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

French WomenTrading Feminine Allure For Mere Sexuality?

A new study out of France confirms some of the recent postings here about the changing nature of rape (here and here), raising the question: If women are just as promiscuous and forward about sex as men, is it time to rethink our fundamental thoughts about how we define and prosecute rape?

(Obvious disclaimer for the thick-headed: This article is not about the violent, power-driven, violent rape -- the crime as we all have traditionally understood it. That remains unquestionably the place for fierce prosecution and long sentences. It is about "gray rape," when a woman who is sexually provocative not just by her dress, but by her words and actions, later charges her partner with rape.)

The study, as reported in The Telegraph, shows a dramatic transformation of the French female:

Women now have more than twice as many partners as they did in the 1970s, according to the study by the French Aids research agency, which is backed by the government.

"Are women just like men?" asked Le Nouvel Observateur yesterday, which released extracts of the Study on Sexuality in France, a 600-page tome that brings together 12,000 in-depth interviews with people of all ages conducted during 2005-06.

One of the biggest changes in recent years, according to the report, was that male and female sexual behaviour had become increasingly similar.

The proportion of French women who claim to have had only one partner has dropped from 68 per cent in 1970, to 43 per cent in 1992 and 34 per cent in 2006. A woman's average number of partners has risen from under two in 1970 to over five today, while a man's has remained the same for four decades, almost 13.

French women's first experience of sex is now almost as early as that of the opposite sex: in 1950 there was a two-year difference, but the gap has narrowed to four months, to around 17 and a half. Meanwhile, more women remain sexually active for longer than previously: nine-out-of-10 women over 50 are sexually active today, compared to just 50 per cent of that age group in 1970.

And here's the zinger:

"The good old dichotomy (male predators, females patiently awaiting the warrior's return in front of the cave entrance) is in big trouble", said Le Nouvel Observateur.

What we are seeing is the exchanging by women of feminism (not "feminist-ism!") for sexism or sexual parity. Feminism has taught women that they are the same as man, which means of course that women must be sexual in the same way as men are. Once that transformation occurs, especially if it's encouraged by alcohol and drugs, you get women as willing to be provocative as men are eager to be provoked, as evidenced by the increasing number of partners French women are bedding.

The old norm did not allow for breast-flashing, dry-humping on the dance floor, or the actually initiation of the sex act as normal feminine behavior; rather, it was seen as the actions of a woman who had made up her mind to go all the way.

The old norm had to do with the allure, the promise of something special and rare. If it were not so, why is does lingerie exist? The fact that in the old days, women slipped away to "slip into something more comfortable" shows that there were stages to seduction, and decisions made along the way. The lingerie was in dresser drawer, not the dance floor.

Feminism has done all it can to destroy the feminine. Left without their whiles, it's not surprising that some women decide part way through a sex act, or wake up the next morning, realizing that they've made a mistake. When that occurs, they would be more justified in charging Gloria Steinem with rape than the hapless man they led, or misled, into bed.

The man was just being normal, but Steinem and her sisters and acolytes were striving to turn normality on its head, attacking biology, physiology, morality and tradition. It's no surprise that the liquor companies, bar operators, fashion designers and frat houses have all been quick to seek their self-interests by aiding and abetting the transformation.

Lost in the process was innocence. Will society come to miss it one day? Will Pandora's box close once again?

Transgender Wars

Last weekend, I put up an "Our Crumbling Civilization" post about a second-grade boy who wants to go to school as a girl, and a school system that was allowing it.

Perhaps you read it and nodded in agreement. Not everyone did. You might want to revisit the post and check out the comments that are coming in from the transgender community. Stuff like:

• "it is so sad that people are so close minded. You people who have the nerve to call a child "perverse" or label TSism as a "perversion" really need to wake up. If you spent just one day in their shoes I seriously doubt that you would be spreading hate speech and outright lies."
  
