S/O Hypersexualization of Today's Culture /Media's Impact on Youth Sexuality

[frogger]

There is nothing that will encourage obession like telling someone to just not think about something. If you want to not think about something like the sick, demented version of sex that the porn industry sells, you replace it with something better, more important, and yes pleasurable.  For most of us, that isn't celibacy but a healthy relationship with pleasurable sex that won't destroy a person making someone impotent or leave them wearing a diaper. It is having someone to enjoy and who has got your back. If you can give someone a vision of that , preferably before they are exposed, then I think they will better be able to combat it and recognize it for what it is. That is where some groups in the purity vein fail. 

 

[nixpix5]

23 minutes ago, Bluegoat said:

 

Oh, I don't think blame is part of the equation at all.  It's very much cultural.  For many teen girls, I think they have a strong sense of wanting to be sexually attractive, but as you say, that's been totally normalized.  And the alternative, as Dines says, is invisibility.  And for some girls, especially the younger teens, I don't think they totally get the sexual element.  It's just fashion.

But to me that is why we have to tell them, to point out how the fashion industry works, how capitalism has turned female sexuality into a commodity, and how that fits into the teen culture.  Because they don't know and can't resist it or make informed choices unless they are taught.  And it's also I think why it is totally appropriate for a place like an educational institution that is responsible for the well-being of children and teens to not allow that kind of thing to be normalized within the school.  I thought it was interesting that Dines said that in her childhood, there were multiple models of what it looks like to be a women, but now they have narrowed.  A school should be a place where we see the other models, and where teens have a chance to inhabit those other models, and look around themselves at something different.

Agreed. This is a bit of a tangent but it reminds me of how deeply ingrained this all is in our culture. A couple years back Barbie puts out a STEM set. I am intrigued to see what Barbie will be building. First the box is nauseatingly pink but I get it, pink is ingrained too and sells. What does Barbie do with her new found STEM training you ask? Builds a freaking shoe closet for her spine and feet damaging heels! Gah! So close Barbie....so close....

[nixpix5]

20 minutes ago, frogger said:

There is nothing that will encourage obession like telling someone to just not think about something. If you want to not think about something like the sick, demented version of sex that the porn industry sells, you replace it with something better, more important, and yes pleasurable.  For most of us, that isn't celibacy but a healthy relationship with pleasurable sex that won't destroy a person making someone impotent or leave them wearing a diaper. It is having someone to enjoy and who has got your back. If you can give someone a vision of that , preferably before they are exposed, then I think they will better be able to combat it and recognize it for what it is. That is where some groups in the purity vein fail. 

 

I agree and how I tried to raise my older boys. In an ideal world I wish they would have waited for marriage but I didn't...I could only discuss the cons of that choice and try not to be a flaming hypocrite. One son has been in a long term relationship and is engaged to her. They have the most trusting and open relationship when it comes to discussing their likes and dislikes in their sex life with each other. That can be hard for young people but because of early frank conversations my boys are not selfish or clueless. One son told me that he told his fiance early on to never fake anything because it is confusing for guys. To be honest and he promised not to have his manhood insulted haha. That just made me laugh. 

[Murphy101]

I’m not shy about discussing this stuff with my kids. Maybe it’s bc for so many years I was raising teens sons with a father who wasn’t around much. Idk. 

But to me, sure we feel awkward and silly, but this is too important to let embarrassment stop me. More than most anything else in life, I want my children to grow up to be genuine loving people who have relationships with genuine loving people. This stuff makes that very difficult to happen. I don’t think saying porn is bad or sex before marriage is bad is enough. I don’t think telling them will go to hell is the answer either. They need to know there’s legitimate cause for concern, even with marriage and God aside.  They need to know that they are being lied to by media and likely peers looking for validation too.  They need to know addiction and trauma and twisted mentality aren’t shameful things people inflict upon themselves. 

[Bluegoat]

16 hours ago, StellaM said:

 

Expression is definitely shaped by culture; it's unclear whether orientation is also. Twin studies suggest a role for genetics. 

Changing the narrative around porn is indeed required in order to tackle its social harms.

I'm unsure as to how you link porn consumption with expression of a gay orientation, except by the route of social deviancy. Perhaps I'm not understanding.

 

 

Somehow I missed this post earlier, sorry!

I don't think it's at all unlikely that there is a significant component of very biologically based realities around this question, I'd be quite surprised if that wasn't the case.  I think it's difficult to really pull apart that from expression entirely, especially at an individual level.

The link with gay orientation is I think simply that at the moment, for almost all progressives, that has directed the narrative they have around the question of sexuality.  What I guess you might call the gay rights argument or lobby has made a series of very specific arguments about the nature of sexuality, and like many groups they've tended to use the ones that really resonate with people, even when it's been a little simplified, or they aren't the best arguments.  And it's been extremely successful in many western countries, and among pretty much all progressives.

So those particular arguments are now forming the basis of how a lot of people think about sexuality.  So, most believe that "being gay - they don't separate orientation and expression here -  is something entirely innate or unchangeable, not affected by experience or culture except in cases of oppression and repression.  They believe that sexual interests should entirely private, so long as they are consensual.  They have an individualist view of sex without reference to any social questions, thinking that society doesn't have the right to police the sexual behaviour of others.  They believe that this represents diversity in the same way multiculturalism does.  They believe any relationships based on contracts are acceptable. 

These are the ideals and beliefs they now bring to almost all kinds of sexual activity.  They are foundational principles, not just things that happen to be true about homosexuality or same sex encounters.  So when you plug in different sexual interests, like rough sex, or watching porn, or appearing in a porn movie, instead of an interest in same-sex activity - well, the conclusions are not going to be that there are problems with those activities.  It is that they too are innate, they are private, if they are contract based and consensual they are healthy forms of diversity.

I think to get people to look at it differently, you need a deeper and more complex view of sexuality as something more than individual, consent based, and just about what people enjoy.

[Bluegoat]

33 minutes ago, frogger said:

There is nothing that will encourage obession like telling someone to just not think about something. If you want to not think about something like the sick, demented version of sex that the porn industry sells, you replace it with something better, more important, and yes pleasurable.  For most of us, that isn't celibacy but a healthy relationship with pleasurable sex that won't destroy a person making someone impotent or leave them wearing a diaper. It is having someone to enjoy and who has got your back. If you can give someone a vision of that , preferably before they are exposed, then I think they will better be able to combat it and recognize it for what it is. That is where some groups in the purity vein fail. 

