You're not a good citizen until your uterus prolapses

[Saya]

Alright, so its an article from a magazine and not exactly news, but damn if is not horrifying.

Our four ex utero kids are generally well-behaved, or so we’re told. But occasionally they do something spectacularly disobedient, and even more incredibly, they fail to make any serious effort to conceal it. This infuriates their father. If they’re going to do something that dumb, he growls, they should at least be clever enough to keep us from discovering them at their sin.

However, I salute their stupidity. I take it as a sign that though the children are disobedient, they have at least sinned simply and honestly. Their sin is impulsive, not deceptive; it is primarily of the flesh and not the devil. They sin with desire but without duplicity. They sin as I wish I sinned.

Their sin reminds me of a time when I would say of a couple of friends “in trouble,” “If you’re going to be stupid, at least be smart about it.” Their stupidity led to their exposure, their excruciating confessions to parents, their hurried marriages, the incongruity of birthdays and anniversaries in their family histories. At the time when had such sophisticated advice to offer, it did not occur to me that this counsel amounted simply to adding decep- tion to their sin.

Signs of Health or Brokenness

Sexual relationships, while enacted privately, are public property. The lover declares, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine.” This protects the relationship from internal and external breach. Those within the relation-ship are bound to each other by their promise of troth, held in trust by the neutral third parties who witness the promise. Those outside the relationship know that this new unit of their community is being rightly founded, and also that any attempt to besiege the promise is illicit. The vow of complete self-giving is sanctioned by those present, and its publicity makes it safe to carry out. Thus would a bride in former times blush—all those gathered in her honor knew what she would be doing in just a few hours.

And in former times, when the married couple fulf lled their vows to God and each other and their witnesses, they produced, at God’s favor, babies to prove it. The lack of a baby indicated either a broken body or a broken vow. While both called for the community’s prayer, the latter also called for the community’s assistance in healing the marriage for the benefit of everyone, for a broken vow means broken people. When a baby gave evidence of a union where no vow had been made, it was similarly in the interest of the community to correct the situation in the way that would most benefit all the parties involved.

In marriage, a couple gives over supervision of their marital health to those who approved their avowal. A sexual relationship between people who made no vows would normally not remain a secret for long. But contraception blinds the community by concealing the sexual act outside of marriage, or its absence within marriage, and by leaving goods damaged in various ways unmarked as such.

The heartbroken suffer alone in hijacked bodies. A relationship is known to be serious (since sex is no longer a mark of gravity in a relationship) when both members unload the “baggage” of past relationships. Accountability is lost, and there is little opportunity for prevention. We are all left to pick up someone’s pieces when it is too late, and without help, since these matters are private.

This is not to advocate public shaming. The Church is not a place of shame, for Christ covered shame with his naked death. But the shame of sexual immorality torments even if it is not widely known.

Every member of the community profits from a protective mechanism against such shame. Two people cannot become one flesh without being personally affected, and the shock waves their union generates change the community. Publicizing the event allows the community to approve, prepare for, and absorb the change. Extra-marital unions infect the community with diseases of body and soul. Atrophied unions weaken the community in body and soul. A community that has been deprived of its primary diagnostic tool for identifying an ill or illicit union is less able to remedy itself.

Unacknowledged Debt

Why must we have physical, public evidence of the faithful fulfillment of even those marital vows most of us can’t imagine neglecting, at least at first? Who would lie about such things? Well, who would talk about them? Allowing nature to manifest our faithfulness is certainly more graceful than a verbal report.

Contraception, now the status quo, also puts the burden of disclosure on the tragically infertile. They are forced to openly deny contraceptive use to prove their faithfulness. The involuntarily childless must actively solicit the sympathy of friends and the prayers of the Church, giving painful birth only to words that express their sorrow.

The fruits that proceed from the union of lovers bear witness to the lovers’ faithfulness to their public vow. This is the pain of infertility: a union unconfirmed, a love lacking its plainest proof.

This is also why the Church perceives discord in the decision of a newly married couple to take a few years to “enjoy being married” before ending marital enjoyment with children. Apparently, we are expected to take them at their word that they are fulfilling the vows made before us, although they refuse to tender the token. In those storied former times, we’d have worried that perhaps the sweet things weren’t quite sure how things worked. For now, charity ordains that we fill in the child-shaped marital deficiency with the sad assumption of trouble conceiving, except in the great majority of cases, where bride and groom make no secret of being confirmed window shoppers at the baby mall. If you’re going to be married, be smart, after all. Be ever copulating but never conceiving. Their debt to their witnesses (to say nothing of each other) goes quite unacknowledged.

So also is the public treated disrespectfully by the couple who, 2.1 children later, give no sign of continued faithfulness to their vow. Is he so disgusted by the sight of his wife’s birth-changed body that he will no longer suffer its embrace? Is she using her maternal exhaustion as an excuse to withhold herself from him? Can this marriage survive? The only way we know a marriage to be sexless is when it comes out in therapy, on the golf course, at play dates, on the pages of The Atlantic.

