When it comes to our bodies, there are no stupid questions—just bad sex ed, writes sex columnist Martha Kempner.

I’ve been a sex educator for more than 25 years, and in that time, I have gotten some pretty wild questions. 

Kids demand to know if I’ve had a threesome, for example, or heard of a “smash burger.” These aren’t really sex questions—they’re attempts to shock me, embarrass me, or get me to reveal something about my own sex life. 

Anonymous question boxes—like the one I dutifully decorated in stickers and sequins before teaching my very first human sexuality course—make it easy for students to say absolutely anything. But that’s the point of the box, because mixed in with queries about how old I was when I “lost my virginity,” I always find a few questions that demonstrate a true lack of knowledge. 

These questions are never stupid, but they do make me angry about how little sex education people get at home and at school. The questions that reveal a lack of understanding about basic anatomy are always most alarming. 

What is a vulva? Can you pee while wearing a tampon?

Here’s one that I’ve been asked more than once, both by young kids and grown adults: How can you pee when you’re wearing a tampon?

I remember when one young woman asked this in my Sociology of Sexuality college course, in New Jersey. I regularly taught that class from 2012 to 2020, and it wasn’t designed to........

© Rewire.News