Libby Anne's excellent post on Purity Culture (MERGED)

[camdendayton]

sorry about the double thread. I searched for lovejoyfeminism and it didn't come up. Now I know to look more carefully :)

[Austin]

sorry about the double thread. I searched for lovejoyfeminism and it didn't come up. Now I know to look more carefully :)

Don't sweat it. It's not a problem to merge them at all :)

[Joykins]

I'm also very skeptical that purity *behavior* is as widespread as purity *culture*, for what it's worth. For a lot of people it is really all about appearances. I do feel sorry for those who really do take it seriously, though, because it seems like the effect is often very castrating.

[Angri-la]

The giant purity balls really make me ill. I would be really uncomfortable, to say the least, if my husband came up to me and said "I am taking 12 year old Ladybug to a dance in a big white dress that looks like a wedding dress. I am giving her a wedding like ring and having her pledge her undying-til-marriage virginity. We will dance and get photographed with all of the other fathers and their little Purity Princesses. You can stay home and read your fundie site." We would be having a serious conversation about me leaving with my daughter. It is not healthy for fathers or especially strangers to be so obsessed with virginity and purity.

The Purity ring girls are more likely to do it and not use birth control and end up with unexpected baybees, or even worse, disease. I hate that people think this is normal and I am so glad I narrowly missed this trend. I do recall a girl or two that did have purity rings, but even the evangelicals I knew thought that was a little weird, because it was "like being married to your dad, ew". I guess they've changed their minds.

[Patsy]

"Fetish" is probably accurate for a lot of them. Anybody here recall the Youtube of the wedding in which the bride and groom had barely even touched hands before they said their vows and had their first kiss ever in front of an audience of cheering clapping men? And it was scripted that way, and the men who scripted it described the kiss as especially exciting or the payoff or some such? EEEEEEEWWWWWWW.

See: Doug Philips' description of a first kiss at a wedding. Two paragraphs, in-detail, so fucking skeevy.

[AnnoDomini]

Where do I find that description?

[sea_gale]

Wow, great thread. I've often wondered how these girls manage. I imagine the girls who are brought up with a reasonably healthy attitude to their bodies are just as eager as the boys, but like someone upthread said, some of these wedding nights must resemble a rape scene.

[Joykins]

Where do I find that description?

Slowly, he drew her to him, his hand caressing her jaw, his thumb gliding across her lower lip. Her mouth opened under the pressure like a Venus Fly Trap about to swallow an unwary fly. She sucked his thumb into her mouth and swirled her tongue around the tip.

"You got a pretty mouth," he rasped, leaning in and pressing his mouth to hers. She tasted sweet, like honeysuckle and Boone's Farm strawberry wine. Her mouth opened under his, and their tongues performed a sprightly dance as his arm twined around her to grab her ass.

Their bodies fused together like two atomic nuclei in a hydrogen bomb, and just as explosively. By the time the pastor separated them, he had come in his tuxedo pants.

OK, it's either what Doug wrote or my entry in the next Bulwer Lytton contest.

[Patsy]

some of these wedding nights must resemble be a rape scene.

Guys, can we get this right, please? If your new husband forces himself on you, that's rape, not 'a bit like rape'. Even if you liked the guy and intended to do stuff consensually.

[VintageJen1984]

The giant purity balls really make me ill. I would be really uncomfortable, to say the least, if my husband came up to me and said "I am taking 12 year old Ladybug to a dance in a big white dress that looks like a wedding dress. I am giving her a wedding like ring and having her pledge her undying-til-marriage virginity. We will dance and get photographed with all of the other fathers and their little Purity Princesses. You can stay home and read your fundie site." We would be having a serious conversation about me leaving with my daughter. It is not healthy for fathers or especially strangers to be so obsessed with virginity and purity.

The Purity ring girls are more likely to do it and not use birth control and end up with unexpected baybees, or even worse, disease. I hate that people think this is normal and I am so glad I narrowly missed this trend. I do recall a girl or two that did have purity rings, but even the evangelicals I knew thought that was a little weird, because it was "like being married to your dad, ew". I guess they've changed their minds.

Not so sure. I was raised evangelical and was given the purity ring spiel (and even had one, that I wore for a couple of years) and the evangelical version of purity rings has nothing at all to do with your father. It's an outer symbol that you pledge not to have sex before marriage, but not to your dad. Just in general. It usually happens at big youth retreats and the like. You are more likely to have pledged your virginity to your church peers. LOL.

