Category Archives: Relationships

Jenny

I am shown a picture. It is of my youth group at a ski trip. In the picture is a pretty blonde, I’ve seen her around before. I must know her name. “Who is that, I don’t recognize her?”

“Jenny.”

****

I sit in church, she’s sitting with her family. 14-year-old perfection in a blue shirt. I do not hear the sermon, I stare. I notice I’m staring and look away. I try to pay attention to the pastor and his message of God, but my eyes drift inexorably towards His earthly angel. I need to talk to her after the service.

I don’t.

****

I have been roped into greeting people coming to church. I stand near the door, shaking hands and saying ‘hi’. A few people ask me how I’m doing, I answer as I always do, “fine.” My eye wanders expectantly towards the entrance as I hand out bulletins. Finally, I am rewarded. She comes into view. Her top is cut just right; it is modest and wholesome, yet the smallest bit of breast can be seen. My heart skips a beat, literally; it misses one pump, it hurts so good. How can just a square inch of milky-white flesh do this to me?

Never before have I had that strong a reaction to anyone; I did not know at the time, but I never would again.

This vision of perfection walks towards me. I can’t meet those green eyes, I look down. I shake her hand, say something, say anything. Out squeaks a “hi”, she says “hi” back. Say more, just speak, one sentence, that’s all, but my mouth refuses to open. She goes to sit down. My body is still roiling.

There will be other chances to talk with her.

****

At youth group, she’s there. A card game starts, I join, she joins. I’m good at games, this is my chance. Impress her, talk to her. She speaks, another replies. I stare intently at my cards. My gaze wanders to the face I think of every day, I pull it quickly back to my cards. Over and over again. The turns pass, I continue to draw and play saying nothing. Some conversation is engaged in by the others, but mostly it is silence. The game ends, I win, yet I know I lost.

****

I am at the mall with my mother. She asks about my life. She asks about girls. I tell her of Jenny, she tells me that’s cute. I say, but she’s 3 years younger than me. My mother says three years doesn’t matter. I hope, but am not sure if I believe her.

****

I am at youth group. A group is talking. I enter the group and stand beside her. Speak! But what do I say? Anything, just speak. What if I say something stupid? Just say something, I can’t. You must. I turn my head towards her, my mouth opens, and nothing comes out. My mind curses me.

****

I am newly 18, now a youth leader. We are at a corn maze, I see her and her sister enter. I follow behind. I catch up. We talk. An actual conversation, our first. It turns out the younger girl is her niece, not her sister. We walk through the maze, conversation flowing, awkwardly, but flowing.

“I’m cold.” “You can borrow my jacket.” “No thanks.”

Conversation continues.

“We should ditch my niece and go off by ourselves.” “That doesn’t seem very nice.”

We continue talking and talking through the maze. We get through after an hour and end up at the camp fire.

She sits elsewhere, I stare into the fire, poking it with a stick as I daydream of us. I have a natural high for the next month.

****

A few weeks later, at youth group. She walks up to me. She’s wearing a Corona jersey that drapes most wonderfully over her perfect breasts. The white highlights her pale skin. She smiles her perfect smile, and says “hi”. Her beauty transcends words.

I say “hello” back. She stands there, looking at me. Say something! what? Anything. Anything? Ask her about her week. How? I don’t know, just do it.

Time passes. She talks to someone else nearby.

****

I am talking with my mother and sisters. Relationships come up. I mention Jenny, both my sisters go “awwww”.

****

After church, she stands alone, leaning against a wall. Her lips are redder than usual, her hair in a ponytail. She’s wearing black leather boots and a leather jacket. She looks classy, cute, and sexy, all at once. I need to talk to her. I go lean against the wall nearby. I should speak. I say nothing. We both stand and lean for minutes.

I hate myself, but there will be other chances.

****

I am on the bus. I daydream of Jenny, as I do every day. I dream of holding her in my arms. I dream of coming home to her smile each day. I dream of the little blonde children we will have. The dreams are wonderful, yet painful and lonely. It tears at me.

I daydream of something less painful, of killing myself, of peace.

****

At church, she’s leaning against the wall again. So very pretty, I should talk to her. I will… After I help put away the chairs.

The chairs are put away, she’s still there, go talk to her. I will… but first I have to think of something to say.

You’ve though of something, talk to her. I will!

I walk towards her.

I can’t. I turn.

I walk home, raging at myself.

I get home, I cry.

****

I am 20, it is Christmas Eve. It has been a half-year since I have seen her. Months of daydreams, yet each month thinking of her less. I think about her only a few times a week. I vaguely wish to see her again.

I get my wish. I see her walk in. Her golden hair wreathes her angelic face. She looks the season in her classy crimson top. So very pretty.

I sit in the back, I can barely take my eyes off her the entire service. What should I say to her.

The service ends.

I walk out and stand in the hallway. She’s just inside the auditorium, I can talk to her. I can’t. I rage at myself. My friend notices me and asks why I am out here by myself, pacing. I tell him. Go talk to her.

I enter back into the main room. She’s leaning against the same wall as before. I stand in the back instead. I muster courage for 10 minutes. While I muster, she leaves with her family.

On the way home, my mother asks me what’s wrong. I don’t tell her.

****

The day after Valentine’s Day. My mother tells me she saw Jenny, she was at a Valentine’s supper at my church with someone else.

She goes back upstairs. I cry on my bed.

****

In my mid-late 20’s, reading my facebook feed. Her niece’s profile comes up as a friend of a friend. I haven’t really thought of Jenny in years, but I wonder. I go into her friend’s list. Search “Jennifer”. There’s a Jennifer,  but the last name’s different. I click the profile picture; the girl in the dress matches my vague memories of Jenny’s face. She’s with a man in a suit. More pictures, pictures of children, pictures of her smiling with her children.

She’s aged, no longer the 14-year-old angel of my dreams. She’s now chubby, the perfect curve of youthful hip and breast hidden under a small layer of fat.

And yet, she’s still beautiful. Her smile still glistens and her flaxen hair still glows. I feel a dull ache.

I close the browser, trying not to think.

****

A couple years later, apropos of nothing, I think of her. I wonder.

What if I had the social abilities then that I do now? What if I had been able to summon my courage then, as I can do now?

Would I have been able to win her heart? Would those children be mine?

What if, instead of an empty house, I came home each day to my beautiful, chubby, blonde hausfraus and our adorable little kinder? If those children were mine?

How would my life be different, how would I be different, if I had been a better man?

I write my memories down.

While writing, I’m curious once again, I search for her profile for the second time. She’s aged, she’s still vaguely pretty, but not beautiful. She has changed, or have I?

