Sex Education: Season 3

I consider SE’s first season one of the best things Netflix has ever done. It was magnificent. The second season was meh IMHO and the only good thing was Adam’s character development and Adam’s relationships with Ola & Eric. I hated all that Otis/Maeve drama and wasn’t a fan of what the others were into. So let’s dive into the 3rd season.

I gotta give it to the show. They explore some phenomenal aspects of raging hormones, teenage sex and love. They went further this season by slightly advocating for Emily Nagoski’s Come As Your Are book (smth I urge everyone I go on a date with to read). The show also has very good and healthy sex advice.. from time to time anyways. And the fact that’s it’s all bright and shiny and has the word “sex” in it, drives a lot of teenagers to watch it, which is great as they learn to be more open, talk, communicate, learn to like & accept themselves and their bodies, understand that each body is unique and beautiful. But for all the good there’s bad as well.

There’s some toxicity hidden in what the characters do and I couldn’t ignore it. I understand these are teenagers and we all did some toxic shit when we were 17 but I hope the show called out this behavior more. Specifically:

> Eric almost breaks up with Adam in the beginning, because he thinks Adam “isn’t properly gay and isn’t ready for penetrative sex”. It was a major red flag and disgusting. If you tell your partner you’ll break up with them unless they have sex with you — you are a massive asshole. Boys do this to girls all the time and apparently, they do it to other boys too. That was realistic but they should have called out Eric on it. Noone should be forced to have sex! Forcing sex screams #smalldickenergy

> Eric cheats. Maeve cheats. Otis has cheated. This has got to stop! Liking someone else while you’re in a relationship is ok. It happens. But you should talk to your partner about it, you should learn to communicate. I wish Sex Education put more effort into showing that it is wrong.

Overall, I care less and less about Maeve and Otis (I fast-forward their scenes). I was much more interested in Adam’s story, his mom and dad, Ruby, Aimee and some of the others. Adam and Ruby were massively mistreated and on the last episode, I cried for like 15 minutes non-stop. It was insanely heartbreaking watching him compete in the dog show.

I’m not sure I’ll watch season 4 and if I do, again, it will only be for Adam.