 

 

This is true to an extent, but realistically I think we need to acknowledge to ourselves that most people are actually going to have periods in their lives where they will be celibate.  Maybe often, maybe long ones.  Maybe their whole lives, even if they don't want that.  Because a lot of people seem to think that it isn't possible to do this, and if it happens, it's sort of a terrible curse.  That seems to lead to all kinds of negative ideas.  And maybe to not enough emphasis on giving people concrete tools to really help them deal with it when it does happen.  Like, what do we really tell kids about what to do when they are really sexually tempted?  All the role playing and such they get at school, doesn't tend to say much about that, and I suspect most parents aren't giving advice about it.

[Carol in Cal.]

So, say we wanted to curtail / stop in its tracks the p*rn industry.

What legislation would do this?

We need a M. A. D. D. type organization to promote this, and it will almost certainly be mocked to high heaven, accused of puritanism, accused of hating free speech, and accused of being s*x-negative.  Those are daunting hills to climb.  What do we do?

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Arctic Mama said:

Oh heaven forbid.  

 

Sometimes women men want to marry younger, and yes, gasp, even choose to have children at a younger age.  That doesn’t mean purity culture brainwashing OR a failure of aspiration OR sexual education.  Shocking, but true.  Not every life goal is benefitted by waiting until you’re 29 to marry.

 

But there are more than a few men and women I know who had very little trouble with remaining chaste until they got married.  And yeah, a few female friends who are hitting 30 and still virgins by choice.  The errors of the purity cult crap were learned, and a healthy balance struck once again, by many Christians.  It might mean they marry early, but that is far from the emphasis.  

It’s not meant to disparage those who marry young. I don’t think I’m wrong to assume we all have ideals in our heads for our kids. And I don’t think I’m wrong that among a group of parents as likely to be attentive to how to best support those ideals as we have here, there are going to be some, myself included, who don’t think early marriage is the best choice. I do not encourage early marriage, and I also don’t emphasize chastity. 

When I was growing up, surrounded as I was by numerous people who were taught, and who embraced chastity, I saw lots and lots and lots of examples that brought me to believe this was not what I wanted to emphasize with my own kids. I appreciate that you may have had a different experience that led you to draw different conclusions. I personally only knew one woman who both remained chaste AND completed degrees and married later, and frankly, her eventual choice did not knock my socks off in terms of being extremely worth the wait. I figured I would hedge my bets with my own kids. 

[Murphy101]

I have no idea how this got into the evils of young marriage. 

Porn, cheating and more do NOT happen because the person doing them just couldn’t find a satisfactory sex partner in a long term relationship. It usually has nothing to do with that. In fact, the majority of married people who use porn or other sex workers or who have affairs, and related activity usually state it had nothing to do with their marital sex, of which most also claim was good/satisfactory. 

[SanDiegoMom]

1 hour ago, Bluegoat said:

 

Oh, I don't think blame is part of the equation at all.  It's very much cultural.  For many teen girls, I think they have a strong sense of wanting to be sexually attractive, but as you say, that's been totally normalized.  And the alternative, as Dines says, is invisibility.  And for some girls, especially the younger teens, I don't think they totally get the sexual element.  It's just fashion.

But to me that is why we have to tell them, to point out how the fashion industry works, how capitalism has turned female sexuality into a commodity, and how that fits into the teen culture.  Because they don't know and can't resist it or make informed choices unless they are taught.  And it's also I think why it is totally appropriate for a place like an educational institution that is responsible for the well-being of children and teens to not allow that kind of thing to be normalized within the school.  I thought it was interesting that Dines said that in her childhood, there were multiple models of what it looks like to be a women, but now they have narrowed.  A school should be a place where we see the other models, and where teens have a chance to inhabit those other models, and look around themselves at something different.

 

I grew up on TV all the time and magazines like Cosmopolitan and Vanity Fair in the house. I had a very distorted idea of myself and what constituted attractiveness -- I didn't realize how they had permeated my consciousness AT ALL.  It contributed (though wasn't the sole cause) to eating disorders, depression and self harm.  I am raising my children with very little TV (and definitely no TV advertisements  -- ugh, all those makeup and hair ads and of course beer and truck commercials are the WORST) and we allow no magazines in the house besides the Atlantic and the Economist. I want my daughters to have a sense of self entirely unrelated to their appearance.

I might have gone the extreme opposite -- I almost exclusively dress in champion athletic apparel as it is comfortable -- but I always stop and think about my husband shopping for clothes.  He never gives a thought to how he might appeal to someone else in his clothes.  He just chooses well made clothes in colors that he likes and that feel comfortable.  All those years of clothes shopping where my entire day could be ruined by trying on clothes that made me feel fat, or frumpy, or ugly. I just don't care anymore, and part of it is because my life is not inundated with images of airbrushed, surgically enhanced women. 

My kids will see it when they are off on their own, but hopefully by then their identities will be formed and their self esteem will be able to handle it.

[Murphy101]

9 minutes ago, Bluegoat said:

 

This is true to an extent, but realistically I think we need to acknowledge to ourselves that most people are actually going to have periods in their lives where they will be celibate.  Maybe often, maybe long ones.  Maybe their whole lives, even if they don't want that.  Because a lot of people seem to think that it isn't possible to do this, and if it happens, it's sort of a terrible curse.  That seems to lead to all kinds of negative ideas.  And maybe to not enough emphasis on giving people concrete tools to really help them deal with it when it does happen.  Like, what do we really tell kids about what to do when they are really sexually tempted?  All the role playing and such they get at school, doesn't tend to say much about that, and I suspect most parents aren't giving advice about it.

 

Yes. There’s the idk what to call it. Myth? That sex is a must. And it’s gotta always be spectacular.  With origami at the same time for the partners.

But the reality is far from that. Regardless of age, physical condition or relationship.

Sex has replaced intimacy, and in the process, it’s ruining both for many people. 

[Liz CA]

8 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

So, say we wanted to curtail / stop in its tracks the p*rn industry.

What legislation would do this?

We need a M. A. D. D. type organization to promote this, and it will almost certainly be mocked to high heaven, accused of puritanism, accused of hating free speech, and accused of being s*x-negative.  Those are daunting hills to climb.  What do we do?