Would I still find her beautiful had I been a better man?

She recently celebrated her sixth anniversary. They seem happy in the few pictures of them, but most of the pictures are of children.

There is no dull ache, just a slight wistfulness.

I don’t know what to think, so instead, I share my thoughts with thousands of people I have never met. Hopefully my writing will help a younger version of me; maybe it will only confuse him more. Either way, I feel this needs to be written.

Guest Post: Minimizing Sex Starvation

***I’ve been busy lately, so here’s a guest post from Bee.  There’s a decent chance this post was submitted to me to advertise a particular site (Edit: From the comments it seems not. My apologies to Bee.) but the post is readable and on topic and cleaning and routines is something I struggle with (or, more accurately almost completely ignore in my bachelor home) so some encouragement to keep on top of things is helpful.

As well, the idea of scheduling sex is interesting and not something I’ve thought of. On one hand, it seems like it could be a good to get it regularly, but maybe it’s a bit of a forced buzzkill. What do y’all think?

I do accept and post guest posts that may give my readers some value or information related to the topics of this blog, so if you have something worthwhile feel free to submit it. Lately, I’ve been getting a lot of people submitting near illegible spam. So for those people sending me spam, this post represents the bare minimum of quality I will accept for future guest posts, so if you can’t reach this, don’t send anything. ***

In this world, risk can never be eliminated or fully controlled; it can only be reduced and managed. My two suggestions can minimize the possibility of ending up in a sexless marriage. My two suggestions can not guarantee you will not end up in sexless marriage.

This post is for single, Christian men. Because Christian men can only find sexual release in marriage with their wife this makes avoiding a sex starved marriage very important.

We see from Genesis 2 that the wife was brought into Adam’s existing life. Before Eve was created, Adam was an adult and was working a job given him by God.

Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.” 19 Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. (Genesis 2:15 – 20 NASB)

For most Christian men their God given job is:

  • to worship and give thanks to God.
  • to grow the church by having more than 2 children.
  • to disciple their wife and children to grow in Christ.

Eve was brought to Adam to be his helper in his already existing work and life. Eve needed to fit into Adam’s existing life and world.

I believe that one important part of being a helpmeet is to meet her husbands’ sexual needs.

In the pioneer days of North America mothers taught their daughters a weekly routine that organized and prioritized their work as married home helpmeets. Monday was washday, Tuesday was ironing, Wednesday was mending, etc. This weekly routine focused their energies and helped prevent discouragement or depression. Mrs. Bee has told me that looking at her weekly schedule helps her when she forgets or loses track of what she should be doing.

As a single man you want to be able to practice what you preach about schedule and routine. While single, begin to incorporate the power of routine into your life. Start going to bed at the same time each night. Designate one evening a week for cleaning your apartment or home. Incorporate exercise, grocery shopping, Bible study, fasting into your week. The FlyLady is a good source for help with cleaning and routines.

My solution to minimize the chances of a sex starved marriage is based on two foundations.

Choose a woman who believes in personal submission to her husband. A sexually available wife is also a submissive wife.

Make sex a regularly scheduled event. Begin with a 20 or 30 minute session three times a week. Most married men will be fine with that but if you need sex more frequently, then change the schedule after awhile. For the Christian man who married because he “burns’, sex is too important to let happen only when his wife is emotionally in the mood.

Like Adam, you have job and a regular schedule before getting married. As a Christian man, you are not scheduling sex in your routine before marriage. But, as soon as you are married, you adjust your existing bed time 3 or more nights a week to accommodate your sexual release, your wife’s sexual release, fleshly uniting with your wife, and your procreation duties.

Jesus told two short parables illustrating that major decisions should be considered carefully before commitments are made.

For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ 31 Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand? 32 Or else, while the other is still far away, he sends [o]a delegation and asks for terms of peace. Luke 14:28 – 32 NASB

These parables means you should inform a women of what your schedule after marriage will be like and allow her to decide, without pressure or coercion, if she is willing to enter into this kind of relationship with you. Be wise, don’t bring this up on the first 3 dates, but do bring it up shortly before you are ready to propose. It would be natural for most women to experience some trepidation at the thought of performing sexually three times a week, or more. Trepidation alone should not be a deal breaker. Try to discern if willingness is present with any trepidation.

Your convictions regarding birth control and sex during menstruation (Leviticus 15:19) may be factors in adjusting your schedule with your wife. Those details are best left up to each couple to work out.

If your wife gives you regular sex make a special effort to reward her. An occasional longer time with more romance for her can be a reward. Helping her with house chores so she can get to bed on time is also something I have done that has not hurt my sex life. I have not done chores to get more sex, I have done chores because my wife was freely giving me plenty of sex.

I hope these ideas help single, Christian men avoid a sex-starved marriage.

About myself; I met my wife at church in North America. My N was zero. Her N was greater than zero but she has not had a problem bonding to me. We have been happily married for 21 years. My wife has never sexually refused me even though I did not know these principles before I got married. I was fortunate that my wife believed in being submissive and in serving me sexually – I was not wise enough to look for those qualities when I was looking for a wife. In the last 9 months we have been scheduling sex 4 times a week. I am very happy.

Unrealistic Expectations

Donal pointed out this comment by Elspeth:

Most people (men and women) have unrealistic expectations, about themselves, about what they are worth, about what they should be able to have. And those who know they can’t have what they want will go without. Especially men. I’ve heard a couple of young men actually say that.

He then defended those with reasonable, but possibly unrealistic requirements. (Read his post for definitions).

I’m going to go farther: as a man you should have unrealistic requirements for marriage. I’ve created my list for marriage and it’s reasonable, but possibly not realistic.

Based on previous analyses only about 40% of women are even worth considering for marriage looks-wise (ie. are not fat or actively ugly) and only about 30% of women would be in the 0-2 sexual partners category (although, that’s a bit higher if you go younger) and less than half have not had a one-night stand. Throw on top of that that you should almost never* marry a woman over 30 and be wary of those over 25, and your pickings are getting slim. That’s not even considering the much more important (for marriage) aspects of personality and inner beauty.

we can estimate that only about a fifth of eligible women would be even worth considering marrying. If we then look towards such things as religion, shared values, mutual compatibility, personality, and the like, the percentage of women that would make a decent wife for any particular man is shockingly low. (The only reprieve is a man only needs one reciprocating girl to meet those requirements).

If only 20% of women are worthy wives, then that means that 80% of men are not going to be able to find a worthy wife. Now, it should be noted that most men won’t meet the requirements a worthy wife should have and many men will choose unworthy wives, but still, if even a quarter of men are waiting for worthy wives that means that 20% of those men are simply going to have to do without.

