ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the current sexual climate in China, and specifically explores participants' experiences of sex education and learning about sex. It investigates the Party-State's stance on sexual matters in the reform period. Stress is often placed on the importance of 'moral discipline', heterosexuality, monogamy, marriage and the family, reinforcing the moralist agenda of the Party-State. Sex education at school was non-existent during the Mao period. Rather, information was generally given to women and men just before or after a wedding ceremony in the form of marriage manuals or sexual artefacts. In the West, the lack of discussion around sex is frequently seen as a method parents employ to 'protect' children, as a way to maintain childhood 'innocence' and sustain the boundary between childhood and adulthood. In China, parents are generally reluctant to discuss sex with their children. Sexual knowledge and contraceptive use among unmarried adults in China is very inconsistent.
