“‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ [Book] Told Me to Stay Pure Until Marriage. I Still Have a Stain on My Heart” – Regarding: Dating Book by Author Josh Harris (with other related links about the IKDG book) and Criticizing “Purity Culture”

“‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ [Book] Told Me to Stay Pure Until Marriage. I Still Have a Stain on My Heart” – Regarding: Dating Book by Author Josh Harris (with other related links about the IKDG book) and Criticizing “Purity Culture”

August 24, 2016 update: I added a new link at the bottom of this post: people continue to attack the idea of sexual purity by publicizing backlash against the Harris IKDG book.

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I myself have never read the IKDB book, which was written by Harris. I have read about the book on other sites in the past, and it is my understanding the book discussed how to date, and other such topics, and is not strictly about sex or virginity.

The author uses this review of the IKDG book to bash “purity culture,” and in so doing, touches on the topic or staying chaste until marriage.

I am in the middle of this debate. I cannot completely agree with all the critics of “purity culture,” depending on what they are criticizing about it and why.

I believe that the Bible teaches both male and females are to sexually abstain until marriage, so I don’t believe in tossing out this teaching all because some young women feel they have been hurt or oppressed by it.

On the other hand, how some Christians have taught about sexual purity has been lop-sided – males are typically not addressed, only females – and Christians could do a better, or more sensitive job, in how they present the concept of remaining a virgin until marriage.

With that introduction, here is the link, with some excerpts (and note, I am not in complete agreement with all views in this piece; however, I’m not a supporter of a lot of Christian dating advice. Christian dating advice tends to act as an obstacle to singles who want to someday marry):

(Link): “‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ told me to stay pure until marriage. I still have a stain on my heart“

Excerpts:

By Liz Lenz

July 27, 2016

In 1997, Joshua Harris published “I Kissed Dating Goodbye,” a book that was in part a warning about the harm that relationships before marriage could cause. Harris evoked images of men at the altar bringing all their past partners with them into the marriage to reinforce the point that love and sex before marriage took pieces of your heart and made you less.

At the time, Harris was just 21, but he was already a rising star.

…He [Harris] was what we, as young evangelicals, wanted to be. And so we strove passionately to attain the ideal of premarital purity he laid out for us. Now, almost 20 years later, even Harris appears to be questioning whether his advice did more harm than good.

…But Harris’s book was hugely influential.

…On the surface, I am a purity-culture success story: I am a heterosexual woman, a virgin until marriage, now with two small children and a husband I deeply love. We attend church. We believe in God. And yet, for me, the legacy of purity culture is not one of freedom but one of fear.

Purity culture taught me that I ought to be passed down from father to husband, more an inheritance than a human.

 I was taught that men are my cover and my shield, when for the most part they have been the ones causing damage through molestation, rape and abuse.

I was taught that my holy calling was to open my legs for one and only one and bear him children. Barring that, I was to keep them closed and never express desire or lust or fear or longing.

So many women in my life cracked under the untenable pressure, often giving up on God all together. Others were forced into marriages with men who hit them and hid their abuse behind another message of the church borne from purity culture, that God hates divorce.

A Book Called “Prude” That Uses the Term “Neo Virgin”

A Book Called “Prude” That Uses the Term “Neo Virgin”

An author by the name of Carrie Lloyd was on Christian TV program The 700 Club today. She wrote a book called “Prude” about her choice to remain celibate after having been very sexually active while in her 20s. I think she also used the term “Neo Virgin” on the show and maybe in her book.

I have not read her book, I only saw her interview on the show today.

She was raised in a Christian household, but later drifted away from the Christian faith and then came back to the faith later.

I support her choice to remain celibate until marriage. I don’t have a problem there. However, I have to admit to not being fond of terms such as “Neo Virgin.”

Either you are a virgin or you are not one. I’m over 40 years of age and have never had sexual intercourse, not even with my ex fiance, because I was wanting to wait until marriage to have sex.

I find terms such as “Neo Virgin” or other Christian phrases such as “Born Again Virgin” or “Spiritual Virgin” to be a little demeaning to actual, honest to God virgins such as myself. Such terms dilute the real meaning of, or state of being, a virgin.

I also find it ironic that Christian culture continues to uphold fornicators as experts in how to resist sexual temptation or how to go about sexual purity and celibacy, rather than publish books by honest- to- God virgins who are past the age of 30 or older who are still maintaining their virginity.

