Oh boy. Last night’s Glee was a good one, and chock full of great potential blog topics: love triangles forming, childhood dreams dashed, and underage
Image: Glee on Fox
drinking. For those who devoured watched last night’s episode though, it’s obvious that the most important topic was teen sex. Rachel and Finn (Finchel) and Kurt and Blaine (Klaine) both “did it” for the first time in the episode – storylines that are burning up the blogosphere at this very moment (read some of the buzz here here and here).
Here’s my two cents: In the best of all possible worlds, teenagers wouldn’t be thinking about such weighty topics as sexual relationships, pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, and sexual orientation. Instead they would be busy singing and dancing, running and playing, reading and writing. But, we don’t live in a fantasy world: we live here. And where I live, teens have sex on the brain. Almost all the time. And guess what? It’s been that way for a long time – generations in fact. To deny this is dangerous and narrow-minded, and can lead to some scary consequences for teens and parents (unwanted pregnancies, life-threatning diseases, sexual abuse, and more).
So while I would have liked to see at least one of the couples decide to wait to have sex (in the interest of showing both sides of the argument), I think the folks over at Glee did a nice job portraying Finchel and Klaine’s first times. Safe sex was discussed, the pros and cons of sexual intimacy were presented, and no hot-and-heavy scenes were shown. Moving forward, I hope the writers include the heartbreak and regret that can – and often does – accompany a teen’s first sexual experience. In the interest of showing teen sexuality as it really exists, I think this is essential. Perhaps Rachel might begin to regret the event, Blaine might become jealous of Kurt’s other friends, Finn might realize that sex with Rachel isn’t all that much fun, or someone posts details of the event on Facebook. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what’s in store in the episodes to come.
In the meantime, here are some ideas for talking to the teens in your life about sex: