by Joseph Oscilowski ‘22

“Sex Education” is known for having numerous LGBT+ characters, each with their own stories and problems. But even with such diversity in sexuality, this show does an extremely good job in accurately representing real-life people and situations.

The second season of “Sex Education” was released on January 17 to Netflix. This show focuses around the life of Otis, a high school boy who develops a reputation for providing his classmates with sex advice.

One example of an LGBT+ character in the show is Eric, Otis’s best friend. He is an openly gay African American who struggles with choosing between two school mates as his romantic partner. He experiences a lot of acceptance and open-mindedness after he came out to his very religious family, an aspect not generally shown in TV shows. Eric becomes more expressive as he becomes comfortable with showing his true colors, and his sexuality is very well represented in the show. An unfortunate trend in shows is to make the gay main character the cliche “gay best friend” to the cliche “popular girl,” and generally keep them grouped together with little-to-no interaction with straight males. What “Sex Education” does right is showing a very strong friendship between a gay and straight male. This moves away from the assumptions that gay males only hang out with girls, using instead a more realistic perspective that sexuality does not affect friendships, nor who people are friends with. 

Another LGBT+ character is Adam, who plays the role of the “school bully.” Adam struggles with his feelings, confused about his attraction to both males and females. What makes Adam a good LGBT+ representation is that he is not a “feminine” guy. Generally, shows often protray gay or bisexualmale characters as very feminine, when in reality, gay/bisexual guys can be anywhere from extremely feminine to extremely masculine. It also represents his experience with coming to terms with his sexuality very well. 

Among the show’s many other LGBT+ characters is Ola, Otis’s ex-girlfriend, who identifies as pansexual (being attracted to all genders). From the start of the show, Ola is aware of her sexuality. Viewers can see Ola come to realize that she doesn’t have as strong of feelings for Otis as she does for her best friend Lily. Ola’s representation is well written because it took her a little while in the show to realize that she is more attracted to Lily than she is to Otis, giving perspective into how attraction may be for those who are pansexual.

In the end, the best part about the extensive LGBT+ representation in “Sex Education” is its lack of focus on homophobia. Though homophobia affects a lot of LGBT+ people, and is a very serious and real topic, the show instead focuses on showing all of the characters as equal. It is refreshing to see all of the characters being accepting of each other and not making sexuality to be an impact on friendships.