 

Personally, I think my discussions on this with men between 18-35 yrs go better when I explain the brain issues and the similarities to addictions to substances first. Somehow they can relate to this and - for the moment - does not focus exclusively on the sex part. Perhaps this would also be a way to go about publicly. In much the same way as Dr. Dine presents concerns, we need to find ways to escalate this to the lawmaking levels. Law enforcement in my area is well aware of the correlations; the local FBI office has a task force but it needs to go higher than this. And I think it needs to be presented with empirical evidence and not based on emotional responses. It will be an uphill climb all the way and it won't be for the faint-hearted.

[Guest]

16 minutes ago, Arctic Mama said:

Yeah.  That’s offensive.  But I’m glad your aspirations for your kids mean that it’s college and work or bust.  My own mom felt that way and the “you’re wasting your potential” insinuations and discussions caused more than a bit of damage.

 

She finally apologized and ate crow on that a few years back.  

 

It couldn’t be that you are defensive? 

I am not your mother and said nothing about wasted potential. 

I am speaking about my own observations of people around me and the choices they have made, as well as my own choices and the expectations that were placed on me and how they panned out. 

I would not be heartbroken if my DD up and got married tomorrow, but I would be disappointed. Just as I would be disappointed if DS failed Triganometry and is not graduating after all. I don’t think it is rare for people, especially young women, to get married because they don’t have another goal and there’s a big draw for making a family. It is the path of least resistence. You hardly have to do anything to get married beyond settling on a suitable partner. 

I was saying, I think we all decide, especially among hsers, what we hope for our kids. Do we unschool? Or do we teach the Trivium? Or something in between? This is like that. My parenting in this area reflects the conclusions I have drawn. YMMV. Nothing wrong with that. 

[unsinkable]

19 minutes ago, Murphy101 said:

 

Yes. There’s the idk what to call it. Myth? That sex is a must. And it’s gotta always be spectacular.  With origami at the same time for the partners.

But the reality is far from that. Regardless of age, physical condition or relationship.

Sex has replaced intimacy, and in the process, it’s ruining both for many people. 

I am not ashamed to admit I love a multiple origami...especially when we make a few of the little frogs you can make hop? And all of the little frogs are hopping at once?

Bliss...

[Murphy101]

You make it sounds like “settling on a suitable partner” is no big deal. 

Let me assure you, that’s bleepin hard to find. It was 25 years ago and it sure as heck hasn’t gotten easier.

Your posts do come across as saying those who marry young are just lazy stupid or purity brainwashed.

[mom31257]

2 hours ago, Katy said:

 

My main concern with my daughters waiting until marriage is that 30%+ of young men DO have sexual dysfunction as a result of porn. I've seen conservative Christian marriages where both "waited" until marriage for sex only to find out years later that before marriage the husband already had a 10+ year porn addiction, and sooner or later it led to the marriage falling apart, or infidelity and then the marriage falling apart.  In my experience this is probably MORE than 30% of Christian men because the need for sex isn't squashed by the demand for celibacy, and that need is so easily satisfied using a phone in a bathroom these days.

 

Are you saying girls should have sex before marriage so that they can tell if the man has sexual dysfunction possibly due to porn? It's to try them out, so to speak? I hope I'm misunderstanding you. 

I think what needs to happen is an honest, open conversation between the two. If she suspects that he has a hidden problem or even if she just wants to know (or he does), she needs to make him feel that he can be truthful without harming the relationship. If they can't have an honest conversation about it, then marriage shouldn't be on the table in the first place. 

[mom31257]

2 hours ago, Katy said:

 

Really?  You've never seen, "It's better to marry than to burn" used as a reason for a lusting kid to get married ASAP?

Really,   I've never seen rushing into marriage so they can have sex actually taught. Some might assume that's what waiting until marriage means, but all the teaching I've seen is to wait until marriage AND wait to get married until you find the person God would have you marry. 

[Murphy101]

20 minutes ago, lllllll said:

Yes, that is exactly the problem my now grown kids are having - finding the bleeping partner who's just ...  normal??  sane???  I'm not sure what.  It's so blasted frustrating ...  for them and for me.  And this includes our dd's as well as our ds's.   

 

Teens and 20-something’s aren’t even dating as often as they were 25 years ago.   Because even no commitment dating is more difficult. So the idea that marrying young is the easier least resistance thing is not even slightly accurate with current social data.

[Carol in Cal.]

15 minutes ago, mom31257 said:

Are you saying girls should have sex before marriage so that they can tell if the man has sexual dysfunction possibly due to porn? It's to try them out, so to speak? I hope I'm misunderstanding you. 

I think what needs to happen is an honest, open conversation between the two. If she suspects that he has a hidden problem or even if she just wants to know (or he does), she needs to make him feel that he can be truthful without harming the relationship. If they can't have an honest conversation about it, then marriage shouldn't be on the table in the first place. 

 

How many people will have this honest convo honestly?

And how do you determine whether someone is being honest or not?

Your solution is an unrealistic one, and I think you have entirely missed the point, which is that essentially a serious illness has pervaded our culture, and it's difficult to detect, almost impossible to cure, hard to prevent, and hard to stay disengaged from in marriage because it is so pervasive that it's getting to the point where it's more the norm than the exception.  Naturally that is very concerning, because prevention in our own families, though a clearly important priority, is not going to come close to protecting our kids from the effects of it.

It's kind of like how syphillis pervaded the royalty of Europe for a while--it spread around, no one could talk about it, it was almost impossible to avoid, and it wasn't curable.  Addressing it within your own nuclear family wasn't enough to protect them from it.  Royals had to marry royals.  Alliances were much more certain when sealed with strategic marriages--essentially hostages.  So the farce continued.

(Actually, how DID it finally get stopped?  There might be a lesson there.  I don't think it was floating around in royalty right up until the advent of antibiotics.)

[frogger]

1 hour ago, Bluegoat said:

 

This is true to an extent, but realistically I think we need to acknowledge to ourselves that most people are actually going to have periods in their lives where they will be celibate.  Maybe often, maybe long ones.  Maybe their whole lives, even if they don't want that.  Because a lot of people seem to think that it isn't possible to do this, and if it happens, it's sort of a terrible curse.  That seems to lead to all kinds of negative ideas.  And maybe to not enough emphasis on giving people concrete tools to really help them deal with it when it does happen.  Like, what do we really tell kids about what to do when they are really sexually tempted?  All the role playing and such they get at school, doesn't tend to say much about that, and I suspect most parents aren't giving advice about it.

