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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024

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Of course, you also have to not hate the concept of young adults having sex to do that, and you can't be a traditionalist or progressive without hating young adults and sex [both will claim "protection of women and children" as an excuse to hate sex- traditionalists hate it when a young men has sex with a woman they feel should have been theirs, progressives hate it when a young women has sex with a man they feel should have been theirs] so it's definitely too much to ask of them.)

This is an absurd misrepresentation of traditionalist views. Trads are perfectly fine with young adults having sex; we just want them to do it inside of marriage.

From "Sexual Principles" by Free Northerner:

There are two biological adults strongly attracted to each other. They have been blessed with strong mutual attraction at a young age, and their families’ response would be to destroy their relationship because of some desire for them to be “abstinent”?

That’s insanity. That’s cruel. That’s borderline satanic.

Here is Paul on the issue:

To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am. But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion. (1 Corinthians 7:8-9 ESV)

The proper response, the Christian response, is to get these two young adults married and starting a family.

The modern drive for ‘abstinence’ uber alles is unholy. Some precious few are given the gift of singleness, they should abstain, but most are not given this gift and calling.

God blessed most with a sexual drive and a holy desire to become one flesh with another. To demand abstinence until some point in their 20’s or 30’s from those not given to singleness is cruel, destructive, unrealistic, unbiblical, and satanic. The focus on abstinence hands the devil a strong hold over young adults in which to subvert their holy desires into unholy ones.

One of the major problems with the modern church is the unbiblical emphasis on abstinence. Abstinence should never be an issue in the church. If two Christian young adults want sex with each other, their parents should rejoice and bring them before the altar post-haste.

Is it any wonder the unchurched are repulsed by such a hideous doctrine as abstinence?

And from "In Support of Early Marriage: Why I Hope Our Daughters Will Be Teen-Aged Brides" by Sunshine Mary:

It is our hope that our daughters will marry young, ideally around age 19; I have already begun gently talking to the middle-schoolers about the importance of marriage and taking seriously from an early age the search for a suitable husband.

How young should a girl marry? In most states, according to Teens / Minors Marriage License laws, if you are 16 or 17 years old, you can marry with written parental consent. If you are 15 or younger, you will need both parental consent and the approval of the probate court.

Although I would prefer our daughters to wait until around age 18 to marry, if one of them met a highly appropriate young man, and both of the families were in agreement that they would make a good marriage match, I would consider allowing them to marry at 17, which is the age my mother married my father, who was 19. Sixteen or younger seems very young to me and I would probably encourage them to wait a bit, simply because babies tend to follow marriages. However, if one of our daughters married at 17 and immediately became pregnant, I still don’t think that’s such a big problem; after all, by the time I was 13, I was regularly baby-sitting in the evenings for families with toddlers and babies. Baby-sitting is not as great a responsibility as parenting, of course, but if a girl begins to babysit by 12 or 13, then by 18 she should have enough experience with children to manage one of her own if she is married. Proverbs 17:6 says Grandchildren are the crown of the aged, and the glory of children is their fathers, so why discourage our children from marrying and having children?

The unrealistic notion of practicing abstinence through high school, college, and beyond is an idea emblematic of boomer cuckservativism, not traditionalism in any meaningful sense.