  
• "My current nine-year old doesn't seem to have a problem with his mother who has been transitioning/ed since he was five. He has been told age-appropriate and understandable facts about what has gone on. He seems perfectly well-adjusted, shows no signs of ever wishing to 'be a girl' or any of the difficulties you seem to think he might have from such a 'traumatic' experience as having his 'father' be who she actually is."
  
  
• "Tolerance has replaced not 'sanity', however you define that, but cruelty. ... Between one in 500 and one in 2000 Americans seek to change their genders."
  
  
• "i am married, transgendered and have two kids, one boy and one girl. it is quite offensive that people call this perversion. i suppose it would be more liberating that a girl would want to be a boy? no one would find that strange because she wants to be masculine. my daughter and son both seem to be masculine and feminine. my daughter rips holes in the knees of her pretty jeans and my son screams at mom putting on makeup. if they grow out of it-fine-if they don't-fine."

The comments are thought-provoking to say the least, and I encourage you to give them a look.

They haven't changed my view one iota in this case, which to me is all about the kids in the classroom, not the kid who wants to dress as a girl.

I don't think that as second graders they should have to deal with this, and the school district should have required the boy and his parents to go through several years of therapy, allowing him time to consider his desires and the consequences of his choices from a more mature perspective, and time for the kids in the class to mature before being asked to deal with issues like transgenderism.

Our Crumbling Civilization: Sick Santa Edition

I don't even know how to write this. How do you tell people that in New York there's a place one can buy a ... a ... a ... Santa With Butt-Plug to mark the holiday season? For $100, yet?

This past Easter, it was Chocolate Jesus, now we have to suffer through a chocolate Santa with a butt-plug. Is there a lower basement our culture can settle down into?

Here's the photo and the story, which unfortunately for America's reputation ran in the Times of London:

Is it a raunchy festive talking-point? Is it a work of art? Whatever it is, the $100, 10in tall chocolate Santa with Butt Plug is the talk of chic New York - and is delicious, even if the sugar rush could keep you awake.

I'm not 100% clear what one would use a butt-plug for, and please don't tell me. It's enough to know that this little bit of sickness is the creation of one Paul McCarthy, "the 62-year-old Los Angeles-based artist whose reputation was forged in the 1970s with performances that involved him rolling about on the floor, filling his pants with tuna and cramming his mouth with frankfurters."

The Times said "artist," not me. Shoot me, but I still feel artists create works that lift us up and inspire us, not works that exist only to outdo the last abomination foisted on us by the likes of McCarthy.

McCarty is selling his Sick Santa's in a gallery run by Michele Maccarone (say the name, don't just read it). Yes, a gallery, not a store, because this is art, you know. One thousand buyers thus far, many of them "art cognosenti" tell us it's art, as does The Times:

It’s all part of [McCarthy's] stream of thoughts about the infantilism of much contemporary culture, of how it all leads back to ingesting and defecating, to food and sex and toilet training.

Shudder. I actually agree with McCarthy: Much of contemporary culture is infantile indeed. But I bemoan the fact; I don't go around celebrating it by turning a revered childhood symbol of giving into a ass-inine attack on what's left of our culture.

And since you may be thinking, "What good is a chocolate sex toy anyway," and thereby contributing all the more to society's slide into hedonism, I'll leave it to Maccarone to explain:

“Well, if you want to break this off and stick it . . . I wonder. It might work . . . I haven’t tried."

It appears there remains room for Maccarone to get sicker still.

Flat Buns Update

Carl's Jr. and Hardees are apparently the butt of too much criticism over their "Flat Buns" commercial, which I recently covered as yet another sign of our crumbling civilization, and have promised to modify it.

Are they editing it to remove the blatant sexuality, which Laura Ingraham refers to as the "pornification" of America? Not exactly.

Apparently, Carl's is more concerned about offending teachers than it is about offending the moral sensibilities of folks like us who are trying to raise good kids and live decent lives. From the OC Register's Fast Food Maven blog:

After angering educators with a sexy teacher ad, Carl’s Jr. reps said they will expel the female character from the “flat buns” commercial.

