Apparently, the theme of sexual ethics has carried over from last week. There have been a lot of great responses. These are some of my favorites.
1. On virginity
Joy Bennett has three great pieces on the subject, and it looks like there’s more forthcoming:
- On Virginity: What I Did and Did Not Mean (clarifying her previous post about the chances most people will marry a virgin)
- What’s Wrong with Virginity? Nothing, Unless You’re Obsessed with It (op-ed piece for The Guardian US)
- If Not “Sola Virginity,” What Do We Teach? Part 1 of 2 (intimacy and marriage)
2. On “Biblical clarity”
Preston Yancey gives a great summary of the problems that arise from reducing sexual ethics to a list of Bible verses we can commit to memory.
3. On what’s missing
Slacktivist offers the perspective that the purity movement has failed to produce anything like a sexual ethic, only a sexual rule (“NO!”).
Evangelical purity culture and its attendant cult of “modesty” enthrones male lust, inverting what Jesus taught us. “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away,” Jesus said. But purity culture says male eyes are inviolable, so if a man’s eye causes him to sin, then women’s bodies must be torn out and thrown away — or at least covered up and shut away. Modesty somehow always means women in burkas,* never men in blindfolds.
4. On sin and consent
Two more great pieces by Dianna Anderson:
We spend so much effort and energy telling people to say “no” that we’ve not equipped them with how to say “yes.”
A healthy sexual relationship has much more room to happen when everyone involved is doing so enthusiastically and with full knowledge and agreement about boundaries.
In unrelated news, here are two more posts this week you may enjoy:
5. On seasonal depression
Registered Runaway offers some good ideas for how to cope with winter depression. If, like many of us, you are suffering, you don’t have to do it alone.
6. On Valentine’s Day
In case you don’t follow my other blog, here’s this weeks short story.
Have a great weekend, everyone. See you back here on Monday!
