Review of the show “Sex Education”

Image of gummy bears in soda not sexual, but as awkward as sex sometimes can be.

I saw that a show called Sex Education appeared on Netflix. I have teen-aged boys. I felt I had an obligation to watch it and see what they’re going to be subjected to. I began the first episode, and the first scene showed high-schoolers, Amy on top of Adam, both naked, she was asking whether he liked her tits, and I thought, Oh! They just - are going to simply throw me in there right away. The show could have easily been just an opportunity for teen-aged kids, like my own boys, to see sex scenes without being in trouble for watching porn.

I was immediately caught by the fact that Adam was not really there. He was not making eye contact, not enjoying what was going on, and he absent-mindedly answered Amy. I thought, This is a true thing that can happen. This scene is not playing a made-up fantasy sex session. Amy wanted to try doing things so that he’d enjoy it, so they moved to a different position, she climaxed, and Adam - pretended to. Horribly. She confronted him on it, demanded to see the condom, and verified that he’d faked it.

So now I’m thinking, They used a condom. Pointedly. This first scene is showing that these high-schoolers are using contraception, that it’s possible for a guy to not feel the joy of sex while the girl does, that faking while having sex is not a wise or convincing thing to do, and Adam’s lackluster reaction shows my boys that sex may not be the great thing everyone probably says it is. I was intrigued. So far, for being a sex scene that many people will undoubtedly complain about, I was happy with what was going on. What made me uncomfortable was that on the show, just below this display of sex-floundering, the mother was innocently watching TV. I looked up. My 17-yr-old boy’s bedroom was just above me as I watched this. Nah, I told myself, the floor up there is squeaky and besides, his brother just moved into his room.

I watched two episodes that night, last week, and just finished the first season yesterday. The “teen-aged boy living with a sex-therapy single mother” situation is so unique and fun-filled with awkward moments that I found myself cringing with a smile multiple times. Otherwise, the whole show is filled with relationships that many will connect with: Nondescript boy-in-a-corner teams up with over-eyelined, growing-out-pink-haired slut girl of the school who, it turns out, probably has an IQ of 150. One of the two openly-gay boys in the school is a black kid whose gentle father seems to know the truth about him while his mother is cushioned from it. The bully is the Headmaster’s son who learned to be a bully from his father. The “head student” jock who is at odds with what he really wants as opposed to what his mother wants for him, is the son of a lesbian couple.

As I watched Sex Education, the show poured forth a richness about life that I didn’t expect. The relationships between people are highlighted and unique in that the facet you see is generally restricted from public television: a boy has a difficult time mastrubating because he doesn’t want to touch his penis, the picture of a girl’s vagina is mass-texted to everyone in school and she’s afraid everyone will find out whose it is and doesn’t know who sent it, a boy took 3 Viagra pills in order to impress his girlfriend and ended up being afraid his penis would literally explode in a bloody mess.

These are not issues that one typically hears about in life. But maybe it’s stuff that has happened to some kids and they don’t feel that they can turn to anyone. Perhaps they feel that they’re the only ones who have suffered these catastrophes so they hide inside themselves and fester rather than live the life a bright, free teenager should. I think to myself, My sons wouldn’t want to talk to me about this kind of thing. Maybe to their Dad, but maybe they’re experiencing too much anxiety to talk to anyone about it. What if they mention it to a friend who has very poor advice or who they thought they could trust but it turns out they cant? This show could be the window into their own understanding of themselves and, just as importantly, an understanding that everyone else has different anxieties about having sex, about how their developing bodies are reacting, about what they’re thinking when they become aroused, about where they stand in society because of these thoughts and occurrences… This show expresses to them, in a very entertaining and true-to-life fashion, that there is no one place in society to be when concerning sex. Everyone is in a different place, either physically or emotionally, and it’s okay to be wherever you are.

That is one of the most important messages I want my boys to hear. Hearing it from somewhere other than their mother or father is a great relief for me. I thank Sex Education for coming into being, (sexual pun slightly intended there). I hope that whatever flack this show will likely get from parents who are afraid of their children getting “ideas” about sex doesn’t shut it down or dismiss the show’s obvious attributes in any way.