****

It is better to live in a corner of the housetop
than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife. (Proverbs 25:24 ESV)

While a good marriage can be a great blessing, the consequences of choosing an unworthy wife are huge.

I remember reading somewhere (I can’t find the link) that 70% of marriages either end in divorce or perpetual unhappiness, which means that only 30% of marriages end up being happy and healthy. (That’s pretty close to my estimation that only 20% of women who are worthy wives, is it not?)

There is a 40% chance the marriage will end in divorce, the odds of which are strongly effected by how worthy the wife is. The cost of an average divorce to a man is about $150,000, the price of a smaller house. (This does not include child support, which will run an average man a pretty penny as well). The emotional costs of divorce are also huge: it is better to be single than divorced.

But even if the family stays together, there’s a chance the marriage will be miserable. Number I’ve read range all over the place. This study shows that 97% of marriages are ‘very’ or ‘pretty’ happy with their marriage, while this one shows 80% are satisfied with their relationship. I’ve seen lots of other numbers bandied around of anywhere from 20-60%, but most of these did not seem supported by anything. 80% satisfaction sounds right, which means 20% of marriages not ending in divorce are unhappy.

So, there’s a 50-70% chance that a marriage will be unhappy or end in divorce. If a man chooses a wife wrong, he will end up miserable.

****

Men should have unrealistic (but no unreasonable) requirements for marriage. IF only a fifth of women display the qualities that make a good wife, not all men will be able to find a good wife. Going without is much superior to entering a marriage that will end in divorce or misery.

So hold those requirements high and be unrealistic if necessary to so.

****

Before the accusations of misogyny start flying, know that I also advocate women demanding more from their relationships. Women should also hold high requirements for marriage and relationships.

****

* I have talked with one girl approaching 30 whom, had circumstances been different, I may have considered, but she had been engaged in her mid-20s then the guy calling it off because she wouldn’t have sex with him until marriage. There are not many women out there with that level of virtue, but every rule has an exception.

More on Courtship

A lot of people commented on my courtship experience. I can’t respond to everything, but here’s some things I’d like to point out.

First, I hold to the courtship model and believe it is the correct path. It is morally right and proper for civilization, and, if done properly, should be good for marriages. Chad wrote well on it in the comments:

Courtship is a tool from Christendom in which the families were involved so that emotional intimacy, physical intimacy, commitment, and logical “do these two people work together” proceeded along side each other in practical steps towards marriage and creation of a family. It openly acknowledged that emotional intimacy leads to physical intimacy, and that physical intimacy going too quickly can lead to a lack of commitment on either party’s part as well as delude those sexually lusting after each other that they’d work well when they become one flesh.

Even in it’s hayday, courtship was something that was a…. tenuous thing, at times. For humans have always been lustful, prideful, and rebellious; and unmarried youth are more so than any other. Hence where courtship was ignored, shotgun weddings were enforced.

That, also, is not to say that the system was abused by poor intentions of parents getting greedy or losing sight of the overall good of their child by focusing too much on any individual trait (beauty, lust, status, wealth, etc) rather than overall health of the child and, in particular, whether the person they were joining flesh with would help them achieve salvation and sainthood.

These days, courtship works where people acknowledge what it is – a system in place in which emotional intimacy and physical intimacy do not outpace commitment and logic. It does not, and SHOULD NOT, have the same form as old school courtship as our current societal failings have led to different expressions of individual failings. It should acknowledge that courtship is not engagement, nor is getting to know someone a little before asking to court them a bad thing. Most traditional families want to know the individuals before courtship is pursued, and when that is not possible, or they’re not as traditional, a few ‘casual dates’ for coffee or to a public activity is usually accepted. Meeting the father a first time is not unheard of, but I haven’t encountered a grilling such as FN as of yet.

The whole system is supposed to take two fallen human beings and place them together in a way to support each other through love; not topple into a fallen state of sin, nor make princesses/saints out of fallen women, nor kick a Brother in Christ out to the curb with nothing but his coat and tattered remains of dignity and respect.

Any courtship that doesn’t align with reality is not courtship, but a twisted perversion of delusional ‘love’ which is lacking in all that makes love beautiful.

As did Cail:

The main difference between courtship and dating is that when you ask to court a girl, you’re declaring up front that if things go well, you’ll be proposing in the near future, and if things get to a point where one of you decides marriage isn’t in the cards, you break it off. It’s dating for the stated purpose of discerning marriage. All this other stuff about questionnaires and hyper-chastity is just extra weirdness that people are trying to call courtship because it makes it sound traditional and churchy.

I wholeheartedly support the involvement of family in the creation and development of relationships and marriages and the right of parents to veto a daughter’s relationship choices. The lack of family involvement in marriage leads to the screwed up sexual and

That modern ills and individual flaws are a part of modern courtship does not invalidate the model. No system is perfect.

My story is not a criticism of courtship as a system, it is a criticism of the incorrect application of the system.

****

Second, I submitted to the father because he had the right to my submission in regards to courting his daughter. A father has the right, the duty, to screen his daughter’s suitors. He also has the right to put whatever conditions he deems necessary on his daughter’s suitor and end the relationship if he desires. I believe in this case the father went about that screening in an incorrect way, but even if he was wrong it was fully within his rights to make the wrong decision.

If you do not accept a father’s right to do this, you are not a friend of patriarchy, you are the ally of the modern sexual marketplace and an enemy of civilization.

On the other hand, I know I should have been more forceful in my interactions with the parents. I was caught off guard: this was not a social situation for which I was prepared or had developed a system. I think prariepolyguy had the right idea:

Your goal with that kind of thing is to establish peerage, that’s why I say answer questions and pose counter-questions. He can’t simply banish you for being disrespectful because you aren’t being, but you don’t just sit and submit to his whim like a pussy and don’t lose face with the girl…

I also would have asked for it to be private, between me and the father. As Barnabas said:

It strikes me that the problem isn’t so much the grilling, its that the daughter is present. This should be a conversation between men with daughter and mom not present. Best approach if faced with such a situation would be to demand a private discussion.

****

Third, as her husband I would have taken over the leadership role from her father, but that transfer of leadership does not occur until the wedding, or at the very least the engagement. It is simply wrong to think that I have any headship over a woman to whom I am not married.

****

Fourth, for those of you saying I should have not have submitted to the father, but instead taken the girl against the father’s wishes, you are wrong. If she was the kind of girl who would disobey her father and abandon her family for a man she had known for only a month, she is not the kind of girl I would want to marry. The woman who will rebel against and abandon her father under the influence of passion is the same woman who will rebel against and leave her husband under the influence of passion. Once the father had denied the relationship, the only way we could have had a relationship is if she was the type of girl I would not want to have a relationship with.

