March 31 2009 Topic
Sexual Responsibility:How Are Individuals and Society Helped or Hurt by Personal Sexual Choices
I'm excited for this discussion. I'd like for it to be open, frank, and thought-provoking. While morality can and should come up, I hope to avoid excessive moralizing and would rather use our time to identify and discuss the questions critical for helping each of us to develop our personal moral opinions about sex.
The core questions of our discussion are:
- What does it mean to be sexually responsible?
- How are individuals and society helped by personal sexual choices?
- How are individuals and society hurt by personal sexual choices?
Required Readings & Video:(4 short readings and 1 short video, all totaling about 45 minutes; all documents and video located online):
1. What Are the Major Issues Involved in Sexual Responsibility?
- These issues will form the foundation of our discussion. I have compiled a summary of some of the critical issues and questions we could discuss. This is a required reading. Please read this before you read any of the other required readings, because it will provide important context. 15 minutes to read. To access online click here.
2. The Pill and The Sexual Revolution
- “Birth Control Pills Helped Empower Women, Changed the World” Source: Sandy Cohen, The Religious Consultation on Population Health, Reproduction, and Ethics, July 17, 2005. 10 minutes to read. To access online click here.
3. Sexual Morality
- Our discussion will focus primarily on the following sections of this article about sexual morality: Freedom vs. Oppression, Population Control, Religious Morality, and Democratic Balance. 15 minutes to read. To access online click here.
4. Abstinence Before Marriage, Full Fidelity After
- As an example of a conservative religious viewpoint on sexual responsibility and marriage, advocating complete abstinence before marriage and full fidelity after, please see The Proclamation on the Family, issued in 1995 by the Mormon Church. 5 minutes to read. To access online click here.
- Purity Balls and Purity Pledges: An increasingly popular trend among conservative Christians is purity pledges and purity balls, where teenage girls pledge to themselves and their fathers that they will abstain from sex until marriage. To see a 3 minute YouTube video of a purity ball and an interview of a teenage girl participant click here.
- Optional: New York Times article detailing purity balls and purity pledges. 10 minutes to read. To access online click here.
Dang it, I thought we would be home this month but no, we will be gone. I think we will be here for April. Sad to miss the sex talk.
ReplyDeleteMatt,
ReplyDeleteSuch an interesting topic. Thanks for your preparation and the thought you have put into this.
The most compelling reading for me was, curiously, the list you put together. As you said, the sheer number of social issues that are affected by personal sexual choices is overwhelming when you stop to think about it. In fact, I am left to wonder whether the idea of a "personal" sexual choice is a myth altogether. How personal can it be when the way we choose to behave sexually invariably affects others? Even in the most intimate situations, at least one other person is impacted for good or ill (or both) by a "personal" sexual choice, and then that person's behavior in the rest of his/her life may be altered, which affects other people and so on and so forth. Perhaps this is part of the answer to your question about the definition of "sexual responsibility." Maybe having an appreciation for the intrinsic social interconnectedness of sexuality, and then acting according to that understanding is part of being responsible.
Thanks for the stimulating conversation everyone.
ReplyDelete:)