Pajama Boy of Boundless shames virgins for being proud they are virgins.

Guys, I’m a little late on this one, but if you needed more proof that Joshua Rogers is the Pajama Boy of Boundless, then go read “Stop Worshiping Your Virginity”.

Yes, we’ve reached the point where mainstream Christian thought has been reduced to this:

If you’re a Christian virgin, you are no more righteous than anyone else (regardless of how long you’ve been wearing that promise ring). And if you’re not a virgin, you are no less righteous than anyone else — the only thing that makes you righteous is faith in the perfect blood of Jesus. Whatever you did (or didn’t do) in the past simply isn’t part of the Christian equation when it comes to your worth, so you can go ahead and stop obsessing over your virginity now.

I don’t know how many adult Christian virgins Rogers happens to know, but generally speaking, there aren’t a whole lot of virgins, even in the church, past 25 or so.  Most of them aren’t proud of it.  Most of them wish that they could find someone to lose it with (in marriage or otherwise).  And most of them don’t go around telling others about it.  Even among people that it would be “safe” to discuss it with, they don’t talk about it.  Where does Rogers live that he is knowingly running into haughty adult virgins???

Most people who survive well into adulthood still virgins don’t do so because so many people were offering up sex and they, out of immense moral superiority, were about to deny all of the would-be sexers.  Usually, it’s more like “I couldn’t get a date, and when I could, the other person wasn’t that attractive, so….nope.”

Anyhow, regarding the quote above:  yes, in a spiritual sense, we are all “equal” in that we have all been forgiven of our sins.  And no, remaining a virgin doesn’t in and of itself make you more virtuous than someone else.  But let’s be real, sex has pretty obvious and life-altering consequences, in a way that is significantly different from uttering a swear word or having a selfish thought, and we, being human, tend to assign different weights to actions whose consequences tend to have different weights.  Why is this a fundamentally bad thing?  I mean, we live in a Christian culture where you can have a man sobbing because he realized that he hasn’t been as nice to his wife as Christ would be to the church…….but try to say that there are real-world consequences for sexual sin, and one of those consequences may be that men, on the whole, will find you less desirable for marriage, and suddenly you’re a tool of the devil spreading lies??!?!?

No one is saying that sexual sin will absolutely prevent you from finding a spouse, but Christians respond AS IF you had said that when you say that sexual sin (especially for a woman) makes it harder to get married to the type of person you would want to marry.  It’s like the concept of sexual market value and sexual options cannot exist in Christian-world, even though we see that reality play out in every church in America.  But if the Boundless commenters are a microcosm of the church, then there is a very strong will within the church to deny the reality of SMV, or that sexual history matters….which is pretty much exactly the same thing you could read on a feminist website.

Christians who don’t promote young marriage don’t actually care about chastity.

Reader Nate Winchester sent me a link to this article from The Catholic World Report: “Should We Bring Back Young Marriage?”

It’s a longer article, but it’s a good read.

My take on the issue of young marriage is that if Christians are actually serious about chastity, then they HAVE to support young marriage.  And it seems to me that Christians at large are not serious about chastity.  All of the “True Love Waits”-style campaigns, purity rings, abstinence education – all of that means NOTHING in the face of biology…or at least it ends up meaning nothing if you’re alone with your boyfriend in your apartment at night and you’re in love with each other, or at least happen to think each other is hot.  I mean, what do parents REALLY THINK is going to happen?  Maybe not the first time, but given ENOUGH time.  That they’re just having Bible study at 1:00am?

Are adult Christians just stupid?

Is it not obvious to anyone with half a brain that human beings were not designed to delay sex for two or three decades after coming to sexual maturity?  Yet we have Christians not blinking an eye at full-grown adult singles waiting until age 35 to marry for the first time, because that was just God’s perfect plan or whatever.

Maybe these Christians (because THEY married at age 21 or 22 and never had the delightful experience of having unfulfillable sexual desires for 10 or 20 years) think that anyone can wait because THEY were able to wait for, like, five years.  Maybe the only singles they know at church are low sex-drive 2s, or girls who became chubby single cat ladies by age 26 and are totally content to serve in the nursery at church while patientlyyyy waiting for Mr. Right that everyone knows will never arrive – isn’t it obvious that waiting is a realistic and achievable goal?

