Is it reasonable for parents to panic at cartoon nudity in school textbooks? Only if we embrace irrational taboos about bodies.
When I had sex ed in the late 90’s, I was shown videos with real (but obviously non-sexualized) nudity. I don’t remember there being any controversy about that at all, and I went to a Christian school (Anglican).
Control, mostly, at least at the meta level.
Many of the parents who freak out hold a lot of shame themselves surrounding bodies & sex, having been denied good sex ed. It is their job to ensure they don’t pass that to their children, but I imagine this is easier said than done, especially if shame & ignorance are normalised within a culture.
For them, the best argument may be that children who do not know about sex are vastly more vulnerable, not only to bizarre information and unpleasant mistakes, but to sexual predators.