Anderson's doing a show on abstinence and purity balls

[latraviata]

It's creepy because a 4 year old snuggling up to daddy and saying she wants to marry him when she grows up is cute.

A 14 year old doing the same thing, in a public setting, with a contract, is not.

This :clap: :clap:

[bananacat]

Many feminists, including this one, are perfectly acceptable of asexual people, very sexual people, and everyone in between. Forcing one thing onto anyone is wrong. That's why all of my other posts have mentioned that teen girls have a right to their own body and it isn't their parents who own it. So no, purity pledges don't help those young people who just don't want to have sex right now. It might seem nice to you, but they need to make that decision on their own terms. And yes, our society needs to accept their choices, just as we need to do a much better job of accepting the choice of teens who do choose to have sex. But purity pledges don't help achieve that goal.

[ElphabaGalinda]

What bothers me about purity pledges is it takes something that's supposed to be private, and makes it public. It's no one's business but your own if you're having sex, and it's equally no one's business but your own if you aren't.

Also having your parents that interested in your sex life is creepy. If you need your parents to validate whatever choice you're making in terms of sex, then it isn't entirely your choice.

[Koala]

O Latin, you kind of summed it up there. You were unsettled and annoyed when your classmate forced the question of "who here has had sex?". Isn't that exactly what happens to the girls who go through the whole purity fandango? Their sex lives, or lack thereof, become front and centre of their relationship with their parents (much worse for them than an irritating classmate was for you).

There's also a huge question about the validity of making these promises to anyone but yourself. If you expect your parents to hold you accountable to your purity vow, as Renting has asked, what does that look like in reality? What does Daddy do or say if he suspects the vow has been broken or is about to be? Normally if you promise someone something and don't keep the promise, there are negative consequences to that.

This exactly.

I also have a hard time envisioning a young woman (totally independent of outside influence) hatching a plan to pledge her purity to her parent/parents. Even then though, I think it's highly inappropriate.

[FlorenceHamilton]

The act of physically having sex, whether the first time or any other time, is something you do for yourself. It is an expression of the desire to become completely vulnerable together with another person (ot not). It is a very powerful experience physically and often emotionally.

This is what I taught my children. I told them that the most important thing to consider is whether this is what they really and truly wish to do. If you think that you will be happy with yourself even if this other person never wants to see you again, then it is ok to follow your desires. As soon as you get the sense that having sex is simply for the other person and not yourself, then it is best to not get physically involved.

The idea that teaching people to guard their virginity as a commodity is offensive to me. Virginity is not a prize and more than any other inexperience is a prize. It is simply the state of inexperience. Life is short. People are precious. All of our experiences should be treasured if we treasure ourselves.

I think that we are errroneous as a society to make sexuality a commoditiy at all. It is also potentially emotionally damaging to pledge this commodity to a person to whom it does not belong. A person's sexuality does not belong to one's parents, one's church, one's school or a billboard. Whether a person is selling/giving this part of themselves to another person to guard (which in turn makes the woman a more desirable commodity) or to whomever will pay for it (which makes the woman someone's else's commodoty), it still make a woman a commodoty. Women are still commodoties?

In practical, societal terms, the value of virginity in ancient (and biblical) times had to do with lineage. The only way to be absolutely certain that a child was fathered by a given man was to impregnate a virgin. If a woman had ever had sex with another man, then paternity would be in question. One a man legally copulates with a woman (she is his wife or servant), he can only hold onto this biologic certainty by covering the woman up and hiding her from all other men and by keeping her cloistered in his home. He can not allow her to be anywhere near any other man unless he is there to protect her from having sexual contact with him. This was reality. There was not other way to be certain that children were fathered by a given man. The secondary consequence was that woman became property and their value was strictly tied to their childbearing ability and their purity. As time went on, the ceremony and circumstance became more and more elaborate to ascertan this purity of lineage.

In present time, the need determine lineage is less important altogether. In addition, we have really good ways to determine paternity anyway. In ancient times, children were manpower. Today, we prolong childhood and release the children when they are capable of becoming a part of society's manpower. Women, although they also perform the important function of bearing children, become free agents for themselves as well. We have learned as a species to control childbirth and to protect ourselves from disease (although we do not always practice the means to this goal). This has empowered women to get out of the cloistered protection of a man who is protecting HIS OWN INTERESTS.

