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Girls who have sex are like tape that loses its stickiness. Seriously? Girls who have sex are like tape that loses its stickiness. Seriously?
(about 1 hour later)
Tony Abbott once remarked that a woman’s virginity was her “greatest gift”. By the time of my 17th birthday, hormones raging, mine was a gift as wanted as a thick jumper with the wrong neckline, an awkward end-table that fails to match the rest of the furniture or a souvenir bottle of tawny port bestowed on a teetotaller.Tony Abbott once remarked that a woman’s virginity was her “greatest gift”. By the time of my 17th birthday, hormones raging, mine was a gift as wanted as a thick jumper with the wrong neckline, an awkward end-table that fails to match the rest of the furniture or a souvenir bottle of tawny port bestowed on a teetotaller.
I guessed correctly that someone else may derive some pleasure from it, and shifted the item with friendliness, but little ceremony. The initial act was clumsy and unglamorous – a “first go” often is – but the mechanical instruction was a revelation. The summer that followed I applied practice to theory with – ahem – some dedication.I guessed correctly that someone else may derive some pleasure from it, and shifted the item with friendliness, but little ceremony. The initial act was clumsy and unglamorous – a “first go” often is – but the mechanical instruction was a revelation. The summer that followed I applied practice to theory with – ahem – some dedication.
Related: Melbourne church CityLife apologises for warning students not to hugRelated: Melbourne church CityLife apologises for warning students not to hug
I thought “boys” were delicious and sex was delightful; oh, reader, I still do. Maybe it was because I’d devoted my teens as an arty-loner to the consumption of dirty cult novels and late-night SBS movies that I missed the cultural message that my sexuality was something that I was supposed to deny, suppress, restrict and experience as a source of tension and shame. I certainly missed the comparison of sexual joy to disintegrating sticky tape – something which took place this week in a Melbourne state high school.I thought “boys” were delicious and sex was delightful; oh, reader, I still do. Maybe it was because I’d devoted my teens as an arty-loner to the consumption of dirty cult novels and late-night SBS movies that I missed the cultural message that my sexuality was something that I was supposed to deny, suppress, restrict and experience as a source of tension and shame. I certainly missed the comparison of sexual joy to disintegrating sticky tape – something which took place this week in a Melbourne state high school.
Year seven girls at Fairhills High School were exposed to booklet called Science and Facts, produced by a Christian group called Epic Youth, itself part of pentecostal megachurch, CityLife. Without recourse to any actual science or facts, the booklet informed teenage girls that:Year seven girls at Fairhills High School were exposed to booklet called Science and Facts, produced by a Christian group called Epic Youth, itself part of pentecostal megachurch, CityLife. Without recourse to any actual science or facts, the booklet informed teenage girls that:
Having multiple sex partners is almost like tape that loses its stickiness after being applied and removed multiple times. So the more you have the harder it is to bond to the next.Having multiple sex partners is almost like tape that loses its stickiness after being applied and removed multiple times. So the more you have the harder it is to bond to the next.
I only wish I was making this up. Delivered to girls in the first flush of their adolescence, this is nothing but the propaganda of pre-emptive slut-shaming. Accompanied by some pseudo-scientific nonsense about oxytocin making girls “needier”, the booklet attempts to put a new spin on ancient measures of social control that portray sex as something to which emotionally-needy girls relent and girls of strength deny.I only wish I was making this up. Delivered to girls in the first flush of their adolescence, this is nothing but the propaganda of pre-emptive slut-shaming. Accompanied by some pseudo-scientific nonsense about oxytocin making girls “needier”, the booklet attempts to put a new spin on ancient measures of social control that portray sex as something to which emotionally-needy girls relent and girls of strength deny.
The sticky tape analogy hails from the armoury of objectifying metaphors that have been used against young women for years. In the United States, abstinence-only Christian sex “educators” have been reinforcing the notion that young women are only as valuable as their intact hymens by symbolically passing chocolate Peppermint Patties around classrooms and decrying the mucky devaluation that results.The sticky tape analogy hails from the armoury of objectifying metaphors that have been used against young women for years. In the United States, abstinence-only Christian sex “educators” have been reinforcing the notion that young women are only as valuable as their intact hymens by symbolically passing chocolate Peppermint Patties around classrooms and decrying the mucky devaluation that results.
Those aghast that such messages are still being broadcast to girls in 2015 need to understand that it’s precisely because feminism has won the argument for sexual liberation that the forces of social conservatism are pitching such a bloody last stand. Please note: outrage at Epic Youth’s booklet was brought to media attention by no less than the mother of one of the Fairhills students, whose concern was that it “dangerous and unhealthy to teach this to girls, especially whilst they’re going through adolescence.”Those aghast that such messages are still being broadcast to girls in 2015 need to understand that it’s precisely because feminism has won the argument for sexual liberation that the forces of social conservatism are pitching such a bloody last stand. Please note: outrage at Epic Youth’s booklet was brought to media attention by no less than the mother of one of the Fairhills students, whose concern was that it “dangerous and unhealthy to teach this to girls, especially whilst they’re going through adolescence.”
The sticky tape opinions of Epic Youth are irrelevant; this is your empire, and they have no voting rights at all.The sticky tape opinions of Epic Youth are irrelevant; this is your empire, and they have no voting rights at all.
Leaving aside questions of how a religious group was given such access to state school students, the school at least was also quick to act. They’ve cancelled the Epic Youth program and are co-operating with an education department investigation. The department has declared the booklet’s messages “totally out of step with department approaches to sexuality and relationships education”.Leaving aside questions of how a religious group was given such access to state school students, the school at least was also quick to act. They’ve cancelled the Epic Youth program and are co-operating with an education department investigation. The department has declared the booklet’s messages “totally out of step with department approaches to sexuality and relationships education”.
For conservatives who rely on the subjugation of women to retain a sense of “natural” entitlement to authority, the state’s defence of female autonomy must be terrifying. In the meantime, there remains a group of girls at Fairhills High who have suffered the insult of having their intimacy compared to office stationery.For conservatives who rely on the subjugation of women to retain a sense of “natural” entitlement to authority, the state’s defence of female autonomy must be terrifying. In the meantime, there remains a group of girls at Fairhills High who have suffered the insult of having their intimacy compared to office stationery.
To them, I offer my experience as evidence of a better, fairer world to come for an enjoyable sexual adulthood. I’d also like to offer a better metaphor for understanding their sexual instincts now. Your sexuality is not a roll of stickytape or a chocolate bar or a birthday bottle of tawny port; it’s also not a democracy. It’s an authoritarian empire ruled by one person – you.To them, I offer my experience as evidence of a better, fairer world to come for an enjoyable sexual adulthood. I’d also like to offer a better metaphor for understanding their sexual instincts now. Your sexuality is not a roll of stickytape or a chocolate bar or a birthday bottle of tawny port; it’s also not a democracy. It’s an authoritarian empire ruled by one person – you.
You are the sole legislator, you control all the media, and sexual communication with anyone else through a process of diplomatic negotiation that you can end at any time. The sticky tape opinions of Epic Youth are not only laughable, they’re irrelevant; this is your empire, and they have no voting rights at all. You are the sole legislator, you control all the media, and sexual communication with anyone else is a process of diplomatic negotiation that you can end at any time. The sticky tape opinions of Epic Youth are not only laughable, they’re irrelevant; this is your empire, and they have no voting rights at all.