Sex ed talk with my parents never happened.
While handing me a book, they said sex was about making babies.
(This is why I strongly believed my parents had sex only three times in their lives; once for each of their kids)
So my sex ed basically was a sink or swim kinda thing with as a result the answer to your “why sex” question being “to keep men in a relationship with me”, until recently.

I strongly believe that sex ed should start at kindergarten age (taking the opportunity to break the heterosexual norm btw). I am also very doubtful that the sex talk in adolescent years changes anything in the mind of a person. The education is pretty much over by that time, influenced by peers, media and what has been experienced in family life.

Maybe the teenager-big-talk’s purpose is for parents to check whether their kids got it right. See if they have to adjust their child’s ideas and opinions just a bit or confirm that they are on the right track.

My kid is only one years old so keep me posted about how you did it so I can pick up some ideas!

Being VERY picky, obviously, but aren’t the 2 guys Indonesian/Malay rather than “white?”

Not that it makes a huge amount of difference (other than sinking the racial connotations you’re trying to ascribe to the ‘artist’) as it’s still an unoriginal, rather contrived, rape-fantasy which doesn’t do anything for me.

As for the relationship-ed Lisa, I think just letting him know that you’re there and open-minded enough to talk through anything is probably enough. He’s going to make mistakes regardless of what you say and/or do, and that’s not a bad thing.

There are several episodes in my sex/relationship-life which still, on recollection, have the power to make me visibly cringe or laugh aloud. Whilst I regret any hurt I unintentionally caused my early girlfriends, I guess I had to make mistakes in order to learn from them. I’ll occasionally think back and kick myself for being so shy/awkward, but nothing my parents said (or could have said) would have fundamentally changed my experience.

If I had a son (two daughters, and not old enough for this yet TG) my one piece of advice would be to not panic about when or how you’re going to lose your virginity.

I know that’ll probably sound shallow (hell, I WAS shallow as a teenager, and completely at the mercy of my hormones), but it seemed to be the driving force in my life for way too long. That and terminal shyness / inexperience with girls (my school had a 1F-6M ratio whilst I was there) meant I didn’t have a clue until well into Uni and set me up to be easy pickings for my ex.

And don’t worry about his marriage spiel (if you are worried that is) as I used to be quite adamant that I wouldn’t get married (6 years last month) or have kids (2 and that’s definitely it!).

Of course, like I said, defining “art” is VERY hard to do, maybe even impossible. Dictionaries notwithstanding.

The real indicator in my books is the exercise of the creative process.

Syfr, I think you win the prize for the best advice, though, and it reminds me that I do want to ask their dad if he’ll provide a brief crash-course in the actual effective and efficient use of condoms (ie, how to tell what size you need, how to put them on properly without popping them, how to remove them without destroying their efficacy, etc. etc.)

Fac, I dunno about that definition of “art;” by that definition, if I whipped my pants off in the middle of the street and took a dump in front of several total strangers and said that that was my personal self-expression of the Bush administration, by your definition, it’d qualify as “art.” That’s like defining “food” as “anything you put in your mouth, chew and swallow that you first tell others is something they should eat that’s good for them and/or tasty too.”

Art has always been up for debate, and I suppose that’s as good of a place as any to start. I remember my first year at Ryerson, the Communications class and Art History class had a cross-disciplinary assignment/discussion about the oldest question in creativity….”What is Art?”. Oddly enough, I was having this conversation last night with a friend.

The best I could come up with is “art is the creative expression of an idea or concept that evokes an emotional response from the “viewer”, which contains many meanings”. GOOD art resonates on a deep level, pop-art, otherwise known as (popular) crap, tends to operate on the same principle as sales (perceived value). Put another way, good art makes people want it, crap art is marketed well and thus valuable.

Call me cynical.

The 4 photo “gang rape” scene is a startlingly compact social commentary, and can be easily shown to have a dualistic (at least) meaning (or potential morality), which in my mind would indeed qualify it as “art”, although the “good” appellation is unearned.

I could explain, but prove it to yourself…try and look at it in as many ways possible, what story could be being told. Can you come up with 2? 3? 6?

That’s how I usually begin anyhow…

The sex-ed aspect of the post also brings a couple of thoughts to my mind. First is the reticence many parents face this with, which I regard as a direct descendant of a Puritanical mindset passed through the generations. The reluctance to address this subject, while not universally a Western phenomenon, certainly seems exacerbated by the taboo placed on the subject matter.

As for the ex being reluctant, I’ll just leave you with the concept that men have not exactly been encouraged to be comfortable with their own sexuality, definitely not recently. Perhaps that factors somewhere.

Personally, I think that rather than having “the talk”, this subject is best approached on an ad hoc basis, with certain points addressed separately, but tied to previous education/talks. Being open about sex (within limits) around your kids is far better sex education than being an uptight prude with encyclopedic knowledge who can conduct a killer seminar.

And I sympathize, since I have 2 girls that ask a fair number of “embarrassing” questions…

Things I would tell my (theoretical) kid about sex:

-there’s no shame in waiting until you are ready.
-know your boundaries, and be willing to leave if they are crossed.
-respect her boundaries, and stop when she says stop.
-lots of people lie about their experience, so you don’t have to believe the guys who say they’ve had like, 62 women.
-hold on to the base of the condom when pulling out.

It occurred to me after posting earlier that I often told my daughter what *not* to do about sex. But once she turned 18 I never discussed with her what things to look for in a sexually intimate relationship. IOW, I mentioned all the negatives and completely missed talking about the many positives. Damn! I wish now that I could have a do over.

In some ways I think talking to someone of the opposite sex could be really useful, especially for a heterosexual person. After all, you know about your own sexuality, but insight into the other side of things is harder to get.

And I agree with Danny that the fastest way to shut down that conversation and many future ones is to make it clear to your kid that you already have your idea of who he is, and his opinion in the matter is irrelevant because he’s just a stupid teenager. Not only will he figure it out and never come to you for anything again, you’ll (perhaps irreparably) damage your relationship with your son. The best thing you can keep in mind, if you ask me, is that even though you went through similar shit and you have your own experiences, you are not your son. Your son has had different experiences and different thoughts about those experiences, and to find out what he’s thinking, you actually have to ask. The only thing I think you should lecture him on is the necessity of using the standard of enthusiastic participation, but perhaps you could frame it in the context of your own experience with men for whom your enthusiastic participation was unimportant. If it were my kid, that would be what I emphasized – it’s cool as long as everyone involved is happy to be there, consenting, communicative, and safe, and beyond that it’s none of the parents’ business unless he chooses to include you.

I’m pretty sure neither my son nor I are thrilled that I am his opposite-sex parent in this specific case, but it is what it is.

As an aside, I’m not thrilled with this notion that parents—or in the case of classroom sex-ed, teachers—of the same gender as a child are magically better able to talk to that child about teh sex. I mean, sure, I can think of discussions I’d rather have with women than men, but they focus on deeper social factors—constructing relationships with women (and men) in a patriarchy, etc. As opposed to, say, a broader overview of fucking.

And I know that’s kindof a feature of larger society and really hard to cancel, but there it is.

Oh, and for what it’s worth: my parents took the stance of, “we’re not talking about it, except to say don’t do it yet,” stance, and that seemed to work out just fine. Oh, of course, I had sex with quite a few people without them knowing about it, but hey, no scars, STDs, or the pattering of little feet, so it all seems to have worked out well.