“Many people are not taking the ad as it was intended to be taken,” CKE Restaurants stated today. “We will be re-editing it (the commercial) to remove the female teacher character and focus exclusively on the rappers. We believe these changes will eliminate the primary source of concern and we anticipate that the revised ad will begin airing by the weekend.”

I can understand teachers not wanting to have the classroom sexualized, and Carl's leggy young blond certainly accomplishes that. It's a serious issue, as one teacher made clear in a comment on my previous post:

The ad is offensive and degrading.
I was once practically raped in the classroom.
Teaching is a difficult enough job without having to turn women teachers into sex objects to sell a hamburger.

Agreed. But even with the teacher-protecting edit, the lyrics remain, and Carl's continues to sexualize America. Here they are in case you think I've overstated my case:

Well, I like 'em really hot
I like 'em really flat
I like 'em lookin' like a pancake stack.
What about hiney? Got no hiney?
I call you Your Hineness.
In anatomy class
You got butt minus.
Flatness makes a better rear
Stand sideways, girl, you disappear.
Flat buns.
I like flat buns.
I like the flat ones.

For those of you who must have one last glance at the teacher (professionally, I'm sure, only to evaluate whether she truly does over-sexualize the classroom), click here.

Hillary, The Children's Advocate? HA!

Give Hillary a minute and she's launch into just how wonderful she will be for our kids. Sez her Web site:

America is ready for a president who fights for our children. Hillary has spent her lifetime as an effective advocate for parents and children.

From her first job out of law school at the Children's Defense Fund to her time as First Lady of Arkansas and of the United States to her service in the Senate, helping children has been at the center of Hillary's public life.

Why then, if she's so concerned about the tykes, has she not slapped down her hubby, for all the damage he's done to them?

Incredible Wife, upon hearing excerpts from a Hillary screech speech on Hugh Hewitt's show last week became incensed; paraphrasing:

How can we give her control of America if she can't even control her husband?

Let's put it another way: If the wife of a male candidate were caught sleeping around, would we find him particularly presidential?

Incredible Wife's anger goes back ... way back:

"Is oral sex performed on you within that definition as you understood it?" Clinton was asked during his August 17 testimony, viewed by the public for the first time Monday.

"As I understood it, it was not, no," the president answered. (source)

That testimony that oral sex does not constitute sex, from President Clinton's testimony before the grand jury, was almost nine years ago, but I still remember vividly Incredible Wife's immediate reaction:

Kids are going to hear that, and when they do, they're going to start believing that oral sex isn't sex because the president said so.

I was skeptical. First, because I didn't believe much of anything Clinton said. But more importantly, in my teen years, oral sex was hyper-sex. In our wildest dreams, my friends and I thought we might get some sex ... but oral sex? That was the stuff of legend, and the thought that it wasn't sex was ridiculous.

Then, five years after Clinton's testimony, came this:

A high school newspaper article that claims 40 percent of the students have had oral sex has stirred controversy in Montrose, Colo. The Montrose High School Chieftain published the story in its April 30 edition.

The article, written by MHS student Katherine Smith, questions whether experts and students consider oral sex as "having sex." The school paper published the column, story and information box on the subject.

The story begins by citing a "survey" of Montrose high school students which determined that 60 percent of the students do not consider oral sex to be "sex."

My wife gave me that "told you so" look and I re-read the story, awe-struck in a disgusted sort of way.

At that point, Bill Clinton should have gone on MTV and told the kids he was wrong, he was lying, of course oral sex is real sex. But of course he didn't, and for all we hear, oral sex is still entrenched as a suitable short-of-sex sexual act among kids.

Fast forward to last week, when Incredible Wife was enjoying a deep gum cleaning at our local DDS. The dental hygienist told her,

You wouldn't believe the amount of disease we're seeing now ... STDs from oral sex, and even worse. Cancers! And we're seeing this with the younger patients.