Here is a link to a page that discusses Ms. Lloyd’s story and book:

(Link): Making Healthy Relationship Choices in an Unhealthy World

Excerpts:

• ….Growing up, Carrie was teased about her stance on abstinence.  By the time she entered high school, she was infamous with the boys at the neighboring school as one of the last remaining virgins.  Once her photo was pinned to the school notice board.  She was the target to see which boy could get her to lose her virginity.  Her peers didn’t feel the same way she did.  “No one wanted to save it for one person,” says Carrie.  “This subtle prejudice toward my choices made me more determined to hold out.”
• …. Meanwhile, women were fighting for someone to love them.  “I call this the curse of Eve,” says Carrie.  The curse says, “Everything will be redeemed once I have found my husband,” and that a woman will be happier having found her purpose.
• THE DECADENT DAYS
• Carrie was 18 when her father underwent a serious heart operation so severe it almost killed him and left him with some brain damage.  In his effort to deal with his pain, Carrie’s dad began to drink.  “Seeing my preacher papa enter into substance abuse caused me to question everything he taught,” says Carrie.  “What happened to relying on God?”
• When she was 23, Carrie’s dad passed away.  One night Carried decided to walk away from God.  She was mad at God and men and started on the path of hurting others.  Several years later, Carrie had several physical relationships and reached the lowest point of her life since her father died.  She prayed to God and heard an inaudible voice that said, I’ve been here all along.  Carrie realized that God had never left her.

According to the rest of the article, and from what I remember from the TV interview, when she decided at some stage in her late 20s (or her 30s?) to remain abstinent, some of the men she dated broke up with her. One guy did stay with her for two years and respected her “no sex until I marry” belief, but the relationship ended, though not due to the celibate aspect.

Here is a page about her book:

(Link):  Prude: Misconceptions Of A Neo-Virgin

• Overview

• “SEX. LOVE. VIRGINITY? In the dating game, the V-word has become as strange and complicated as the L-word, with purity as outdated as pay phones.
• What is an ex-athiest, post-porn addict, unorthodox Christian girl to do these days?
• How can she create boundaries without scaring off every available guy? Is purity even possible without being puritanical? In this candid, humorous account of the true-life trials of Christian dating, the author shares the wisdom she’s gleaned in her quest for love in a modern world.
• She guides with grace and honesty through the often hush-hush topics of sex, porn, shame, female competition, misconceptions about purity, and those dreaded “waiting till marriage: conversations.

————————–

Related Posts:

(Link):  Churches Would Rather Hear From Ex Porn Stars Than Adult Celibates or Virgins – Church Invites Ex Porn Star to be Guest Speaker

 (Link):   Why are young feminists so clueless about sex? by M. Wente

(Link): Article: Our Born-Again Virgin Bachelor – Secondary or Spiritual Virginity

(Link): Celebrity Deems Herself A Born Again Virgin And Vows to Stay Celibate “For A Year” – Oh Puh-leaze

(Link):  Woman Says She Refuses to Hook-up with Men ‘For Fun’ – Says Most Men She’s Met Are Willing to Wait

(Link):  How About Using Celibates as Role Models For Celibacy? (Oddity: Christians Holding Up Non-Virgins [Fornicators] As Being Experts or Positive Examples on Sexual Purity)

(Link):  She’s Waiting Until Marriage to Have Sex. Here’s Her Response to Those ‘Inevitable Jerks’ Who Think Her Decision Is ‘Stupid’ – by E. Kahn

(Link):  Sometimes Fornication Can Impact Another Relationship Later – One Example

(Link):  When Adult Virginity and Adult Celibacy Are Viewed As Inconvenient or As Impediments

(Link): Self Control – everyone has it, is capable of it, but most choose not to use it (New Study Says Conservatives Have Better Self Control Than Liberals)

(Link):  Hypocrisy: Secular Pundits Judge Christian Sexuality: Josh Duggar’s So-Called Vanilla Sexual Preferences Deemed Dull

(Link): False Christian Teaching: “Only A Few Are Called to Singleness and Celibacy”

(Link): Statistics Show Single Adults Now Outnumber Married Adults in the United States (2014)

(Link): The Netherworld of Singleness for Some Singles – You Want Marriage But Don’t Want to Be Disrespected or Ignored for Being Single While You’re Single

(Link):  Ever Notice That Christians Don’t Care About or Value Singleness, Unless Jesus Christ’s Singleness and Celibacy is Doubted or Called Into Question by Scholars?

