Polly Drew's Sunday Lifestyle column-1/30/05

Miss Drew accepts that teens have, and perhaps should have, oral sex. Therefore, she admonishes adults to tell kids to use flavored condoms, dental dams, cut up condoms or plastic wrap. She even includes a nod to rappers who mention using a barrier during oral sex in their songs. Imagine the responsibility rappers are modeling for the rest of us!!!!

Its not heartening that a marriage and family therapist sees "protection" as the only issue here. In her questioning of her young patients, I hope she at least considers that their participation in oral sex could have something to do with their need of her services. We have spent several generations building the self esteem of girls and breaking down gender biases. Yet, no one seems to want to tell any young teenage girl that being on her knees with a boy's penis in her mouth was not the objective. The Ick factor of this type of casual sex has to be devastating to the teens and to their perception of what intimacy should be. I would hope a therapist would explore where they are headed with their "hooking up" behavior.

Then she advocates that people of all ages "must use a barrier every time they have any kind of sex" . Wow, lets take the most intimate, loving act--the act that binds a couple and brings children into this world--and lets put a barrier into it. But a condom won't be the only barrier. What about suspicion, fear, indifference and all those other emotions that ultimately will ruin the relationship. Is this what we really want sexual intimacy to become?