There's been quite a lively discussion in the forum lately about waiting for marriage. As you know I've written a lot about how I feel about the subject. Now I want to write about another side of the issue that nobody talks about.
There is a large group of people out there who are sitting on the sidelines listening to all this talk about purity and waiting and how it is worth it and so forth. Some of you may be among this group. If so, please understand that I am not trying to exploit your pain. But if we are going to talk about sex and waiting we need to bring your voices to the table too.
One of the biggest fictions that society promotes about sex--both the pro-abstinence side and the anti-abstinence side--is that sex is a voluntary act between two consenting adults. In most cases it is. But not always, and that's what I want to talk about now. Those of us who are in our 50's and older know what it was like when rape and sexual abuse were not talked about. When it wasn't reported and when it was it wasn't taken seriously. If we aren't careful we could slide back into that way of thinking.
In the movie "Precious", Precious is a pregnant overweight African-American teen who lives in horrendous poverty and abuse. Her mostly white teachers have no clue as to what Precious' life is really like. All they see is another stereotypical teenage mother, another burden on the taxpayers. They assume that Precious is pregnant because she went out and had sex without thinking of the consequences. But we can see what those who cast judgement on Precious cannot--and that is that Precious did not have a choice. She was raped--repeatedly--by her mother's boyfriend. This is in fact her second child.
Precious doesn't have the option of saving herself for marriage. That was brutally taken from her.
The other night I watched "Breaking Trail", a Western starring Robert Duvall, who rescues a group of Chinese girls (little more than children) who were sold by their desperately poor parents to a buyer who shipped them across the ocean to America where they were destined to be prostitutes in a mining camp. While "Breaking Trail" may be fiction, what it describes isn't. These girls, too, were deprived of their chance to wait until marriage.
This sort of thing is still going on, by the way. I read a report on human trafficking that says basically, if you have a drug problem in your community, you have a human trafficking problem as well, it's that widespread. This is where I have a big problem with the sex industry. The men in the mining camps didn't give a damn that the Chinese girls were frightened children far from home, all they cared about was what was between their legs. They never stopped to ask if these girls were here because they wanted to be. Same with the modern sex industry. How many people reading this who like to view porn have ever stopped to ask: Are these people doing this because they want to do this? Did they have a choice?
Once upon a time consumers never stopped to think about where their coffee came from or how other goods were produced. Now we have the Fair Trade movement. You see their stickers all over the place. Perhaps that is what the sex industry needs. Fair Trade. Of course it probably won't go over given the puritanical strain in this country but it might be a start.
In fact there is a racial/economic aspect to this whole business of abstinence that hasn't even been touched on. Not only is there a double standard but there is a racial/economic standard. It's called the "Madonna/Whore" syndrome. There were the kind of women that men waited to have sex with after they were married and then there were the others who were fair game because of their skin color, economic status, disability or anything else that marked them out from the mainstream. Brothels were a thriving business in the Victorian era. While white women were saving themselves for their wedding night their would-be husbands were doing no such thing. It just wasn't talked about, that's all. There were questions a bride did not ask. Just as there were questions that the wife of a slave-owner did not ask.
There are women who go their entire life without ever being propositioned, without ever being in a situation where they felt threatened sexually. And then there are others who it seems they cannot make a move without some male a**hole hitting on them. Guess which ones make up the bulk of the abstinence movement.
But remember, it's not only women who have been robbed of the choice of who and where and when. We've been hearing a lot lately--an awful lot--about young boys and teens who were sexually molested, often by the same people who are saying "Sex belongs only in marriage."
Let's not forget that while waiting for marriage has its pros and cons, it is a choice not everyone gets to make. It can be taken away. And we need to conduct our discussions mindful of that fact.
There is a large group of people out there who are sitting on the sidelines listening to all this talk about purity and waiting and how it is worth it and so forth. Some of you may be among this group. If so, please understand that I am not trying to exploit your pain. But if we are going to talk about sex and waiting we need to bring your voices to the table too.
One of the biggest fictions that society promotes about sex--both the pro-abstinence side and the anti-abstinence side--is that sex is a voluntary act between two consenting adults. In most cases it is. But not always, and that's what I want to talk about now. Those of us who are in our 50's and older know what it was like when rape and sexual abuse were not talked about. When it wasn't reported and when it was it wasn't taken seriously. If we aren't careful we could slide back into that way of thinking.
In the movie "Precious", Precious is a pregnant overweight African-American teen who lives in horrendous poverty and abuse. Her mostly white teachers have no clue as to what Precious' life is really like. All they see is another stereotypical teenage mother, another burden on the taxpayers. They assume that Precious is pregnant because she went out and had sex without thinking of the consequences. But we can see what those who cast judgement on Precious cannot--and that is that Precious did not have a choice. She was raped--repeatedly--by her mother's boyfriend. This is in fact her second child.
Precious doesn't have the option of saving herself for marriage. That was brutally taken from her.
The other night I watched "Breaking Trail", a Western starring Robert Duvall, who rescues a group of Chinese girls (little more than children) who were sold by their desperately poor parents to a buyer who shipped them across the ocean to America where they were destined to be prostitutes in a mining camp. While "Breaking Trail" may be fiction, what it describes isn't. These girls, too, were deprived of their chance to wait until marriage.
This sort of thing is still going on, by the way. I read a report on human trafficking that says basically, if you have a drug problem in your community, you have a human trafficking problem as well, it's that widespread. This is where I have a big problem with the sex industry. The men in the mining camps didn't give a damn that the Chinese girls were frightened children far from home, all they cared about was what was between their legs. They never stopped to ask if these girls were here because they wanted to be. Same with the modern sex industry. How many people reading this who like to view porn have ever stopped to ask: Are these people doing this because they want to do this? Did they have a choice?
Once upon a time consumers never stopped to think about where their coffee came from or how other goods were produced. Now we have the Fair Trade movement. You see their stickers all over the place. Perhaps that is what the sex industry needs. Fair Trade. Of course it probably won't go over given the puritanical strain in this country but it might be a start.
In fact there is a racial/economic aspect to this whole business of abstinence that hasn't even been touched on. Not only is there a double standard but there is a racial/economic standard. It's called the "Madonna/Whore" syndrome. There were the kind of women that men waited to have sex with after they were married and then there were the others who were fair game because of their skin color, economic status, disability or anything else that marked them out from the mainstream. Brothels were a thriving business in the Victorian era. While white women were saving themselves for their wedding night their would-be husbands were doing no such thing. It just wasn't talked about, that's all. There were questions a bride did not ask. Just as there were questions that the wife of a slave-owner did not ask.
There are women who go their entire life without ever being propositioned, without ever being in a situation where they felt threatened sexually. And then there are others who it seems they cannot make a move without some male a**hole hitting on them. Guess which ones make up the bulk of the abstinence movement.
But remember, it's not only women who have been robbed of the choice of who and where and when. We've been hearing a lot lately--an awful lot--about young boys and teens who were sexually molested, often by the same people who are saying "Sex belongs only in marriage."
Let's not forget that while waiting for marriage has its pros and cons, it is a choice not everyone gets to make. It can be taken away. And we need to conduct our discussions mindful of that fact.