Certainly.  My point is to say a good healthy lifestyle in regards to relationships is valuable and worth fighting for regardless of where you are personally and whether you will be celebate by choice or circumstances for some time. The "just don't think about what you actually really want" advice is what doesn't seem to work out so well. 

[Katy]

3 minutes ago, mom31257 said:

Are you saying girls should have sex before marriage so that they can tell if the man has sexual dysfunction possibly due to porn? It's to try them out, so to speak? I hope I'm misunderstanding you. 

I think what needs to happen is an honest, open conversation between the two. If she suspects that he has a hidden problem or even if she just wants to know (or he does), she needs to make him feel that he can be truthful without harming the relationship. If they can't have an honest conversation about it, then marriage shouldn't be on the table in the first place. 

 

I actually don't tell them what to do or not to do except that they need to make a conscientious choices.  I talk to them honestly about pros and cons of different choices they might make, and what I hope they do and why.  But I don't pretend I can make the choices for them and I don't imply much if any judgment about whatever they might choose. What I want to avoid is the scenario way too many Christian kids encounter- which is they get caught in passion, and rather than think things through and handle things responsibly - with birth control - they get pregnant from someone they would NEVER choose to marry and bring a child who had no say in how their lives would go into an unstable situation and unhappy relationship.  Or worse, they might end up with a disease they can never get rid of that will drastically alter their lives and potentially cause their deaths.  And I could lay out a pretty clear biblical argument that that is the ethical thing to do in an era when premarital sex is the norm, even if it isn't the preferred option among Christian parents.

[Bluegoat]

4 minutes ago, Katy said:

 

I actually don't tell them what to do or not to do except that they need to make a conscientious choices.  I talk to them honestly about pros and cons of different choices they might make, and what I hope they do and why.  But I don't pretend I can make the choices for them and I don't imply much if any judgment about whatever they might choose. What I want to avoid is the scenario way too many Christian kids encounter- which is they get caught in passion, and rather than think things through and handle things responsibly - with birth control - they get pregnant from someone they would NEVER choose to marry and bring a child who had no say in how their lives would go into an unstable situation and unhappy relationship.  Or worse, they might end up with a disease they can never get rid of that will drastically alter their lives and potentially cause their deaths.  And I could lay out a pretty clear biblical argument that that is the ethical thing to do in an era when premarital sex is the norm, even if it isn't the preferred option among Christian parents.

 

I'm always curious when people say this sort of thing though - what if there really wasn't reliable bc, or antibiotics in case of some other issues?

Because my suspicion would be that people would actually be telling their kids that the stakes were pretty high over this and that not having sex was a not only viable, but pretty imperative thing.  

[Guest]

37 minutes ago, Arctic Mama said:

Marrying young is disappointing like failing trig?  Path of least resistance?  Really?

 

It’s like you can’t even hear yourself.  Your parenting may well reflect the conclusions you’ve drawn.  It’s those conclusions that are the issue.

Yes. *I* would be disappointed if my 21yo dd got married tomorrow. Yup. I do not think it is wise. I literally cannot think of one good reason to marry early.

I would also be disappointed if tomorrow my DS18 said, “I have decided not to go to college. I’m going to move to California with my buddy, Garret and we’re going to open a surf shop. I can wait tables while we get the shop up and running.” 

I would be disappointed in numerous situations that are not the worst thing ever, yet are not what I consider ideal. The world wouldn’t end and I wouldn’t try to stop it beyond saying I think it’s not optimal, but it’s not what I hope for and the counsel I give my kids reflects my beliefs. 

You have a different view. I concede that. You raise your kids accordingly. No big deal. 

[Carol in Cal.]

1 minute ago, Bluegoat said:

 

I'm always curious when people say this sort of thing though - what if there really wasn't reliable bc, or antibiotics in case of some other issues?

Because my suspicion would be that people would actually be telling their kids that the stakes were pretty high over this and that not having sex was a not only viable, but pretty imperative thing.  

This actually was pretty common at one time.

You see it reflected in novels of the period.  For instance, it was a major theme in Gone With The Wind, written in 1935.

 

[Katy]

7 minutes ago, mom31257 said:

Really,   I've never seen rushing into marriage so they can have sex actually taught. Some might assume that's what waiting until marriage means, but all the teaching I've seen is to wait until marriage AND wait to get married until you find the person God would have you marry. 

 

Yes, I've heard that preached from the pulpit in more than one church.  The worst was an Assembly of God mega church.  When I was 18 I had two proposals from men who didn't know me at all, hadn't had a single non-group conversation with me before. This happened in the week after one of those sermons. And in both cases I treated that as if it was never going to happen (I could recognize the difference between lust and love even if the guys could not), but the men in question scoffed at my response. They were both certain they were going to marry me because "God told them" they would. I watched my friends, mostly sheltered girls with less dating experience and less self-confidence fall for this thing over and over.  Most of them married the first guy who expressed an interest when they barely knew anything about each other. This was right at the beginning of the popularity of I Kissed Dating Goodbye and courtship taking over the evangelical world.  Many of these relationships ended in divorce because of porn addiction and infidelity related to porn addiction.  More than one of the guys that were in my "college" group at that church have since openly discussed their sex addiction, but NEVER would have admitted a thing at that age. And more than one of them abandoned their families for other relationships. Now that I'm doing the math, 70% of those young marriages ended badly.  So yeah, call me cynical that hormonal young people with no life experience have a good idea what God's ideal for their lives is, OR that trying to follow it will protect them from harm and give them magically perfect marriages.  That's a fantasy.  I'm thrilled if you're in the minority it worked out for, but people sin and life isn't a fairy tale, so I'm NEVER going to teach my kids a lie that following some imaginary ideal will protect them from harm.  It doesn't work that way for most people.

[Katy]

6 minutes ago, Bluegoat said:

 

I'm always curious when people say this sort of thing though - what if there really wasn't reliable bc, or antibiotics in case of some other issues?

Because my suspicion would be that people would actually be telling their kids that the stakes were pretty high over this and that not having sex was a not only viable, but pretty imperative thing.  

