Groundbreaking YouTube series features talks about sexuality with kids with disabilities

On May 31, the eve of Pride Month and the last day of May’s “Sex Ed For All Month” campaign, a YouTube sex-ed series for youth named “Every Body Curious,” dropped a very special new season — five episodes featuring conversations about sexuality with kids with disabilities.

And one of the most striking things about this new season is that, as soon as series creator Louise Pollard started working on the project with co-hosts Nadine Thornhill and Spencer West, it became clear that this Toronto production would be covering new ground.

“We knew that a conversation about sex for folks with disabilities really didn’t exist,” said West, co-host of this season, as well as content creator, motivational speaker and gay disabled activist. “It’s always for non-disabled folks. And disabled folks need these types of topics covered as well. And sometimes they’re the exact same and sometimes they’re a little different, a little nuanced.”

Even before this groundbreaking season, “Every Body Curious,” a sex-ed show that covered a range of material including consent, body image and orientation (among other things) felt pretty progressive. It’s frank, straightforward and compassionate — and always lets the kids lead the way.

“When Louise (Pollard) pitched the concept to me, one of the things she really wanted was for the conversations to really be kid-led,” recalled Thornhill, one of Canada’s foremost experts on child and adolescent sexuality. “As a sexuality educator, that’s how I approach my work and that’s also how I work with youth. It’s very much ‘What do you want to know?’ ‘What is important to you?’

“And then, ‘How can we, as the adults, support and facilitate that learning?’”

Given that we’ve been seeing attacks on both transgender and reproductive rights of late, this seems timely. And we’re not just dunking on red states and the United States Supreme Court here, either. Many will have forgotten this but, in 2015, right here in Ontario, proposed changes to the sex-ed curriculum that included information on gender identity and online image sharing became controversial and divisive.

So, as Thornhill argues, it’s always a good time for candid, accessible and correct information.

“I always think it’s relevant, because I think the sooner we have access to this kind of information the better off we are,” she said. “I mean, you get to adulthood and you’re, like, ‘Oh, 90 per cent of the stuff I learned was wrong or incomplete.’ And then you have to unlearn it, which is a much more complex process than just learning it to begin with.

“So if we can talk to them and help them navigate these experiences when they’re young, I just think it saves a lot of time and heartache and therapy when you’re an adult,” she added. “Or at least that’s been my experience.”

Season 3 touches on a lot of topics: masturbation, testicles and sperm, why some people are gay and what sex-ed classes in school should cover but don’t. And, watching the shows, it was hard for me not to wonder why it’s taken so long for something like this to be produced.

“What I’ve learned from my disabled friends is that the attitude around sexuality is often that it doesn’t matter, isn’t important or isn’t a priority,” said Thornhill. “And I fundamentally disagree with that, so I’m very proud to be part of this project.”

Thornhill notes that she couldn’t have done this season without West, however, since he brings the “lived experience” of having a physical disability, as well as years of experience as a disability justice advocate. West, who was born with a spinal defect and had both legs amputated at the age of five, has raised awareness as well as money for organizations such as Free the Children through initiatives such as climbing Mount Kilimanjaro.

I asked him what he thought the most important message from this season was.

“I think, for me, the message is that disabled people are fully formed and, by this, I mean that we have feelings, so we want relationships, we want to have sexual partners, we want to have intimacy, and we want to understand gender identity and sexual orientation,” said West. “Often, the disability community is not seen as sexual.

“Because of that, there aren’t a lot of resources that exist for us to learn about all those things,” he continued. “Now, though, there is a resource and a place to at least start to engage in these types of conversations.”

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