Trust Women

Today is the 37th anniversary of Roe v. Wade and the 5th annual Blog for Choice event. For the Past 5 years NARAL has been asking bloggers questions related to the right to choose in order to raise awareness for reproductive rights and ask what they mean to us. This year's question is:

In honor of Dr. George Tiller, who often wore a button that simply read, "Trust Women," this year's Blog for Choice question is:
What does Trust Women mean to you?

To me, trusting women is about understanding that we can make our own informed decisions. We do not need to be coddled. We do not need to be told misinformation in order to make the "right decision." We do not need to be forced to look at ultrasounds of the fetus to make a decision that we've already thought long and hard about. We do not need to be ordered by a court to do what is best for us and our families. If kids are given comprehensive sex education they will be given the tools with which to make informed decisions about sex and family planning. Women will have the ability to prevent unwanted pregnancies and to plan families if and when they want to. We need to help women to be able to make the right decisions for them by helping everyone to be educated about sex and sexuality.

I also think that part of trusting women is listening to their stories and having more women coming forward with them (if they so choose) to show that they make hard decisions that are right for them. Abortion especially is so demonized and we normally only talk about it in terms of rape or incest cases, but what about the rest of the women out there who get them? So many women feel like they can't come out and share their stories because they do not want to be demonized or judged for making a decision that was right for them. That was why I shared my story back in August soon after Dr. Tiller's murder. Read it here.

Related reading:
1. STIs and Sexual Responsibility
2. Contraception
3. Can you Get Pregnant from the Withdrawal Method?

In Which I Assess My Future

I've done a lot of thinking lately about what I want out of this upcoming move. Originally this move was going to serve as a vehicle for going to school out in the Bay Area. But I've really been giving this some thought lately. I realized that school wasn't really about furthering my education or widening my opportunities. I was using it as an excuse to stall longer and to network. Sure I knew I'd learn stuff, but I don't think school is really the answer right now. This is not to say that I won't ever go back to school, but for right now it is on hold. And lets face it, unlike undergrad, grad school is not that easy to get out of if you feel like you're not in the right area or school. I hate research. HATE IT! So why was I planning on going to a research university?

So I've reassessed the situation. I'm going to use this upcoming move as a way to start over in my life. I do not want to work in accounting. This was never my goal in life. So after Chicago, accounting is done. As long as I can get domestic partnership benefits through my wife's job I can do what I want! All things considered, this seems very possible for everything she does in the future as long as she stays in her field.

So what do I want to do? Well to start things off, I want to start doing phone sex/advice. I think I need to get back to my sex worker roots. And I need to make money. So I think that will be a good option for me. I'll even get a landline because I despise talking on my cellphone. They're pretty cheap these days through the internets. On top of that I want to get a part time job. Something in non-profit maybe. Definitely something that focuses on sex, sexuality, gender, and education. Hellz to the yes for rewarding jobs! These two things will keep me more focused in my field and hopefully allow me to be more productive with following my career path. I plan to keep up my blog, try to get speaking/teaching gigs, spend a lot of time writing (including my porno screenplay), and I would love to start making porn (writing, directing, and producing). Of course I don't expect everything will go perfectly as planned so I will take whatever comes along that looks like it will make me happy.

The bay area is still the best place to be doing all this in my opinion. There are just way more opportunities out there. However, because I no longer have the requirement of school I also don't have the total final say about where we live. The wife has been really limiting herself to where she'll be able to do post doctoral work by only looking in one place. Its still the number one choice, but there are other possibilities in other places where I may still be able to find community and inspiration. Seattle and Portland, OR are both somewhat on the table. But really, I feel like Oakland/San Francisco are the place for me to be. But we shall see what happens.

I feel really good about this decision. Bring on the future!

How To Be a Sex Educator

Dear Garnet,
I've been wondering for a little while about how one becomes a sex educator. What sort of degrees or certifications do you need? Are there any particular schools that are great for studying sex ed?

Currently I'm a biology major finishing my general education classes at a community college before I transfer to a university. I'm involved in VOX, a Planned Parenthood advocacy group on my campus right now. I really love what I do for this group and I think it would be awesome if I could make it into a career.

It is incredibly difficult for me to answer this question for two reasons. First, there are many different types of sex educators who have differing backgrounds in educational as well as life experience and who teach to varying types of people. Some of these careers require high degrees and some of them don't require any degrees. Some of them are positions you may find with a company or a school and others are entrepreneurial in nature and therefore are whatever you make of them.

Second, and the reason that this question actually made me chuckle, is that I'm trying to figure this one out for myself. I am an aspiring sex educator. I think I'm starting to reach my goals on sex education, but I'm really still trying to figure out what type of sex educator I want to be and how to become that type. Like you, I work for Vox at my school. I also write this blog, review sex toys for a couple different woman-run sex toy shops, work at a woman-run sex toy shop where my title is sex educator, and have done some escorting work for Planned Parenthood.

So really what you have to do is figure out what kind of sex educator you want to be. If you want to work with Planned Parenthood I highly suggest talking to someone at Planned Parenthood about what types of jobs they offer and what is required to fill those jobs. You can also get some of that information on their website here.

For this type of job as well as others in the sex education field, possible topics of study in college can include, but are not limited to medicine, public health, education, anatomy, gender and women's studies, psychology, history, and language (being bilingual can really help with a lot of positions especially in non-profit). Based on this wide possibility of studies its difficult to make a recommendation as far as a particular school to go to. Look around and do your homework before deciding what school you want to attend. The only thing I can recommend would be to look for a pretty liberal school if you want to receive an education that takes diversity into account.

I will be getting my bachelors degree in May from a state university which is pretty average in its undergrad program although it has been rated as one of the top 100 colleges for GLBT students and is a very diverse campus in general. I feel that my gender and women's studies classes have especially helped me to understand a lot of issues involving sexuality, gender, and the intersectionality of different identities. For grad school I plan on attending The Institute for the Advanced Study of Human Sexuality which specializes in sex education and sex therapy. It is my choice to go there to further my education in the sex education field. Some sex educators never even went to college.

So this is really all up to you. There is no real established path to becoming a sex educator. I do recommend that you find well established sex educators who are involved in the kind of sex education that you want to do and write to them. Ask them what paths they took, why they decided to become a sex educator, and ask if they'd be willing to mentor you a little.