 

I hate the what if game because it isn't dealing with reality.  Reality is there IS reliable birth control, and you can be aware of physical symptoms of STI's and you can use condoms properly (the right size, with space at the tip so they don't break or fall off) with spermicide and you can combine all of the above.  And ever since reliable birth control and condoms have been around it's been the norm - meaning it is more common than not - for even Christian kids to have premarital sex. Which is not to say I approach this like my parents did - scoff at the idea that anyone waits - but I am honest with them about what choices they make and what choices their friends are likely to make and I do stress making responsible choices more than I stress abstinence. 

I hope they choose abstinence.  I hope they have faith to wait until they find the person who really is right for them. I hope they choose to wait for the person they have everything in common with, who the relationship that is easy rather than hard, and I hope they wait until they're at least 28 to get married.  I got that age from some James Dobson book back when I was in my 20's.  Something about brain maturity and statistics showing marriages at 28 or older are more likely to be happy and life long.

[Guest]

51 minutes ago, Murphy101 said:

You make it sounds like “settling on a suitable partner” is no big deal. 

Let me assure you, that’s bleepin hard to find. It was 25 years ago and it sure as heck hasn’t gotten easier.

Your posts do come across as saying those who marry young are just lazy stupid or purity brainwashed.

When you are 18 and have had one boyfriend whom you met at school or through a friend or at church or what-not, and there’s this idea, especially if it’s shared mutually, this idea that, “we have to get married to...you know,” then settling on a suitable partner is, in fact, easy. You just marry that guy. The bird in the hand is worth two hundred in the bush. So, it’s easy to put on your rose-colored glasses and marry him. 

No, I don’t think folks who marry young are lazy or stupid. It’s just easy to settle for this guy if you are already eager to get married. Being hungry for sex is a reason someone might settle for Mr. Right Now. I do think being young and h@rny can make a person less scrutinizing than they would be at 25 and already...less h@rny. 

Also re: lazy. It is human nature to put in less effort where that option appears viable. There is a certain inertia common to humankind. Four years of working towards a degree takes a lot more effort than “just getting married.” If I hadn’t witnessed it so often in my teens and now, repeating again with young women my dd’s age, I guess I wouldn’t think so. But I did. So I do. 

[frogger]

13 minutes ago, Quill said:

Yes. *I* would be disappointed if my 21yo dd got married tomorrow. Yup. I do not think it is wise. I literally cannot think of one good reason to marry early.

I would also be disappointed if tomorrow my DS18 said, “I have decided not to go to college. I’m going to move to California with my buddy, Garret and we’re going to open a surf shop. I can wait tables while we get the shop up and running.” 

I would be disappointed in numerous situations that are not the worst thing ever, yet are not what I consider ideal. The world wouldn’t end and I wouldn’t try to stop it beyond saying I think it’s not optimal, but it’s not what I hope for and the counsel I give my kids reflects my beliefs. 

You have a different view. I concede that. You raise your kids accordingly. No big deal. 

 

Considering how important parents opinions are to children I think this is a dangerous and sad approach to life. I guess my heart goes out to your kids if the perfectly legal/moral thing they want to do is just a disappointment to their mom.  Running a business, disappointed. Getting married, diasappointed. You are right, you can choose to raise your kids however you want but that sounds like a lot of heartache. My kids will choose their own life and live with their own decisions without the nagging thought in the back of their minds that mom might be disappointed.

[mom31257]

23 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

 

How many people will have this honest convo honestly?

And how do you determine whether someone is being honest or not?

 

I believe strongly in extensive pre-marital counseling. It will open up a lot of conversations young people might not think to have. My dh and I met for a couple of months with a counselor, and we attended a marriage seminar that had sessions for engaged couples. We worked through marriage workbooks on our own, discussed them together, and then with our counselor. 

Honesty is something that just comes down to faith until the person gives you a reason not to trust them. And nothing you do can prevent any problems if the person is that good at hiding things. I believe people show their true colors for the most part, if we are willing to see them. 

I went to my parents and sought their advice before I agreed to marry my husband. If they had seen anything they questioned, I would have begun to question it, too. Surrounding yourself with good counsel you trust can help you see clearly in situations that can be hard to be objective. 

[Carol in Cal.]

1 minute ago, mom31257 said:

 

Honesty is something that just comes down to faith until the person gives you a reason not to trust them. And nothing you do can prevent any problems if the person is that good at hiding things. I believe people show their true colors for the most part, if we are willing to see them. 

 

Addictions always lie.

And embarrassing ones are less likely to be discussed than almost anything else.

[Guest]

Ok, guys. I fold. This wasn’t the conversation I intended to have. I am still extremely concerned about my youngest son and the implications inherent in the opening post. But I have no interest in further discussion of early vs. Later marriage.

Plus I need to work on my garden.

So, have a good night. 

[Katy]

4 minutes ago, frogger said:

 

Considering how important parents opinions are to children I think this is a dangerous and sad approach to life. I guess my heart goes out to your kids if the perfectly legal/moral thing they want to do is just a disappointment to their mom.  Running a business, disappointed. Getting married, diasappointed. You are right, you can choose to raise your kids however you want but that sounds like a lot of heartache. My kids will choose their own life and live with their own decisions without the nagging thought in the back of their minds that mom might be disappointed.

 

This is really rude and condescending, considering that Quill's DH is a business owner.  If the kids are raised in a culture where education is important, and going to college is expected, and waiting until you're at least 25 and are neurologically an adult to marry is their family culture, this is no more dangerous or sad than any family culture that expects kids will graduate high school.  If you're going around judging people this way my guess is the one who's setting herself up for disappointment is you.

[frogger]

4 minutes ago, Katy said:

 

This is really rude and condescending, considering that Quill's DH is a business owner.  If the kids are raised in a culture where education is important, and going to college is expected, and waiting until you're at least 25 and are neurologically an adult to marry is their family culture, this is no more dangerous or sad than any family culture that expects kids will graduate high school.  If you're going around judging people this way my guess is the one who's setting herself up for disappointment is you.

 

I don't want to be condescending but each individual has only one life to live and only a small portion of it is child bearing years. We have already seen in this thread disappointment for people being pushed to do one thing or another. I personally am rebuilding a relationship with a parent who always thought they knew what was best for me. There were many years we didn't even bother talking because I chose to make decisions for myself and they were often disappointed. But yes, that is another topic. The idea that young marriage is the some evil thing when we were talking about SM behaivor and torture for pete's sake seems ridiculous.

[WoolC]

35 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

 

How many people will have this honest convo honestly?

And how do you determine whether someone is being honest or not?

