The Problem with Purity, Part 2: How Pressure for Sexual Purity is Abusive (A Male Perspective)

I was probably 8 years old the first time I noticed our minister talking about the problem of sexual desire. He was standing in the pulpit. I, like everyone else, was sitting in the pews. 

I might have budded a little earlier than children. In any case, I remember having my first little crush when I was in preschool. I could have told you by then that I thought girls were super pretty. Awkward as I was, I had my first kiss when I was 6 years old. By 8, I was definitely fantasizing about sex, though I didn't quite understand the process just yet. I KNEW in my inner most being (or something like that) that I wanted to see women naked. I still do.

So, imagine my surprise when my minister informed me that imagining seeing women naked if you weren't already married to them was a terrible sin, that it made God very unhappy and that the most we were allowed to fantasize about before marriage was kissing someone we weren't married to. I WAS DEVASTED. 

To be honest, I don't recall exactly how I felt in that moment, but this sort of message was sent over and over again. Sexual thoughts crimes were punishable by eternal damnation and I was guilty. I wanted so badly to have a sexually pure mind, but those ladies and their sexy butts - I just couldn't get them out of my head. 

I make light of it now, but honestly, up until my mid-twenties and maybe until I became an Atheist, I was absolutely tortured by my competing desires to be a good Christian and my natural desire to mate. I was disgusted with myself. I'd find myself feeling incredibly horny and as soon as the climax came, I'd feel immediate horrified regret. I'd failed and hurt my Savior! How could I be so unfaithful to God. How could I shit on my faith?!? I made resolutions every day. And every day I broke them, usually more than once. If I had been diligent enough to count every 'wicked' thought I'd had... I definitely sinned several times every waking hour. Anyway, more than once, I cried myself to sleep. More than once, I confessed my shame publicly. I just wanted to be pure! And this came with consequences not only for me. 

It took me a long time after marriage to learn to enjoy sex. I feel like, even now, I don't enjoy it as well as I would had I not been traumatized by my desire for moral purity.

Looking back, it's bad enough that I felt so much shame for feelings that are natural for all animals to have, and without which we would not procreate. I shouldn't have spent so much time feeling so much guilt and so much shame for having been born human. What's worse is that it had a negative effect on my marriage and my various romantic partners over the years. I was so ashamed of my desire, that in my early years of marriage it was difficult for me spend time thinking about my partners needs, because even thinking about my own needs was shameful. The truth is, I didn't think about my own needs. Instead, I thought about the guilt I was carrying and the cause of it. 

And while this never happened to me, one can look at societies where this kind of guilt is common. In these societies and communities, men learn to hate women. They hate women because the desire they have for women's bodies make them feel guilty. And then, their attitude often makes women feel guilty for having bodies. The schizophrenic attitude this causes men to have towards women can lead while societies to send women the message both that they must be beautiful and show it and also that they are shameful for doing so. This is an absurd and harmful burden for both women and men to bare - it's antihuman and not the best way to deal with the complexities of sexual desire.

And this is just one example of how purity is corrosive.