DEAR PETER:
Last evening my daughter-in-law phoned with this concern: her two children (my grandchildren), a girl, 7 years, and boy, 5 years, have become sexually active, exploring one another's bodies. The girl has been masturbating for two years. When this behavior was first recognized by the mother, the child was told that she could do it in the privacy of her own room, but not in public. Well, when the mother found the two children stimulating each other under a blanket, the daughter told her that they were having their private time together and that it wasn't right for her to pick up the blanket. The mother is very concerned. Is this behavior common? Will these children become more sexually active? What if this behavior is continued in a friend's home?
Grandma

DEAR GRANDMA:
My blood boils to hear about such an incident. It especially boils because I know that these things are not happening in a vacuum, or by happenstance. For the past forty years in America, professional "sex experts" have touted a philosophy that in essence says "Children are sexual from birth, and should naturally enjoy sexual activities, even while young."

This viewpoint (which I consider criminally irresponsible) was given the veneer of credibility by sex "researchers" Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey and his co-worker, Dr. Wardell B. Pomeroy. They co-authored the Kinsey reports, which have provided the statistical weapons, however erroneous, for sex educators until this day. It's not commonly known that Pomeroy has continued his pro-sexual educational activities as the head of the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, based in San Francisco.

Pomeroy conducts "Sexual Attitude Restructuring" (SAR) workshops for sex educators, who then in some cases come back to the classroom and teach our children. In an interview published in the British Journal of Sexual Medicine in 1982, Pomeroy described the SAR's this way:

"As part of our intensive courses we project several films on to a series of screens simultaneously. They vary in context from 'hard porn' homosexuality to milder loving themes."

A reporter who participated in a SAR at Pomeroy's institute wrote for Esquire Magazine in 1982:

"As we lounged on cushions in the darkness, the whole wall lit up with images of human beings -- and sometimes even animals -- engaging in every conceivable sexual act ... some seventeen simultaneous moving pictures ... over a period of forty minutes.

"How did we...react? ... By the end...the physical act...seemed commonplace. Nothing was shocking, but nothing was sacred either."

You might ask how all this might have affected your grandchildren. After many years of active educational efforts such as these, our children today are parroting back the same lines that sex educators such as Pomeroy have preached. A book by Pomeroy called Boys and Sex (there's also one called Girls and Sex) can be found in the juvenile sections of many public libraries. In this book (perhaps read by many children) Pomeroy writes:

"By playing with girls sexually before adolescence, trying to understand how they are made and how they react, the chances are increased for a satisfactory sex life when a boy grows up... But it is too much to expect that parents will take that attitude."

"Because it is done secretly, however, doesn't mean it's dirty. Too many parents tend to make their children feel that anything done in secret must be dirty. It isn't. It's simply private." (emphasis added)

And in light of the fact that your grandchildren are exploring each other's bodies, it might be useful to review Pomeroy's attitudes about incest. In an article published by Forum / Variations Magazine (a Penthouse publication), entitled "A New Look at Incest", Pomeroy stated:

"...Incest between adults and younger children can also prove to be a satisfying and enriching experience."

My first reaction, upon researching this material (which I did back in the late Eighties), was that no one could possibly agree with such extreme viewpoints. I found, though, that many, many sex education professionals have adopted attitudes such as Pomeroy's and are actively promoting this type of viewpoint. Your granddaughter's comments highlight the fact that their efforts are becoming successful. Fifty years ago, what young girl would glibly reply with such an argument?

Are incidents such as these common? I believe that they are becoming more and more common -- and will continue to increase unless parents actively educate their children in a reverse direction. Your grandchildren's sexual activity may indeed increase -- it's rather logical that it would. If an incident happens at a friend's house you may face the miserable prospect of having your friend say, "Why did your child corrupt my child?"

Children are the victims in this equation -- and are being helplessly fed wagonloads of tripe. Rather than raking them over the coals, we need to gently explain to them why it is so important for the maturity of their emotions and their own capacity to love unselfishly that they wait before engaging is sexual activity. I hope to address this question in a future column.

For now, I refer you to my essay on abstinence, written as part of a proposed curriculum for high school students in Mainland China, entitled "Parental Love, the Guidepost for Sexual Activity". [Editor's Note: The above essay has been expanded into a 2 1/2 hour seminar on "marriage preparation, abstinence and character education", called "The True Love Thing to Do", on the web at http://worldcommunity.com/tl/.]

I also refer you to the abstinence program called "Free Teens", started by Richard Panzer, at freeteens.org. It has proven quite successful with young people.