What Black Women and Girls Deserve from Sex Education:
An Interview with Dr. Regina Davis Moss, President and CEO of In Our Own Voice: National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda
Systemic racism has long shaped sex education in harmful ways. For generations, Black women, girls, and gender-expansive young people have had to navigate sexual health conversations defined by stigma, silence, oversexualization, rather than by care and affirmation. We sat down with Dr. Regina Davis Moss, President and CEO of In Our Own Voice: National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda to discuss why culturally affirming sex education is essential in advancing sexual health equity and bodily autonomy for Black women and girls. Dr. Davis Moss further affirms how sex education is an upstream approach in the Reproductive Justice framework by ensuring young people feel seen, heard, and affirmed in ways that honor their identities, lived experiences, and communities.
Dr. Regina Davis Moss
Can you share what sex education looked like for you growing up, and what you wish you had learned?
Growing up, sex education was fragmented, clinical, and often rooted in scare tactics rather than empowerment. I often heard of many girls and women navigating unplanned pregnancies, sexually transmitted infections, and relationships where they did not always feel safe or valued. What struck me early on was that so many of these experiences were tied to a lack of honest information, support, and agency.
Even as a young girl, I was deeply curious about the reproductive process. I used to read books about the female body and fertilization, and during my teens before I even knew the language for it, I had become an informal sex educator among my peers. But curiosity alone is not enough when young people are denied truthful, affirming conversations about their bodies, sexuality, relationships, consent, and self-worth.
What I wish I had learned was that sex education is not just about avoiding pregnancy or disease. It is about autonomy. It is about understanding that your body belongs to you, that your choices matter, and that you deserve relationships rooted in respect and reciprocity. I wish someone had explicitly taught us that our voices mattered in medical settings and in the decisions we make about our futures.
Sex education, when done right, gives young people the tools to protect their health, advocate for themselves, and self-determine their lives.
How did your identity shape the way you experienced sex education?
My identity shaped every part of how I experienced sex education because Black girls are often taught about sexuality through stigma, silence, and stereotypes instead of affirmation, empowerment and care. Growing up as a Black girl, I became aware very early that society often viewed our bodies differently. There was an assumption that we were more mature, more knowing, or somehow less deserving of protection and understanding. That has real consequences for how Black girls receive information, are given options, access care, and understand their own worth.
Growing up, I quickly realized that the challenges facing Black women and girls were not confined to one zip code. Regardless of where they lived, they were still dealing with the same issues around sexual health, shame, and lack of access to trustworthy information and care.
As a young person, I saw firsthand how difficult it could be for Black women and girls to exercise agency. Those experiences shaped my understanding that reproductive justice must center both agency and autonomy. Agency is believing you have the right and capacity to make decisions for yourself. Autonomy is having the freedom and support to act on those decisions.
That understanding has guided my entire life’s work. I believe storytelling is a critical part of that work because, as Ida B. Wells said, we must “tell the world the facts.” People need to hear us, believe us, trust us, and ensure young people have the information they need to make meaningful choices about their bodies and futures.
When you think about “culturally affirming sex education,” what does that look like in practice?
Culturally affirming sex education means telling the truth: young people deserve full, accurate education that recognizes their humanity and lived experience. For Black youth especially, that means acknowledging the historical legacy of exploitation, stigma and oversexualization of Black young people in our culture, while also affirming their dignity, joy, and right to self-determination.
In practice, culturally affirming sex education means providing information about bodies, relationships, consent, contraception, abortion, identity, and health in a way that gives young people the tools to take full ownership of their sexual health. It means creating spaces for young people to ask questions without judgment and to see themselves reflected in the conversation. At its core, culturally affirming sex education says to young people: you deserve information, you deserve care, you deserve respect, and you deserve the freedom to make decisions about your own body and future
Why is it especially important to center Black girls and gender-expansive young people in sex ed conversations?
Black girls and gender-expansive young people are too often forced to navigate systems that deny them safety, care, and the full truth about their health and bodies. They face harmful stereotypes, stigma and medical racism that can make seeking care feel unsafe or dismissive, and lawmakers who continue trying to restrict access to the very information and resources young people need to make informed decisions about their lives.
That is why it is not optional, but essential to celebrate and center them in these conversations. Doing so lays the groundwork for us to fully uplift the Reproductive Justice principle of bodily autonomy. Sex, identity and relationships do not look the same for everyone, and there are many experiences Black girls and gender-expansive young people carry without being offered a real outlet or safe space to discuss them. Too often, Black girls are expected to be resilient without being protected. Gender-expansive young people are too often erased entirely from conversations about health and sexuality. Culturally responsive sex education helps change that. It means giving them the tools to speak up, advocate for themselves, set boundaries, access care, and imagine futures rooted in safety, joy, and self-determination. That is what Reproductive Justice calls us to do.
How do you see sex education fitting into the broader framework of Reproductive Justice?
Sex education is a Reproductive Justice issue because bodily autonomy begins with knowledge. Reproductive Justice is about the human right to have children, not have children, and raise the children we have in safe and sustainable communities. That vision is only possible when young people have access to accurate, affirming information about their bodies, relationships, and options.
Sex education is an upstream strategy. It equips young people with the tools to protect their well-being, name their needs and recognize healthy and unhealthy relationships. But Reproductive Justice also reminds us that individual choices do not happen in a vacuum. A girl cannot freely exercise reproductive agency if her choices are constrained by social and economic conditions, racism, lack of healthcare access, or inadequate education. That is why culturally affirming sex education must exist alongside comprehensive healthcare. It is an upstream strategy that helps young people enter adulthood feeling informed and empowered to make decisions that are right for their lives.
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