Or maybe it’s that as long as the couple weren’t cohabitating before marriage, then we can totally assume that they weren’t having premarital sex, right?  Even though they dated for five years!

I think some of it is that there are a lot of married Christians in the church these days who had premarital sex, and they just don’t want to address it, because then THEY might have to come clean about their own fornication, and nobody wants to go there because (A) no one else’s business, and (B) awkward.  So everyone just turns a blind eye to what they know is going on, and it’ll all work out because we’re all forgiven and everybody makes mistakes and no sin is greater than any other sin.

Until someone gets pregnant.  But even then, everyone rallies around the brave single mother (no abortion = hero for life) and volunteers to babysit.

We hear a lot these days from pearl-clutching Christians about how evil the world is and how depraved the culture, etc.  If Christians are really serious about changing the culture for the better, then they need to get serious about promoting young marriage and stop telling singles (either explicitly or implicitly) that they have a long time to find someone and it’s better to go off and have adventures while they figure out who they are.  And they also need to stop telling people that the 20s are a “season” in which you can work on yourself to become closer to God and therefore marriage-worthy or whatever.  By the time you hit your 20s, you should already be well-formed enough to be a good candidate for being a spouse.  That has not so much to do with how many various experiences you have in life but very much to do with your fundamental character.  Marriage shouldn’t be about bringing two “experts in life experience” together but rather about bringing two young people who may be inexperienced in life but of solid character together.  All the life experience in the world means very little with no character.  Age 22 is not a good age at which to BEGIN to develop character.   Yes, it’s a good thing to have done some introspective thought about who you are and what you want, but this idea that we have to be practically irrevocably formed before even entertaining the thought of marriage is wrong-headed.  If anything, too much formation makes it that much harder for someone to get married and stay married.

 

When guys advise girls to put out to prove marital worthiness, they really mean “only put out for betas.”

Obviously, as a Christian, I believe that sex should be reserved only for marriage, but since I operate in a corner of the internet that isn’t exclusively Christian, I figure it’s worth talking about why premarital sex is such a bad deal for women overall.  This is not to say that some women haven’t put out and ended up in good marriages anyway.  It’s more that if you look at society as a whole, it’s a bad thing.  It’s worth pointing out that the manosphere seems mainly geared toward upper-middle and upper-class (white beta) men (if not in raw income, then at least in education/social class/taste), and so a lot of advice is filtered through those lenses.  Many social pathologies have not (yet?) come to the upper echelons of society because of money and a stronger adherence to traditional social strictures.

The basic gist that I see all over the place is that women should have a low partner count but should put out for guys they’re serious about who could also be husband material.  The problem is that the same guys who advocate this strategy also believe that women have no control over their hamsters and will be ~forever ruined~ for marriage by sex with an alpha.  So basically, they are advising women to be crazed sex freaks only with betas.  This sexual performance will prove to the man that the woman is a good bet for marriage.  So somehow women are tasked with finding betas to treat like alphas within, like, three tries, lest they be branded for eternity as ruined slags who will cheat cheat cheat cheat cheat cheat cheat and make you raise someone else’s secret baby.  Also, they need to divine the man’s fitness for marriage within 3-5 dates – so within 12-20 hours of time spent with the guy, approximately.  This is because no self-respecting man is going to waste time on a chick who won’t put out.

This “strategy” seems like no strategy at all.  Men are banking on the premise that the two guys who came before him were horrible at sex, but she had significant relationships with them anyway (because only big ol’ whores would have one night stands or flings).  Women are banking on the much riskier premise that she will find someone who is willing to commit to her in marriage within three tries that she can also be a crazed sex freak for for the rest of her life.  It’s like playing Super Mario Bros. with three lives and you have to get to the flagpole before you die three times or time runs out.  Also, I feel like there is a presumption that the girl is always the one ending relationships, because what guy would dump a “nice” girl who is a crazed sex freak only with him, right?  But girls get dumped all the time, and not just by alphas.  Every girl, if it hasn’t happened to herself, knows girls who in good faith entered into dating relationships that ended in getting dumped for whatever reason.  The guy just stopped being attracted, the guy decided he wanted something else, the guy decided it wasn’t working out – even if the guy had also declared his love, talked about a future/marriage, often went the extra mile.

