[quote]
Zero_Z wrote:
If anyone’s going to have sex with MY daughter, it’s gonna’ be ME!
nephorm wrote:
…[/quote]
Haha, apparently you haven’t seen that movie. Either way, if I had a daughter I’d definitely not want some pud kid getting her knocked up, but at the same time I know lots of girls and not a one is married and not a one is a virgin. The whole deal with chastity is situational IMO, and I think the ceremony is a little extensive.
[quote]nephorm wrote:
Mick28 wrote:
No need to be insulted, infuriated or otherwise ticked off. I’m sure that the other poster respects your opinion, I know that I do. But you’ll have to admit, perspective does indeed change when your personal circumstance changes.
I won’t argue with that. I am sure that if I were the father of a girl I would be trying to safeguard her virtue in any way I could.[/quote]
That argument could go both ways. A fathers love could make him go to far to the other extreme and unrealistically overprotective.
Ah, hell the bottom line is even among people who qualify by having children they still will have differing views.
I think we all agree if we cared about a female child be her a daughter, sister, cousin, that we would advise them to steer clear of sex when young and be fully educated on the matter regarding risks so that when they are confronted with temptation or an eager pushy boyfriend they will make a decision from a more educated viewpoint that will hopefully keep them chaste, but if not keep them free of disease and child.
My two cents for what it’s worth.
D
[quote]Majin wrote:
Abstinence pledges are the last bid attempts of these dimwitted zealots to preserve their ‘kind’ by abusing their children. And I’m so glad it ain’t working.
What I’m pissed off about is tax money going to any religious activity whatsoever. May a large rock climbing shoe catch them from out of the toilet.[/quote]
To assume that all attempts at teaching abstinence as a core value, whether religiously or practically motivated, are acts of ignorance or archaic paternalism seems as far fetched as believing that any contraceptive education is an implicit approval of the act.
Someone stressing abstinence for a specific reason or belief even though chances are it will fail doesn’t mean one shouldn’t try. Chances are better than 80-90% that I’m not gonna be as strong as Dave Tate, but I am sure gonna work my ass off to try. Granted, in failing to break a squat barrier, I wont find myself chock full o’ babies or passing puss and motor oil out of my man meat. But the difficulty of acheiving an ideal does not degrade the ideal itself, nor does it mean that stressing abstinence on its own will lead to babies vaulting out of your daughter’s vulva in a pretty little row when she almost inevitably fails.
On the otherside, refusing to address any manner of safe sex because its “prohibited” and letting it be known that you are gonna disown your child if they screw up like in the plot of 8 out of 10 episodes of “law and order” seems a pretty damaging, and unforgiving song and dance.
Teaching abstinence doesnt have to mean you will not inform your kid how to pork properly and punch your child in the face if they screw up. And teaching safe sex isnt a nationwide acceptance of all manner of carnal mayhem. So if atleast on issues like this, we could step away from an “us vs. them”–banjo playing, dark-ages, dimwits vs. god-hating goat-sexers, we might just make sense and stop a few people’s genitals from rotting to the consistency of a 8 week old banana and oozing to the ground with a satisfying plop.
In other news, I know a kid whos parents wanted to do the whole purity silver ring thing and he somehow talked them into getting him a “chastity katana.”
Last I heard he was getting rusty trombones from the just-18 siblings of his friends… and had a big sword that could cut things.
I think we can all agree, despite our socio-economic, philosophical, or religious differences, that he has something figured out
I think the main point trying to be expressed by the people against this vow is that if you’re doing your job as a parent it’s unnecessary. Teaching your kid abstenence, teaching your kid about birth control, this is being agreed with. But you have to have a good relationship with your child.
The absentee father who makes this kind of vow of chastity with his dauther thinking it’ll make up for not being around it probably won’t work unless mom has been being a major influence to support it. The father who has always been there and has been teaching his dauther about everything he can think of that may help her in her life (including sex) this vow is probably going to work. But you know what, it was probably more everything else than just the pledge.
I had a wonderful relationship with my father. He was around as much as he could be (my parents got divorced and I lived with my mom). He did his best to teach me what he could. With various conversations (not always sex related) he taught me basically ‘who not to fuck’. It was heavily implied I should abstain from sex, when I did have sex to use protection.
But he also felt he raised me right that I could use my own judgement as to when to have sex. I’ve only had sex with one person in my entire life. I first had sex in highschool, five years later that man became my husband. We STILL don’t have a kid, by choice. We’ve never once needed to even entertain the notion of an abortion. Our relationship is stronger now than it’s ever been and this is while we’re dealing with a lot of financial hardship.
So really, try to raise your daugther as best you can. Teach her the values you want her to carry with her. Be there for her. But also, trust that you raised her well enough that when that judgement call comes she makes the choice that’s right for HER.
[quote]Lilium wrote:
I think the main point trying to be expressed by the people against this vow is that if you’re doing your job as a parent it’s unnecessary. Teaching your kid abstenence, teaching your kid about birth control, this is being agreed with. But you have to have a good relationship with your child.
The absentee father who makes this kind of vow of chastity with his dauther thinking it’ll make up for not being around it probably won’t work unless mom has been being a major influence to support it. The father who has always been there and has been teaching his dauther about everything he can think of that may help her in her life (including sex) this vow is probably going to work. But you know what, it was probably more everything else than just the pledge.
[/quote]
Word. An elaborate ceremony (especially the wedding-esque dress) to pledge of this sort rubs me a little funny, and if it is one’s primary attempt to get a kid to keep it their pants, I doubt it would have much of a success rate, but I’m also not sure that I see it as a monument to closed-mindedness and as an act of clitoral neo-colonialism on the part of all the dad’s who do it.