As long as we carry with us, the ancient traditions that keep women trapped as the chattel of men, then virginity will be something that our male associates buy and sell.

[MrsYoungie]

I keep imagining being a young girl and being coerced into one of these things. I mean, what young Christian girl is going to say "no" to being presented with this purity ring nonsense? Is she going to say "Oh no Dad, I plan on having premarital relations before I marry".

Plus, if all the girls in her church group or doing this, can she shame her family and herself by being the only one without a ring?

Peer pressure at its absolute worst I think. From her Christian perspective she will be forced to make a vow she may have no intention of keeping. Great practice for marriage vows, eh?

[xDreamerx]

Exactly. These vow are not really made as a free choice. Even if one supposes these young women are taking these vows because they want to, one has to ask, "What makes them want to do this?". The culture surrounding them has put so much emphasis on their virginity and pressure on them to remain virgins that they feel they have to. Even if they don't feel expressly forced some part of them must know how they would be treated and perceived if they chose not to take them. But I wonder if many of them even think of not taking them because it is so instilled in them.

[Austin]

Why couldn't you have just said that it wasn't something you wanted to discuss? It is a private thing, and as you are all college students, she needs to learn boundaries. If she had started that conversation up at a job she could have gotten in big trouble for harassment.

And it is the whole privateness of the matter that makes the balls and vows and anything else that makes a big, public deal out of it creepy.

You need to learn how to say, "I'm not discussing that" or "that's none of your business". Practice in the mirror and stop worrying so much about what others think of you. It's not your job to make everyone comfortable, particularly if they're making you uncomfortable.

[CC3]

Wouldn't talking to teenagers about sex when they are at home be more appropriate? Why in the world are these girls dressing up as brides? I've never seen anything like it. smh

[kb2]

Full disclosure (and I probably should have said this from the start): I was in class yesterday and we had all been told to bring an object owned by a woman (the subject of the class is women in America) so we could practice analyzing objects and hypothesizing about a society and culture based on objects. Several people brought high-heeled shoes. At one point one of the girls in my group decided to go off on a tangent about how some guys really like it if you wear high-heeled shoes and nothing else, and then proceeded to interrogate everyone else in the group about whether we'd ever been with a guy who wanted us to do that. I felt incredibly uncomfortable and awkward and because of that encounter I'm in more of a "can't it just be okay to not want to have sex" mood than usual. I realize that's not what anyone on this thread is saying, and I probably should have just kept my mouth shut.

This is the exact feeling I get about purity rings. Granted, there are plenty of purity rings that just look like a normal ring, and the subject might never come up, or whatever. But the idea that someone would wear something in public that says, "Guess what everyone, I've never put a PENIS in my VAGINA! Ever! No penises anywhere! I might not have ever put one in my mouth! Let me tell you all about the penisis that are never going in my vagina! Just in case you were wondering, I'm wearing this ring--because of my vagina!" It doesn't strike me as modest. Why can't people just not have sex? I didn't have sex with anyone for a longer period than average, I didn't broadcast this to complete strangers. I also didn't mention to complete strangers when I started having sex--because ew.

[Brainsample]

3.) Why and for what unfathomable reason should any woman, ever have to publicly proclaim the status of their hymen, either via a ring she wears or a ball she attends with her daddy?? If a woman wants to remain a virgin until she marries, that's fine and great if it's her choice. It's a PRIVATE decision and is of absolutely no concern of anyone else, including her parents. My husband would be beyond uncomfortable if our daughter had decided to proclaim her virginity to him and ask him to be the "protector" of her hymen. It's so gross and inappropriate I can't even think about it..

Because you're a member of what amounts to a fertility cult?

[Brainsample]

The act of physically having sex, whether the first time or any other time, is something you do for yourself. It is an expression of the desire to become completely vulnerable together with another person (ot not). It is a very powerful experience physically and often emotionally.