So what does a girl gain from a failed sexual relationship?  Nothing.  The guy gets sex and an ego/status boost.  The girl just loses time and gains a notch that will work against her chances of getting another marriageable guy, because guys don’t care so much about the quality of the relationship, they just care about the number.  She can also then expect the next guy to expect her to do everything sexually for him that she did for the previous guy, unless she lands a suuuper beta with a forgiving heart.  But landing a suuuper beta with a forgiving heart makes it even harder for the girl to be a crazed sex freak for him, so it’s just a downward spiral with no end.

It’s just a very bad strategy.

Recently conservative comedian/commentator Steven Crowder got married, and both he and his bride were virgins on the wedding day.  He recounted in a subsequent op-ed that he thought their wedding night was “perfect” and “nothing short of amazing. ”  Whatever kind of sex they had that night was surely not perfect or amazing by experienced sexing standards, but by coming to marriage as virgins, Crowder and his wife got to have a wedding night that they could consider perfect and amazing and that will remain a cherished memory.  More interestingly, the next day he and his wife were eating breakfast and they overheard another newlywed discussing her new marriage and opining that “nothing’s really changed.”  (Also, the groom had gotten so wasted at the reception that he wasn’t even eating breakfast with his new wife.)  Presumably this woman had cohabited with her now-husband and had used up all the perfect and amazing sex of new love long before her wedding night.  It made me sad to read about it.  At the one table were Crowder and his bride giddy with the freshness of lives newly entwined, while at the other table were people who had been there, done that so long ago that the marriage was hardly registering with them.  And people wonder where romance went and why marriages don’t last…but darn it, they got the receipts from premarital sex!

P.S.  Only three people have responded to the podcast idea.  Please weigh in if you would like to see this project move forward.

Sex goggles.

I am convinced that most bad relationships do not end because of sex goggles.  They say that sex changes everything between two people, and it does…because of the sex goggles.  The Bible describes this as two people becoming one flesh, but it basically means sex goggles.

Sex goggles magically add anywhere from +1 to +5 points of attractiveness to a person, which is why two homely fat people can think each other gorgeous, and why men stay with drab, frumpy, personality-free women even though it’s obvious the men could do better.  Sex goggles boost the other person’s attractiveness to the point where it makes leaving the other person difficult due to the fear of not being able to find someone at least equally attractive.  Sex goggles are so powerful that a lot of guys will stay with a woman who doles out very little sex, just because a woman is more attractive when you know you’re assured of sex twelve times a year rather than face the unknown of possibly having sex zero times a year.  Once you put the sex goggles on, it’s hard to take them off.

I’m not saying that sex goggles are bad per se.  Sex goggles are actually a feature of sex as designed by God.  God designed sex to bind two people together, and how else to facilitate the longevity of that binding than by throwing sex goggles into the mix?  I mean, if you’re going to grow old with someone, and growing old means you’re both going to turn into droopy, wrinkled hags, then by all means, bring on the sex goggles to make me forget I’m swapping spit with an 85-year-old geezer.

The problem that people run into with the sex goggles is when they have sex outside of God’s design.  Now you too often have two people viewing each other with sex goggles who should never have been bound together.  The problem is twofold:  first, the sex goggles obscure all of the problems with the relationship upfront.  Second, the sex goggles make it very difficult to walk away into a sexless unknown.  Whenever you read stories of guys agonizing about whether or not they should commit to a woman, or girls trying to decide if Mr. Right Now can transition into being Mr. Until I Die, and there are some noticeable warning signs, you can usually determine that all the drama and dithering originates from sex goggles.  I mean, think about it.  If you removed sex from the equation, how easy would it be to walk away from someone who was making you miserable?  Who was selfish?  Who handled money poorly?  Who was abusive?  Who was not supportive?  But if you’re wearing sex goggles, suddenly it becomes this very arduous process of trying to decide if you should stay, and it’s so complicated, and you need the advice of so many people, and you find yourself rejecting good advice even though you agree they’re right.  Does this not sound like insanity?  But sex goggles make it possible.

So, respect the sex goggles.  Follow God’s plan and don’t put them on until you’ve tied the knot.