On the other hand, those inclined to give evidence of ongoing sexual success can simply mention recent adventures to friends. We no longer provide pregnancies to testify to our faithfulness, for faithfulness is no longer a positive act or a community act. It is simply the failure to pursue gratification elsewhere. Furthermore, to whom could we possibly owe testimony? Sex is private.

“Safety” in Secrecy

Outside of marriage, contraception permits sexual sin without public consequence. The public, for the most part, no longer cares, but the Church certainly must. Those who accept contraception as legitimate within marriage set up their children to succumb not only to lust, but also to guile. Fornication super-enabled by contraception leads the young away from marriage and into a life of secret sin behind closed doors on which no one has a right to knock.

The Christian couple “in trouble” faces more shame now from the Christian community than in ages past. With so many opportunities to conceal an illicit relationship or even an illicit pregnancy, those couples who must admit publicly to a sin considered private assume a largely avoidable humiliation. They’re concupiscent and stupid.

Christian parents are tempted to hope that if their kids mess up, they will at least be “safe” about it. The young have to be taught, with subtlety of course, that for everyone to remain happy, they must plan their sins and take measures to prevent these sins from coming to light. Veniality is far too risky.

The people we seek to keep safe are ourselves. There is nothing safe about “safe sex” besides an external reputation. As long as no one knows, we can still participate in society’s grotesque nuptial parodies. Our daughters flounce down the aisle in ironic white gowns, naked from the cleavage up; our sons save for honeymoons on which the couple, drained by months of preparing for the exhibition of extravagance, can finally get some sleep. We smile about how our darlings waited—or if they didn’t, about how they at least were smart enough not to let it become a problem.

Empty Glasses

But as go the banns, so go babies. Our churches must grow, but our families must be reasonably sized; our sex must be fantastic but never dutiful; our food is organic but our love is not. We sip from empty glasses and sing the expressiveness of the wine. True love waits, or if that’s too hard, it can be made to appear to wait. And after the official waiting is over, love need show nothing for itself but a naughty grin.

http://www.generationcedar.com/main/...privacies.html

I think it disturbs me even more knowing that it came from women and most of the people on the site in support of it seem to be women as well. How many people exactly think this way?

I came about by way of scienceblogs, which has a good discussion about it: http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2...tch_on_the.php

[ape descendant]

OMFG... The attitude that this article conveys is so goddamned offensive I can barely contain my ire, I must rant.

This sick and disgusting view of sexuality and procreation is part of what’s so very wrong with the religious right.

Casting women as little more than baby making factories... casting sex as only a tool for procreation, denying the enjoyment that healthy sex can bring... casting birth control as some sort of culprit out there stealing virtue.

I find it reprehensible and abusive to mentally clobber one's children over such a basic need and urge. To teach them that it is a great evil unless it is done the way some shitty organization tells them to.

And finally, treating the act of bringing another person into the world as a forced consequence of sex, when it should be a joyous decision. Life should be a gift one gives another, not some punishment for the parents.

In a world facing overpopulation, this is an attitude that will breed more harm than good.

[triggerhappi26]

I think the sad part in all this is that there is truth in it.

I was 14 when my doctor told my mom that I'd never have kids, 5 years later and it still has no impact on me at all. Yet people were sympathetic as if my life had ended because I will not have a child of my own.

A friend of mine from junior high got pregnant and moved in with her boyfriend when she was only 15. They raise that girl together and yes they have to work hard, but I'm sure you wouldn't ever see a happier kid. Yet Lisa was shamed for getting pregnant so young, (not that I condone teenage pregnancy either) but for her to continue to be "shamed" when they do such a good job and have a more functional child than ones I've seen from couples who are married and 30 something.

It shouldn't be the place for outside comment of anyone, church nor family.

I've met women who are married for 20 years and haven't had sex in 12 years.

Yet I know another woman who is actually older than the married one, who has been with her husband 4 years, married for 2 and I've had the "pleasure" of walking in on them.

My parents marriage ended over a lot of issues, one being sex, they had been married 21 years, but the last 2 years, no sex. Added to the fire for divorce.

Do any of us have a right to comment when we are so obviously different. So many different situations. How can we possibly be measured by the same "rules"?

[ape descendant]

You put it so gently, and elequently.

[triggerhappi26]

Thank you. That comment made my day.

[ape descendant]

Awe, I'm glad! =^.^=

[triggerhappi26]

The weird thing in my own case is people were more sympathetic to my mom.

Like she had this great loss because she'd not have a grand child from me.

(Though I do have a brother, just no one holds at much hope for him, he's rather well stupid to put it politely. Turned 21 in March, and only last year he was sticking cheezies up his nose and eating them even after my Nan's dog licked the chezie while it was in his nose.)

I think the reason they weren't sympathetic to wards me though was that I was so young. Can't be sympathetic of not having kids without encouraging having a baby to someone who was only 14.

[ape descendant]

Yeah.. well it sucks when people are overly sympathetic about being childless... people really do act pretty strange about it... They get really weird when you'd been married 7 years and don't have kids... its always "oh I'm so sorry", not realizing that for the vast majority of that time you were waiting to make sure your marriage and finances were stable enough to bring another person into the family.

