Wednesday, April 24, 2013

I'm A Slut

Naughty things don't make me shy or ashamed, I love sex. Being raised catholic and later a baptist, sadly this was not always the case. Sex and sexual issues were something the teens in my youth group always knew existed but didn't dare talk about openly. There were a few occasions were we'd talk about how hard the boys at school would try and get with us, as if the crowning achievement of their adolescence was convincing a "Purity Girl" to be a teenager themselves. I never made that pledge myself, didn't think it was right to make a promise to god that, if he exists, knows that I wouldn't be able to keep: THAT would be lying, and that's a "sin."

By the time I was 22 I had lost count of how many people I'd had sex with, then I gave christianity the boot altogether.

Wiccans don't have the same taboos about human sexuality that the Abrahamic religions do, which was probably the biggest turn-on (giggity) for me at that point it my life. It's been argued that Wicca and Paganism openly encourage promiscuity, and if I were any authority on the subject they might have been right. They also don't buy into the same bullshit about 'a woman's role int he home' or the traditional sexual dynamic between men and women that is openly propagated by most curch doctrines, catholicism especially.

The majority of my relatives are what I've come to call Long Island Catholics. This is a very distinct 'breed' that lament their faith and it's burdens in familiar company, but don't you dare question it. If you've ever been to West Babylon NY, you can't throw a rock without hitting a catholic church or anything that belongs to the local diocese. This is where my parents grew up: My Dad is originally from Brooklyn and my Mom is from somewhere in the general vicinity of Queens (she sure has the accent, but she'll never admit it.)

This part of Long Island is catholic-ville USA, I've travelled to other parts of the US over the years and I have never seen a large community more tightly rooted into catholic dogma and doctrine than this particular part of the Empire State. Catholicism isn't just their religion, it's every facet of their lives: Where they go to eat, what they wear and even where they work were all 'advised' by local parishes and fellow congregants. This is they way they do things because that's what everyone in their realm has always done and people who don't follow suit aren't shunned, just looked down on with scorn and criticism.

"Because that's how it's always been done" is no longer an acceptable excuse for anything in this day and age.

The first time I had sex, I was 16 and it was with another girl. Put away your tissues, happy-pants, that's not what this is about. I was terrified at first that god was actually watching me the whole time, then I eventually figured that if he was really so against this kind of thing he'd have genetically engineered me with some sort of feature that made gay sex impossible. Even as a young born-again I couldn't wrap my head around why they hated gays so damn much: If they really are sinners, just like me and the other youth-group girls who dropped-trou from time to time, how is that any of OUR concern?

And to this day I don't understand what's commonly called "Slut Shaming" or why it's even an issue: If you're hungry, eat. No rational person starves themselves because they're worried about what other people think, just eat responsibly and safely and enjoy life. The only reason why religious nut-bags are against contraception is because they think it will encourage their teenage kids to do what they're probably already doing anyway. To which my advice would be to get your head out of the clouds and back onto your own neck and shoulders so you can see what's actually going on with your family.

Parents these days aren't teaching their soon-to-be adults how to interact with other human beings on a responsible intimate level and this is a public safety concern, especially in terms of the importance of CONSENT.

I've talked to a lot of young women, even a few young men, who described a sexual encounter that they didn't realize for years was actually an act of rape: Doesn't matter if you said no right away or changed your mind halfway through, as soon as you say stop and they don't stop it is cold-hard-RAPE. And who could blame them? They have this idea in their heads that only certain people get raped: Cheerleaders, drunk sluts, faggots, etc... What the fuck are these kids' parents doing to their heads? If you are a parent reading this I do hope SOMETHING is sinking in, you are responsible for making sure that your 'baby' lives long enough to become a functional adult. NOT teaching them about sex and relationships is setting them up for a social and emotional train-wreck, I don't care how uncomfortable that makes you feel.

Telling your kids that their feelings for one another are icky because god doesn't want you to feel them is just plain asinine because that concept makes the assumption that you can control what your kids think and feel: You can't. But some degree of guidance about HOW they eventually decide to express those feelings is crucial, because any parent wants to have a son or daughter they can be proud of. No parent wants to openly admit that their kid is now a registered sex offender, if only someone had told him that "No Means NO..."

Ignorance is not bliss, it's death.

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