"Abstinence Only" Exposed as Subversive of Actual Evangelical Values

Christine J. Gardner convincingly argues that the abstinence movement works against the most profound Christian values of selflessness and sacrifice and instead adopts rock concert style techniques of pop culture as a tool to get people to turn against that pop culture.
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"Chastity is getting a makeover. Surrounded by a sex-saturated society, millions of young people are pledging to remain virgins until their wedding night. But how, exactly, are evangelical Christians convincing young people to say no when society says yes?" So writes Christine J. Gardner in her brilliant book Making Chastity Sexy: The Rhetoric of Evangelical Abstinence Campaigns (University of California Press).

Making Chastity Sexy is important and perceptive in a profound way that casts light on a large subject -- religion in general and evangelicalism in particular when it comes to attitudes toward sex, life and religion. Gardner (an evangelical herself teaching at an evangelical school) takes her readers far past merely investigating the sex education/abstinence campaigns to make the point that individualistic society and the autonomous self has become the means of the "wait until marriage" virginity -- sanctifying movement. In other words the evangelicals are using pop culture techniques to make abstinence only "sexy."

Implicit in the abstinence sex "education" programs being promoted around the country, on which billions of dollars have been spent by the government especially during the Bush era, is the belief that committing to delay sex until marriage makes sense only if one has a personal commitment to follow Jesus Christ. At the heart of the campaigns that are supposedly about sex education is a belief that without a "new life in Christ" the life of abstinence is almost impossible to follow. Thus abstinence only programs like True Love Waits, Silver Ring Thing, and the Pure Freedom are selling virginity as a sexy choice of personal affirmation using consumerist techniques that are promising "better sex," in fact "great sex" and perfect marriages ifvirginity is maintained as a "gift" for the prince or princess, God will lead you to as a reward for putting on that ring, signing a pledge and delaying sex.

Studies have shown that those who pledge to maintain their virginity and who do not keep the pledge are less likely to use contraception when they break their pledge and have sex. A 2009 study published in the magazine Pediatrics uses the data to compare pledgers and non-pledgers who share similar characteristics and found that after five years the pledgers were just as likely to have had sex as the non-pledgers. Other studies find that the sexual behavior of virginity pledgers does not differ from that of closely matched nonpledgers, and pledgers are less likely to protect themselves from pregnancy.

In other words the programs fail in their long-term objective but are a resounding success if "success" is measured in terms of finding excuses for large religious gatherings and reinforcing the evangelical beliefs of the young people at those gatherings. Because when those same young people fail to keep their pledges they feel the full weight of evangelical guilt on their shoulders and thus far from being driven from the movement are driven to their knees to confess within their home churches and remain part of the evangelical community wherein the glue that binds them to that community is the guilt of their own failure.

The abstinence only program not only fails but sets up young people to fail doubly. First, as the book notes, at best sexual activity is delayed only by a few months or years and then when the young person enters into sexual relationships they are more exposed to pregnancy and venereal disease not less. That's because abstinence only programs do not fall into the category of comprehensive sex education and thus actual education about sex, condom use and so forth has been denied any such use would imply premeditated sin and thus in fact the message of abstinence only is don't do it but if you do do it since you're sinning don't compound the sin by planning to sin.

The thrust of Gardner's brilliant book that takes it into new territory is to analyze how the various groups like the Silver Ring Thing, have used the modern feminist rhetoric of choice based on a primary language of individualism to sell the notion of Christian chastity. The way the chastity argument is pitched the young people is that if they wait sex will be even better and that their choice to remain virgins is a self affirming "stand" against the secular culture. In other words they're using sex -- and the message of individualism and personal choice -- to sell the abstinence message. From attractive Christian celebrities as spokespersons to the sale of panties printed with virginity slogans, the abstinence movement uses the power of sex to make chastity appealing to the media-saturated "texting" screen-hooked generation. Abstinence only rallies wind up looking more like the rollout of a new line of the Victoria's Secret panties and bras than anything most evangelical great-grandmothers would have recognized as pitching chastity.

The American abstinence version of "sex education" depends on a fairytale narrative to reinforce definitions of female and male stereotypes. The "princess" in other words the young woman, waits passively for the "prince" to actively "rescue" her from virginity, spinsterhood and the secular culture. Each fairytale princess in the abstinence movement's narratives is rewarded for waiting by finding her true love and living happily ever after. And by definition a "true Prince" cannot be sexually active outside of marriage.

