New education program in N.B. raises questions about modern sex-ed

[ckramer]

FREDERICTON (CP) - A new sex education program in New Brunswick, which includes such topics as masturbation, orgasm and oral sex, has raised new questions about the place of the birds and the bees in the modern classroom.

A growing number of parents are demanding removal of the new curriculum.

"This curriculum is an assault on the children of New Brunswick," says Dr. Carolyn Barry, a physician in the Fredericton area and mother of six children.

"Children are 10 and 11 when they start this program in Grade 6, and they are being presented with concepts of oral sex, mutual masturbation, anal sex, oral-anal sex. It absolutely contravenes our community standards."

The controversy in the Maritime province shows that although sex education is now a basic fact of life in most Canadian classrooms, it still has the power to stir deep-seated feelings about how much children should learn about sex, and when.

Barry and other parents who have expressed their outrage at public meetings around the province say the new sex-ed curriculum will create a more sexually permissive, anything-goes society.

"It will change the culture of New Brunswick," she says.

Some parents say they want a program that talks more about abstinence.

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