The "fundamentalists" fought back just as hard. Their arguments ranged from scriptural quotations and the Saint Augustine concept of "Original Sin", to sex education being a Communist plot for the subverting of American youth into degeneracy, to the concept that classroom teaching would sterilize the romance and love out of sex. Sex had to be taught with a foundation of decency, they said; a child who learned sex as he would tennis would never have the respect, awe, or control of his growing desires, and would soon become cynical and immoral. And like religion, they argued, the ethics and decencies which made sex more than just copulation between man and woman were too varied from family to family for a mere teacher to present effectively.
Montock was rural, away from the centers of the state, and its outlook was narrow and firmly planted in tradition. Not unexpectedly, the small town was almost entirely on the side of the "fundamentalists", and so convinced were its citizens in the inherent evil of sex education, that they were caught off-guard by the passing of a sex education law in the state congress. Sex courses were made mandatory in all school districts as of the current school year, and as a result, the Freshman class of Montock High was given a chance to learn about sex every Wednesday afternoon whether their parents liked it or not.
The State Board of Education had passed down a series of guidelines, starting with the rule that the class was voluntary – up to a point.