Your solution is an unrealistic one, and I think you have entirely missed the point, which is that essentially a serious illness has pervaded our culture, and it's difficult to detect, almost impossible to cure, hard to prevent, and hard to stay disengaged from in marriage because it is so pervasive that it's getting to the point where it's more the norm than the exception.  Naturally that is very concerning, because prevention in our own families, though a clearly important priority, is not going to come close to protecting our kids from the effects of it.

 

I'm more hopeful about honest conversations and even a cure for this because of my college experience, which was admittedly, an anomaly.  I went to a big state university with a large Campus Crusade for Christ presence, this was 2004-2007.  They held a large anti-porn campaign and had male speakers who warned of the dangers of porn, how it had destroyed their marriages, the addiction, and violent cycles it caused, etc.. I also attended a summer missions trip through Crusade where I met dh and he told me that the guys that summer did a program on breaking porn addiction.  We attended different universities but dh and and his roommates had weekly accountability meetings to deal with porn and other issues.  So, yes, we had lots of honest conversations about porn, because the culture that we met in made it less of a taboo subject.  My sister even had a guy that she was dating tell her without prompting that he was struggling with porn addiction and needed to deal with that before entering a serious relationship.

This really wasn't the typical True Love Waits culture that I experienced growing up in church.  It was more of relationship based, struggling together, being vulnerable, encouraging one another and refusing to hide the ugly truth about porn.  

I don't know how to extend this kind of environment and attitude to the culture at large; but I did want to share a glimmer of hope.

[nixpix5]

3 hours ago, Garga said:

 

I feel the same way. I'm very upset about this today inside my soul.  I'm disquieted.  Mostly because there's just nothing to do about it.  And I think of all the people who are already so far down the hole, that they'd just jeer at my concerns and that makes me furious and depressed.  The part where she said they're making hate, not making love, was almost too much to bear, because it was so, so true.

The worst part too is within a decade or two the majority of people running the country will be doing so with brains engineered toward this so they will cease to see anything wrong with it. It will just be the new normal in brain evolution.

[Barb_]

3 hours ago, Carol in Cal. said:

PS  I took a lot of heat here on these boards when the Miley Cyrus image hit the tubes and I voiced how objectionable I found it.  But now I have the benefit of hindsight to call that what it was.  My DD was groomed by the Hannah Montana thing, flat out.  That's what it was.  Super sweet and appealing to super gross, in just a couple of years.  Think about it.

 

I was with you back then on the Hannah Montana thing, fwiw even though we didn’t experience the same sort of hero worship here.

[Barb_]

3 hours ago, Katy said:

And honestly, I don't think that's fair either.  Many young women seem more inclined to commitment at a young age than men do.  I would have LOVED to be one of those people to marry my college sweetheart at 23. But in an age of adulthood being pushed further and further back, finding a man who is ready (willing or not) for that sort of commitment and responsibility is rare.  My boyfriend in my late teens and early 20's would have been a HORRIBLE starter husband.  And that is what it would have been, because he wasn't mentally healthy enough to get married and I wasn't mature enough to realize I was putting up with poor treatment

 

Yeah, I must be talking in circles because it isn’t the early marriage I’m against, it’s the feeling shepherded into an early marriage to save boys from themselves that I’m against. 

[Bluegoat]

1 hour ago, Katy said:

 

I hate the what if game because it isn't dealing with reality.  Reality is there IS reliable birth control, and you can be aware of physical symptoms of STI's and you can use condoms properly (the right size, with space at the tip so they don't break or fall off) with spermicide and you can combine all of the above.  And ever since reliable birth control and condoms have been around it's been the norm - meaning it is more common than not - for even Christian kids to have premarital sex. Which is not to say I approach this like my parents did - scoff at the idea that anyone waits - but I am honest with them about what choices they make and what choices their friends are likely to make and I do stress making responsible choices more than I stress abstinence. 

I hope they choose abstinence.  I hope they have faith to wait until they find the person who really is right for them. I hope they choose to wait for the person they have everything in common with, who the relationship that is easy rather than hard, and I hope they wait until they're at least 28 to get married.  I got that age from some James Dobson book back when I was in my 20's.  Something about brain maturity and statistics showing marriages at 28 or older are more likely to be happy and life long.

 

I don't think it's a what-if game, it's a way of exploring the idea and the assumptions behind it.

A lot of people think, well, it's inevitable many kids will do this, and it seems to create a sense that it's really asking a lot of them to try.

Yet if you lived 100 years ago, or in a place without good access to drugs, you'd likely say it was really important and believe that is was possible.  Not that everyone would do it, which is a different thing, but that t is possible and also that it is not wrong to say, that's what you should be demanding of yourself because the consequences are serious.  That would not be overstepping.

In between those things, human nature has not changed.  If it is a possible thing when no bc is available, it is a possible thing when it isn't.  It's something else that has changed, probably risk assessment. 

[Bluegoat]

49 minutes ago, Barb_ said:

 

Yeah, I must be talking in circles because it isn’t the early marriage I’m against, it’s the feeling shepherded into an early marriage to save boys from themselves that I’m against. 

 

Shepherding is the problem, maybe.  I guess what I wonder though, is sex not actually a pretty reasonable reason to get married?  I think that's pretty much almost always been one of the major reasons for marriage, so that people having sex have some kind of accountability to each other and the results of that activity?  I don't think those kinds of marriage were less likely to be successful, in some ways they were a lot more down to earth.  I guess, if someone wants to marry because sex is a big deal to them, and that means they can't have a certain kind of career or be a missionary or whatever - well, those are kind of the choices we make in life.  Sometimes we choose wrong, or we with there didn't have to be a choice.  But I think that's not so much about figuring out how to always make the "right" choice, I think it's more about learning detachment or how to live within God's providence.  

Now, I think people can successfully be celibate for long periods, and there is no reason most people could not manage to be celibate for a long time and marry later. That seems to be something that I don't see a lot in the evangelical churches - it seems like pretty much everyone marries.  There isn't a tradition of monastics, or celibate priests or hermits or individuals in the lay community, and not much tradition of periods of celibacy within marriage.  I wonder how that would change the sense that avoiding pre-marital sex is best done by marriage.

[Bluegoat]

31 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

Those arguments come straight out of the 60's free love b/s. They are not exclusive to the gay rights movement. 