Incredible Wife responded,

Es aw eaus uh ill in-un!

Yes, it's all because of Bill Clinton. But can we trust our local hygienist on a subject as tricky as oral sex?

You betcha.

Syphillis: "Transmission of the organism occurs during vaginal, anal, or oral sex." (CDC)

Chlamydia: "Chlamydia can be transmitted during vaginal, anal, or oral sex." (CDC)

HIV/AIDS: "Yes, it is possible for either partner to become infected with HIV through performing or receiving oral sex. " (CDC)

If it's not sex, Bill, how come it spreads sexually transmitted disease? If you love kids so much, Hil, why don't you call your husband on his lie and actually protect the children?

The answer, of course, is because they're Clintons, and nothing is more important to the Clintons than ... the Clintons.

Before we finish this, recall that the dental hygienist mentioned cancer, too. And she was right about that, as well:

MONDAY, Aug. 27, 2007 (HealthDay News) -- Human papillomavirus (HPV), which is believed to be responsible for most cervical cancers, may also be at the root of many cancers of the mouth and throat, new research suggests.

Although the rate of most head and neck cancers has been declining over the past 30 years because more people have stopped smoking, the rate of certain cancers in the throat and mouth hasn't dropped, according to research published in the Aug. 27 online issue of Cancer.

"Smoking prevalence has dropped dramatically, and, likewise, most head and neck cancers have declined in incidence. Cancers at the base of the tongue and tonsil are increasing or have remained stagnant. We're not seeing the reduction in incidence that we would have expected," said study author Dr. Erich Sturgis, an associate professor of head and neck surgery and epidemiology at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, in Houston.

The study authors suspect the reason may be orally transmitted HPV infections.

"Just as cervical cancer is the outcome of a sexually transmitted disease, as are most anal and penile cancers, people need to be aware that they can get throat or tongue cancer as the consequence of a sexually transmitted disease," said Sturgis. "Oral sex can't be considered safe sex."

"Oral sex cannot be considered safe sex." How does that ring with Hil and Bill, who are letting it stand that oral sex isn't even sex?

From now on, whenever Hil claims her great love of children, think of children with syphilis, chlamydia, HIV/AIDS or tongue or mouth cancer and ask her in your mind, "Do you really stand for children, or do you just stand by that cancer on America named Bill Clinton?"

Photo: Free Republic

Our Crumbling Civilization: Flat Buns Edition

You'd think a classic bit of Americana like the patty melt would be beyond the touch of the civilization-slimers who bring everything down to the scuzzy mindset of an 18-year-old male in order to sell more product and make more money.

I can understand dropping "my first lay" to that level, but the patty melt? What next? Apple pie? Oh, they already did that.

The patty melt's fall into society's sewer is brought to us by none other than fast food chain Carl's Jr. (Hardee's in the Eastern U.S.), who not that long ago gave us a minimally dressed Paris Hilton flaunting about in a largely successful effort to get young men to think of Carl's hamburgers when they think of sex ... a pretty compelling marketing strategy, you have to admit.

When Carl's decided to offer patty melts on its menu -- patty melts, by the way, that don't look nearly as good as the one featured here -- they did it with a TV ad called "Schooled" (view here), showcasing a too-hot for this planet high school teacher who slithers about in a slinky gray suit while a couple boys in the class rap:

Well, I like 'em really hot
I like 'em really flat
I like 'em lookin' like a pancake stack.
What about hiney? Got no hiney?
I call you Your Hineness.
In anatomy class
You got butt minus.
Flatness makes a better rear
Stand sideways, girl, you disappear.
Flat buns.
I like flat buns.
I like the flat ones.

The scene cuts to a patty melt with a more mature male voiceover: The patty melt. On flat buns. Only from Carl's Jr.

Patty melts are not, of course, "only from Carl's Jr." The only thing that's only from Carl's Jr. is the raucously in your face flaunting of the old "sex sells" paradigm of advertising, and a willingness to further degrade the American morality in the name of "creative advertising."

