Quote Of The Day: Unsacrificed Virgins Edition

“Virginity is extremely alluring. Its 'mysterious allure' . . . is not rooted in an image of innocence and purity, but rather in the notion of strength. It takes a strong woman to be abstinent, and that’s the sort of woman I want to be.”
-- Harvard student Janie Fredell

What is the NY Times doing running a 7-clicker of a story on virginity? I could understand it if it was a "how naive and hopelessly behind the times these virgins are," but the NYTimes magazine story that ran last weekend, Students of Virginity, approaches its subject with respect, for the most part.

In telling the story of Janie Fredell and the other Harvard advocates of abstinence in the campus club True Love Revolution, the NYT tends to give us the opposition's lines as soundbites, rather than developing them fully:

True Love Revolution was denounced, however, after its first big outreach effort, on Valentine’s Day 2007. Members had sent out cards to the women of the freshmen class that read: “Why wait? Because you’re worth it.” Some interpreted the card to mean that those who didn’t wait until marriage to have sex would somehow be worth less. One writer for The Crimson concluded that “by targeting women with their cards and didactic message, they perpetuate an age-old values system in which the worth of a young woman is measured by her virginity.” ...

People continued to accuse Fredell of being antifeminist and propagating gender stereotypes, but she was determined that True Love Revolution would go on “until the end of Harvard.”

What we're seeing is opponents who have to stretch what True Love Revolution says in order to get offended, and who attack it with the ridiculous taunts of the modern era progressives -- she is propagating gender stereotypes, as if that means something at all, let alone something negative. Compare the sound of the opposition to the voice the NYT gave Fredell:

To bolster herself, she often thought of Gandhi and Nelson Mandela.

There was a day when the revolutionaries loved by the leftists at the MSM were fighting the revolution for open sex; now we are presented with a young woman who turns to Gandhi and Mandela to strengthen her for the counter-revolution -- perhaps a sign that even the progressives are becoming concerned with the society that condones both the hook-up lifestyle and the flaming of anyone holding a view that's an iota off of "mainstream progressive" (an oxymoron that one must accept to agree with PC-think).

Compare Fredell's position with that of Lena Chen, a Harvard sex blogger and a debate foe to Fredell:

“For me, being a strong woman means not being ashamed that I like to have sex,” she said. And “to say that I have to care about every person I have sex with is an unreasonable expectation. It feels good! It feels good!”

Let me see if I've got that boiled down right. If it feels good, do it. A sparse moral code for sure. Fredell, in contrast, says she makes decisions based on this question: What will make me happy in the future? Postponement and planning vs. immediate gratification -- could the continental divide of American culture be more stunningly presented?

The on-line article does not include comments (c'mon NYT, shake off the last century!), but there's a hint of comments in one of the last paragraphs, dealing with the response to the Chen-Fredell debate:

Chen’s perspective on society, and Fredell’s, was borne out in the aftermath, as people wrote in to Ivygate, calling Lena Chen a “slut,” a “whore,” a “total whore,” a “whore whore slut.” And then someone by the screen name of Sex v. Marriage wrote in to say that “most guys out there would rather end up with a girl like Janie.”

Chen's got Friday night covered (and Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday as well, no doubt), but Fredell's got her life covered. From the NYT, a lesson in living a life beyond "if it feels good do it." Wow.

hat-tip: Jim