ABSTRACT
This chapter portrays the public debate that took place in the spring of 1999 in Lebanon between advocates of school sex education for pubescent students and their adversaries. An attempt is made to contextualize this debate within the highly polarized diverse 'communities' of Lebanese society. Supporters of school sex education claim the realities of contemporary life, which have rendered conventional familial and ethical restraints insufficient. The sex education curriculum includes a scientific foundation of the anatomical, physiological, and functional biology of human reproduction. The sex education curriculum aims at training students to acquire decision-making skills and techniques by drawing upon their mental, emotional, relational, and ethical resources. The opposition to sex education in schools dismisses students' right to scientific knowledge of their own bodies and bodily functions and to related health and prophylactic measures. The issue of sex education of Lebanese youth at the age of puberty falls within a broader context of recent debates within Lebanese society.
