How convenient that you would suddenly behave as if you were referring to Puritans all along. I believe Paula has already begun an intelligent work, and you are ignorant to say Christians, especially now that you *CLAIM* to have been speaking about Puritans.
At least, do not in the near future make such uneducated generalizations. That is like saying all Christians believe the same things. I hope you understand my point. Thank you.
How convenient that you make your judgments based on only part of the post.
In the future, I would hope you could at least be decent enough to address the whole point.
I'll be in the gazebo, since you're already up on the cross.
Tiassa said:
It's just that I don't know where the hell to start.
So let's try with this, from Q25:
I have no idea why you stopped reading where your quotation of my post ends and your response begins.
I shall soon be introducing a new visual format for my posts. Every section of my post that should be read entirely separate from any other will be marked with a
Big Neon Sign
and each of those footnoted with detailed instructions as to how the reader should perceive each section.
Look, I mean ... seriously ... is this post-Kennedy cynicism brought to a new level? I understand people's problems with "magic bullet" explanations, but that issue shouldn't preclude the communicative option of addressing multiple points at once.
Do me a favor, §outh§tar, and go back and read through our posts and make it into a bit of a dialogue. For instance, you called PreacherX's statement ignorant and asked how Christians "see sex as dirty".
I wrote:
• "
Yet the latter suggests that you don't actually know any Christians, or at least are unaware of the last century's worth of gender-based standoffs . . . . In the United States, at least, the foulness of human sexuality has been a morbid fascination of Christians' for the duration."
And went on to mention "glove hysteria" (19th century), "clothing-optional zones" (contemporary), and Puritans (17th century). Now, if you stop to think about it, while there's plenty to say about the 18th century, I'm sure, if we're so bored as to look, we might pause to reflect that the three points cover interesting aspects and a fair period:
• Puritans - foundation of "American mores"
• "glove hysteria" - psychosomatic condition in predominantly-Christian communities resulting from sexual trauma - i.e., masturbation
• "clothing-optional zones" - A contemporary reflection of the presumptions of the law in the United States. You
are accountable for other people's sexuality.
None of these are positive reflections of sexuality in Western society. I think your choice to focus solely on the Puritans and to respond to me as you did might be a bit misguided.
Additionally, while I do apologize with the confusing transition based on Q25's post, is there something about the string of 20th-century issues which lead me do declare, firmly, "
The irrational litany against sexuality in this country comes entirely from Christianity," that would suggest I'm somehow focusing on Puritans exclusively?
What does
LA Law or
Out magazine have to do with Increase Mather?
And, honestly, I'll confess at something that puzzles me in general, and here again I will address Q25's post, but sure, §outh§tar, please do keep reading if you're still with me here.
• "
America - the mother of all repressed sexuality."
This is the statement Q25 objected to in my response to the topic post.
• "
Even if Dunne's thesis is sound, for instance, 'the adult male's achievement of pleasure through violent domination' is the sublimated leitmotif of American sexuality."
Yet this hasn't drawn the flick of an eye.
And I think the repression
is self-evident. Were we not having communal issues regarding sexuality, the US wouldn't be in an uproar all the time.
I don't know ... it just makes me grin and shake my head.
My favorite recommendation is to find a Mark Huestis film called
Sex Is and get really high before watching the opening scene in which Jesse Helms, on the Senate floor, tries repeatedly and unsuccessfully to say the word, "sadomasochism." (Funny story ... my
girlfriend took me to that film. How high was I? :m: )
Seriously, where does one start explaining how Christians see sex as dirty?
It starts from birth; one of my sublimated misogynies that has actually pissed off a couple of women is the idea that I
don't believe in one-nighters insofar as I'm apparently making the implicit statement that a woman is not emotionally-stable enough blah-blah-blah.
This is not a positive regard for sexuality, when people feel the necessity of such discussions.
It's a prevailing theme; all I can say is that by Lutheran standards, I was a bit pesky with my mouth as a 13 year-old. Catholics thought I was the goddamn devil when I was 17. But I tells ya ... by the time I dropped out of college at 21, I can't tell you how painfully and broadly I had to open my mind just to keep up.
Where did my partner learn to be ashamed of her body? Of all the things we've fought about, her appearance hasn't been on the docket. It's culturally-acquired behavior; in her case, Seventh-Day Adventism. (In my own life, I've encountered the strangest string of former SDA's ... people my age who refer to themselves, melodramatically, as "escapees." Now ... they all have certain distinct problems. And they all have certain sex issues. And while I admit that most, if not all people, have odd issues about their sexuality ... um ... wow ... er ... whoa. I just can't quite describe it.)
And it just piles on from there.
I was raised to a very liberal Lutheran standard, and I almost can't remember what it feels like to think that way. But yes--sex equals bad equals sinful equals dirty equals ... all that crap. And you know what? That's
fine with me. It's still fun that way. Whatever. But your request of PreacherX and Q25's response to me--I'm seriously amazed that this idea seems somehow unusual to you.
I mean, Emma Goldman, for instance ... she went to prison at least three times that I can think of. Once for advocating against the draft, once for trying to kill a mining executive, and once for advocating birth control.
Literally, it's a running theme in American history. Poke around in discussions of the Inquisition and you'll eventually come across the oddest theory, that the victims were carrying out some morbid psychosexual neurosis.
Anecdotal, public-rhetorical, statistical, electorally . . . it shows. It's permeating.