****

Fifth, I’ve had more reasonable experiences with asking the father’s permission for courtship. The other couple times I’ve done it the families were warm and inviting, we got to know each other casually over dinner, and they extended permission without much hassle. My courtship experiences as far as families go have generally positive experiences; this time was the exception.

****

Sixth, I know I should stop it with the porn. Every now and again I try. When I do, I may abstain for anywhere from a week or two to three or four months, but I always come back to it. It is my besetting sin.

Courtship and Young Men

A commenter at Donal’s asks: if there are so many desperate tradcon young women, why aren’t the tradcon young men courting them?

As a young man who could accurately be called a tradcon, I am going to tell a personal story from this winter which might illuminate.

I was on a Christian dating site, and sent a short message to a girl, she responded. After a few messages back and forth I invited her for coffee, she accepted and we met. Over the next month we went for coffee a few more times and I had her over for dinner and cooked her some Yakisoba. She was a sweet girl with good values, feminine, and joyful; somewhat plain, but attractive enough. I was the first man she had ever gone out with and she was taken with me and I was growing rather fond of her.

One night, I visited her church for the Christmas play service where she was playing Mary. After we went for coffee, chaperoned by one of her friends. We talked for an hour or two, at one point the topic of why she was on a dating site came up. She said it was because there were no men at her church. This confused me (well, it would have had I not been a reader of the manosphere), because I was sure I saw at least 3 or 4 unattached men at the Christmas service (not to mention she had previously told me stories of her interactions with one of her male friends at the church, from which, even never having met him, I could tell he liked her). So, I told her, ‘what do you mean, I saw a bunch of single men at your church.’ Her and her friend both had the same reaction: ‘yeah, but ewww.’

I did not press the point further, although I was happy I was no longer in the ‘ewww’ category as I had been years before.

My family celebrates on Christmas Eve, so we went to my parent’s house to meet my family, have Christmas dinner, go to our Christmas Eve service, and such. We had an enjoyable time, the atmosphere was relaxed and festive, my parents went out of the way to make her feel welcome, and they all took a great liking to her. Things went well.

The next day we went to her parent’s for Christmas. It was not to be their Christmas celebration for that was a major family get-together that was to take place at a different time, so it was just a basic supper. We drove out to their farm together. We walked in and I was sort of ignored (her parents, three of her brothers, and two of their wives were there; the girl was the only daughter with 5 brothers). I didn’t really know what to do, I had expected them to at least say greet me at the door, or say hi, or something. So, I said ‘hi’, put my gift on the table and sat down on a couch. I was then ignored for about 20 minutes. As regular readers may know, I’m not that good in social situations; Only twice before had I asked permission of a girl’s father and I’ve never been in a situation where I was in someone else’s home and been ignored, so I was out of my depth and experience and didn’t start a conversation with anyone but the girl. After a while, the father got to opening my gift, made a few jokes, then went back to ignoring me. One of the brothers did show me and the girl a cattle pen he had made, but other than that nothing. After another while, we all ate; nobody really talked to me and I didn’t really say much.

After supper, the parents seemed to notice my existence, and asked about me and the girl. I told them that we had gotten to know each other a bit, I was fond of her, and I would like their permission to court her. They then presented me with a list of dozens of questions (I’m not sure if this is the exact list, but if it isn’t it’s close enough for government work), saying me and the girl should go over them. I said we would. The parents then proceeded to grill me with questions straight off the page for the next hour or two.

I answered fully honestly. I am a mostly responsible, decent young man, but I am not perfect and have my failings. So most of the questions on employment, finances, home life, responsibility, church life, etc. I answered fine. Out of the many questions asked though , the parents got stuck on three major questions: alcohol, physical contact, and Bible reading.

I drink responsibly on occasion, but they were absolutely against any imbibement at all and they hammered on that point over and over, even though I said, if it was necessary I stop drinking while courting her I would (leaving it unsaid but implied that we would decide the alcohol question in the long-term as a couple; the girl herself didn’t drink but didn’t have problems with moderate alcohol consumption).

They asked about physical contact, I told them her and I had already discussed and agreed upon limits for physical contact previously (and they were strict limits) and although her desired limits were stricter than mine I would respect hers. Despite this they still did not like that my limits were not as strict as hers (for one example of the differences, I thought the engagement would be a good time for a first kiss, she wanted to wait until marriage); they then spoke approvingly of a young couple they knew that had worn boxes (actual, literal cardboard boxes) whenever they were alone together so they would not be tempted by physical contact.

The last was Bible reading. I answered that I don’t read daily; I tend to read sporadically but in-depth when there’s a topic I want to look into, but that I would take my duties as a leader of the family seriously and lead both my wife and children in regular Biblical study. That was not good enough for them, so I said I would start reading daily (and I did read daily for the next four months or so, even after the relationship ended).

A fourth area of concern was when they asked me what my greatest struggles in the faith were (this was after the Bible question): I said, ‘well, I guess I should read my Bible more and like most young men I struggle with lust.’ They then asked me about pornography, so I admitted in front of a dozen strangers that I do struggle with watching porn, but hadn’t watched in the last few weeks and was trying to stop (I stopped watching after our second date and continued to abstain for a few months after all this). Oddly, this didn’t seem to be that big deal to the parents, it was barely mentioned after that except for a joke (the alcohol question was far and away the big one, followed by the Bible one), but I mention it as this was the one that seemed to matter most to the girl.

After the grilling, the parents conclude that while they have concerns but aren’t going to kick me away. They get my e-mail and say they’ll keep in contact with me.

After we’re done, I drove home with the girl (and her friend who chaperoned us there and back on the 2-hour drive); we spend the first half hour in silence, then we talk, she was disturbed by the porn thing, so we talked about that, and she concludes she wants time for us both to think and pray, so she wanted a break for two weeks (when we were never even officially dating). So we had no contact for two weeks.

The parents e-mail me a couple days later and we go back and forth a bit as we discuss my readings of Ecclesiastes and Proverbs; things seem fine. A week or so later, I get a 2-page, heartfelt handwritten letter where she says we can no longer court (from the letter it sounds like its her idea), so I assume we’re done. I don’t respond as I agreed to no contact for two weeks andI didn’t have time to write a letter back. Then on the exact day the two weeks are over she texts me. We meet for coffee and talk. She offers to be friends; I say no, it’s either a relationship or we part ways. She thinks, and decides on a relationship; we then spend a happy evening walking outside in the January chill. We’re back together; we make plans to meet on Sunday.