(Link):  Are Single People the Lepers of Today’s Church? by Gina Dalfonzo

(Link):  No Christians and Churches Do Not Idolize Virginity and Sexual Purity – Christians Attack and Criticize Virginity Sexual Purity Celibacy / Virginity Sexual Purity Not An Idol

(Link): Secular, Left Wing Feminist Writer Marcotte on Anyone Choosing To Be a Virgin Until Marriage: “It’s a Silly Idea” – What Progressive Christians, Conservative Christians, Non Christians, and Salon’s Amanda Marcotte Gets Wrong About Christian Views on Virginity

(Link): Want To But Can’t – The One Christian Demographic Being Continually Ignored by Christians | Re: Marriage Not Happening for Hetero-sexual Christians Over the Age of 30

(Link): On ‘Late’-In-Life Virginity Loss (from The Atlantic)

(Link): Why Some People Become 30 Year Old Virgins (Article / Study)

(Link): Virginity Lost, Experience Gained (article with information from study about virginity)

(Link): Some Atheists Are Just As Ignorant About Adult Singleness and Celibacy as Progressive Christians, Secular Feminists, and Protestant Evangelical or Conservative Christians

(Link): Celebrities who waited until marriage to have sex (list 2)

(Link): Living Myths About Virginity – article from The Atlantic

(Link): I Shouldn’t Need An Excuse To Be A Virgin – (Secular Editorial Defends Virginity – More Rare Than a Unicorn Sighting)

(Link): Virgins and Celibates are Sexual – Not Asexual and Androgynous – You don’t have to have sex to possess sexuality

(Link): Asexuality and Asexuals

(Link):  Meagan Good Tells Single Women Why They Should Stop Having Sex

(Link):  Preacher: ‘They Will Know We Are Christians By Our Hot SEX Lives’ – and once more, never-married celibate adults and their experiences, wisdom, and input are ignored

(Link):  Want To Grow Your Church? Advertise Sex (Story via A Little Leaven Blog)

(Link):  The Decisive Marriage – Study Says Couples Who Don’t Have Pre-Marital Sex, or Not Much or Not Many Sexual Partners Pre-Marriage, Have Better Quality or Longer Lasting Marriages

(Link): Weak Argument Against Celibacy / Virginity / Sexual Purity by the Anti Sexual Purity Gestapo – Sexual Compatibility or Incompatibility – (i.e., Taking Human Beings For Test Spins – Humans As Sexual Commodities) (Part 2)

(Link):   Stop Pretending Sex Never Hurts, By D.C. McAllister

(Link):  The Myth of Safe Sex by D. Foley

Thoughts on John Piper’s “Walking the Wedding Aisle Without Your Virginity” and T. Fall’s Rebuttal

Thoughts on John Piper’s “Walking the Wedding Aisle Without Your Virginity” and T. Fall’s Rebuttal

Please understand that when I discuss things such as virginity and fornication on my blog, I am always discussing consensual sex, unless I explicitly state otherwise.

I am not discussing sexual abuse in this post per se (the main focus is on consensual sex), and the majority of other posts on my blog, unless it’s really obvious I am doing so, or give a disclaimer. Sexual abuse is another category altogether.

Most of my posts also deal with the topic of sexual purity from the vantage of a never-married adult getting married for the first time, not divorcees, remarriages, or widows.

Over at the “Desiring God” site, one can find this page, which contains a transcript of a podcast by John Piper:

• (Link):  Walking the Wedding Aisle Without Your Virginity – Desiring God site, by John Piper

Here is some of what Piper had to say:

• I think the main thing I want to say is this: Virginity is a precious gift that you cannot give to your fiancé, nor she you. That is a great sadness and a great loss.
• But there are gifts you can give her and God will multiply those gifts so wonderfully that the loss will not be destructive.
• You said that you have heard people say, Save yourself sexually for marriage and it is a terrible thing to squander that. Well, I say: Yes, yes, yes — that is exactly right. That is exactly what I think Paul and Jesus would counsel any virgin: “Flee fornication” (1 Corinthians 6:18).
• Your body belongs to God as a single person, and it will belong to your future spouse. It would be good to think about 1 Corinthians 7:3–4: “The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights” — that means sex — “and likewise the wife to her husband. For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.”
• ..That is a gift you don’t have to give. And you will want to teach your children to have it.So what is the gift you do have to give to this fiancé with whom you have had sexual relations? What gift can you give her that God might be pleased to make so wonderful, the gift you can’t give her will not destroy?
• [Piper then instructs the young man to apologize to his future wife for the fornication]

Blogger Tim Fall wrote a critique of Piper’s page here:

• (Link):   Idolizing the Virginity Fetish: correcting a mega-pastor’s bad advice – Tim Fall’s blog

Regarding Tim Fall’s rebuttal to Piper’s “Walking” post.

