AUGUSTA, Maine — In general, the best place for adults to be during conversations about sex is “somewhere else,” according to 16-year-old Aleah Graham of Limerick.
Graham knows they mean well but still, she would rather learn about sex from people her own age.
“Adults think they understand what we’re going through,” she said. “Yeah, they were teenagers once, but times have changed. Who are you to tell us what our lives are like?”
At face value, teens teaching teens about sex is an alarming concept, though Graham and 130 other students across Maine say they’ve found a bridge between adolescent chatter and adult input. The students have spent the past several months making a movie that they say will connect with teens about sexual health like no class or birds-and-bees conversation ever could.
Written, directed and produced almost entirely by teens, “Two Seconds — a short dramatic film” premieres Tuesday at Brunswick High School in what will be a literal red carpet event.
The film, produced in cooperation with Project AWARE, the Maine Summer Film Institute’s Reel Life Program and the Family Planning Association of Maine, is searing and realistic. It confronts teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, relationship violence and a lot of other dead-serious topics with gripping emotion. At a prerelease screening on Wednesday at a Maine Public Health Association conference in Augusta, the tears flowed and the audience erupted in a standing ovation.
“It hasn’t settled in yet that we actually made it,” said Lindsay Parker, 16, of Owl’s Head, who is one of the movie’s actors. “I did feel a little embarrassed [about being in the movie] but now that I’ve seen it, I love it. It came out way better than I expected.”
Nancy Audet of the Family Planning Association of Maine said “Two Seconds” is intended for use in schools and virtually anywhere else it’s requested.
“My goal is to have young people tell us and each other the truth about their lives,” she said. “I want them to know where to go when they have questions.”
“Two Seconds” refers to how long it takes to make a bad decision that could alter the course of a person’s life. But Audet stressed that “Two Seconds” is also how long it takes to make a good decision.
Students from central, southern and midcoast Maine converged at Maranacook Community School in Readfield, where most of the movie was produced over six months starting in December 2011.
Peyton Feener, 17, of Camden said the process of making the movie was educational in itself.
“It’s really important that we actually see both sides of the story,” said Feener. “Some of the movies you see in health class are really cheesy. No kids take them seriously. They’re seriously outdated and they make fun of kids.”
Graham said “Two Seconds” will make an impression because it’s unvarnished, real and to some degree emotionally difficult to watch.
“It’s so personal,” she said. “It’s almost too much. This stuff is really hard to talk about.”
Carl Lakari, co-founder of Project AWARE, said the Reel Life Program has produced several films with Maine teens about teen issues, but “Two Seconds” is the program’s first foray into sex education.
“We want their perspective out there,” he said. “This is about starting the conversation about teen sexual health.”
And that includes conversations with Lakari’s own daughter, 13-year-old Nadia Schmid Lakari of Saco, with whom these conversations aren’t any easier than they are between a lot of fathers and daughters. Schmid Lakari is one the film’s actresses.
“I feel more comfortable [talking about sexual health] around certain people,” she said. “Certain people have different opinions on it. You really just don’t want to be judged by anyone.”
“Two Seconds” premieres at 7 p.m. Tuesday in Brunswick High School’s Crooker Theater at 116 Maquoit Road in Brunswick. Anyone is welcome to attend, though seating is limited. Reservations can be made on the Family Planning Association of Maine’s website.
Two seconds Wow I am glad I never had sex as a teen.
That kinda sucks HB… I feel bad for you.
Took me a very long time to find the right woman to train me right .
“Who are you to tell us what our lives are like?” Dear child, most of us have owned a pair of shoes or boots longer than you’ve been on the planet. Who are we? We are folks who are either a heck of a lot smarter or at least way more experienced than you are. We are your parents, guardians, teachers, coaches and employers. If you only want to listen to others who are as inexperienced and confused in life as you then your chances of being successful at anything are looking rather dim. We are your BEST available resource on ANY issue. Please consider that before uttering the sentence above again.
Great post StillRelaxin. Nice to see we can agree on this issue. I can tell you it is tremendously hard to be a parent today. Especially as a father with teen daughters. Their lives are SO hard. I guess they think our’s are a bowl of cherries.