I am really uncomfortable with equating (any) gay sex with porn or rough sex. Gay sex can be about love and mutual connection; straight sex can be about hedonistic gratification. The sex of the sexual partner is irrelevant to the deviancy of the act.

I hear you are saying acceptance of (gay) deviancy leads to acceptance of a greater range of deviancy, such as porn.

The answer to a pornified society is not to put gay people back in their box. 

 

I don't think deepening a discussion is the same as putting people back in a box, I don't see why that would be implied at all, unless the original cause was in fact wrong.  I suppose the risk is, you find people on further reflection think differently, but I have a hard time seeing that as a reason not to improve thinking.

As far as being uncomfortable with equating them, well sure, but people do, because they see them, have been told to see them, as sexual identities. Being into S&M is seen as an identity, being into kink.   And because they all seem to apply to the privacy of sexual activity idea, and the idea of individualistic consent, a lot of people see no way to differentiate.

It doesn't really matter whether the arguments are crap if a lot of people believe them.  And there were a lot of people my parents' age who did, more on the basis of personal sympathy for nice monogamous gay couples than any real in depth look into the logic of the arguments, a heck of a lot of people operate that way.  They weren't all or even mostly people who were into the free love culture, or who approved of it.  I suspect they might not have generally applied those same arguments to porn, but their kids see those arguments as foundational in a way their parents didn't and will follow them further.  The idea that the state has no business policing sexuality is going to have implications beyond same sex relationships.

I think if you want to get people to really think about porn more holistically, you have to challenge ideas like anything private and consentual is ok, , and it will be difficult because so many associate them directly with gay rights.

[Bluegoat]

20 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

It's pretty simple in that there are only three orientations - heterosexual, bisexual or homosexual. I mean, we only have two sexes in our species, so orientation has to be limited - it's maths. 

A man having sex with a woman is likely straight, whether or not his friend has sex with the same woman (ick). 

A confused man is a confused man. He will still have an orientation, unless he's asexual. 

I do not believe porn is creating gay kids out of straight kids, if that's what people are worried about. If that was happening, we'd be seeing a massive rise in numbers of gay kids, and we aren't. The % is pretty stable. Wake me up when that changes. 

 

 

 

 

I'd think the if there was an effect, it would be seen in kis participating in bisexual activity, maybe especially girls, or group sex with mixed sexes.  I have no idea if anyone keeps any stats on such things.  It would be really interesting I think to see some stats looking at kids who watch porn and their sexual activities, broken down by sex and sexual identity, and maybe gender identity too.

[Katy]

50 minutes ago, Bluegoat said:

 

I don't think it's a what-if game, it's a way of exploring the idea and the assumptions behind it.

A lot of people think, well, it's inevitable many kids will do this, and it seems to create a sense that it's really asking a lot of them to try.

Yet if you lived 100 years ago, or in a place without good access to drugs, you'd likely say it was really important and believe that is was possible.  Not that everyone would do it, which is a different thing, but that t is possible and also that it is not wrong to say, that's what you should be demanding of yourself because the consequences are serious.  That would not be overstepping.

In between those things, human nature has not changed.  If it is a possible thing when no bc is available, it is a possible thing when it isn't.  It's something else that has changed, probably risk assessment. 

 

Of course when the risk was higher less people had premarital sex.  Now puberty is much lower and marriage is much higher and with precautions risks are much lower, which also is a factor.  That has been the reality of life since for the last 50 years. Of course people don't divorce their behavior from risk.  Kids are unlikely to do so either. Living in a fantasy that because life was different 55 years ago your kids aren't going to make decisions based on the way life is right now is naive at best.

[Bluegoat]

Just now, StellaM said:

 

I think you are overestimating the connection to gay rights, and underplaying the connection to the sexual liberation movement more broadly.

The decriminalization of gay sex leading to mass moral deviancy is a hypothesis at best, and oh boy, I'd want to see some hard stats before I gave that argument the time of day.

 

Well, I don't think I argued that. I'm not even saying they necessarily are connected that way, I am saying I think that is the overwhelming association among progressives.   I think it's just kind of normal that when people accept a poorly thought out construction, it will often have unintended consequences over time.  And I don't think it's that uncommon, so it's not like it's a special case, I think it happens a lot with social change.  

I'm not sure you can separate gay rights and the sexual liberation movement easily, so I can see why you'd say it's more tied to the latter.  But I think  in many people's minds where they see sexual liberation in a more unorganized way, kind of an idealism or historical thing, but they see gay rights as comparable and parallel to the civil rights movement - and civil rights, gay rights, trans rights - these things are seen as serious and completely non-negotiable.  As soon as someone says something like - this porn is having the effect of creating sexual patterning or certain sorts of deviancy, they think - wait, that is what people said about homosexuality.  

[Bluegoat]

46 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

I can't see how knowing if a person is feminine or masculine or neither would help in regards to stats, but yes, it would be interesting to look at stats overall. 

I can give you an anecdote, and that is that lesbianism has become wildly unpopular on college campuses, as an 'excluding' orientation. Dd went to the LBGTIQ meeting on her campus when she first started uni (I'd have advised her not to, but we don't discuss that stuff at all) and left half way through because she was made to feel very uncomfortable for her 'preferences'. 

I found that quite interesting. I don't think bisexuality or being gay is where it's at, on campus, anyway. 

 

 

Hmm, that's interesting, I don't know if I've heard of it here.  Do they have the same attitude to gay men and hetereosexuals? But it does touch on what I was thinking around gender identity and this question of porn imprinting certain sexual loops and such, which is how do changes in people's sense of their identity related to whether they consider themselves a lesbian or gay or something else.  Particularly in terms of kinds who think of themselves as non-binary which seems to be a sort of catch all that could potentially include almost anyone.  Do you really consider yourself bi-sexual if you think you are non-binary and sex isn't an important category?  Or those who think of themselves as pansexual?  How does that affect number?  And I'd be really interested in any link between things like extreme gender norms in porn and alternate gender identity along with how that might correlate to sexual behaviour.

[Greta]

6 hours ago, Carol in Cal. said:

6.  I AM EXTREMELY UNCOMFORTABLE WITH THE EXTENT TO WHICH I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT TO DO ABOUT THIS.  It's a disaster for everyone, it endangers women in ways that I hate to even imagine, it is also absolutely horrible for men, and I feel quite uncharacteristically helpless.  

