What do we actually mean by "safe sex"? It seems to be just about girls not getting pregnant. And that is wrong. There are plenty of young women who engage in coercive sex, taking steps to avoid pregnancy, but continuously damaging their mental and emotional state. There are others who need to use the pill because their boyfriend refuses to wear a condom: she may be protected from pregnancy but what about sexually transmitted infections and the fact that she is in a relationship where she is having sex with someone who would put her at risk.

So, I was disappointed about the news that pharmacies in the Isle of Wight are now able to provide one month's supply of contraceptive pills to girls as young as 13, without the knowledge of their parents or GP. This is not because I am prudish at the thought of young people having sex; if that was the case I wouldn't spend my time regularly listening to young people discussing relationships, but because our concern with young people having sex is once again narrowed down to first, decisions that girls make and second, to pregnancy.

It takes two people to produce a baby, and yet we constantly heap responsibility on girls to prevent this happening too early. Furthermore, our assumption that all teenage pregnancy is the result of consensual sex reinforces our belief that if only we could enable girls to avoid pregnancy then they would be having sex safely.

Last year, I spoke to a group of young women in custody about their first sexual experiences – all had sex before they were 16. When discussing her first sexual encounter aged 13, one young woman explained that afterwards she felt as though her "body was broken inside". What was more heartbreaking, however, was that she had sex again the very next day.

But why should we be concerned – she had "safe sex"? I would argue that we are not providing enough opportunities for young women and men to understand the place of sex within relationships, within their lives and the impact that having "unsafe sex" has on their emotional wellbeing.

And then there are boys: following the tragic murders of two young people over recent weeks we once again return to media debates around serious youth and gang-related violence.

While it is true that the victims in both these cases were males, it would be narrow-minded to think that women and girls have not been affected by these incidents. Did they not have mothers? Did they not have sisters or partners? Pleas once again have been made for knife crime prevention programmes to be rolled out in schools, but we need to ask if the problem is just with the weapon used and what this violence means for all of us? Violence among young people can be weapon-enabled, but it can also take place without a knife or a gun. Is rape not a weapon? Is emotional torment to the point of suicide not a weapon? If our attention is narrowed to a particular weapon or the use of such weapons by males we will never reach a solution.

Consider knife crime prevention: I wonder how much discussion is focused on preventing boys from using knives rather than considering the girls who are coerced into carrying them for their boyfriends; or what about disputes that result from arguments about sexual rights and property? When a boy is willing to stab another for sleeping with his girlfriend and posting it on YouTube, that problem is one that won't be addressed by lifting knives off the streets. The knife is just one problem among many in this scenario.

Violence through sex, violence through stabbing, shooting or bricking someone over the head will not be solved by placing girls and boys in silos and attributing social ills to each based on gender stereotypes. Only when we strive to see the world though the eyes of young people, both male and female, and address the violence they experience holistically, will we begin to heal the emotional scars that it leaves behind.

• Carlene Firmin is chief executive of the Gag Project and co-ordinator of the Female Voice in Violence project at social policy charity Race on the Agenda.