Amen
You and your agreeing commenters need to reread the artcile (and maybe see the movie). Don’t, as usual,depend only on the headline. Also note that 2 seconds referes to the time for a good/bad decision.
Well stated.
And according to your post you are supremely arrogant, and that arrogant know it all attitude is exactly why teens don’t want to talk to you. They want to talk, not be told or dictated to. So keep on living because it is obvious you haven’t learned everything yet.
“We are folks who are either a heck of a lot smarter or at least way more experienced than you are.”
“We are your BEST available resource on ANY issue. Please consider that before uttering the sentence above again.”
With an attitude like that, I’m not surprised why young people don’t want to talk to you.
First of all, sir, as a teen, I love and respect my parents and other adults in my life. But, experience doesn’t always make anyone smarter. If I had taken the advice my mom, dad, or even older brother have given me about sex, (and trust me, there wasn’t much advice to be given in the first place) I might be in a much tougher place than I am. No one, and I repeat, NO ONE, knows you better than you. No one knows what’s best for you, except you. Nobody, not even our parents, knows what it’s like to be in our shoes. You have no idea how hard it is to be a teenager these days. Explaining all the drama of high school nowadays to my mom is like explaining rocket science to a five year old, no offense mom. Why would anybody WANT to take advice from someone who can’t even keep up? I’m not saying the best advice always comes from other teens, but honestly the best advice I’ve heard is from my friends who’re going through it all and are still young and feeling the same way I am. We ALL make bad choices. But we learn from them. We’re not perfect, but neither are you. We may not always be right, but you most certainly aren’t either. There are some adults in my life that are less mature than middle school aged kids. There are adults in my life who continue to repeat the same mistakes over and over again. Experience and age has NOTHING to do with knowing the best and/or right decision to make.
People with hostile opinions like you are the main reason behind the lack of trust between adults and teens. Maybe we’d be more open to this “best available resource” if you weren’t so hostile about it. I’ve taken advice from those “as inexperienced and confused in life” and I wouldn’t be in the place I am today, have all the opportunities that I do, if it weren’t for taking their advice. I’ve struggled with self-harm, depression, anxiety, sexual health, peer pressure, an eating disorder, drug use, and thoughts of suicide, and I promise you, I wouldn’t be breathing if it weren’t for my friends, the ones you say I shouldn’t take advice from. They were much better at helping me than my mom was. Please consider all of this before uttering the words you wrote above again.
Take ease Hanna, the years ahead will teach you what you should have learned from those who tried to help you waaaay back when. Good luck. Was this too “hostile” for you as well?
Times have changed ya it ok to have sex mommy can my boyfriend spend the night in my bedroom? Such BS. it is not funny the values this kids have today has gone so far down hill. When I visted my parents in my 30s we slept in separate rooms of or respect for them if nothing else. Tell you what I never got an STD or a teen girl pregnant . We had gear or a dad cleaning his guns when we brought are dates home . Teens want some respect respect yourself and earn it.
I have read several of your posts today and I must say that you seem to be almost totally unacquainted with any form of punctuation or the necessity of syntax. Your comments might garner more thoughtful responses if they were expressed in a more coherent form. Then again, many of your points are, themselves, incoherent. “Form follows function”, eh?
Ya so what is your point. Haha.
“Searing” Really?
If teens would learn that our bodies are not our own, but that they belong to the God who created us, that would be a major step in the right direction. Our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, whom we insult when we sin with our bodies. Obedience to God will free you from more stress than anything else in the world can. We’re here on earth for a few decades at most. We will spend forever in the next life, and there will be no sex in the next life. Sex is great, but it should be done within a marriage, as God intended. Sex is infinitely less important than the salvation of our souls, and that’s what we should teach kids to focus on. Their lives would be a lot less stressful and devoid of a lot of problems that they don’t need to have, and shouldn’t have in the first place.