Not my style, I can say that.
I think the problem I have with this is that it is focusing on the wrong thing. Whether a girl is chaste or not is not neccessarily the important part. You could raise a virgin who has no self-respect, no goodwill towards other people, no drive to suceed in life, etc. and be a failure. You could raise a girl who gets straight A’s, star of a sports team, volunteers time at a homeless shelter and is an all-around great human being. Would she be a bad person if she was having sex with her boyfriend every night?
Now obviously real life doesn’t always work like that. But why have a ceremony to put this extrinsic quality (chastity) that really, by itself doesn’t mean anything? I’m not saying this is always the case, but perhaps what is really important, the intrinsic quality of self-respect (among other things) often associated with chastity is being lost?
Some people might be ready for sex at an earlier age, some probably aren’t ready for it at 35. What if you aren’t married until you’re 35? Why make a blanket rule that applies to everyone without considering individual factors?
[quote]pushharder wrote:
GloriaStansberry wrote:
…Not my style, I can say that.
Are you a dad, Gloria?
(Good grief, that sounds odd to ask a Gloria if he’s a dad)
[/quote]
Nope. Would like to be someday. And absolutely all sorts of feelings would change with fatherhood. As of now, I’m not anti any convenant between father and daughter, mother and son etc. The fact is, I know very little about much anything at this age in my life. And I can see that a covenant is an established theme in the judeo-christian heritage and making an agreement between parent and sibling, certainly doesn’t irk me.
Frankly, in and of itself, I tend to doubt the efficacy of such an agreement without an otherwise firm foundation, but I don’t have a very strong (or informed) opinion on the specific matter of such a celebration.
and in reference to above quote. don’t worry. I’m not sitting in a dark room, wearing thick eye shadow and a cobwebbed wedding vale and slip like Miss Havisham over here.
[quote]jtrinsey wrote:
I think the problem I have with this is that it is focusing on the wrong thing. Whether a girl is chaste or not is not neccessarily the important part. You could raise a virgin who has no self-respect, no goodwill towards other people, no drive to suceed in life, etc. and be a failure. You could raise a girl who gets straight A’s, star of a sports team, volunteers time at a homeless shelter and is an all-around great human being. Would she be a bad person if she was having sex with her boyfriend every night?
Now obviously real life doesn’t always work like that. But why have a ceremony to put this extrinsic quality (chastity) that really, by itself doesn’t mean anything? I’m not saying this is always the case, but perhaps what is really important, the intrinsic quality of self-respect (among other things) often associated with chastity is being lost?
Some people might be ready for sex at an earlier age, some probably aren’t ready for it at 35. What if you aren’t married until you’re 35? Why make a blanket rule that applies to everyone without considering individual factors?[/quote]
I hear ya on it sexual history not making someone a “bad person”. The Christian faith (along with other religions) does place value on sexual purity before marriage, and of course one’s beliefs are gonna effect how he or she responds to the validity of that. Perhaps certain people of any conviction or belief system(theistic faith, secular humanism etc) are indeed guilty of focusing too strongly on “the rules” of what not to do at the expense of larger ideals (love, forgiveness etc.) central to the belief. A “rule” such as this in and of itself may not be nec. restrictive and dehumanizing but can easily be degraded to become so.
Indeed, in my opinion, a problem can arise when one focuses on details of just about any thought system at the expense of the most important things.
Regardless of beliefs, (and I think most would agree) that one’s self worth should not be determined by chasteness or the social implications it carries.
I suppose the the real barometer of such an agreement would be the father’s response toward the child’s failure. I don’t think many people, regardless of their philosophical background, would say that the child should be made to feel like they are not a good person regardless of a breach of a notion of sexual purity. Unfortunately, i suppose it turns out that way sometimes.
I’m not a dad, but I’ve sure written a lot about this topic.
Leave it to conservative christians to teach that a natural human function is a sin.
P.S
How embarrasing that must be for the little girl who has to go through with something like that.
You just know that 99% of them are only doing it because there parents are making them so they can brag to their christian friends how holy and good their daugher is.
People didn’t want their daughters having sex before marriage in the past, but then, they got married at 13-15 years age. And had 8-13 kids by thirties. If they didn’t die with the first one.
I think these people are placing far too much emphasis on sex.
[quote]DanErickson wrote:
How embarrasing that must be for the little girl who has to go through with something like that.[/quote]
I don’t think so; little girls want to please their daddies at that age. If it comes to be seen as a normal rite of passage in the community, there will be little to no embarrassment for even slightly older girls.
Preface: I’m a dad (happy now Mr. Push?).
I suspect this type of ritual won’t accomplish what it hopes to.
I base this on two premise.
When a teenage girl’s hormones kick in, lying to her father about how she’s still a virgin will begin and last until (a) she’s obviously pregnant, b) she gets married, or (c) she gets caught in the act.
Fathers will continue to believe what their daughter tells them until (a) she’s caught in the act, (b) she’s obviously pregnant, or (c) she gets married.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
Jtrinsey, are you a dad?[/quote]
I sure hope not!
And I suppose my views might be different if I was. How much of this discussion (in favor of the chastity vow) do you think is generated by the fact that a father is very uncomfortable with the thought of his daughter having sex.
It’s often quite a double-standard, fathers teach their sons about how to use protection and how to “be smart” about sex, but teach their daughters how valuable it is to save it til marriage. Note that I am not directing this towards anybody specific nor am I saying this is the case for everybody.
I think it’s undeniable that female chastity is valued much more than male chastity by our culture as a whole. There is definitly a double-standard there, why?
But of course, since I ain’t no daddy, my opinions don’t matter…