This is what I taught my children. I told them that the most important thing to consider is whether this is what they really and truly wish to do. If you think that you will be happy with yourself even if this other person never wants to see you again, then it is ok to follow your desires. As soon as you get the sense that having sex is simply for the other person and not yourself, then it is best to not get physically involved.

The idea that teaching people to guard their virginity as a commodity is offensive to me. Virginity is not a prize and more than any other inexperience is a prize. It is simply the state of inexperience. Life is short. People are precious. All of our experiences should be treasured if we treasure ourselves.

I think that we are errroneous as a society to make sexuality a commoditiy at all. It is also potentially emotionally damaging to pledge this commodity to a person to whom it does not belong. A person's sexuality does not belong to one's parents, one's church, one's school or a billboard. Whether a person is selling/giving this part of themselves to another person to guard (which in turn makes the woman a more desirable commodity) or to whomever will pay for it (which makes the woman someone's else's commodoty), it still make a woman a commodoty. Women are still commodoties?

In practical, societal terms, the value of virginity in ancient (and biblical) times had to do with lineage. The only way to be absolutely certain that a child was fathered by a given man was to impregnate a virgin. If a woman had ever had sex with another man, then paternity would be in question. One a man legally copulates with a woman (she is his wife or servant), he can only hold onto this biologic certainty by covering the woman up and hiding her from all other men and by keeping her cloistered in his home. He can not allow her to be anywhere near any other man unless he is there to protect her from having sexual contact with him. This was reality. There was not other way to be certain that children were fathered by a given man. The secondary consequence was that woman became property and their value was strictly tied to their childbearing ability and their purity. As time went on, the ceremony and circumstance became more and more elaborate to ascertan this purity of lineage.

In present time, the need determine lineage is less important altogether. In addition, we have really good ways to determine paternity anyway. In ancient times, children were manpower. Today, we prolong childhood and release the children when they are capable of becoming a part of society's manpower. Women, although they also perform the important function of bearing children, become free agents for themselves as well. We have learned as a species to control childbirth and to protect ourselves from disease (although we do not always practice the means to this goal). This has empowered women to get out of the cloistered protection of a man who is protecting HIS OWN INTERESTS.

As long as we carry with us, the ancient traditions that keep women trapped as the chattel of men, then virginity will be something that our male associates buy and sell.

[dawn9476]

Wouldn't talking to teenagers about sex when they are at home be more appropriate? Why in the world are these girls dressing up as brides? I've never seen anything like it. smh

Because that would make sense. Fundies don't do things that make sense.

[camdendayton]

Um, seriously? Your virginity is the most precious gift? I can't decide if that is more or less fucked up than a father vowing to "go to war" for his daughters vagina.

^This bothers me more than anything. If your husband sees virginity as the most precious gift you are giving him you should not get married! I think they mentioned this on the show, but your love and companionship (and I'd add commitment) are the most precious gifts you give your husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, whatever.

[dawn9476]

What bothers me about purity pledges is it takes something that's supposed to be private, and makes it public. It's no one's business but your own if you're having sex, and it's equally no one's business but your own if you aren't.

Also having your parents that interested in your sex life is creepy. If you need your parents to validate whatever choice you're making in terms of sex, then it isn't entirely your choice.

Exactly. It's like you are putting a target on your daughter's back not only for bullying but for boys or in some cases grown men, who would think it would be fun to take advantage of a "Purity Princess."

[doggie]

Um, seriously? Your virginity is the most precious gift? I can't decide if that is more or less fucked up than a father vowing to "go to war" for his daughters vagina.

I was fully agreeing. a gift that lasts one thrust and is forgotten some gift. sure not a gift that keeps on giving.

[Brainsample]

^This bothers me more than anything. If your husband sees virginity as the most precious gift you are giving him you should not get married! I think they mentioned this on the show, but your love and companionship (and I'd add commitment) are the most precious gifts you give your husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, whatever.

Not to get too fundie or anything, but one of the most beautiful images that I found to be healing in my own recovery from having my virginity taken away from me at the age of 8 was Ezekiel 16. God likens Israel to an unfaithful woman whom he finds laying helpless in her own blood (great imagery), and loves her and restores her, making her His wife again, showing her honor that she doesn't deserve.