On Friday I get an e-mail from her parents saying we can’t see each other anymore. I get a text from her a little while later; we text a bit over it. She says she’s going to obey her parents, and I encourage her to do so. We say goodbye. I respond to the parents asking if there’s any way I can earn their trust; I do not get a response. Me and the girl have not contacted each other since.

****

Maybe this is where the tradcon young men are: stuck between ‘ewww’ and and the impossibly high standards of parents. How many young men could possible be able to give the positive, hoped-for answers when surprised with a grilling on five dozen questions? (Oddly, had I simply lied or stretched the truth, we’d probably be courting).

Of those very few who could possibly meet those requirements, how many will not be ‘ewww’?

I would guess there is probably a huge positive correlation between being able to meet those dozens of parental standards and being an ‘ewww’ guy.

If parents and young women make it impossible for young men to live up to your courtship standards, how can they possibly complain about being unable to find young men.

****

This brings us to the next part, Moose Norsemen finds someone (Thomas) arguing why courtship is fundamentally flawed. I agree with Moose and I agree with courtship, but Thomas does make some good points.

The courtship movement eliminated dating and replaced it with nothing.

Or, put another way, they replaced dating with engagement. The only tangible difference between an engagement and a courtship is the ring and the date.

The goal of courtship is not to prevent marriage, it is to promote marriage by helping find suitable mates for men and women. Right now, it seems from what I’ve read around the web, that it is often used to destroy relationships rather than to create marriages.

A father should find a good man for his daughter, but how can he expect to when the first thing that happens when a young man comes a-calling is to grill him about every aspect of his life and boot him away if he doesn’t answer all 50 questions correctly?

How can a young man possibly think the risk and unpleasantness of that kind of grilling and the huge expectations of courtship is worth it for a girl he barely knows?

If I hadn’t gone on a number of dates and already developed a fondness for her in the month before meeting her parents, I would not have thought it worth it to go through that. What kind of men would willingly deal with that kind of ritual humilation before even spending any alone time with a girl? (The answer: The kind of man women go ‘ewww’ over).

You rarely hear of fathers trying to find and introduce good young men to their daughters; from the impressions I get, fathers seem to act primarily as a negative filter in courtship rather than a positive one.

There is no perfect young man, so if any flawed young man is rejected, who could there possibly be available to date young tradcon women?

****

So, if we want a better courtship, one that isn’t broken, what we need is one devoted to creating marriages, not siphoning out young men.

Parents should act as a positive force for marriage. Instead of simply screening out young men, they should be actively looking and screening in young men for their daughters. Introduce young men you approve of to your daughters (and vice versa). Meet with other families in shared family events to get young people together.

Courtship should be more relaxed. Courtship is not engagement and it should not be treated as such. It should, at first, be somewhat casual (with the long-term goal in mind) so the young couple can get to know each other. Young people in group activities, young men attending relaxed family events with the girl’s family, a few outings to public places, etc. Let them get to know each other before dumping all kinds of expectations on it. Expectations and seriousness should escalate over time.

Questions like those above should be gone over, but over time. Instead of playing bad cop on the first meeting, get to know him and learn these things over time by spending time with the young man.

It should be recognized that young men aren’t perfect. Instead of a father rejecting a generally good, but flawed young man his daughter fancies, he should work with the young man to help him better himself. (If the young man refuses to try to better himself, that is another story).

Courtship is not about keeping young men away from young women, it is about actively trying to create godly marriages.

****

In my particular case, it’s possible that the problem is me, as a commenter at Moose’s stated:

If it were me getting shot down by a bunch of dads as viable husband material for their daughters, I’d be asking WHY. I wouldn’t assume it was a problem with them first: I’d assume it was a problem with me.

I know I could be a better man in many ways, but I’ve only ever been shot down by that one father before, and most of the older adult males in my church and life seem to respect me and think well of me, enough so that I at their behest I have led the young adult small group in the past and, again at their request, am entering a leadership residency in my church. But I thought I should mention this as it might seem an explanation.

****

Because I’m sharing, here’s one more small story from university when I was just starting to work my way out of omega. I was part of a small group at my university Christian group. In this particular study there was me and one other guy and three young women. These young women were all in the 7-9 range. One I had asked out a year-and-half before and been rejected (she was the first girl I ever asked out), another I had asked out a few months before and been rejected, and the third had just broken up with her boyfriend a couple months before and we had been getting close to each other (we ended up dating later that year).

The topic of the sermon we were watching was dating, so we were talking about this. At one point, one of the young women said dating was hard because there were no good men. The other two agreed with her. I was shocked, so didn’t respond but I should have. I had personally asked out two of them and was very obvious in my intentions to the third.

All of these girls were very attractive, good girls and could have had any man they wanted. The one I knew the best had many male friends, I knew at least 3 or 4 guys (who were good men, if a bit socially awkward) who had either asked her out or were so obvious about liking her even someone as socially oblivious as I could tell. One had just gotten out of a year-long relationship, her third relationship in 3 or so years. The final one was one of the most beautiful women I had ever met and would occasionally tell stories of guys who had gone out of the way to compliment her.

I was an ‘ewww’ man at the time (but improving), so I didn’t count. I guess those other men didn’t count either.

These two stories are why I don’t believe women when they say they can’t find a good man or there are not good men. I have seen women who could have almost any man they want, who had numerous suitors (who were good men), , who had good male friends who obviously wanted them, who had been asked out by me specifically say there were no good men, when it was simply untrue. Unless a woman lives in a village of 50 people in the middle of nowhere, there probably are good men, the women’s probably just not counting them.

Oh, and just as a last little bit, two of those three women are married. The most attractive one is not; she’s 29 this year and, as far as I know, is still single.

****

So, for tradcon young women and their families, maybe it’s not that there are not good men, maybe it’s that men are stuck between ‘ewww’ and impossible standards.

Instead of young women and their families holding out for a suitor who is both super-attractive and able to meet a parent-approved 50-point bullet list, and rejecting any suitor who is not perfect, maybe give them a chance.

Parents, instead of rejecting that young man your daughter fancies, work with him* to help him improve himself. If she doesn’t have a suitor, work to help introduce her to good men. Be a positive force for marriage rather than a negative force.

Young women, instead of rejecting or ignoring those men you don’t see, make yourself available and say yes when you are asked out even if he is kind of awkward.* The worst that can happen is a few hours of unpleasantness and maybe you’ll be able to work with him to improve those awkward things that aren’t quite attractive.

****

* Obviously, I am not talking about unrepentant degenerates, those unwilling to try and better themselves, and the like here, just the normally flawed.

