On March 6, 2022, the South Korean cable channel MBN launched a new reality show titled High School Mom and Dad, dealing the stories of teenage parents. Teenage parents refer to those who became parents before they come of age. Since it was the first-ever television program in Korean broadcasting history featuring the lives of young parents, it sparked controversy in numerous online communities. Therefore, issues such as teenage pregnancy, inadequate sex education, and the sex life of teenagers have been receiving increasing attention from the public.
High School Mom and Dad was produced to explore the definition of “family” by looking at the developing stages of teenage parents. This reality show aims to illustrate the tough realities that teenage parents face and provide information about teen pregnancies. One of the panels from the show, In Gyo-jin, said, “Social issues surrounding teenage parents are serious, ones that should not be neglected. However, we were busy hiding the news from the public. Now, it is the time to face the real aspects of sex life among teenagers and correct their faulty knowledge regarding sexual relationships.” On the other hand, some critics pointed out p r o b l e m a t i c aspects of High School Mom and Dad. To begin with, they concerned that the show may minimize the issues related to teenage pregnancy to young teenagers. The show acquires the high possibility of depicting teenage parents as responsible and teenage pregnancy as a general phenomenon. In other words, viewers of similar age groups watching the show might ignore the severity of such issues. Furthermore, there is a concern over the public disclosure of teenage parents and their childrens’ privacy. In worst case scenarios, the cast of the show might have to endure criticism from the public. Nevertheless, more and more teenage parents are exposing themselves to the media, presenting their daily lives through YouTube. However, there are some people who criticize them claiming that they are “immature” and “irresponsible.” In this context, whether these types of media contents can provide synthetic information about “teenager’s sex lives” or distort the reality of teenage parents is still questionable. According to Statistics Korea, 918 teenagers delievered a child in 2000. Among them, 11 teenage parents were below the age of 15. The lowest age of pregnancy and giving birth that obstetricians experienced on average were 15.2 and 17.2. As more and more cases of teenage pregnancy are spotted in today’s society, it is essential to discover the causes of the issue and suggest reasonable solutions to minimize the problem.
Young parents might face some difficulties as they go through the process of becoming parents. These problems include both physical and psychological obstacles. First, there could be health problems in terms of pregnancy. Park Sun-hwa, a Professor at the College of Medicine at Ewha Womans University, said, “Teenage pregnancies are reported to have a high risk of anemia, premature birth and pregnancy toxemia.” Bae Jaeman, a Professor at the College of Medicine in Hanyang University, added, “There are some teenage mothers who do not receive sufficient prenatal examinations due to their social circumstances. This increases the possibilities of obstetrical risks.” Secondly, teenage parents might experience psychological hardships. Professor Bae said, “Theoretically, it is true that there are some physical and medical difficulties that pregnant teenagers might e x p e r i e n c e . Nonetheless, in the real world, I personally have not seen many pregnant teenagers go through health problems. The more serious drawbacks that teenage parents might experience are related more to psychological issues than physical difficulties.” He also mentioned that numerous pregnant women suffer from postpartum depression. Even so, teenage parents tend to experience more hardships like having to bear others’ scathing eyes and conflicts with their parents. Thus, teenage parents are more prone to undergo psychological difficulties than other general parents. In addition, according to the Korea Research Institute of Sexual Psychology, an organization which provides sex education, referring to psychological aspects, teenage parents are more likely to have difficulty adjusting their lives to live as parents, since it was unplanned pregnancy.
There are increasing criticisms over sex education in South Korea for teenagers. Yet, not many people take strong actions to remedy the problem. Firstly, sex education in
South Korea remains in outdated styles. Professor Bae argued, “Sex education in South Korea is still on a traditional and abstract level like talking about how babies are born when the sperm and egg meet each other.” Secondly, sex education in South Korea is impractical. Professor Park pointed out, “Sex education for teenagers is limited to the knowledge of biological sex and prevention of sexual abuse. This kind of education does not fully lay out practical information to teenagers.” Third, since sex education is not a regular subject for teenagers, there is a side effect. Most sex education in South Korea is dealt in “health classes” or “technology and home economics classes” in school. However, most of the time, these lessons are carried out by guest lecturers. Pauline, a Nun from Korea Teenstar, an organization which provides comprehensive sex education to teenagers, mentioned this problem. “A lot of schools are giving partial sex education to teenagers. It is more like ‘invisible mending’ information,” she asserted.
As teenage parents have started to expose themselves in public, more people began to recognize the seriousness of the issues related to teenage pregnancy. These people strived to suggest practical solutions to resolve the problem. First, introducing real cases or current issues can help attract students’ interests and sympathy. It can also help teenagers realize that sex education is vital in real world. “I think it is better to bring transparency into sex education. Rather than hiding the truth of teenage sex lives, exposing the reality of them and emphasizing the importance of advanced prevention of pregnancy are needed. Similar to cigarette advertisements warning customers about the dangers of s m o k i n g , s e x education also has to be rigid a n d r a i s e t h e seriousness of teenage pregnanc y,” c l a i m e d Professor Bae. S e c o n d l y , different methods or approaches to sex education should be implemented. Rather than simply watching videos or listening to lectures, trying different ways of sex education like acting, debate, and listening to the real experience of teenage
parents can encourage teenagers to actively participate in sex education. According to the Korea Research Institute of Sexual Psychology, authentic sex education starts from the period when teenagers recognize their sex fully by themselves such as whether they are males or females. At the same time, it is essential to help students realize why sex education is needed. The Korea Research Institute of Sexual Psychology added, “Similar to students studying subjects like math and English to go to college, all people have to learn basic knowledge about sex to live in today’s society, because information to share love by having sexual relationships, to marry and to raise children is essentially required in life.” Nun Pauline added, “Teenagers have to realize that ‘sex’ is not only limited to ‘physical’ relationships. They have to realize that it includes ‘love’ and ‘new birth’ as well.” Finally, active sex education has to be processed at home by parents. They should not be too dependent on sex education carried out in schools. Parents should communicate with their children and provide their knowledge of sexual relationships. In conclusion, precise sex education is needed to provide teenagers with an adequate knowledge of sex and enable them to have appropriate and safe sexual relationships. To do so, consistent attention and communication with teenagers are necessary.