Beijing holds youth sex education camp

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While many students spend their summer holidays at study camps, a small number are choosing to cram for something more essential and more hushed up.

30 teenagers spent a weekend at one of Beijing's first sex education summer camps and discovered that sex education – something barely mentioned at home or in school – could be open and fun.

Sex education camp in Beijing on August 19, 2017 /CGTN Photo

For the camp's youngest participant, 11-year-old Ma Qianran, she's likely the first in her junior school to learn about issues like these.

"The camp, it's kind of fun. I never had such classes before. I'll tell my friends," she told CGTN.

It's also a first for her mother Song Meirong.

She said they’re attending the camp because they think it’s time and that professional guidance is much-needed.

Sex is still a taboo subject for many people in China but it's not something people can shy away from anymore.

Previous children's sex education camps in Chongqing, China, 2015. /CFP photo

The camp takes place at a time when China has been shocked by a growing number of very public sex offenses on minors caught on camera.

Last week, an 18-year-old man was arrested for publicly groping a young girl at a train station. Similar cases were reported the same week in Chongqing and Jiangsu.

Courts in China recorded more than 10,000 cases of child sex abuse between 2013 to 2016.

Fang Gang, who started the sex education camp, said the Beijing session is the biggest, most open and successful they have held in five years.

But, he pointed out, there is still a long way to go.

Fang Gang, Beijing Sexologist and educator /CGTN Photo

Fang, also a sexologist with Beijing Forestry University, told CGTN, “Coping with harassment is one thing kids today must know. But just knowing techniques to fend off violence is far from enough."

"In the end, they have to be strong and brave in mind. They have to decide for themselves what to do in face of each different case," he explained, saying that sex education is "empowerment for the kids, that's the most important.”