This topic was brought up in the HPV vaccine thread, and I wanted to get everybody's opinion on it.

I think that sex before marriage is not necessarily a bad thing. I think it, along with living together, gives couples a chance to see what their marriage might be like. Sex is a huge part of marriage, and bad sex can undermine a marriage, IMO. Plus, it helps you figure out if what you are feeling is true love or just plain lust.

I personally believe that the push to make teens abstain until marriage may actually be contributing to the high divorce rate. If people think that they have to be married to have sex, I think they might rush into a marriage because they might not know the difference between lust and love. Take my former roommate, for example. She and her boyfriend dated for 4 years before they got married. To my knowledge, they were both virgins when they married. They separated within 6 months of marrying and were officially divorced the day before their first anniversary. I really believe that the disgrace in having sex before marriage and living together (he was Mormon) contributed to the failure of their marriage. I think that if they had been allowed to see what each other was truly like, apart from dates, they wouldn't have gotten married.

Indeed, it is my opinion that once they are designated as taboo they will become more erotically charged.

Exactly. Once you refuse something to a child or say that they "must not do this or that", they want to see what all the fuss is about. Either that, or they start viewing whatever it is in an entirely unhealthy way.

...doesn't respect women because he doesn't ogle them.

I didn't read that ogling = respect in anyone's comments, though I may have missed some. I think people are saying that curiosity, especially in a young child, and especially about something the opposite sex has that he does not, is natural. Perhaps it will work exactly as she has planned, and perhaps she is seeding her child with future neurosis. Who's to say. Other than that child in another 15 years.

Since those statistics are only for reported rapes, I doubt that they are right at all. In many Muslim countries, or at in least Saudi Arabia, I believe, a woman reporting a rape can legally be put to death.

Of course, there IS a huge difference in teaching your child that its rude to stare and teaching him "dont look at that temptresses evil bosoms or you'll be struck down by lightening". We may all be reacting to something that's never been said.

Exactly. Once you refuse something to a child or say that they "must not do this or that", they want to see what all the fuss is about. Either that, or they start viewing whatever it is in an entirely unhealthy way.

In fact, it is this tendency that has led to a lot of us being here and developing the attitudes we have about food. In many cases, we grew up with very restictive parents and were told that "eating this can make us fat, so you can't have any". What did we do, in many cases? Ate in private, where no one could see, and binged.

I didn't read that ogling = respect in anyone's comments, though I may have missed some. I think people are saying that curiosity, especially in a young child, and especially about something the opposite sex has that he does not, is natural. Perhaps it will work exactly as she has planned, and perhaps she is seeding her child with future neurosis. Who's to say. Other than that child in another 15 years.

"Other than that child in another 15 years" -- I'll report back to you then!

BTW, this child does know what breasts are for. His mother nursed his yonger sister and brother. I don't think he's developing any neuroses because his eyes aren't glued to exposed body parts.

I think I am going to agree with Sunta. Rape and other sex crimes aren't about sex, they are about men having power over their victim.

This is 100% true. There are deep psychological roots behind rape, virtually all of which will stem directly from aggression. About 75 - 80 percent of rape victims who fight back get away, even though they could have been overpowered. According to the rapists, it's because they had to fight, and they didn't want to fight, they wanted to dominate. Just like robbers. They don't want someone who's going to put up a fight, that could get you hurt. They want someone they can overwhelm. DIfferent motivators, same target group.

When I was in school they used to advise us to "just go along with it" if we were ever being attacked. I remember sitting in a session and having the advisor tell us that if a man grabs us and threatens rape, we should fondle him and rub against him like he's just the best thing since sliced bread, then make an excuse (her suggestion was needing to remove our tampon) to get away for a few minutes and run as fast as you can.

You can probably see the flaws in this approach. :faint:

:clap2: And teach our daughters to respect themselves too.

Some mothers/fathers don't mind their kids showing too much skin, or "making out" with the boyfriend all over the place.

I know that at the end the decissions that my daughters make in the future will be out of my hands . I know that as now, is my obligation to teach them selfrespect and respect for others.

At my daughter's Highschool you see boys trying to avoid girls who come on to them. Girls who break up with the boys because they don't want to have sex and girls who harrass boys to the point of making the boys so desperate that they end up calling the girls "whores and sluts", and then is when the girls feel offended.

When I look at the world around me, I see sex crime increases as promiscuity increases.

Really??? Shall we get into a discussion of the rape rates in Darfur, a country of devout Muslims? Do you think their society advocates promiscuity?

Shall we talk about child sex slaves in Iran, or what's happening in Utah today with devout religious people forcing innocent young girls to marry against their will?

