<p>Thank you… that’s why I appreciated my kids telling me which kids were in a relationship or not before we had these sleepovers.</p>
<p>I will add, and some of you with a more conservative opinion may not believe me, but I did not allow my daughters to do camping trips, or any of those overnight trips because there weren’t any chaperones. Oh, well. They survived. They can camp all they want now.</p>
<p>The absolute key factor to me is responsible chaperoning, which I have provided.</p>
<p>What exactly are you saying, mini? That human mating behavior has no basis in biology? That all psychology is garbage science? Or that you haven’t taken the time to look at any of the literature? </p>
<p>I don’t know where you are coming up with the comment about Iran. I’m suggesting that human mating behavior (sexual behavior) demonstrates gender differences that are rooted in biology – 50,000+ years of biology. As intelligent beings, we can modify our behavior through cultural norms. But the kind of changes in social behavior in western culture over the past 40 years don’t change certain tendencies – males still want to have more casual sexual encounters than females. Just because you don’t like it doesn’t make it wrong. And telling young females that they should behave the same way as young males sexually is anti-feminist.</p>
<p>sjmom: what mini is saying (as I understand it) is that if you forget the past 40 years of western culture, the behavior norms reflect social pressures of an agricultural society- which is (only) about 10,000 years old. if you look before that time then the 40,000+ years before that had very different pressures. and mini I guess is arguing that ours is no longer an agricultural society, hence things are reverting back to the old “default” (and maybe more natural) state. did I understand you right, mini? </p>
<p>what <em>I</em> am saying is that while I agree that there are gender differences rooted in biology, nobody here has cited any BIOLOGICAL study to show that the male of the human species is intrinsically hard wired to prefer more casual sexual encounters than the female is. I’m not saying that it is not true but the psychological studies you cite do not have the power to answer that question. One may have an <em>intuitive</em> sense of what the answer is, but one must recognize it as just that- intuition.</p>
<p>One thing I <em>am</em> certain about is that this discussion has veered far away from a very simple question asked by OP: how to handle the co-ed sleepover request. I really don’t think such a deep analysis is needed to make that decision. IMO that decision should just be guided by how comfortable the parents are about the possibility that high school seniors might engage in sex in their house.</p>
<p>Not to derail the fascinating academic tangent, but if it’s possible to do two at once…regarding family decision-making, did anyone find the presence of a younger sib changed their decisions? We often made conservative choices for the two older ones during h.s. on the basis that there was an 12 year old boy in the house. This infuriated the older two.</p>
<p>My S is only two years younger than D, and he was often befriended by D;s guy friends. He didn’t change my decisions.</p>
<p>vicariousparent: Not that it really matters, but you are detailing my argument that is forwarded most cogently in a book by Elizabeth Fisher, which is, sadly, out of print.</p>
<p>One favorite bit of research of mine is when researchers asked an aboriginal woman to name her lovers she said, “You expect me to remember all of those?” This was said with complete nonchalance. </p>
<p>Of course an anecdote proves nothing but I think it’s funny.</p>
<p>Sorry vicariousparent for being off topic again.</p>
<p>This discussion is very relevant right now – not for me, but for a coworker.</p>
<p>His daughter, a freshman in HS, has been invited to a co-ed sleepover with the rest of her sports team as an end-of-season party. The party is at the coach’s house. Apparently it is a longtime tradition.</p>
<p>The team ranges from freshmen to seniors. About 3 weeks ago, a senior on the team asked her out, and they are now sort of dating. The parents are very uneasy about all of this, and not very prepared either. They are not thrilled about their daughter attending this, and are struggling to come up with their rules.</p>
<p>What do people think about a coach hosting a co-ed sleepover?</p>
<p>I’m uneasy about a freshman dating a senior (I did it briefly once upon a time, and it worked out fine, but it doesn’t for most), I’m uneasy about the 9th grader and senior being in this situation together after three weeks of “sort of dating,” I’m uneasy about a coach holding a sleepover, and I’m uneasy about the fact that the girl’s parents apparently see this as something the daughter must do when it is very much up to them.</p>
<p>What kind of team is this that’s co-ed and all four years, anyway? I’m assuming it’s not school affiliated?</p>
<p>I would never go to a sleepover at my coach’s house.</p>
<p>I love my coach, he’s an awesome guy. But I think more than anything it would look VERY bad (for us and the coach) to have a team of 6-8 girls spending the night at the man’s house.</p>
<p>First of all, if the coach is hosting it, I think technically it’s considered a school-sponsored event. If anything happens, it will truly be the coach’s rear end and probably job. </p>
<p>We had a drama teacher once who wouldn’t attend cast parties, because if she came, it would indicate she approved of the event and therefore she could be responsible for anything that happened. </p>
<p>I, too, have more questions. What sport is coed? And if it’s a coed team, well either way, if the coach is a male or female, there would be students of the opposite gender there. Perhaps he or she has a staff member of the opposite gender coming to help chaperone. Or maybe they’re married, and the spouse has agreed to chaperone their same gender.</p>