The fairytale narrative implies an audience whose members expect a reward for their sacrifice of sexual abstinence. In other words a fairytale happy ending to remaining virgins is great sex, great marriages, and oh yes, a shot at heaven too later on. Thus the abstinence movement promotes the idea that happy marriages and relationships can be guaranteed by "saving" one's virginity for the Prince or Princess of God's choice.

The fairytale narrative also implies that its audience consists of heterosexuals who, for the most part, define their identities as consistent with traditional evangelical gender roles. Those who remain single by choice or otherwise let alone gay men and women, are excluded entirely from the programs since virginity is sold as a guarantor of good marriage and marriage the purpose of relationships.

Feminism is the bogeyman here, as professional and domestic callings are set up as archenemies. For some young people, focusing on a divine romance with Jesus can function as a substitute for or avoidance of earthly romances. As Gardner points out one of her evangelical male college students told her that girls have turned him down for dates because, as he put it "they are too busy dating Jesus."

Gardner convincingly makes the argument that the abstinence movement works against the most profound Christian values of selflessness and sacrifice and instead adopts rock concert style celebrity saturated techniques of pop culture as a tool to get people to turn against that pop culture! The final result of the abstinence only movement is that evangelicals are selling their spiritual birthright to adopt techniques to sexily sell no sex to a generation saturated by a pop-culture. But the technique undermines the fundamental message of the gospel. Because the Christian gospel whatever its other virtues or lack thereof, is not in the business of pitching a consumerist lifestyle where virtue is rewarded by good times.

Nowhere in the abstinence only movement is the idea that the young people need to "take up your cross and follow me" as Jesus taught. Abstinence is pitched as a cool thing to do whose reward will be even better sex and more fun. The Disney Corporation, Wal-Mart and the "ethic" of corporate America are well represented here but the actual still small voice of Christian morality is lost.

Timeout for a personal rant: What also seems to be missing both in the abstinence movement and in this wonderful book is a plan for what actually might work in bringing balance to the seesaw our culture is experiencing between insane levels of sexualizing youth on one hand and abstinence on the other. My personal curmudgeonly view is pretty clear on this: What we really need is art, music, literature, beauty, drama, and everything else that builds a life of aesthetic wonderment and engagement.

The last thing we need is more rock concert-packaging of so called youth events and laser shows pandering to pop culture and consumerism as a way of building "character." What both the evangelical subculture and the rest of our society lack today is a vision of sexuality as a normal part of a wondrous life that seeks quality above quantity and beauty above triviality at every level.

If I was writing a sex education curriculum for the whole culture -- teenager and otherwise -- it would begin with aesthetics and the love of art. Keep sexuality beautiful and promote high culture from kindergarten on, less pop more classical music, less TV more Shakespeare weekends, less guitar lessons and more piano lessons and yes this sounds "elitist" but if you want to talk about values why not the best? It's this aesthetic component that is sorely lacking in both consumer and corporate America that keep selling us the lowest common denominator in every area of life from our personal relationships to corporatized social media replacing actual community.

In a culture that does "texting" better than it does conversation where our young people leave high school barely educated and hardly speaking their own language the least of our problems is when they have sex. The big problem is that we have perfected an ugly culture that has turned sex into a consumer product in the same way that strip malls and urban blight and sprawl are destroying American communities.

(Conclusion of rant!)

According to a 2008 survey by the Barna Group evangelical and other "born again" Christians divorce at the same rate as other Americans. The message of great sex may resonate more strongly with evangelical youths than the message about waiting for sex. If sex is so great and the reward for abstinence while why wait?

This is the message the youths in the abstinence only programs seem to be getting because on average they only delay sexual activity by some 18 months after signing abstinence pledges. And thanks to the abstinence only programs when they do have sex they're going to have unprotected sex because they regard their sex as shameful. You don't plan to sin. So sex when it happens is a pledge breaking sin and something to be done secretly and hidden away from those who will judge you.

Thus evangelicals themselves have become part of the status quo and reduced their religious voice in favor of "connecting" with young people. Gardner's book makes a convincing argument that the unintended consequence of the abstinence only programs is to further infuse consumerist individualistic and selfish "values" into the evangelical movement. This reinforces the guilt attendant on sexual activity in a way that drives young people away from the use of condoms, exposure to truthful counseling and an ability to negotiate their sexual experiences in a positive way.

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