The Rationalization of Effort

I got some pushback in the comments on my last post. FBNF thought that 100 times a year was a lot more than her experience. I responded that this was probably due to environment: I probably should have said she the 100 dates was probably average for her environment and lifestyle, but the general pattern would still hold.

I haven’t been able to find studies on how often women are asked out. I remember reading a number of threads on the issue, where women were asked how often they were asked out: answers for most were once a week to once a month. I can’t figure out where those threads were. So I did another search.

A quick google of various internet threads says it depends a lot on how one defines “asked out”; “real” asks are uncommon, a dozen or two a lifetime, but “random” ones are fairly common. This thread ranges from uncommonly to multiple times a day.

I turned to a quick search on /r/AskWomen. The answers across threads there were comparatively low to elsewhere. Never was common, a 6-12 in a lifetime was the plurality, a few times a year also common, while once a week or more was rarer. I think one guy from one of the threads had the right of it:

  • I’m seeing a lot of people distinguishing between a request to hang out that turns romantic and a request for a formal date, which is probably not a distinction the asker was making.
  • Redditors in general tend to identify themselves as introverted and/or shy, and shy people don’t get asked out nearly as often as outgoing people do.

Also, not to be an ass, but on the whole Redditors are probably far less social and far less attractive than average people and would be less likely to be asked out.

Here’s a thread where the bizarre top answer is “Have had 5 or 6 boyfriends in my life, but never actually been asked out on a date.”

It seems that it is common for women to only include explicit requests for a date. Being hit on doesn’t count, being asked for a number doesn’t count, being asked to ‘hang-out’ with romantic intentions doesn’t count, etc. Someone even being a relationship isn’t counted as being asked out. This is bizarre to me. As a man, I would (and did) count some lady on the street asking me to hang out as being asked out.

Anyway, it seems once a week to once every month or two would be “average” if you included hitting on and phone number asks, but a lot less, a few time a year or less, if it’s only for formal dates.

So, in my assessment we could say somewhere between 6-50 times a year would be normal for propositions of all types, but about a dozen “real” requests for formal dates a lifetime. This would of course vary a lot based on the women’s environment, attractiveness, and personality.

The bigger her social circle, the larger her city, the prettier she is (to a point), and the more outgoing a women is, the more she’ll get asked out.

****

Which brings me to the point of my post: the rationalization of effort.

Unless you are a very experienced player or naturally very social, asking women out is a frightening and draining experience for most men; it has a fairly high mental cost. In addition, being rejected after asking a girl out is both painful and humiliating. Because of this men will often do a quick analysis of their odds of success combined with the ease with which they can ask a woman out and their level of motivation to ask that particular girl out. (This often leads to over-thinking, which is a major problem I struggle with).

This can lead to some weird outcomes. As Heartiste recently noted (NSFW) men will often not hit on the hottest girls, because the odds of success seem so slim. The prize may be great, but if the odds of success seem too low a man will not even try. It works the other way as well, a man may go after someone he might not otherwise chase simply if he thinks the odds of success are high.

What this means is that a man will only ask a woman out if he thinks he has a chance and the situation allows for an easy way to ask a girl out compared to the potential odds of success and his attraction.

He also needs motivation: most men see women around them all the time in their daily lives, including many attractive ones, but they rarely approach them. They will go out of their way to approach a particular women if he has some particular motivation to.

For one example, years ago there was a girl at my church who my mom would occasionally bring up as someone I should pursue. She seemed nice, she was attractive enough, and there was a decent chance she could have hit the points on my list but I never did approach her. There was nothing that really made her stand out to me. If happenstance had brought us into conversation together perhaps something might have happened, but there was nothing motivating me enough so I would put in the effort and take the risk of approaching her. (In retrospect, I probably should have).

As a contrasting example, there was a woman I was friends with for a while, she was attractive and fun to hang out with, but it didn’t even really cross my mind to think of her as a prospect. Then one day she was holding a friend’s baby and cooing over it; that display of maternal instinct peaked my attention and I started to entertain the prospect. I ended up asking her out a month or so later. (A mothering instinct is something I find incredibly attractive.).

One major factor in a man’s thinking is environment. Small, casual social environments (like house parties or games nights) are far more conducive to approaching for most men than most other environments. Church always has some formality, cold approaches are the most difficult ones, work comes with extra baggage, large parties/clubs/bars are good for certain personalities (ie. players and extroverts), but not for most men, etc.

There’s more to the sexual marketplace than a person’s raw SMV/MMV and displays thereof, there’s motivation and risk. A woman may be attractive, but she also needs to demonstrate something to motivate a man to approach (a particularly high level of beauty may be enough) and make it so that the type of man she wants to approach will think there is an ‘easy’ in.

****

So, based on that here’s a few practical tips for women hoping to be approached more:

Be out in the world. Men can’t approach if they don’t see you.

Get in environments where approaching is easy. A casual, social environment is best.

Smile: A kind smile lowers the expected cost and raises the perceived odds of success, increasing the chances of being approached.

Signal availability: Look pretty, have an open demeanor, put yourself in a physical space where approaching is possible (ie. stand around other people, not on the other side of the room by yourself), walk casually instead of bee-lining: make it easy for a man to approach and it will be more likely.

Don’t signal unavailability: Don’t wear earphones, don’t wear a ring on your ring finger if you aren’t married, don’t stare at the ground, don’t walk around staring at your iPhone, etc., these will all discourage most men (players aside) from approaching. Most men don’t want to intrude on you when you are doing something. By doing this you are self-selecting for the kind of guy who interrupts busy people.

Signal something unique: Signal something that makes you stand out, particularly for the kind of man you are looking for. If you are looking for an physically active man, wear something that indicates you participate in a sport. If you are looking for a bookish man, carry a book. If you are looking for a traditional man, look traditional. If you are looking for a family man, coo over your friend’s baby. If you are looking for a player, show your cleavage. If a man sees you share something in common, something particular that interests hims, or that gives him an easy in to open, he will be more likely to approach you.

Do the opposite of all this if you want to be approached less.

****

For Christians in particular:

When out of a church setting, it can often be difficult for a Christian man to tell if a woman is Christian or not, and if she isn’t he likely won’t be motivated to hit on her; hitting on a non-Christian would be a waste of time and effort. By displaying something obviously Christian, a Christian woman can give him that much more of a reason to talk to her, increasing her odds of meeting someone.

For Christian women, if you want more Christian men to hit on you, bring along something with you when you go out that makes it obvious you are Christian. Carry your Bible or a CS Lewis book or something else obvious; wear a Jesus fish necklace or a Bible camp t-shirt. (This is probably what the WWJD bracelets used to be for).

