I have heard such terrible analogies like the gum one. Always comparing the sexuality of women to objects. Because that's what we are to people who believe shit like this is true. Objects to be used and consumed and thrown away.
You know what I was reminded of was when a teacher licked the frosting off a cupcake and then tried to offer it to the students. After several students turned her down, she said "No one is going to want your cupcake if the frosting has already been licked."
See, when the church I grew up in did it, they used an analogy that went both ways- sticking two sheets of paper together and then ripping them apart- and they were pretty careful to be just as forceful about the boys having pre-marital sex as the girls. But then it still left me with hugely fucked-up notions about sex and 'purity' that I'm still trying to work through today and which left me worse than unprepared wrt stuff that happened later, so... yeah. Still very not good.
that's what we got in secondary school (also in the uk) - although it wasn't 100% from an abstinence viewpoint. It was: if you glue two pieces of cardboard together and rip them apart, they're gone have parts of the other stuck to them forever. It was used as an analogy for both sex and relationship and the emotions behind them; that they were serious things and to never do anything you felt you weren't ready for, or to make someone do those things.
(this was from a women's/sexual health group that came in. they were pretty shame-y in some exercises about sti's though.)
See, if it had been done from that viewpoint, I think it might have actually helped? But instead the people doing it with us were basically saying 'yeah so if you have sex with one person you'll be inextricably tied up with them forever and RUINED for anyone else' which was really really unhelpful.
One 'health' class I had when I was young did the paper ball thing--a piece of paper was passed around and everyone did whatever they wanted to it--wrote on it, crumpled it, ripped the corners, etc. When it made it back to the front of the room, the teacher said that's what happens to our bodies and souls when we had sex with a lot of people. If I remember right, this was during our fifth grade "your body is going to go through puberty, this is what you should know" class. (This was in Dover, PA, which was one of the first big "teach creationism in the class room" promoters, if that gives any indication of the school system there's views).
Thankfully, every sex ed and health class I had after that was much better and taught real information.
Well to be fair, none of us knew the reason for it. It was at the very beginning of the lesson before it was even told to us what the lesson was about, like an ice breaker kind of thing. All we knew was that they separated the girls and the boys into different classes and had heard from other kids that they would give us maxi pads and talk about periods. You tell a bunch of 11 year olds to do whatever they want to something, even a piece of paper and they're going to do it gleefully and try to one up each other's destruction.
Yeah, I think that was the point. :( There was also a lot of "you have sex with every person your partner has ever had sex with" type of talk. Which makes sense in a way, because it's a good idea to talk about past experience and get tested before having a new sexual relationship and all that good stuff, but it's put in kind of the most uncomfortable way possible.
Sometimes I have to wonder about the teachers who teach classes like this; I know some don't have a choice, but how can the people who design these courses not see how damaging it is? You're not saving or helping anyone when you shame them and make them hate themselves.
The best reversal of this I've read was comparing a woman to an urn, or a water vessel. How is the urn better unfilled, as opposed to filled, when the whole purpose of an urn is to carry water?
I dislike both analogies, because they are equating women with inanimate objects, but if one needs a similar argument to rebut the gum, well....
I have heard such terrible analogies like the gum one. Always comparing the sexuality of women to objects. Because that's what we are to people who believe shit like this is true. Objects to be used and consumed and thrown away.
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I wish I had a punching bag. It would feel so nice to just vent.
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(this was from a women's/sexual health group that came in. they were pretty shame-y in some exercises about sti's though.)
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Thankfully, every sex ed and health class I had after that was much better and taught real information.
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Yeah, if all your partners have the 'do whatever you want, ruin it/her, it doesn't matter' mindset. What a horrible thing to expect.
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I dislike both analogies, because they are equating women with inanimate objects, but if one needs a similar argument to rebut the gum, well....
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