<p>Our high school has this silly tradition (well, four years now), called Camp (insert football coach’s last name). It takes place when football camp opens up, and the teams have a lock-in at school for several nights… parents provide meals, etc. They have team-building opportunities, etc in the evenings. I know the cheerleaders and poms girls are also included in Camp (insert last name), and stay overnight. But I’m sure there’s plenty of male and female staff during the night. I think the girls only stay overnight one night, though.</p>
<p>My bet is that if this coach is doing this, the school knows about it.</p>
<p>The parents are totally freaked out about the whole situation, including their 14 year old dating a senior. One reason they are “sort of” dating is because the girl’s parents don’t want them to, but can’t seem to forbid it. Anyway, it’s a long story, and I don’t want to give too many details. </p>
<p>Yes, the sport is school affiliated. I was very surprised to hear that the coach has been holding co-ed sleepovers at his house for a long time. I have no idea if the principal, athletic director, superintendent or school board know about this. This isn’t my school district. </p>
<p>We’ve talked about this a lot in the office. One of my coworkers kept asking me what was ‘intrinsically wrong’ about the situation. Another one pointed out that there are some potentially serious liability issues for the school district if anything ever did happen at one of these parties.</p>
<p>edit: teriwtt, we cross posted. Yes, you got the sport.</p>
<p>Well said. Even though there evidently studies to support this, it sure does seem to be easily observable. I do wonder, though, how much of it really is biology and how much is social conditioning. It’ll be interesting to see what happens in the next few generations.</p>
<p>I do agree that acknowledging differences between the sexes does not make one sexist. We do have different plumbing, after all.</p>
<p>Back to the original topic: I was a teenager in the 70s. I was always amazed that some kids had parents who would let them have keg parties in their back yards, and all sorts of ‘behavior’ transpired. I’m curious if there are any of those parents on this forum, who would admit to having allowed such events.</p>
<p>Duh ( im saying that because with all the other stuff going on, I completely forgot about this)
My daughter will be attending a coed weekend coming up in a few weeks in preparation for her trip to Africa.
It is held at the family cabin of one of the teachers & everyone who is on the trip is required to attend. It is an important opportunity to work out details and learn to work together. </p>
<p>I didn’t even think of it being …* coed*, because I never hear my D even mention boys. However, it will be a nice opportunity to get to know them in a situation away from school/socializing.</p>
<p>Thanks, SJMom, I completely agree with you! On another note, WHY can’t a mother forbid her 14 yr. old from dating a Senior? My kids know no one on one dates til they’re 16. Period. Call me unfashionable and not “hip” but that’s our rule.</p>
<p>Most people will concede that many aspects of human behavior and mental health have a biological basis – intelligence, depression, bi-polar disorder, autism, anxiety, ADD/ADHD and even sexual orientation. </p>
<p>Why, then, is it so hard to acknowledge that human biology has an impact on mating and reproduction – and that cultural norms may have changed in the recent past, but biology hasn’t?</p>
<p>Some posters seem to think that biology rules when it comes to libido once puberty hits (male fantasy, big time, as far as I’m concerned!), but is complete unrelated to other aspects of mating, like attachment. Seems inconsistent to me.</p>
<p>dke: absolutely, parents can have rules about dating and sleepovers, etc. When I learned about this situation, the first thing I told my coworker is that he and his wife had better talk with each other and set those rules (like curfews, dating one-on-one vs. group activities, etc.). They didn’t have any – like many parents, they didn’t think that when their innocent young daughter hit HS, things can change.</p>
<p>The problem with forbidding a kid from doing something is that for some kids, that just inspires them to want to break the rule. Forbidden fruit, and all of that. Suddenly that senior becomes oh so more attractive when mom says you can’t date him.</p>
<p>My last comment on bio differences: I agree 100% with sjmom’s statement: </p>
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<p>The point that some here are refusing to see is that in biological (i.e, evolutionary) terms, 10,000 years is considered RECENT past!! Our BIOLOGY is dictated far more by what happened in the 100,000 plus years before that.</p>
<p>OTOH, our SOCIAL norms keep changing very rapidly from one generation to another. What was true for our parents is not true for us and what is true for us will not be true for our children, even though we may wish it.</p>
<p>“IMO that decision should just be guided by how comfortable the parents are about the possibility that high school seniors might engage in sex in their house.”</p>
<p>My question for the no-sleepover crowd is, how do you control what’s going on in the house at 4 p.m.? Is coed socializing in the home banned across the board? What about when parents aren’t home?</p>
<p>I think it’s perfectly reasonable to have an anti-sex rule, but odd to enforce it only at night. (I’ve seen lots of parents do just that, under the apparent assumption that adolescent sex is like a vampire that can only emerge in the dark. These are often the same parents who enforced a strict midnight curfew, yet made no effort to learn whether their kid was on a drunken rampage prior to getting home on time.)</p>