugh

Press, 1 February 1986, Page 14

Sex education: always good for a laugh

“How was your sex education talk?” I asked my intermediate school daughter. “It was cool,” she said. “We all had a cack attack.” (Pre-teen lingo for hysterics). “What about the boys?” I enquired knowing they were to have been instructed separately. “They had a Cack attack too.” (Obviously hysterica! stuff this sex education!) It got me thinking about my own sex education or what passed for such in those dim dark days.

All my instruction was from the virgin pure sisters of religion. No crude facte sullied their otherworldly outpourings. Instead they managed to imbue us with the fear, of the Lord without ever telling us what it was that would bring the wrath of the Almighty upon us. Looking back I sincerely wonder whether they knew any facte to pass on. Most had entered the convent very young and were the products of strict and sheltered upbringing themselves. The good sisters talked about “occasions of sin” and stressed that these should be studiously avoided. If we succumbed we could expect the. wrath

of the Lord to be swift. In exceptional cases, an. elderly Irish nun informed us, it would be heralded by; the wail of the banshee. An unforgettable sound which she , had heard many times in her native Ireland. . ... For the uninitiated, the banshee is a creature of Irish folklore which by its wailing gives warning of the retribution of the Almighty ... quite often a death in the family. The gist of our sex education was that we

' were to keep ourselves i pure at all costs. “Put a high price on yourselves girls,” the nuns were fond of saying, “don’t sell yourselves cheap.” Maria Goretti was held up to us as a model. She was a young French girl . who had died of multiple - stab wounds at the hands of her would-be seducer rather than submit to “the occasion of sin.” Many years later Maria

Goretti’s mother had been present at the ceremony when the Catholic church had made her a saint. Wouldn’t our own mothers be proud, the nuns concluded rapturously. Unfortunately (although I suppose it was fortunate in many ways) we could not live up to their giddy expectations. Because, although it might be hard to believe in these permisslve days, most (if not all)

of us had no idea what the story of Maria Gbretti was really- all about. • •; But came the 'day when one brave fourteen-year-old raised her hand.... “What was the sin Maria Goretti did not want to commit?” The old Irish nun who had never been lost for»~ words before • <looked< > aghast, “ You’re top young! , When you are older.youni understand.” ; / ../ ; \ . ./ 'f, ' Naturally.: dur sex education would hot. havp been;fully rounded with/: out some masculine input.' The parish priest was called in. 1 ; . > Time passed swiftly and all too sodn with our sex and formal education complete we set out into, the world of the early sixties. Ears shrewdly cocked for the howl of the banshee, we precariously side-stepped the occasions of sin in our four-inch stilettos.,, ,?: ■ . But the lessons of the good .sisters!?were? means lost?’ A’: couple of ' years /later a few of us girls were sitting around discussing our sexual adventures when we recalled.' the; 'old; refrain' from ourconvent days.. “Put- a High /price: on yourselves, girls. Don’t.sell yourselves, cheap.” We

Z■ ,/ * |: considered /these words , eyenj/as -we, /'sipped oiir mixed drinks,/when the resident wit asked ... , “Do you think ten pounds an hour Is enough?” Well ... talk about laugh ... we nearly had a cack attack!