[triggerhappi26]

It really is becoming a bit ridiculous on the baby front.

Things like pregnancy pacts between girls in high school, sometimes even younger. Just because some celebrities were sporting the baby bump.

[ape descendant]

Oh my, is that shit for real?

[triggerhappi26]

Unfourtunately yes, it makes me want to shake preteen girls. Scream at them like "GROW YOUR OWN BRAIN DOOOOO ITTTTT!"

Most of them I think should be in therapy, lusting after a fictional character, imitating these celebs, its a little sad.

Of course the statement that crosses my mind then is
"Oh please tell me I was never like that!"

[ape descendant]

That statement crosses my mind too, every time I have to deel with little teeney-boppers...

I am still quite dumb-founded about this pregnancy pact thing... how fucking dumb can ya be? Its a baby, a new human being.. not a freaking toy!!

[triggerhappi26]

you hear this stuff, girls having 3 even 4 kids before they're 25. Octuplet mom still wanting more kids. Women addicted to pregnancy, and so on. Other couples validating their relationship with a child.

Do any of them notice that we're having a problem with over population?

[ape descendant]

I know, and they get all smug with you if you dont' have children. Never mind that on avarage they have more than they can really handle, end up depressed and having a hard time at life in general.

The thing that really irritates me, is when people are called selfish for limiting the size of their family for practical reasons. It makes me want to scream... "hello, its called being RESPONSIBLE"

[triggerhappi26]

I completely agree, all that's needed is will power. We have contraception so use it.

Now there is a limit on how far I'd go with this. In India women are paid with pots and pans,etc. To get their tubes tied. I think offering something motivates them for the wrong reason, a women should want to not have kids, not to get some trinkets, or under pressure of the man she is with to get those shiny trinkets, but to, like you said, to be responsible.

[triggerhappi26]

The problem of course is this is the views of very few and we risk being hypocrites by forcing these views on others.

All we can do is voice opinions and hope people agree.

[Saya]

I am sympathetic if someone wants to have kids but they can't have them, but if it doesn't bother them then why bring it up?

I get some weird reactions when I told a few people that I never want to have kids. My best friend was like "oh no! Thats sad." and a girl who I defriended on facebook and am no longer speaking to actually got mad at me and said I would change my mind, how could I possibly want to miss out on the magic of motherhood?

The thing with pregnancy pacts and girls pressuring each other to have sex, and also shit like purity balls and abstinence only and quiverfull, both come from this belief that your value increases or decreases based on your sexual activity and your body, in your example teenager girls internalize misogyny just as the woman who wrote this article internalized it.

[triggerhappi26]

You know I got that reaction to my from my 14 year old friends after that got the news I couldn't have kids.

I had said it's ok I didn't really want any. They responded like I was crazy.

In this modern age why is it still a value to women that they have to validate themselves by getting married and having kids.

That's an ideal of the past, not that it's a bad thing, but there's a wide open world with oppourtunities to do so much more with our lives.

Why are so many women stuck in the 50's?

[ape descendant]

I think that its backlash from the Liberation movement. Unfortunately liberated women and feminists have come to be demonized as selfish, souless, harpies. Women who believe in their reproductive rights are demonized as flippant and irresponible.

It feels like modern women who are aware of the struggle for equality are having to fight tooth and nail against OTHER WOMEN, just to keep what our grandmother's bought so dearly for us... choice.

[triggerhappi26]

So now the question is, how do you put this right, without stepping on other women's rights and oppinions.

[Saya]

Originally Posted by ape descendant

I think that its backlash from the Liberation movement. Unfortunately liberated women and feminists have come to be demonized as selfish, souless, harpies. Women who believe in their reproductive rights are demonized as flippant and irresponible.

It feels like modern women who are aware of the struggle for equality are having to fight tooth and nail against OTHER WOMEN, just to keep what our grandmother's bought so dearly for us... choice.

Bingo, although as long as feminism has been around feminists have been demonized, its been a tug of war it seems for the women's liberation movement, we got the right to vote, then after WWII we entered the fifties and women were urged to go back home, and a lot of them did. We had second wave feminism, and then in America Reagan took back many of the hard won rights, and told women to go back home. In the nineties we had grrrl power, then when Bush came into office more rights were taken away. I dunno if everyone just now feels the political climate is safer now or what but I notice more and more women identifying as feminist. In Canada especially, but I think its a backlash against what Harper is doing, many are becoming afraid he might be our Reagan.

As for how we can end it without trampling women's choices, thats the thing, its still their choice, it just should be an informed and empowered choice. You're not a bad feminist if you stay home with your young children, but fuck you should not feel obligated to just because you have a uterus.

[ape descendant]

Yepper! *raises a glass to saya* Hear, hear...

We should start a girls club on here.

[triggerhappi26]

I second the girls club idea

[Saya]

Well, its not really necessary, if there's one thing I absolutely love about the gnet community is that most people here seem to be feminists.

[triggerhappi26]

That's true and it's great to see feminism evolve, that it doesn't mean burning your bra, or being a virgin for life, or not getting married and having kids, it doesn't even mean you have to be female to be a feminist.