I know this from experience; there have been at least two cute girls I’ve cold approached because I overheard they were Christian, where if I hadn’t overheard them I probably would not have.

****

For men, something similar probably applies. Make it easier for a woman to say yes when you approach. I don’t have a list of specific practical steps beyond what I’ve already thrown out in the Omega’s Guide (if you have one drop it below). Just keep in mind that if you reduce the cost/risk or increase the perceived benefits of saying yes, you’re more likely more likely to get a yes.

Don’t make it more difficult for her to say yes than you need to.

Men and Women’s Dating Markets

Here’s an article (H/T: RPR) of a woman whining about she hates dating because she wants an ‘organic’ relationship. The article is worthless, but there is something that I want to highlight:

I’d long been criticized for never having “officially dated.” In an attempt to put this argument to rest, I decided to say “yes” to any agreeable man who asked me out. I had 98 dates in nine months.

I’ve talked about this before but this is a good reason to reiterate. Over an extended period, this women had 11 “agreeable” men ask her out each month (I wonder how many ‘non-agreeable’ men she rejected).

And I doubt her 11 dates a month is abnormally high. From her photo, she’s rather attractive for her age, but when she’s 20-odd years past her prime, any average 20-25 year old gal who takes basic care of herself would be her match there, and, at least from her article, it doesn’t sound like she has all that dazzling a personality.

Despite this, she got almost 100 dates in less than year by simply not saying no to ‘agreeable’ men.

Compare this to Krauser, one of the masters of bedding women, who has spent years perfecting and writing about game and has bed more women than 99% men ever have or will. He opened 1000 women and got a grand total of 60 dates in a year.

Again, an average woman got 98 dates in 9 months for doing nothing, while a grand-master of game got 60 dates in a year after busting his hump.

That is how easy the dating market is for women. The vast majority of men will never get anywhere near as many opportunities for romance in their whole life no matter how much effort they put in as this average-looking woman got in 9 months of not saying no.

This is the difference between men and women in the dating market.

****

This is also why advice of ‘just be yourself‘ and ‘you’ll find someone when you stop looking‘ is so common, yet so useless. For women it’s true: all a woman has to do is show up, not cripple herself and say yes and she has her pick of 100 guys a year. She doesn’t need to search and she can just be herself.

In fact, for a woman, ‘looking’ is probably counter-productive. Given the massive opportunities for romance that just come to her, she obviously does not mean looking in the sense most males do, ie. trying to find and ask out suitable members of the opposite sex. She means something totally different; when she’s looking she’s actively vetting men, ie. ruling men out, so when she stops looking she’s no longer ruling men out beforehand, giving one of those hundred guys a foot in the door.

Men though simply can’t do this. George Clooney maybe, but very few others. If you ‘just be yourself’ you’re one of the hundred faceless men boring her with your dog and pony show. If you stop looking, you’re not even one of those 100 men, you’re no one.

This is also why women are often devoid of sympathy/empathy for male dating problems. It’s not that they’re heartless, it’s that they simply can’t understand (unless they are unattractive): the concept of not having plenty of options is as alien to them as having a date fall into your lap every 3 days with no effort is to men.

****

This came up briefly in my personal life; I was with my folks and we were talking about my sister. She went through a break-up and my mother was surprised that she hadn’t jumped back into a relationship within a month and she was proud that she didn’t just jump back into it. I dryly said, “A whole month”. Then she talked about how woman can usually have plenty of options after a break-up.

Little things like that really hammer home the point that women live in a whole different world.

****

So, things to consider for men:

Every time you’re asking a woman out, you’re competing against the other 99 men who’ve asked her out that year. What makes you better than them? Why would she choose you when she rejected them?

If you want to win, you either need to find a girl who doesn’t get 100 offers a year  or you need to offer what those other 99 guys don’t.

Make it look “organic”. She has dozens of dog-and-pony shows she could could attend, make it seem like it just happened.

Practical things for women:

Be available, don’t say no, start saying yes.

That’s it. If you’re a decent person and moderately attractive, you’ll have a guy in no time.

Traditional Family

In my earlier post, lolz commented:

In my humble opinion, the tradcon exchange between husband and wife that you advocate is not really all that equitable – and certainly not what one sees in ancient societies.

He also posted a link (read it all, it’s pretty good, except the conclusion which is too egalitarian and hedonistic for my taste):

In other words, people we call “tradcons” are frequently hewing to a “tradition” that is mostly a recent invention. Throughout virtually all of history, up to and including much of the world still today, “the family” or even “the nuclear family” meant something very different: what it usually was was father+mother+the kids as part of an extended family, with grandmothers and grandfathers and aunts and uncles and/or cousins frequently living under one roof, or in very close proximity to each other, in a mutually supportive environment. “The family” was all these people, usually dedicated to helping each other, often forming alliances with other families to their mutual benefit. Even in societies where it was the norm for the youngsters to move away, they usually moved in mutually supportive groups together only a day or two away from the rest of the extended family, whom they would often get back together with in times of trouble. Even in societies when young men struck out on their own, they usually did so in mutually supportive groups, not alone against the world.

The ancient idea of “the family” was not “we get together and have dinner at holidays and provide each other some emotional support.” It was much more a matter of, “we work together during the day, we make our meals together, we live in one house or adjacent houses, we fight off enemies together, when one of us is sick we all get together to help. Two of our young’uns are getting hitched? We may need to build them a house because we can’t fit them in here right now so let’s give ‘em a new place over on that hill up yonder.”

First, I’ll answer the ‘equitable’ thing. lolz is right, it’s not equitable. Having to work 40-60 hours a week away from your home and family is definitely the shorter end of the stick to raising your own family, as I’ve written before, women definitely benefited from the ‘traditional’ nuclear family. The problem is, unless you’re willing to abandon your kids as latchkey children to daycare and the public schools or you have family that’s willing to take care of them most of the week, you need someone to take care of the kids, and given biological differences between the sexes, the man staying home will result in marital problems and divorce. It makes sense to have the woman stay home.

Which brings us to the next point: both lolz and Esmay are right.

The nuclear family is not ‘traditional’ or the way things were, it was an adaptation to modern industrial society. What the article above failed to mention, is that ‘work’ as we know it today, is a recent invention. Until the industrial revolution, most people’s ‘work’ was either the family farm or or the family home business (or in tribal societies, men hunted, women gathered). There was no real separation between work and home life, they were the same. Sadly, we do not exist in that society. To not starve, most people have to work outside the home. The nuclear family is the best adaptation to that economic reality we have.