No, it's not promiscuity that causes an increase in sex crimes, it's fundamentalism.

Sunta, it's clear from the totality your posts that you believe fundamentalists are the cause of all the world's ills. You're entitled to your beliefs, but I just plain disagree.

Well, I live at the border where fundamentalism is not really spread.

Here northamerican(not fundamentalist) man cross the border to find hispanic (not fundamentalist)people who have children as sex slaves, children that they kiddnap at mexico, guatemala and other countries.

Here there are women and man subjected to slavery ans prostitution. And of course we don't find out until the police let the media know about it.

At the country club we close our eyes to that and say "that only happen at other countries, fundamentalist countries

And Sunta... With that I don't disagree with you on the aspect that is crazy how at other fundamentalist countries women are viewed as things and that are raped just because they are females. But I know by experience that bad and good people exist in all faiths and political/religious beliefs

In fact, it is this tendency that has led to a lot of us being here and developing the attitudes we have about food. In many cases, we grew up with very restictive parents and were told that "eating this can make us fat, so you can't have any". What did we do, in many cases? Ate in private, where no one could see, and binged.

That may be your experience but it's not everyone's. Some kids get fat because their parents let them eat whatever they want.

If a child who would have eaten in private and binged were he in a restrictive household were moved to a permissive household where he could eat whatever he wanted, would he become fat either way? I don't know that there's a definitive answer to that.

That may be your experience but it's not everyone's. Some kids get fat because their parents let them eat whatever they want.

And that's why I said "in many cases".

If a child who would have eaten in private and binged were he in a restrictive household were moved to a permissive household where he could eat whatever he wanted, would he become fat either way? I don't know that there's a definitive answer to that.

And that's why the best methods are neither complete restriction or complete permission. In the case of teaching boys respect for women, I think you can do it in a way that teaches them that they can appreciate someone's attractiveness without ogling them. Noticing that a woman has nice breasts or a nice rear or a pretty face isn't disrespecting them. Ogling them is. To me, teaching a child that he must look away whenever he sees attractive women (or even unattractive women), isn't teaching them to respect those women. I think you can teach them to look, but not to stare.

Gadgetlady, I don't know if your friend's son will associate women with something "wrong" or if he wound up being sexualized early or if he was affected negatively in any way. But to be honest, I think teaching very young boys "respect for women" (even though I don't think it necessarily does that) by that method has more dangers than benefits.

Every woman in the world has breasts. They aren't something we should be ashamed of and try to hide. The ability to feed children doesn't make them sacred objects.

On a similar note, I mentioned my former roommate's ex-husband earlier. I would use him as an example of how being raised very conservatively (he was Mormon) can adversely affect how you live your lfe. This guy was extremely repressed and very immature. When he was at a store, he would take the long way around a store just to avoid the women's underwear section. I always wondered how he would react if he ever had to go into Victoria's Secret with my roommate, since it was the underwear section in Wal-Mart he was avoiding (Almost the most vanilla underwear section you can find!). He would blush and literally get angry at my roommate when she would even mention the words "tampon" or "pad", even when it was in the context of writing them on a grocery list. He would also avoid that section of the store. I'm sorry, but I think if you avoid the underwear section of stores entirely and can't even hear the names of feminine products, you are repressed, not respectful.

Today I remembered an article I read many years ago; I've been trying to find it and I can't, but I'll keep searching. The gist of the article was that a woman's cervix was more likely to develop dysplasia (and therefore cervical cancer) the more sexual partners she had -- but not because of the increased potential for exposure to STD's. The reason was that a woman's cervix "reacted" to a man's semen (almost like a chemical reaction), and if she had multiple sexual partners the cervix was unable to stabilize to one partical chemical composition of semen and she was more likely to develop dysplasia.

I've been looking for the article but I can't find it. Has anyone else ever heard of this?

I've been thinking a lot about the "guilt" and "shame" issues that have been brought up here, and I'm wondering how one could make another feel "guilty" or "shameful" for something that isn't wrong.

Let me give you an example. If you come to my house and yell and scream or look down your nose and make snide comments about the fact that I bought a red car, no amount of action on your part will make me feel guilty for buying a red car because there's nothing wrong with it. If, however, you explained that all red car paint comes from a factory that uses child laborers, you would make me understand why I should feel bad about buying a red car. But if your only reason that I should feel shameful or guilty is that you don't like red, I wouldn't feel guilty.

If I can "coerce" another human being to feel guilt or shame, there must be at least a smidge of concern in his mind that what he's doing isn't right, mustn't there?