I still remember a second period biology lesson in my seventh grade. We were being taught

about the human reproductive system when I raised my hand to ask a genuine middle

school doubt - “What is an orgasm, ma’am?” The teacher froze. A few students snickered.

And then, with a tight smile, she said, “That’s not part of our syllabus.” The moment passed,

but the silence that followed stayed with me longer than any chapter we ever studied.

That’s when I realized something: in our schools, silence is the syllabus. We call it “sex

education,” but what we really teach is discomfort, shame, and avoidance. We don’t educate

students - we warn them. We wrap natural curiosity in layers of taboo and moral panic, and

then act shocked when young people turn to the internet for answers.

The irony is almost cruel. The same institutions that refuse to talk about sex in classrooms

are the ones that lament when students learn from TikTok, Reddit, or AI chatbots. But what

choice do they have? When the adults in the room turn away, the algorithm steps in. And the

internet - no matter how vast, brilliant, or creative - was never meant to be a teacher of

intimacy, respect, or safety.

Silence was once seen as protection. “They’re too young,” we say. “It’ll only encourage

them.” But the data tells another story: countries with comprehensive sex education see

lower rates of teenage pregnancy, abuse, and sexually transmitted infections. Honest

conversations save lives. Censorship doesn’t. What we protect with silence isn’t innocence -

it’s ignorance.

We have built a system that treats information like contamination. In classrooms, teachers

skip the “embarrassing” slides. Textbooks blur out diagrams. Parents demand

abstinence-only education, as if silence could shield their children from biology. The

classroom, once a place for open discussion, becomes a performance of denial. And the

more we avoid, the more power misinformation gains.

The truth is, students talk. They always have. They whisper in corridors, search online, share

rumors and trade half-true “facts.” What’s different now is the reach of those whispers. One

viral video can spread a myth faster than any school can correct it. A single misleading post

about birth control or consent can shape a generation’s understanding. When institutions

refuse to guide, technology fills the gap but not with truth, instead with whatever gets the

most clicks.

But this silence does something even deeper than misinform. It breeds shame. When young

people are taught that questions about their bodies or relationships are “inappropriate,” they

internalize the idea that they are inappropriate. A teenager struggling with their sexuality or

identity learns that their curiosity is something to hide. A survivor of assault learns that their

experience doesn’t belong in conversation. The silence that was meant to “protect” them

ends up isolating them instead.

And it’s not just about sex. It’s about power. Who gets to decide what’s “appropriate”

knowledge, and who benefits when others don’t know. Silence maintains control. It allows

systems to hide flaws behind “values.” It ensures the adults stay comfortable while the

students stay confused. The same pattern appears everywhere: in the avoidance of mental

health discussions, in the censorship of gender education, in the moral panic over

“corrupting influences.” We call it tradition. But really, it’s fear. A fear that honesty might

make us rethink what we’ve always been told.

Sex education isn’t about teaching people how to have sex. It’s about teaching people how

to actually think about it; with respect, awareness, and responsibility. It’s about consent, body

autonomy, relationships, and empathy. It’s about giving students the tools to navigate a world

where everything is sexualized but nothing is explained. Yet, too often, we pretend those

conversations don’t belong in school.

And when we finally do teach them, it’s often too little, too late. A slideshow about

reproductive organs in seventh grade doesn’t prepare anyone for the complexities of real

life. No one mentions pleasure, gender identity, or emotional boundaries. Instead, we leave

students with sterile definitions and unspoken warnings and never the emotional context that

turns knowledge into wisdom. We treat young people like they’ll figure it out themselves, but

we panic when they actually try.

The consequences are easy to see. Teenagers carry guilt for not knowing what they were

never taught. They confuse coercion for consent, rumors for reality. They learn that the

classroom isn’t a place to be honest, so they take their honesty elsewhere - online, where

the loudest voices rarely have the best intentions. The internet is not the villain here; the

silence is. We built this vacuum, and the web simply filled it.

It’s tempting to blame individual teachers, but most of them are trapped too. Many aren’t

given proper training or support to handle sensitive topics. They face angry parents,

outdated curricula, and school boards that treat words like “sex” and “gender” as threats. It’s

an impossible situation: we expect educators to prepare students for life, but only the parts

of life we’re comfortable discussing.

So where do we go from here? We start by admitting that silence has never protected

anyone. We need classrooms where questions aren’t met with discomfort, where honesty

isn’t mistaken for corruption. We need to stop equating morality with secrecy. And most

importantly, we need to trust young people with the truth. They can handle it. In fact, they

deserve it.

Every generation claims it’s ready for progress, but progress only happens when we stop

whispering about what matters most. Behind every censored lesson and every unanswered

question is a student trying to understand themselves. Maybe the real obscenity isn’t in the

topic, rather it’s in our refusal to talk about it.

Because in the end, silence doesn’t make anyone safer. It just makes them unprepared.