Random thoughts and links.

Some bloggers are very prolific, but I find that my inspiration comes in fits and starts.  Sometimes I can crank out a blog post quickly, but other times I’ll spend hours tinkering with a post, trying to figure out how to say what I want to say.  Sometimes I start a post and then don’t finish it for weeks or even months.  It just depends.

Since I don’t have anything fully-formed at the moment, here’s a smattering of stuff that’s floating around in my mind lately.

• Mrs. Cubbie Fink wrote a book.  It’s called What Is He Thinking? and contains the results of Mrs. Fink’s interviews with “men she respects who hope to get married some day.”  According to the description, “The men share their thoughts on topics like how women can respect themselves and the men in their lives, modesty, purity, taking it slow, friendship, letting guys lead, and more. This book gives them the floor to say what they would really like women to know.”  Or, you know, you could just read some men’s blogs FOR FREE and find more honest, more real, and more true information.  Somehow I find it hard to believe that men would be truly frank with someone who looked like Mrs. Fink, but that’s just cynical ol’ me.  P.S. If anyone wants to hook me up with a copy of the book to review, let me know.
• There’s been noise in the media lately about how 80% of self-identified evangelical singles aren’t virgins.  Well, duh.  Most people can wait until age 22 for sex.  Asking the same people to wait until they’re 30 or 35 or older to have sex is just preposterous.  I generally think that after the age of 25, a lot of Christians say “F THIS” and do what their hormones tell them to do.  If Christians really are serious about preventing premarital sex and the social ills that result from fornication (single moms, bastard kids, poverty, demand for government entitlements, STDs, abortions), then they need to change their attitudes about (a) instructing their kids on marriage and its obligations, (b) when it is appropriate to get married, and (c) getting involved in finding good mates for their children.  I know it’s unpopular to try to shape your child’s romantic destiny (yet okay be a helicopter parent dragging your kid over the finish line to get the minimum SAT score necessary to get into a decent college), but wishful thinking is clearly not keeping the kids out of each other’s pants.
• I came across a shop on Etsy that sells sexy bikinis for plus-size women.
• Women admit they were more attractive at 19.  They are actually shocked at how good they looked when they were younger.
• I started following the whole Tim Tebow thing after I saw someone on TV trashing him as a QB a few weeks ago.  Is the publicity good or bad for Christians?  Weigh in.
• I guess a special on virgins wasn’t enough for TLC, so now they’re doing a special on Sunday, Dec. 18th called Geek Love.  In the Venn diagram of life, those two circles intersect quite a bit.  Here’s a promo clip:
  
•  Lady Gaga is a good example of a woman who is extremely sexual but not at all sexy.
• An older article at The Art of Manliness that I read recently:  5 Easy Ways for the College Student to Upgrade His Style.  Antonio strongly favors a classic, somewhat preppy look, but his general points are good ones for men of any age.
• Buy clothes that fit.  Don’t buy anything that doesn’t “sing” when you put it on.  Buying something because “it’s a great deal” is the worst reason to buy something.  Better to buy something more expensive that is great on you, because you’ll wear it more and pay for itself that way.
• Saw this review of an item at Old Navy, written by a mom who claims she is a size 18:  “I don’t always have the time to pull together a nice outfit outside of sweats and a t-shirt. This shirt makes it easy to pull a nice outfit together quickly whether it’s with cargos, jeans or a skirt.”  A nice outfit outside of sweats and a t-shirt?

Until next time,

a.h.

Feminist sexual dogma, cont.

“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” Jer. 17:9 (NIV)

I checked back in on the message board thread that I had posted about earlier, the one from the girl who’d had sex with an alpha on the fourth date, and then he did the disappearing act.  The drama continued, not just in the thread, but she actually obtained a closure of sorts from the guy.

OP’s comments are a sterling example of how a woman’s hamster reacts to an alpha.

She protects him from criticism and only reluctantly accepts his shaming from the hen house:

It’s hard for me to think of this dude as being an asshole, but the more I think about it and read what you all are saying, I realize you’re right.

She wants to hear what he has to say when he finally contacts her:

I guess I’ll let him know that he can call me. I’m just really hurt at this point. But you’re right — I’ll hear him out. At least now I can get the closure that I’ve wanted all along.

and:

I’m just REALLY curious about what he’s going to say. I texted him and told him he could call me after I get off work in a few hours.