What the heck do they do with passages like that? Protestant Christianity is supposed to be the religion that forgives every terrible sin without having to earn it or having to clean up before God honors you.

I can't tell you how hard it was to listen to virginity lectures as a girl growing up, feeling second rate and hopeless/worthless because I never really had a chance to possess it. I tried to cope with that in various ways, and most of them were ineffective if not self-destructive. So much shame.

[alaeangelorum]

Here are versions of the pledge from the first site that pooped up when I googled purity ball pledge. The others are really similar:

I also found that site (I assume you mean this one - http://www.hollywoodpurityball.com/index.php)

The rest of the front page just seems really weird to me - 'once you pop you can't stop' seems to be their motto, complete with a take-off of the Pringles logo except with 'virgins' on the bow-tie. The testimonials page makes me sad as if they are true quotes it seems at least some of these girls really feel their worth is all tied up in their virginity eg "I feel that delaying sex until marriage is the only way to be successful in life."

[Renting with Raggles]

Stupid people will try to pry into anyone's affairs. I think all the advice here about telling them to mind their own business is great. I find "I'm not obliged to satisfy your idle curiosity" works well because stupid people take a while to figure that one out.

Damn, this thing ate the rest of my message to O Latin.

I have many students from cultures who have very similar ideas about virginity to those promoted by the purity ball people (both Christian and Muslim). A women's worth as a person is dependent on the state of her hymen - and this is bound up in people's perception of her father as a protector. They, too, are urged 'to war' for their daughter's virginity. But the strange thing is, this war never takes the form of going after the young men who potentially or actually deflowered their daughter. Best case scenario (in countries like America and Australia, where the wider culture does not take this view of female virginity) a raped girl is merely kicked out of the home and shunned by the family for life. In worst cases, it's an honour killing.

That's why these public declarations made by little girls seem very dangerous - especially when the success of her keeping her vow is tied to her community's perception of her father as a successful parent. It's very different to the adolescent Josh Duggar declaring his intentions of becoming a lawyer, where the worst that can happen is that we have a grand time snarking on him.

[Hane]

Oh, holy Mother of God. Go here and scroll down to the pink icon showing a dad figure holding a key; the daughter figure next to him has a keyhole right on her crotch. There is not enough brain bleach in the world to get rid of that image.

[Wolfie]

Oh, holy Mother of God. Go here and scroll down to the pink icon showing a dad figure holding a key; the daughter figure next to him has a keyhole right on her crotch. There is not enough brain bleach in the world to get rid of that image.

That whole website is gross. It looks like it hasn't been updated since 2007, so hopefully it is now defunct. (though I really, really, really wish it was just a poe, knowin that it isn't.)

[GeoBQn]

I'm pretty sure the Hollywood Purity Ball is an event satirizing purity balls. From their press page:

"The "Hollywood Father/Daughter Purity Ball" is a feisty satire of the movement that has become a staple of evangelical communities in Bible Belt states.

– Los Angeles Times"

[Guest Anonymous]

Oh, holy Mother of God. Go here and scroll down to the pink icon showing a dad figure holding a key; the daughter figure next to him has a keyhole right on her crotch. There is not enough brain bleach in the world to get rid of that image.

Is that a spoof site? It says Balls are open to girls from age 4, and they get a Purity T Shirt that says "Once you pop, you can't stop". That is beyond sick for a spoof, but if it is for real..... :shock:

[Wolfie]

I'm pretty sure the Hollywood Purity Ball is an event satirizing purity balls. From their press page:

"The "Hollywood Father/Daughter Purity Ball" is a feisty satire of the movement that has become a staple of evangelical communities in Bible Belt states.

– Los Angeles Times"

Yay, it IS a poe!

[Hane]

Yay, it IS a poe!

Oh, thank God! Although I started thinking so when I saw a pic of "The Rev. Bill Maher," the "Once you pop, you can't stop" slogan, and the puke-worthy icon I mentioned above, I started worrying when the site linked to "legit" purity ball sites.

Now I feel stupid. I can usually spot a Poe a mile away.