{"id":874,"date":"2013-08-30T20:27:00","date_gmt":"2013-08-30T20:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2013\/08\/sex-and-the-new-double-standard.html"},"modified":"2013-08-30T20:27:00","modified_gmt":"2013-08-30T20:27:00","slug":"sex-and-the-new-double-standard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2013\/08\/sex-and-the-new-double-standard.html","title":{"rendered":"Sex and the New Double Standard"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

I\u2019m going to wade into social issues even though this is more challenging to write about. But this is something I was thinking about a while back in response to various blog posts, and thought it would be useful to try to write this out. \u00a0(I touched on this briefly in my comments on Men on Strike <\/a>earlier.)<\/p>\n

Once upon a time, a girl was told, by her parents, and by society, \u201cdon\u2019t have sex because you could get pregnant and it would leave you ruined.\u201d \u00a0Now, society is just as likely to say, \u201cuse contraception to reduce the likelihood of getting pregnant,\u201d under the notion that teens can\u2019t restrain themselves from having sex. \u00a0And depending on the circumstances, she\u2019ll end up believing either that unplanned pregnancy isn\u2019t so bad (or at least is commendable for not getting an abortion), or be told that in her circumstances, abortion is an acceptable or even the right choice to make \u2014 or she\u2019ll even be driven to the clinic by her parents. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, it\u2019s entirely her choice. \u00a0Under no circumstance does the father have any control. \u00a0(Which has its own consequences \u2014 how can we expect an expectant father to commit to fatherhood if he knows that the mother can, at any point, abort the child?) \u00a0If she is fine with abortion (and since STDs are treated as fully treatable), sex has become consequence-free. \u00a0And, in any case, premarital sex doesn\u2019t leave her at risk of being \u201cruined\u201d and losing respect and her place in society.<\/p>\n

On top of that, \u201cdon\u2019t get drunk because men might take advantage of you\u201d is practical advice but still not acceptable in 2013 America, given the current legal environment in which, if a man and a woman are both drunk and have sex, he is at risk of being accused of rape. \u00a0(Has this actually happened? \u00a0Or is this \u201con the books\u201d but not actually prosecuted? \u00a0I don\u2019t know.\u00a0\u00a0Recall how Dr. Phil was excoriated for tweeting on the topic<\/a>\u00a0in a failed conversation-starter.)<\/p>\n

On the other hand: \u00a0if a man \u2014 or a teenage boy \u2014 fathers a child (even, as Helen Smith tells us in her book, in quite preposterous scenarios, such as a woman retrieving a discarded condom and turkey-bastering her way into pregnancy), he\u2019s on the hook for the next 18 years. \u00a0Now maybe an inner-city kid who never expects to earn a paycheck in his life (at least, nothing in the formal labor market, from which wages can be garnished) isn\u2019t concerned, or someone who thinks his \u201cbaby mama\u201d is compliant enough not to name him as the father so the State can\u2019t come after him, but what would happen if we reversed course on the abstinence message to speak to boys (and men) instead of girls? \u00a0What if we said, \u201cdon\u2019t have sex with someone you\u2019re not committed to because you\u2019ll never know if she really did remember to take her pill that morning, or if maybe she really just wants to get pregnant. \u00a0She might say she\u2019ll just get an abortion if she gets pregnant, but what if she changes her mind? \u00a0She might say she\u2019ll never ask anything of you, but if she goes on welfare, she won\u2019t have that choice. \u00a0You could be paying for child support for 18 years. \u00a0Think about it.\u201d<\/i>

<\/i>What if? <\/p>\n

Now back to your regularly-scheduled economic-ish blogging.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m going to wade into social issues even though this is more challenging to write about. But this is something I was thinking about a while back in response to various blog posts, and thought it would be useful to try to write this out. \u00a0(I touched on this briefly in my comments on Men […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nSex and the New Double Standard<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I'm going to wade into social issues even though this is more challenging to write about. 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