Oh, GIRL, this is really not rocket science.  Also, any time a girl wants to hear what a guy has to say even though she swears she has written him off, he was a mistake, she doesn’t care anymore – guess what?  SHE STILL CARES AND STILL HAS HOPE.  Such talk is pure, grade-A hamster talk.

OP gets her “closure” with alpha, but (surprise!) it wasn’t what she wanted to hear:

Alright, so he called about an hour ago. Basically, he apologized for not calling after we had sex. He admitted that he regretted doing it so soon, and that he was sorry for basically ignoring me for almost two weeks. I accepted his apology. And that was that. Honestly, I wish he wouldn’t have called in the first place. Yeah, I got my closure, but it was easier for me to get over it if I could just write him off as a dick. Now he’s not REALLY a dick, since he apologized. Gah. I’m sad now.

OP admits why she took his call:

Thanks everyone. I’m still super bummed (I guess a part of me was hoping he’d want to go out with me again?), but I know I’ll get over it.

OP in response to a commenter who asks if she would have gone out with him again if he had asked:

I would have.

Exactly how alpha was he?

I don’t know. I know I deserve better.

Mark the following as truth:  the only time women claim not to deserve better is when they’re fishing for compliments from other women (or beta orbiters).  Otherwise, women pretty much always deserve better than what they’ve got (or had).  But let’s look at this situation a little more closely:  OP really, really liked alpha and believed that they had a special enough connection that she got naked and had sex with him after four dates.  Then she procured a phone call from him apologizing for his behavior.  Most alphas would not even bother to call.  Actually, the more I think about it, the more it seems like our alpha was possibly a greater beta/lesser alpha – he did, after all, take OP on dates, which is way more than most women can expect from an alpha male these days.

So what, exactly, does OP believe she deserves that is better?  Considering what happened, she got about as good a treatment as she could expect.  Oh, but she wanted to have sex on her terms.

Ay, there’s the rub.

Clips from TLC’s Virgin Diaries

I haven’t had a chance to see the episode that aired yesterday yet, but TLC’s YouTube channel has some clips up.  Because I am such a generous blogger, I’ve embedded them here.

If anyone had a chance to see the show, please weigh in.

(Virgin Carey goes on a date with a woman who is really perplexed by his ~status and asks if he has any “subscriptions.”)

(Virgin engaged couple discuss the agenda for their wedding night, which includes “do foreplay.”)

(Tamara, the reclaimed virgin, reveals her “number” and says she had sex with each of her previous boyfriends, but that now she has had such a life change that when she has sex again, it’ll be like being a virgin all over again.)

TLC’s “Virgin Diaries” to air on Dec. 4.

On Sunday, Dec. 4, cable network TLC (home of the Gosselins, Duggars, frumps who need makeovers, and little people) is going to air a one-hour special called Virgin Diaries.  This documentary fill focus on six virgins – a couple saving their first kiss for their wedding***, a 35-year-old redditor incel, and three 30-year-old female roommates (one of whom is a “reclaimed virgin”) who are blogging about their search for Mr. Right.

It’ll be interesting to see how TLC handles the subject, especially in light of the promo below.

***

Another example of how feminist sexual dogma lets women down.

I found the following on one of the message boards I like to lurk on.  The typical poster is a lower-to-middle middle-class woman in her 20s or 30s, unmarried, trying to get started in her profession, and desperately wanting love if not in a long-term relationship with a boyfriend.  She tends to be non-religious, or nominally so, and believes in the usual feminist dogma about sex and sexuality.  All of these characteristics come to the fore in this thread, which aptly chronicles how feminist ideas about sex and sexuality just end up hurting women far more than helping them.

In a post entitled “Tell me to freaking get over it. Tell me to let it go.”, OP writes that she went on four dates with an alpha she REALLY REALLY liked, had sex with him on the fourth date, and – surprise, surprise! – now he’s dropped off the face of the planet.  She says:

He hasn’t responded. I know. I KNOW. Drop it. I should get over it. I shouldn’t press for details. It’s pretty obvious that he’s not interested.