I’d be satisfied if they would simply do their schoolwork, treat others in every situation respectfully, get into some form of higher education, select their “partners” with more care than their pets or phones and always use a condom. At least then there would be a greater chance of “evolving” into a species worthy of existence. Increasingly I’m beginning to wonder if we aren’t going backwards in that respect. I suppose that’s what everyone always begins thinking once they cross the “maturity barrier” at age 21.
You are delusional. Keep that religious nonsense in your church where it belongs. Bronze age fairy tales have no relevance in the 21st century.
If sex is so unimportant, why did God make it so prominent in our lives? And not just for procreation. Human sexual relations are far more “higher” than animal instinctive sex. Not that only two species practice sex at any time, not just during seasonal female estrous. That said, responsible sex is veryimportant.
“…as God intended” is the best way to end any sentence.
“I don’t want no mar-ger-een on mah toast. Give me real buttah, as God intended!”
“Junior, get yer hands outta yer pants and put ’em on yer Bible, as God intended!”
Okay, so you believe that’s what “should” happen. Now, how do we deal with reality?
Your Bronze Age dogma is the reason the sexual revolution needed to take place. Your ilk made sex taboo and in the process caused a lot of confusion and as usual for Christianity, a lot of harm. Don’t try to frighten us with your sorcerers ways Heistheone. Your sad devotion to that ancient religion hasn’t helped you conjure up a useful comment, or given you clairvoyance enough to know that your body IS your own and no one elses. The way you describe it, your god is a pimp. You use your own body and he exacts a price.
Wow you guys need to calm down. This movie is for education and entertainment. It is for replacing the outdated health movies. We have learned so much more about health in the past decade or even less! With all of this technology and new tools. You must give the movie a chance before you judge it. It hasn’t even premired yet. Who are you too tell them? Who are they too tell others? The only person you can tell you to do something is yourself, and yourself alone. I’m almost positive she did not mean it like that. And not every teenager has an STD, but at least they are getting tested. You may have an STD. But are YOU getting tested? We didn’t know about Sexual health as much as we don now. So just calm down people. If you have a problem with this subject, then don’t keep posting about it. Respect these young ladies hard work, and leave it at that. And if you dont respect it then dont be rude about it, just dont post anything. Doesn’t the comment instructions make that pretty clear? haha
I applaud these kids for aggressively addressing this critical issue. This type of reality-based education, provided by contemporaries, is exactly what kids need to drive home the seriousness of the potential consequences of unprotected sex, especially for young people. Every kid has heard his or her parents’ advice thousands of times by the time they are physically old enough to get involved with consensual sex, and they are generally at the stage where they are trying to get out from under their parents’ wings. With the freedom provided by a new driver’s license, and exposure to unrealistic consequence-free high-risk lifestyles in movies and on the internet, the odds of young people making the wrong decisions today are much higher than they were 50 years ago. Kids are much more likely to take seriously a warning from their peers than they are from their parents, when they are in the “rebellious teen” years.
I wonder if they talk about what is now the most serious thing for teens, becoming a sex offender. Sexting can be considered child porn. 14 year old kids have been treated as both victims and perpetrators in cases around our country. AWA puts teens on the registry. So we create a film about teen sex, but teens are being thrown in jail for it.
I am very proud of the hard work done by these teens. They deserve to be praised, not put down. It took a great deal of courage to stand before their peers and make a movie in which sex is opening discussed. I suggest that those of you who are so quick to put down this movie…..take time out of our day to actually go see it! You just might find that YOU may learn a thing or two about what life is like for our modern day teens! This movie is to help teens to be able to open up to their parents, and from some the responses I have read on this board….I can see why for some teens, that is difficult to do!
I first want to say that for those so quick to form a judgement on this educational short film, perhaps it might be a good idea to actually view it first! I am very proud 0f all the teens involved with the making of this film, and I think the fact that they were willing to volunteer many long hours to help bring this difficult subject to life speaks volumes about their character. I was lucky enough to witness some of the round table discussions involving the script writing for this film, and I was amazed at the maturity and wisdom these young adults shared. Talking about sex is often difficult for both parents and teens, and hopefully…this film will help to make that process a little easier…