It may be a little dated, but one of the most interesting aspects of this film (a sequel of sorts to 'Boy to Man', another educational film released three years earlier) is hearing young women talk informally about their lives. And look around for a nice hot drink if you're feeling out of sorts.
This is a post-war instructional film on menstruation that mainly focuses on teaching girls about how to use sanitary pads, but also gets into some odd advice: don't get your feet wet while you have your period. It's hard to say whether this is a sexual education film or a short horror movie.
"So they get together in sexual misery, right? Somebody jumps on somebody, and the girl goes 'that's what sex is? Oh my god, that's a nightmare, I don't want it.' And it begins the pattern."Ĭatch the full interview with Ensler tomorrow at 7 pm on CBC Television, and enjoy a squirm-inducing trip down memory lane below. "I interview so many young teenagers, and so many boys have no idea what sex is. She'll talk to George about the current state of sex ed, and share her belief that it's letting young people down and contributing to feelings of shame and confusion.
On Wednesday, July 24, Eve Ensler, the writer and activist who created 'The Vagina Monologues' and 'V-Day', is in the red chair. Most of them are badly acted, strangely staged, and full of outdated language.īut some people would argue that our contemporary take on sex ed isn't all that much better. It’s wonderful how all our gay activists over the years have fought the good fight and won so much for all of us and future generations of gays.Watching these vintage sex education movies, it would be easy to feel a little smug. I knew a guy who once told me that he only could feel alive in summer on fire Islan, the rest of the year in upstate New York where he was a teacher, he had no social life, no outwardly gay experiences or appearances. So as you smugly criticize these guys in the film, I urge other viewers to try to place yourselves in their shoes, and imagine what gay life was in 1976. mere suspicion of being gay, or even unmarried beyond a certain undefined age, could be grounds for loosing government jobs, and of course, no security clearances for gays. These Fire Island frolicers were all born during the gay bashing and gay witch hunts of the lavender scare, under Sen Joe McCarthy and NY asshole closet case lawyer Roy Cohen. The military was weeding out gays left and right.
Gay marriage was not even on the radar screen yet. If a pair did become known in the non-gay world, your partner was known as your “friend” or your “roommate”. It was the era of “couples” always having separate apartments, not talking about the other at work or school, or among straight friends. Society didn’t like it, families raised eyebrows. In those days, many guys wee gay on weekends, straight acting Monday through Friday. Society was very anti-gay, the gay community had lots of internalized homophobia, and whenever and wherever pockets of freedom existed, of course there were excesses that cover compensated for what most of their lives were previously, and for the majority, off of Fire Island.
They did not get to have boy friends in junior high (now called middle school), high school, any many even in college. Aren’t you prissy and sanctimonious? In 1976, most visitors to Fire Island had never known the freedom and self-acceptance of living “openly gay”, “Out”, in their daily lives wherever they originally came from.