I happen to like Tim, so this is nothing personal. But I find myself disagreeing with portions of Tim’s page, or its basis.

Tim makes a few decent points on his page, but his overall premise is similar to the “diminishing-of-virginity” perspective I’ve seen bandied about by a lot of Christians the last few years, which I find disappointing and view as a personal discouragement to maintain my own virginity (more about this below).

I’m not a fan of Piper’s. I disagree with him quite often.

I also find Piper very weird. HIs Twitter account is so earnest and wacko, I sometimes wonder if it’s not actually a parody account, but no, it’s real.

I read Piper’s page, “Walking the Wedding Aisle Without Your Virginity” and actually don’t find much wrong with it.

I find Piper’s “Walking” response to be a refreshing change of pace from the usual conservative Christian malarky about sexual sin and virginity I’ve seen in blogs, podcasts, interviews, and books the last few years, in that conservative Christians have been attacking the concepts of virginity and celibacy, or else drastically minimizing both lifestyles or disciplines quite a bit.

Piper is unabashedly defending virginity in the “Walking” broadcast, which is a rarity these days among Christians. So kudos to Piper for being on Team Virgin here.

Really, anyone defending virginity is so rare these days, Christian or no, I found a secular essay by a Non-Christian young lady who was asking society at large to back off about her virginity quite surprising and unexpected – and these types of defenses are not common:

• (Link):  I Shouldn’t Need An Excuse To Be A Virgin – (Secular Editorial Defends Virginity – More Rare Than a Unicorn Sighting)

How sad. The young lady who wrote that should be able to find a plethora of “pro virginity” articles on Christian blogs and sites (no surprise she cannot find them on secular sites), but I am afraid all she will find on Christian sites are essays that say “beware of virginity idolatry,” “virginity is not a big deal,” or, “God is down with sexual sin, he will wipe your slate clean” (implying one might as well fornicate).

My impression is that Conservative Christians have mainly backed down on supporting virginity because the progressive Christians, who were apparently influenced by secular left wing feminists (it would appear), think it’s wrong or mean to judge anyone’s sexual choices.

To do so, to hold negative views about someone’s sexual choices, is referred to by secular feminists as “slut shaming.”

So, the conservative Christians now believe that even conservative Christians should delicately tip toe around the feelings of fornicators, which includes down-playing virginity, assuring fornicators to the hilt that God loves and forgives them in spite of their sexual sins, and in the process, we are told that virginity doesn’t have much, if any, value.

Nor is virginity a gift to one’s future spouse, according to many of these same writers – at least the ones I’ve come across.

If that is so, if virginity has little to no value, is only an invention of the patriarchy to keep women down, and is not a gift I would be bestowing on a future spouse (should I ever marry), there is no point in me, a 40 something virgin, holding on to her virginity.

This Is Why Being a Nice Guy Just Isn’t Enough by E. Tatum / Double Standards By The Anti-Celibacy Crowd About Friendships and Sexualization of Everything

This Is Why Being a Nice Guy Just Isn’t Enough by E. Tatum / Double Standards By The Anti-Celibacy Crowd About Friendships and Sexualization of Everything

You’ll have to use the link below to read the entire page entitled, “This Is Why Being a Nice Guy Just Isn’t Enough”, because I don’t want to copy their entire post here on my blog.

One thing I want to point out is a bit of a double standard going on here.

First of all, I first became aware of this “Nice Guys” article by way of Facebook group SCCL (Stuff Christian Culture Likes). Sometimes I agree with some of this group’s views on some issues, sometimes I do not.

SCCL is a group that regularly mocks or criticizes the traditional Christian position of upholding or defending the notions of celibacy, or of being a virgin until marriage – sometimes these concepts are all lumped together by them, and by others elsewhere on the internet, under the term “purity culture”.

