Submitted by the Island Reproductive Health Initiative.
How to educate folks about sex begins with talking about sex, but how do you get a table full of friends, family and strangers to sit down and talk about sex in a way that’s comfortable, maybe even fun? You make it a game.
In a stroke of brilliance by one of our volunteers, Tia Owen, The Lower Tavern and Tim Coffey hosted Island Reproductive Health Initiative, or IRHI, for Sex Trivia Night.
Questions ranged from “In what country has a holiday where participants can pray to three phallic shrines for fertility, good marriages, and protection from STIs?” (Japan) to “What is the term in a lesbian relationship for quickly moving in together?” (Uhauling) to the one which sparked the most debate between tables “Where is an egg fertilized?” (Fallopian Tubes, NOT the uterus). In cases of debate over an acceptable answer, the fearless emcee only twice needed to pause and call in a physician and IRHI’s leader, Sarah Lyle.
Some of the hardest questions, for our table at least, came directly from the OWL (Our Whole Lives) curriculum that IRHI offers as an optional course for middle schoolers on Orcas Island.
This program covers age-appropriate sexual education around sexuality, sex, relationships and cultural influences on sex. This year IRHI is fundraising to continue the OWL program through the Give Orcas Campaign which begins May 6 and runs through May 15.
The Orcas Island Community Foundation’s Spring Give Orcas campaign includes 36 other nonprofits on Orcas Island. This year, IRHI is raising funds for not only the OWL program but also for continuing their condom distribution program and offering free longer-term contraceptive options to the community as well.
As hosts, The Lower not only offered owner Tim as the perfect host with his voice any auctioneer or emcee would envy, but they also donated $1 from every draft beer or cider purchased during the event. They were also featured as the answer to one of the trivia questions, “What location that IRHI distributes condoms to goes through the most?” They were tied, but we’ll give them that point.
While this was the first Sex Trivia night, we hope it won’t be the last. With a subject matter that can feel challenging to address, discussing sex casually has never been so easy or fun as The Lower and IRHI made it. They managed to educate a full house about sex, sexual health, slang terms, different cultural views of sex and what IRHI does for the community in a way that was fun, proactive and approachable.