This commercial would have been un-runable a few decades ago, but it wouldn't have been unthinkable. I've been in plenty of creative sessions where someone would throw out an idea so tasteless, racist or sexually over the top that it would get a laugh or a groan, but never a thought to really go with it. Heck, most of the time we'd be so embarrassed by the mere thought of having to admit we could come up with such an idea that we wouldn't even share it with our clients.

Now it seems that the more outrageous the idea, the more likely the ad agency (in this case, Mendelsohn|Zien) is to run it ... and not just run it, but run it as if it were significant in some way other than that bothersome "complete breakdown of civilization" way. Really; the folks at Carl's thought the ad so important they issued a news release on it (via Nexis, so no link):

"The Patty Melt is an American classic but the burger has been around for almost 60 years and, thus, it needed an image make-over to become more relevant for today's fast-food consumers," said Brad Haley, executive vice president of marketing for Carl's Jr. restaurants.

"So, our advertising agency developed a rap song to emphasize one of the unique aspects of the burger: the use of flat, grilled rye bread as opposed to the traditional round-top bun. That rap song, which originally ran as a radio spot for our Hardee's chain, became so popular with the public - even spawning related websites and YouTube spoofs - that we decided to make it into a music video TV commercial for the burger to run at both chains. Who knows? This may help give flat buns the respect and admiration they have been missing for all these years."

To help that possible trend along, and to keep digging this civilization hell-hole deeper, Carl's kindly provides a list of the hottest flat-bunned celebs. Most of them are meaningless Hollywood people, but you'll be interested to know that Hillary comes in seventh on the female side (large thighs and flat buns ... is that the anatomy we want in our president?), and Rudy seventh and Obama tenth on the male side (are Obama's buns too flat to be the first black president?).

Sigh. As much as I'd like it if sex didn't sell, and we lived instead in a world where a clever headline, beautiful copy and tasteful art was what drew people to buy products, I have to admit that ever since they started illustrating the Grecian urns to sell more olive oil, sex has been a big part of the marketing mix.

But really, has it become too much? Has it come down to this?

When Civil Rights Stop

Julie ... uh, John ... no, Julie Nemecek should just pack his ... anatomically speaking anyway ... bags and get the heck out of Spring Arbor, but she ... speaking gender orientationally ... is suing instead.

John was a business professor and associate dean at the evangelical Free Methodist college for 15 years before the earings, dresses, hormones and breasts came, and the request that others call him Julie. And that got Nemecek (Boy! That's easier than the whole him/her thing!) fired.

The college cited a community covenant all employees must sign, affirming biblical principles and tht they will "model Christian character to our students." They are not required to be Free Methodists, according to U prez Gayle D. Beebe, but, she (and she is a she) told the WSJ, "It's an expectation they will be acting out the Christian faith both in the way they teach and in the way they live."

Nemecek signed the covenant and agreeably lived under it for 15 years. He cannot manefest an appearance that supports homosexuality and still live under that covenant, so he had two legitimate choices: Stay in the closet and get counselling, or resign and get a job at a place more compatible with his changed belief systems.

Try as they will, and they will try mightly, religion is not asexual. Because of the power of the sex drive for both good and evil, all serious religions need to deal with it, and have since their creation. Many failed religions that are no longer with us promoted sexuality without constraint. Those that imposed rules, morals, on sexuality have survived the test of time.

But will they stand the idiocy of certain "enlightened" Western judges?

An interesting sidebar is Nemecek's wife, Joanne, shown here with her husband, or whatever. Joannes on the right; it's' not too hard to tell. She told the WSJ, "I feel like Julie's condition doesn't negate my marriage vows."

That is a Christian response if there ever was one. Joanne would be justified in leaving Julie if Julie was sleeping around or violent, but God's desire to keep marriages intact is clear in the scriptures, and it appears that Joanne is one who take vows made as a Christian seriously.

So should Julie. He/she made a vow when he signed the covenant.