Sexual Health Lessons from the Olympics
Faster, Stronger, Higher – Together is the updated Olympic motto, a nod to the ideal that the games embody more than fantastic feats delivered by well-honed muscle and tough sinew in action. For a brief fortnight or so, the youth of the world are gathered in France to compete as comrades united by the Olympic banner (more or less, we can dream).
They’re also knocking boots. In a common sense, proactive approach (abstinence-only doesn’t work for school-based sex ed or the Olympic village!), the organizers of the games make sure the swag bags distributed to the athletes contain condoms. That’s been true for a number of recent Olympiads, but these Parisian prophylactics are especially enlightened.
Take the messaging on the condom wrappers, which includes clever but expected fare such as Don’t Share More Than Victory: Protect Yourself Against STDs. The colorful packaging has some other important words for the athletes such as On the Field of Love, Play Fair: Ask for Consent! and Fair Play, Safe Play: Consent First.
Consent First. Oui!
As a field of work/study/advocacy, sexual health is incredibly diverse, encompassing more aspects than we can list here. STI prevention, reproductive health (including access to health care), pleasure, bodily image, gender identity and sexual orientation, and so much more. It’s clear that these areas overlap, which means we increasingly need to break down the walls of the proverbial silos and work across all these worthy areas. That’s why it’s refreshing to see the Olympics acknowledging that when thinking about sex and safer sex, it’s important to remember that consent is the first and most important part of physical intimacy with a partner.
ASHA agrees, and has resources so that partners can better understand consent and boundaries, and to talk about these matters effectively. Of course we have safer sex covered, too, in STIs A to Z. You deserve great, healthy sex. You also deserve to be respected and heard!
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Sexual Health Lessons from the Olympics
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