{"id":2740,"date":"2011-05-18T12:40:41","date_gmt":"2011-05-18T17:40:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/girlwpen.com\/?p=2740"},"modified":"2011-05-18T12:40:41","modified_gmt":"2011-05-18T17:40:41","slug":"girl-talk-the-other-sex-talk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/2011\/05\/18\/girl-talk-the-other-sex-talk\/","title":{"rendered":"GIRL TALK: The Other Sex Talk"},"content":{"rendered":"

I started talking with my 8-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter about sexuality as soon as they started to ask questions like, \u201cHow are babies made?\u201d \u00a0From my point of view, books have all the answers, and I turned to It\u2019s So Amazing: A Book about Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families<\/em><\/a> by Robie H. Harris and Michael Emberley as a starting point.<\/p>\n

But recent news has me wondering how and when to initiate other, more difficult conversations about sexuality and power.<\/p>\n

For example, my neighbor and I were talking over our 10-year-old daughters\u2019 heads at the bus stop on Monday morning about Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund who has been arrested and charged<\/a> with sexually attacking a maid.<\/p>\n

Our conversation went like this:<\/p>\n

Neighbor: \u201cDid you see the news about Dominique Strauss-Kahn?\u201d<\/p>\n

Me: \u201cYes, it really does show that incidents like that are about power.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neighbor: \u201cThat\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

My daughter Maya hovered nearby, sensing that we were discussing something juicy, but not entirely understanding.\u00a0 She interrupted us with a question about school, and we changed the subject.<\/p>\n

And then yesterday the news broke that Arnold Schwarzenegger fathered a child<\/a> with one of his household employees.<\/p>\n

I admit to turning the paper facedown on the kitchen table.\u00a0 I would have found a way to talk about the Schwarzenegger story, of course, but I wasn\u2019t eager to have the conversation.<\/p>\n

As someone who jumped in early with the \u201csex talk,\u201d I wonder why I\u2019m shying away from talking about sexuality and power.\u00a0 Maybe I want to protect my children from linking sexuality and violence when they still want to believe the best about people\u2019s intentions.\u00a0 After reading Veronica Arreola\u2019s great post, \u201cCan We Whistle Stereotypes Away?<\/a>\u201d I think I might be doing a better service to my kids if I\u2019m honest in acknowledging that some men abuse power over women.<\/p>\n

GWP readers, what do you think?\u00a0 Is there a right time for the other sex talk?\u00a0 Do you have advice about how to navigate this topic?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I started talking with my 8-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter about sexuality as soon as they started to ask questions like, \u201cHow are babies made?\u201d \u00a0From my point of view, books have all the answers, and I turned to It\u2019s So Amazing: A Book about Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families by Robie H. Harris […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1905,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21103],"tags":[851,2397,8959,21395,4374,868,176,133],"class_list":["post-2740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-girl-talk","tag-body","tag-boys","tag-families","tag-girls","tag-parenting","tag-power","tag-sexuality","tag-violence"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1905"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2740\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}