![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.conversiondiary.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/09\/7_quick_takes_sm1.jpg\" "\\"7_quick_takes_sm\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>\u2014 1 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n Yesterday, I was blogging about abstinence education, shame, and horrible Homeric epithets<\/a>. \u00a0That may leave you wondering what kind of sex-ed my high school had. \u00a0It turns out that my school had an abstinence-only policy, but, instead of\u00a0damaging\u00a0<\/em>content, they went with\u00a0no<\/em> content. \u00a0My semester of sex-ed consisted entirely of the teacher putting on episodes of\u00a0Freaks and Geeks<\/em> til the bell rang.<\/p>\n <\/a>\u2014 2 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n I reached to\u00a0Much Ado about Nothing\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0A Song of Ice and Fire<\/em> for my examples yesterday, and I should really tell you that Calah Alexander, who wrote the excellent post on abstinence metaphors that kicked all this off, has also written two great pieces on\u00a0Much Ado<\/em>: \u201cSo You Think You Understand Shakespeare<\/a>\u201d and \u201cLive Unbruised and Love<\/a>.\u201d \u00a0Here\u2019s an excerpt from that last:<\/p>\n [T]his second Beatrice was something else. She was beauty and wit and charm all deeply streaked with pain. She was glittering, brilliant, fierce, and then when that scene came, she was terrible.<\/p>\n When she took a breath and said, \u201cKill Claudio\u201d, the audience took a collective breath. In that appalled, appalling silence I saw grown adults grasping their heads in their hands, covering their faces, and shielding their eyes, as if they were subconsciously trying to block out what was happening.<\/p>\n And she said it with such a dreadful, icy self-possession that it was impossible to play off as heated emotion. Even if the later scene where she refuses to greet Benedick until he tells her that he has challenged Claudio didn\u2019t convince the audience, the raw power of her delivering those two words was enough. She knew exactly what she was doing. She was using selfless love, freely offered, as a weapon against her enemy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/a>\u2014 3 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n I\u2019m really hopeful that Joss Whedon\u2019s adaptation will keep the audience slightly uncomfortable and aware of some of the ugliness and cruelty lurking under the merry war of words in this play. \u00a0 In this interview<\/a>, Joss talks about his choice to have Beatrice and Benedick be former lovers and only slightly disguised anger and hurt below their banter. He also shares Calah\u2019s thoughts about Borachio and Margaret.<\/p>\n <\/a>\u2014 4 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n And while we\u2019re talking about sexual ethics or romances that make us a little queasy, there\u2019s been a spontaneous symposium going on at\u00a0AmCon<\/em> in response to Emily Witt\u2019s essay \u201cWhat Do You Desire?\u201d for\u00a0N+1<\/em><\/a>. \u00a0Nota bene: the essay has some extremely<\/strong> graphic sex and sexualized violence, and thus, so does the commentary. \u00a0PEG has links to most of the\u00a0AmCon<\/em> responses here<\/a> and adds some thoughts of his own.<\/p>\n I like it when people come together to argue in response to a specific prompt; it helps keep the discussion grounded. \u00a0One thread of it has been talking about whether consent is sufficient or only necessary but not sufficient for an ethical sexual encounter. \u00a0Rod Dreher added yesterday<\/a>:<\/p>\n Well, sure, it\u2019s much worse<\/em> for Sally to chop off Harry\u2019s arm mid-coitus without his consent than for her to do so with his consent. But it\u2019s still pretty horrible and perverse for him to consent to such an act. Why is this so hard to say? And if you cannot say that it\u2019s grossly immoral, even if consent is given, where do you draw the line? In Germany, prosecutors did not know how to deal with the case a decade ago of Arwin Meiwes, a cannibal who advertised for a victim willing to be slaughtered in a sexualized ritual. He found one, and slowly killed the guy, and ate him. Meiwes\u2019 defense? His victim soberly consented to the whole thing, and he (Meiwes) could prove it by videotape. Eventually prosecutors won a conviction, but however they managed this legally, that doesn\u2019t answer the moral question as to whether or not consent validates the gruesome act.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n