[thoughtful]

I had long suspect that sexual dysfunction in woman was a by product of the purity movement. TY for an eye opening article.

Just another reason for parents to teach their kids, both male and female that masturbation is ok, and its safe sex!!

"Don't knock masturbation -- it's sex with someone I love."

- Alvy Singer (Woody Allen), in Annie Hall

[Rosa]

I grew up evangelical (maybe fundy-lite) and while it was stressed that you were supposed to save sex until marriage, there wasn't a whole lot of discussion of anything else you can't do (I'm good at parsing the letter of the law and decided that anything up to but not including intercourse was OK, so I actually had a more or less normal-for-high-school dating life), and there wasn't the stress on emotional purity that seems to be so prominent now. I got my Christian sex ed in the early '80s before Joshua Harris probably had his first wet dream. I think that culture has changed now and not for the better.

I think that's the experience of a vast majority. Not just the folks whose parents don't emphasize it as much, but there are a lot of people who just do what they're going to do and rewrite their beliefs as they go ("well we're GOING to get married, it's just like we already are married!").

And for some of those people doing "everything but" can be really really hot and not hinder their sex lives at all. I'd argue it causes bad marriage decisions a lot of times, though.

But there are still people that the message really works on. Libby Anne was a really successful fundie girl, she got along well with her parents and was well-educated (to the limits of their doctrine) and basically was really serious and responsible inside the role she was raised in, so it hit her harder than some other people.

[Joykins]

And for some of those people doing "everything but" can be really really hot and not hinder their sex lives at all. I'd argue it causes bad marriage decisions a lot of times, though.

Howso? IME it kept me from some bad marriage decisions...

[Austin]

Howso? IME it kept me from some bad marriage decisions...

Overemphasized abstinence can cause people to jump into a marriage sooner than they would have had abstinence not been so all-fired important. Having been raised fundie-lite, I can think of at least a dozen marriages that took place around the time of my wedding where it was probably a factor.

[Joykins]

Overemphasized abstinence can cause people to jump into a marriage sooner than they would have had abstinence not been so all-fired important. Having been raised fundie-lite, I can think of at least a dozen marriages that took place around the time of my wedding where it was probably a factor.

That makes sense, but I thought she said that doing "everything but...causes bad marriage decisions a lot of times." I was wondering how that worked. Because that isn't abstinence in any meaningful sense outside the technical.

[Deleted05]

What about your upbringing/life makes you fundie-lite then? Just curious. Fundies & F-Ls both place huge emphasis on sexual & emotional purity. If you & your friends were in typical fundie-lite situations, you'd be crippled w/ shame, not only about the "immoral" thoughts that go through your head, but that you're discussing it at length with friends. Fundies would say this is sinful.

Gaaah. Computer ate my response...

My upbringing was very conservative American Christianity. Think "Jesus Camp" politically, but without the speaking in tongues, or praying to Bush. Sex, dating, marriage and relationships were never really mentioned in my house or churches until high school youth group. Even then, we got the classic "no sex until marriage" lecture, but nothing about how looking at boys will ruin your heart for your future husband.

At the same time, I grew up always thinking I would never get married and ignoring a great deal of what was said on the topic. So maybe it just all went right over my head and I never even knew.

[Deesire]

What I find oddest about this uber-purity mindset is the idea of having your FIRST KISS in front of a crowd of all your family, his family -- your parents and in-laws, for Pete's sake!!! Doesn't that sound like a horrible nightmare for most young people? It seems like for most young couples, first kiss would be among the moments they would want to have in private.

I just can't see how the young people come 'round to thinking this aspect of the "purity" culture is right for them. On top of all the rest of the stress and pressure and expectations surrounding weddings, to throw a highly public, highly exhibitionist first kiss into the mix?!

I just can't wrap my mind around it.

[AnnoDomini]

I've had similar thoughts for a long time about the 'first kiss' being so special yet so public. I haven't liked the idea of the guests 'owning' our first kiss by witnessing it and 'knowing' it was our first.

[Joykins]

I've had similar thoughts for a long time about the 'first kiss' being so special yet so public. I haven't liked the idea of the guests 'owning' our first kiss by witnessing it and 'knowing' it was our first.

...but there's probably a totally illicit thrill by not having it BE so but letting them THINK so.

If you know what I mean and I think you do. ;) :shifty: