American Notes NEW HAMPSHIRE

Called Mutual Sharing, Mutual Caring, a sex-education manual for New Hampshire teenagers has too much mutuality for the state's conservative establishment. The booklet discusses topics ranging from reproductive functions to rape, pregnancy and homosexuality. "Gay and lesbian adolescents are perfectly normal and their sexual attraction to members of the same sex is healthy," says the manual.

Politicians from Governor John Sununu on down have lined up to denounce the manual and block its distribution. Says Strafford County Commissioner Paul Dumont: "We let those guys out of the closet ten years ago. I think we should put them back in." He and his fellow commissioners voted to freeze spending for the county's Prenatal Family Planning Clinic, which paid for the development of the manual during three years of work by community groups, schools and youth organizations.