I guess I just wanted to vent. I’m cool with rejection; really, I am. I’m used to it. But I wish he would have at least told me he wasn’t interested instead of dropping off the face of the planet.

I’m sad that I rock in every other aspect of my life (well…career-wise, at least), but I can’t do the relationship thing at all. I’m just super bummed and down in the dumps about this. I feel like such a stupid freaking whore.

So she’s cool with rejection and is actually used to being rejected, but super bummed at the same time.  Poor hamster.  Women conditioned to believe in sex equality (or whatever you want to call it) constantly find themselves fighting their natures, as OP is here.

The responses read like a recitation of feminist sisterhood catechisms.

First response:

Totally been there, like 100 times. It sucks, but yeah – you’ve already given yourself the best advice you can: let it go.

“Like 100 times?”?????????

Second response:

I think its typical people sleep together on the 3 or 4 date so you’re not a whore. Don’t feel that way.

Everyone knows you need to go on three or four dates with someone to prevent accusations of whore-dom.  Two dates = WHORE.  Three dates = NOT A WHORE.  Those extra three hours you spent consuming carbs with a guy make all the difference.

Still, OP’s hamster is really torn up:

I just really want to know WHY. I want to know exactly what it is I did wrong so I won’t make the same mistake with the next guy. If there is a next guy.

Thanks to feminism and the sexual revolution, women honestly don’t know why having sex with a very attractive man they’re not married to or even “in a committed relationship with” (whatever that means) generally tends to result in the man’s vanishing.  In the olden days, mothers and grandmothers would warn their daughters about being fast.  But I guess in an age where that kind of advice is the unjust repression of the patriarchy and three dates is enough to qualify as not-a-whore, such male behavior is truly, genuinely baffling to women and is completely inexplicable based on their understanding of reality.  Which, as the regulars of this blog know, is not really reality.

In true feminist fashion, the next three responders blame the man:

You didn’t do anything wrong. You liked a guy, you slept with him. That’s normal. He’s just an ass to act this way. He’s the one that’s done something wrong. I think every girl has been there at least once so don’t be so hard on yourself.

—–

It’s nothing you did. There’s nothing wrong with you.

He’s just an asshole for not responding.

Let it go and don’t beat yourself up over it.

—–

Feel happy that you avoided being stuck with a little coward pansy of a man.

Not that what the guy in this scenario did was right, but these responses just illuminates the cognitive dissonance of feminism.  Women are strong and fierce and independent, except when those dastardly men enter the picture and destroy all that strength, fierceness, and independence.

Another responder tries the hamster:

I’m not trying to encourage or anything but is it possible he’s stuck at work? Something might have come up?

Another man-blamer:

He’s a coward at the end of the day, he should have been straight up with you. Don’t be too hard on yourself. Live and learn.

Finally, on post #17, someone states the obvious:

Guys like a challenge and I’m sure he figures if you did it that fast with him you probably have with other guys and guys are weird about that. THEY can do it but a girl is a whore if she does

I think, though, that the most significant aspect of this thread demonstrating the widespread absorption of feminist doctrine on sex and sexuality is that not a single poster advised OP not to have sex and that she could secure the highest-quality man that she could by withholding.  Instead, thanks to feminist sexuality, women are now tasked with finding a sexy man who will commit to her because she gives him sex.  I’m pretty sure success at a unicorn hunt is more likely.  So what we have on college campuses and in teachers’ lounges and in office cubicles is women who are encouraged to have sex because they want it, but who must somehow try to divine that a sexy man will give them commitment even as the women are giving him sex, and fight all her feelings that she’s being a whore.  What a recipe for happiness and contentment!

When I read stuff like this, it just reminds me that God knew what he was doing when He made rules for sex.

Sex in last place.

As far as I can tell, most Christian advice about picking a spouse puts sex, or sexual spark, or whatever you want to call it, in last place.  It may be because a lot of Christians have mediocre sex lives (just hypothesizing), or because traditionally it was more important for a woman to find a good provider than it was to find a good lover, or because Christians just assume that sexual attraction will be there in some form whenever you put a man and a woman together, but whatever the case may be, at least when I was growing up, sexual attraction was, like, the last thing to consider when checking off the list for husbandly attributes.