I have argued on my blog the last few years that it is possible to be celibate, to refrain from having sex, and for men and women to be platonic friends.

I have also argued that it is society, both secular culture, as well as conservative and progressive Christian culture, and most secular feminism, which perpetuates the sexualization all male-female relationships (or even male-male, or female-female relationships).

For doing all this, for defending my choice, or the choice of others to be celibate, and for pointing out that not everything in life has to be sexual or is about sex, I sometimes get insulted or mocked by other people on the internet.

Everyone from secular feminists, to ex-Christians, to conservative Christians, to atheists (yes, ’tis so, click here to read), to political liberals, to political conservatives insult me or ridicule me for all this.

All these groups, who normally loathe each other – the atheists cannot stand conservative Christians, the liberals don’t like the conservatives and so on- all never- the- less totally agree that there is something bad, wrong, or weird about adults who choose to stay celibate, whatever their reason.

All these disparate groups fight like cats on dogs on many other topics, but they all come into agreement on this: they despise and ridicule celibacy (and sometimes, asexuality).

Do these people in these groups ever stop to consider, “Hey, other groups I normally disagree with on fundamental life choices happen to share with me a suspicion, dislike, or fear of celibacy, does this mean something, like maybe I’ve been wrong in my views about celibacy?”

I think it does. That your arch enemy chooses to fight with you on all other issues yet mocks celibacy right along with you might indicate that both of you are either misinformed about celibacy or terribly biased against celibates. Yeah, you might want to ponder that one for awhile.

There are more comments by me below this long excerpt:

(Link): This Is Why Being a Nice Guy Just Isn’t Enough by E. Tatum

Excerpts:

• There are a lot of really wonderful, well-intentioned men who have a difficult time understanding the difference between being nice to women and being an ally to women and women’s causes.
• Then there are other men who pretend to be nice in order to validate their manipulation of women for sex and romance. These are the people who I like to refer to as Nice Guys™.
• While this article is dedicated to helping nice men become better feminist allies, I want to take a second to clarify the difference between an authentically nice guy and a Nice Guy™.
• (Link): Nice Guys™, as many of you know, have become the object of  (Link): much loathing in feminist circles and among women and girls in general.Online, this is the guy who posts hashtags like #NotAllMen and (Link): #ReverseSexism, whenever we publish articles about (Link): street harassment,  (Link): rape culture, and (Link): male privilege.
• He is the exaggeratedly faux timid (read: passive aggressive) dude who still complains about the girls that didn’t date him in high school on message boards and in every other status update.
• Though the most stereotypical incarnation of the Nice Guy™ is a fedora-clad dudebro who spends too much time on Reddit and would probably push a six-year-old girl out of the way to get his hands on My Little Pony merchandise, the more garden-variety Nice Guy™ can be more difficult to spot. 
• Basically, he’s anyone who regards sex as the ultimate goal of interacting with women, and in turn views the idea of a nonsexual friendship with a woman as an abysmal failure.
• Trademarks of a Nice Guy™ include trying to guilt trip women into having sex, claiming that sex should be the inevitable reward for basic acts of friendship, and only being interested in building a friendship until the woman in question rejects them romantically.
• When he gets rejected, he cites every single time they did something nice for her, repeatedly asks her out (as in stalks her), and calls her a coldhearted bitch if she refuses to magically reciprocate his feelings within an almost instantaneous period of time.
• A Nice Guy™ truly cements his status as soon as he begins to complain that (Link): “women only date assholes.”

Manly Christian Bros ‘Apologize’ for Letting Their Women Get Abortions / Bro Choice Men – Abortion Benefits Men Who Want No – Consequence – To – Men Sex With Women

Manly Christian Bros ‘Apologize’ for Letting Their Women Get Abortions / Bro Choice Men – Abortion Benefits Men Who Want No – Consequence – To – Men Sex With Women

This is from a left wing, secular feminist site (“Jezebel”), which is usually quite hostile towards Republicans and traditional values:

(Link): Manly Christian Bros ‘Apologize’ for Letting Their Women Get Abortions

This is one of those topics where I’m not particularly on either side of the debate.

I am pro-life, right wing, and don’t generally agree with left wing feminists often.

While I think I understand the motives behind this pro-life video (which I have not watched, I’ve only read the summary of it by the secular feminist author), I think it was maybe not thought out well (again, going by the feminist’s description of it).

I can’t say as though I agree with feminists that men should have no say at all in abortion.