Ideally, we’d be able to get back to that tribal, extended family structure. One of my hopes, if that someday I will be able to be able to create a tribal structure among my family, and maybe with my friends as well. We’ll live on a mostly self-sustaining farm subsidized by some small income from a couple projects I’m working on. That will take a lot of work, and will be a lifelong project, but hopefully I’ll get there.

But for now, the realities of modern society constrain me, constrain us. We can try to build a traditional, tribal structure, but that is not going to happen right away. Before that, I have to get a wife, then keep my children from having their souls devoured by the progressive school system, that means the nuclear, breadwinning family is a necessity for now.

****

As an aside, I would actually not mind being a stay-at home dad. A commenter at Vox’s site has described his adventures as such:

Hey man… we don’t JUST play video games all day. I mean sometimes its almost 8am before they finish with their school work for the day. And sometimes we go down to the lake and shoot turtles with the 10/22s… or fish… or have great glorious nerf wars in the tree forts. and there is a swimming pool out there for the really nice days… about 300 of them a year.

Ok well… its mostly video games…

He’s also described the risk of it:

Look the truth is if I wasn’t such a stupendous badass my wife would’ve lost interest years ago. Happens all the time. The stay at home dad thing is basically betting your family’s future on your ability to maintain your badass man credibility with practically the whole deck stacked against you. The risks are huge. Of course.. if you pull it off you get to spend all day with your kids shooting turtles, fishing, playing Black Ops II, and watching Sportcenter. so I mean… its not entirely irrational.

Honestly, that sounds like a lot of fun, and would be much better life than going to the office every day.

Even the risk of the family being destroyed, while much higher, is not as brutally punishing, as you won’t be the one paying child support and alimony, and you’ll probably have a decent chance of getting custody.

The question is, could you find a girl okay with the arrangement and could you stay badass. I figure, if you ran a little hobby farm in the country, fished, and hunted, your odds wouldn’t be too bad. You’d still get the provider rep if the meat on the table was something you slaughtered or hunted yourself.

It would take a lot of work to set up, but I’d be okay with the arrangement of staying home on the acreage with the kids while the wife worked.

Musings on Romance

Donal has some musings:

The basic strategy which many (most?) women employ right now, which is regularly known as AF/BB (see Rollo’s post for more), is one that requires two distinct elements to pull off: deceit and desperation. Many, if not most, men would not be content to marry a woman whom they realize is choosing to marry them solely as a meal ticket, and effectively a sperm donor as well. It should surprise no one that men don’t like to be used in that way, and will balk at it if they realize that is what is happening. Hence the importance of hiding what is going on from them.

Maybe I’m odd, but I honestly wouldn’t mind taking a wife who was wanting to make rational deal upfront. I’d be quite willing to go along with a young woman who proposed an honest, straightforward marriage deal: ‘you provide for me, protect me, and father my children, and I’ll bear you many children, keep your house, and provide regular sexual access.’

If she met my list and I had some positive feelings for her, I’d jump at the chance for such a rational young girl.

That’s not to say I’m willing to be the beta bux for a woman who’s already had her alpha fux, but that’s something quite different a family-oriented girl with a low time preference rationally planning her future. In fact, that kind of future-time orientation would be rather attractive in its own right.

My problem with being the beta bux is not that a woman would want “a meal-ticket” but rather that she is not offering a worthwhile value in trade by trying to sell damaged and/or decaying goods for full price through deceit.

If a young woman wanted to make a fair and honest trade on the marriage market for a meal-ticket, I’d be game.

But then again, I’ve always been rather emotionally-detached and bloodlessly rational, so I’m probably the odd one out here.

****

Which leads me to further musings on romance.

The slow, agonizing death of modern marriage did not start with gay marriage nor did it start with no-fault divorce. It didn’t even start with the creation of ‘marital rape‘ or mass contraception.

It started well before that: it started with the acceptance of romantic love as the basis of marriage and the conflation of romantic love and Christian love.

Romantic love is a feeling and feelings change, for this reason romance and romantic love are a horrible basis for marriage.

Christian love is not a feeling, it is a series of purposeful attitudes and actions adopted.

‘Love’ is not love.

If you accept that romantic ‘love’ should be the basis of marriage, you are the problem.

Christian Sickness

I’ve discussed the issue of purity and abstinence recently, but I’m doing it again as I’ve just come across this piece that perfectly illustrates modern evangelical sickness, read it. I’m beginning to think ‘purity’ is one of, if not the most, destructive teaching in the modern church.

In this article, a 30-something women discusses how great purity is and how hard her struggles with sexual desire are.

As a single girl in my thirties who was committed, by God’s grace, to saving sex for marriage,

Notice, ‘committed to saving sex for marriage.’ This is entirely the wrong commitment. The commitment should be to marriage.

Paul was very clear on this: “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)

For those women (and men) burning with passion, counseling abstinence is simply wrong; in fact, it might be borderline sinful. Instead, the church should council marriage.

“Purity culture” is destroying the church.

Or maybe the greater question is, Why do we even want to fight for sexual purity when our desires seem so natural and good—and often feel too powerful to control?

She shouldn’t. These desires feel good, natural, and powerful because they are good, natural, and powerful because God made them that way.

The problem is not the desire, the problem is looking for it in the wrong spot. People should not be waiting until their late-20s, or 30’s to get married and suffer under some perverse form of purity. They should be getting married young and having good, natural, enjoyable sex with their spouses while young.

God created sex, then told us to enjoy it only within the context of marriage between a man and a woman; so if He has us wait an excruciatingly long time for it, He is (mercifully) teaching us to meet our very deepest desires in Him alone.

Waiting is the problem, a Christian should not be waiting. They should be actively preparing and looking for marriage, men and women alike, each in their own way.

She gives some advice on combating lust, of which this is the most interesting:

9. Set hard-and-fast boundaries with men—for your sake and theirs. Hanging out alone with a man never helped me; it usually stirred up desires unnecessarily.

If a man and a woman are hanging out and want each other so much they are considering sin, they should be getting to the altar post-haste. ‘Boundaries’ are a broken product of a broken church culture. If a Christian man and woman are worrying about violating their ‘boundaries’ they should be be getting married.

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To Colleen,

You seem like a decent woman, but you have been mislead by a sick church culture, so please don’t take offense to my criticisms, instead help me to fix church culture. Council your other women readers avoid sticking to some misguided quest for a perverse form of ‘purity’, instead council them to commit to marriage, to try their hardest to find a decent Christian man and start a life.

Stop waiting and ‘being pure’, and embrace the holy desires God has given you. Find a decent Christian man, marry him, and have as much sex as you possibly can; council your readers to do the same.

The false teachings you have received on this issue have obviously hurt you according to your own words, so please help prevent other young women from falling into the same trap.