Things that are more important than sex:

• Loving Jesus
• Attending church regularly
• Submitting oneself to God’s will
• Reading the Bible and praying
• Having a good job and being a provider
• Not a smoker
• Not a drinker
• Not a gambler
• Not a swearer
• Not an abuser
• Not a porn-watcher
• Loves kids
• Would be a good father
• Gets along with his own family
• Gets along with your family
• Sexually pure
• Sexually faithful
• Completely loyal
• Kind
• Compassionate
• Gentle
• Responsible

(The female version just has opposite genders, and women aren’t required to be providers.)

So, once you have all of these items checked off, THEN you can consider if the other person is at least somewhat sexually attractive to you, and if the person ISN’T at least somewhat sexually attractive to you, then maybe it’s time to start praying and then God may enable you to become sexually attracted to that person.

And, in the churchly way of thinking, the reason this kind of advice works is because it’s “the world” that puts inordinate importance on sexual attraction, and Christians are not to be of “the world,” and that appeals to the whole counter-cultural instinct.  Additionally, a lot of people ruin their lives by letting their sex drives do all the thinking, so there’s a precautionary aspect as well.  Churches are in the business of fixing people, but it’s even better not to have to fix people.  Also, nobody wants to think of all of the senior citizens at church ever having randy feelings.

The other thought that I had was that a lot of single Christians are not beautiful women or top-drawer men, and if churches can get singles to get past the requirement of throbbing physical attraction, more Christians will get married.  And since marriage is good for society and the church and people, then everyone wins.

Take, for example, Candice Watters’ advice from this article from Marry Well:

If what he’s looking to hold his marriage together for “many, many, many years” is sexual attraction, he’s setting himself up for disappointment. The only way to keep the high-jinks of new love going is to keep starting over with new lovers.

But that’s the message we’re bombarded with in our culture. In Hollywood especially, the end of the emotional high signals the need to move on to a new relationship where the high-octane meter gets to start over. Sometimes that means serial dating. More often it means divorce and remarriage. Tragically one in five married couples won’t reach their 5th anniversary.

But it need not end this way. When two believers come together in marriage, they have the potential, when the giddy feelings ebb, to leave what C.S. Lewis calls the “thrill” phase of romance for the “quieter and more lasting kind of interest … and happiness that follows.” He encourages this process, noting it is “one little part of what Christ meant by saying a thing will not really live unless it first dies.”

But in order for that to happen, we need to have realistic expectations, and the awareness that those giddy feelings will ebb.

….

I suspect your friend would say his desire for a “zing-pop” connection is consistent with Song of Solomon. There certainly was chemistry between Solomon and his bride. But nowhere in Scripture is that given as a condition for a God-glorifying marriage. You can build a strong, godly, world changing marriage on many things. But you can never build that simply on looks. Good looks are a bonus.

….

I worry for men like your friend who may miss out on highly productive marriages and families that are fruitful for the kingdom, simply because the women God brings to them don’t, at first, cause a chemical reaction.

The problem with Watters’ argument is that she is jumping to the apex fallacy of sexual attraction being the sole reason to marry.  Physical attraction is important to men, but only the most foolish men marry strictly for physical attraction.  (And they really would be idiots, because everyone knows that senior citizens don’t pose for centerfolds.)  But it’s amply evident from reading manosphere blogs that sexual attraction does help to keep marriages together in times when it would be easy to give up, because sex bonds people together.  Just remove sex from a marriage and see how long it lasts with any degree of happiness on either side.

This kind of advice completely misunderstands (at best) and disregards (at worst) male sexuality and what motivates men to pursue women.  When a man is sexually attracted to his wife in a functional marriage, he will be more productive, more open to her counsel, and all-around more content and happy.  I think what Watters is really doing is projecting her desire for young women not to fall prey to alpha players (“he’s so hot that I have to be with him even though he’s a loser”) onto men and their interest in attractive women (“she’s an idiot who hates kids, is in credit card debt up to her eyeballs, and is an alcoholic, but man, I’ve gotta spend the rest of my life legally bound to those jugs!”).

Is society so broken that every piece of advice or persuasive argument must be presented using extreme examples as rationales?  Can’t there be a happy medium where sex appeal is given its due while also encouraging the value of character?  Sheesh.