 

Thank you for articulating this.  I was too overwhelmed and distraught to even find the words!  I knew this situation was bad, but this video painted a more vivid and horrifying picture of the situation for me.  My 18 yo dd just told me last week that she is interested in dating now.  Not that she has someone in particular in mind, but she's hoping the right person will come into her life.  She simply hasn't had any interest up to this point.  How do I protect her???  The thought of her dating someone whose perception of sexuality has been warped by porn absolutely terrifies me.  She is modest and shy by nature.  She's never even been kissed.  And the dating world that she's about to enter is . . . well, this hell that we've created.  It truly makes me want to weep.  

Other mothers of daughters*, please tell me, how can we help our daughters protect themselves?

 

* and please know I'm not ignoring or denying the very real need to protect sons too.  It's just that I only have a daughter, so that's my focus right now.

[Murphy101]

1 hour ago, StellaM said:

 

It's pretty simple in that there are only three orientations - heterosexual, bisexual or homosexual. I mean, we only have two sexes in our species, so orientation has to be limited - it's maths. 

A man having sex with a woman is likely straight, whether or not his friend has sex with the same woman (ick). 

A confused man is a confused man. He will still have an orientation, unless he's asexual. 

I do not believe porn is creating gay kids out of straight kids, if that's what people are worried about. If that was happening, we'd be seeing a massive rise in numbers of gay kids, and we aren't. The % is pretty stable. Wake me up when that changes. 

 

 

 

 

We know for a fact that porn (especially from a young age) can cause deviation in sexuality. Deviation in the sense that a straight man might have sex with another man. Or a gay man might have sex with a woman. A woman who has been raped might start looking for S&M.  You are confusing the sexual act with sexual identity. 

It’s not about “turning” anyone into anything.

It’s about trauma manipulating sexuality in young people to the point that they have no idea where their inherent identity differs from twisted brain mapping due to porn.

This is very complex and distructive to relationships.  It’s not as simple as you might think.  Maybe 50 years ago it was far more straight forward  (pun not intended) but there’s building evidence that’s no longer the case.

 

 

[Bluegoat]

37 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

You just keep finding new ways to say gay rights paved the way to acceptance of social deviancy ie porn ?

Or is it that gay rights have groomed progressives to be unable to say no to porn ? I don't think I am a very unusual 'progressive' (don't like that term, really) but I don't find it difficult to be pro gay and anti porn, and I don't think it requires mental gymnastics to do so either.

I (think I) follow the construction of your argument. You've been patient in clarification.

I suppose the mind experiment I play with myself is to work backwards. If there was no gay marriage, if gay sex was still a crime, if social acceptance of gay relationships was low, if straight males enforced this through gay bashings....would that lead to a point where porn and kink etc was not a problem ? Ie would sexual deviancy be reduced, disappear, or be better able to be controlled ?

Well, obviously not, because when gay marriage didn't exist, and gay sex was still illegal, and gay people were being bashed down town on a Saturday night, there was still kink, there was still rough sex, there was still pedophilia, children and women were still being trafficked, and all the same people consuming porn now were consuming it then. 

For me, re porn, the difference is the medium.

Happily married fathers of my classmates back in the 70's were still consuming porn. It was mostly in the form of magazines, and still images. The internet blew the whole thing wide open, and it is that medium that allows for the devastating live and action imagery we see today.

 

 

More similar to the grooming idea. I'd not have thought to put it that way. I don't know of a better word for progressives I'm afraid, I can't bring myself to say the left.

I think there has always been sexual deviancy in some people, probably for a variety of different reasons.  There have also always been homosexuals.  What's different now is the social norm has changed, and even the idea of a social norm.  

It's not really that there are gay people going around being gay, it's that the particular way a lot of the political lobby chose to work - and was able to drive change at a rate that's almost been unprecedented, it was a hugely successful campaign, and it's now being copied by other rights groups.  Almost run like a advertisement campaign, which I guess makes sense when you look at the political climate from the 80s on - all about the popular and effective argument, not always so much about the most robust arguments.  Whether their were robust arguments almost seems like an aside.  

I'm actually a bit surprised you see this as controversial, because all those ideas I mentioned up-thread are pretty much exclusively the ones I hear when talking about gay rights - in political panel discussions, on the internet, among my family members, in classrooms.  I can count the times I hear a different one and it's usually in more confined, non-public, environments.  And they are exactly the same arguments I keep hearing about porn and gender identity,  prostitution and even recently about a few other things that made me raise my eyebrows.  People explicitly bring up gay rights as well, as in, well, if you think X, what about gay rights, you must be homophobic too.  (And I'll say most of this in terms of public online commentary is stuff from the Guardian, which generally has a middle class, educated, left leaning readership.)  I've seen the link made explicitly too in a few sex-positive advocacy articles that are pretty widely read.

I think if you asked a lot of people to differentiate between choosing to watch porn or legality and ethics of gay sex, they'd struggle.  I've increasingly come to the conclusion that for some reason or another, most people aren't prepared to think about such things in a very clear way.  Which I find really depressing.

[Bluegoat]

1 hour ago, Katy said:

 

Of course when the risk was higher less people had premarital sex.  Now puberty is much lower and marriage is much higher and with precautions risks are much lower, which also is a factor.  That has been the reality of life since for the last 50 years. Of course people don't divorce their behavior from risk.  Kids are unlikely to do so either. Living in a fantasy that because life was different 55 years ago your kids aren't going to make decisions based on the way life is right now is naive at best.

 

My point though was their ability to succeed isn't actually less.  They almost certainly could.

[Bluegoat]

28 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

That's a much discussed hypothesis that will get me shouted at, lol, so I won't get into it, but yeah, it's not only conservatives who are looking at that. 

Sexual behaviours can only fall into one of three orientations, no matter what someone's gender identity is. Considering yourself to be homosexual is not the same thing as being homosexual. I know there are 'how to please a lesbian with a penis' articles out there, but honestly, if you are female, and you're pleasing a penis, you are not engaging in homosexual activity.

Nobody @ me please.

 

I think the difficulty here is in how to capture that statistically and interpret it.

[Katy]

11 minutes ago, Bluegoat said:

 

My point though was their ability to succeed isn't actually less.  They almost certainly could.

 

Yeah, things are exactly the same degree of difficulty when average age of first marriage is 20 years after puberty instead of 2, and most people do have premarital sex, and there are easy and cheap precautions to take the most severe consequences away.   ?