Contact: Andrew Beckwith, 781-569-0400, andrew@mafamily.org

BOSTON, April 18, 2017 /Christian Newswire/ -- Massachusetts Legislators heard testimony on Thursday regarding a bill that is stirring up quite a bit of controversy amongst parents.  "An act relative to healthy youth," drew sharp criticism at the morning's hearing.  Parents and educators expressed strong concern with the bill, which they say imposes a new statewide standard for the sensitive topic of K-12 sexual health education.

"This bill takes control over sex education of out the hands of local school districts and gives it to state bureaucrats," explained Massachusetts Family Institute's President Andrew Beckwith.  "Parents and teachers should be able to decide for themselves what is best for the students in their own community."

One of the sexual health curricula that is recommended by the MA Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, which would have authority over what schools teach if the bill is passed, is Planned Parenthood's controversial "Get Real" series.  These middle school workbooks teach children as young as 12 how to use saran wrap as a "dental dam" for oral to anal sexual stimulation.  "The sponsors of this bill argue that it would guarantee sex ed material is 'age appropriate' and 'medically accurate,'" Beckwith observed.  "Clearly, that is not the case when you have activists at the state department of education that think it is 'age appropriate' for 12 year-olds to study the finer points of dental dam usage during non-reproductive sexual acts." During his testimony, Beckwith presented the committee chairs with boxes of saran wrap to serve, he said, "as a visual reminder of what this bill would force on our schools and children."
 
In 2016, an earlier version of the legislation passed through the MA Senate before getting stalled in the House.  This year's version of the bill, however, contains disturbing new requirements.  For example, local schools are required to teach about abortion as one of the "options for pregnancy."  Teachers would also be forced to give an "affirmative representation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals, relationships, and families."  Beckwith doesn't believe most co-sponsors of the legislation even realize this provision is in the text of the bill.  "When I ask legislators or concerned parents how they would define a 'bisexual relationship' as required by these bills, I am usually met with confused looks.  This begs the question, exactly what type of discussion is that going to be for school children as young as Kindergarten?"