Sex Education; Educating Us Again

The Netflix hit television series ‘Sex Education’ has been educating us on the ways of sex since its 2019 release when the character Otis becomes his high school sex therapist, giving advice to the confused and sex-crazed students as they venture into the world of sex. Each episode focuses on a different problem that a student has gone to him about, while others are worried about why they can’t enjoy sex, others worry about how their bodies look. In the process of doing this, it has educated us all on these matters and made the topic of sex and our bodies less of a taboo. It has created a more open conversation with each other and educated us on sex and matters that we too might have struggled with.

During every new series of this show we learn more and more, advancing our knowledge on an activity that so many of us take part in but clearly knew very little about. So, it is no surprise then that they did it again in their third series that was released last month. This time they are being applauded for giving an insight into the disabled world and how they too can have sex.

Though the character of ‘Isaac’, a disabled boy in a wheelchair who has fallen for his friend ‘Maeve’, has lost the use of his legs and can feel nothing below the waist he can still enjoy sex and the sensations in a different way. The show explores this and asks the questions that many of us have through the voice of Maeve who is confused about how this is possible. Their choice to do this is amazing, they have tackled the idea that sex is a topic that we shouldn’t talk about in the previous series and now they are taking steps to involve the disabled community the way they should. It would be naive and a lie to suggest that disabled people can’t have sex, and the show highlighted that. Their choice to do this has involved the disabled community in a show that we all love, allowing their world to be shown and relating to them in a way that other television series may not have. It is often in media that members of the disabled community are deemed to either be stupid, have limited lives, and are unable to live it the way they want, however, we know that is neither true nor fair.

Members of the disabled community may not live the same way we do or have the same accessibility that we do, but they still have lives and can experience the same things as the abled body community. ‘Sex Education’ makes that clear by not just having the sassy and sometimes conniving character of ‘Isaac’ in the show but also highlighting that he too has needs and desires, that he too has a sex life.