Navigating Sexual Morality Outside the Believer Narrative

[Anonymous]

I know we have had posts on this topic, however it has seemed to come in snippets and not sure I have seen a discussion on this specific framework.

Today was 5th Sunday. Our Bishop presented and talked very openly about some of the statistics about pornography and what our kids are dealing with in the real world in regards to these things. Basically the rates of pornography exposure, usage, and addiction ages are the same outside and inside and the church.

He talked about how we need to be developing relationships with our spouses and kids so that if we have problems or our kids have problems they will be willing to come talk to us and know we will still love them and work with them. I thought it was a pretty good discussion. But the discussion seemed to move away from the practical and into the idea that Satan is behind all of this, Satan wants us and our kids and if people have problems with these things then we just need to help them with their testimonies and they should go to more church things, etc.. etc.. Then we closed with scriptures that basically said if people turn away from God and die in their sins they will be thrust out from God’s presence…not really the loving hope of the Atonement I was hoping to hear about. It did seem a bit scare mongering…

So A for effort, but it fell into a narrative that I have a hard time with and don’t really agree with.

I do believe that the early sexualization of our kids is not good. They are being exposed to things at younger and younger ages that I think can really warp how they build relationships with people and affect their self-esteem. But I don’t necessarily agree with the whole Satan idea. Their are very practical reasons to make sure my kids aren’t sexting, and it doesn’t have anything to do with Satan. I don’t think Pornography is good, but I also don’t think that anyone should beat themselves up if they looked at it a few times. It’s not heroine (though could be for some).

So not sure how others feel about these issues, but how do you or have you approached it with your kids outside of the Good/Evil, God vs. Satan narrative, if you have? Any thoughts or suggestions? How do you counteract some of the narrative they will receive at church?

Any particular frameworks or approached you have used with your kids that have been effective?

[Anonymous]

I believe that kids should have filtering software on their computer to protect them from exposure to pornography.

Second, I don’t agree with kids looking at it, as it will increase the chances of them becoming parents early, which can really hamper education, future relationships etcetera. Plus it means I may become an inadvertent parent of their children at some point. Something I would like to avoid.

I also don’t subscribe anything to Satan any more. I’m agnostic about him as I am anyone else. It’s too convenient to blame him for anything and everything if we choose. Better to also focus on the blessings of avoiding pornography such as:

1. Avoiding the need to view it secretly and hide it from others. As the BoM says, sexual impurity can break the hearts of your children and spouses.

2. Having free mind space for other items rather than thinking about sex all the time. Pornography likely tends to increase a person’s preoccupation with sexual matters.

3. Being free of viewing people as sexual objects, which can happen when people view a lot of porn. One of the church pamphlets indicates frequent viewing of pornography makes you “look at people different”.

4. Preserving positive relationships with eventual spouses or a girlfriend/boyfriends, who may be offended if they know you resort to getting sexual satisfaction from strangers, even if only visually.

5. Preventing the seeking of sexual satisfaction outside of marriage, which I think could happen if a person gets too intimate with porn, to the point they lose their commitment to, or sense of monogamy.

At the same time, I think spouses need to be careful — they need to make sure they meet the sexual needs of their spouses lest they turn to porn for satisfaction. It’s far too easy to get access to now, compared to when I grew up.

[Anonymous]

It appears that your ward took the typical approach to something we are counseled to avoid–they played the guilt card. That isn’t to say it won’t work, guilt can be a powerful motivator. As a parent of 5 children and a former child myself 😆 , I don’t think that my son or daughter want to talk to me about sexting or porn, no matter how good the relationship is. I had a wonderful relationship with my parents and I would never have talked to them about that.

I think the best we can do is to tell them of the damage that can be done by habitually viewing pornography or by sexting with other people. Real life examples can hit home, such as the couple who divorced because of the husband’s porn addition, or the heartbreak that comes from a sexual relationship ending in a pregnancy or a breakup. I agree with SD that I don’t want to raise my grandkids, and I was always upfront about that with my children.

Our 5th Sunday was spent on the LDS.org site and other church sites with all it has to offer. They encouraged all of us to spend time there on the sabbath and partake of the good and uplifting things there. That is quite a contrast from yours SBR.

I tell my kids that their texts are not private, nor is their browsing history. I can look at them at any time. Hoepfully that knowledge will help. I also tell them to use me as an excuse. If a friend wants them to do something they know is wrong, tell them if I find out I will “kill” them (obviously not literally).

I agree that preaching fire and brimstone will do little to deter our children or the adults from partaking in lustful activities, but love, attention, and knowing what your kids are doing and who their friends are will go much farther. As for spouses, I can’t help there. I am a “victim” of a porn addicted priesthood holder and I went through a torturous divorce because of it. That is the greatest deterrent for my children there could ever be. Why? Because I told them why the divorce happened. I don’t think they would wish that misery on anyone.

[Anonymous]

I am also agnostic about Satan, but I do recognize that evil does exist in the world whether there is a devil involved or not. Generally speaking I think much more is blamed on Satan than he actually does (if he exists) and the reverse is also true – I believe God gets credit for much of what just happens. I also do not believe that sex outside marriage is second in seriousness only to murder and I don’t believe masturbation is a sin.

I can’t really answer your question. I can say that we did not take the approach of Satan causing each viewing of pornography or enticing anyone to have sex outside marriage. While we did (and do) teach the law of chastity, it was not directly connected to the ideas of Satan – it’s more that it’s just morally wrong and is against the commandments. However it could be said that we have failed as parents in this regard because we have a child who did have premarital sex, we have a child who we caught viewing pornography (and now have a blocking program), and we have a child who has been caught sexting (with another member, there’s a thread somewhere here about it). On the other hand, looking around in my own ward at others who have children of similar ages, we are not the only “failures.” Kids who our kids grew up with in the church have the same issues, apparently regardless of if they have been taught about Satan being the culprit or not (although we do not assuredly know what has been taught in each home). We apparently did better on WoW issues, interestingly, as our kids don’t seem to have the drug/alcohol issues many of their church peers have. I don’t know why that is – especially considering I don’t believe the WoW to be a commandment (although that is not directly taught to the children, and I do live the WoW).

Actually, the only time I can remember that Satan has been mentioned at home was when my wife told me Satan was behind my doubts several years ago. I don’t believe that (and told her so then) and I’m not so sure she believes it any more. The kids have (and do) have some more orthodox teachers at church, though, and I’m frankly not sure what they are taught there about Satan & guilt.

Interestingly our lesson was on an entirely different topic yesterday (the “Which Way Do You Face” GC talk), but the same ideas came out – Satan entices us to fear men more than God, and there was a discussion about how those who sin (specifically sexually) are not going to the CK unless they repent. There was some push back from me and another guy that didn’t go anywhere (our point was that we don’t know that because we’re not the judges).

FWIW, blocking programs are far from foolproof – do you know how much porn there is on Tumblr? And don’t forget Instagram and Snapchat. Our program allows us to block individual sites, but I’m sure there are more.

[Anonymous]

SilentDawning wrote:

3. Being free of viewing people as sexual objects, which can happen when people view a lot of porn. One of the church pamphlets indicates frequent viewing of pornography makes you “look at people different”.

I am working hard to teach my kids (ages 8 and 7) about how amazing their bodies are. Sometimes when I scratch their back I talk about their skeletal system or their digestive system. We have an oversized anatomy picture book and the kids were looking at it and asking me questions. My intent is for them to see bodies as more of a complete package rather than reduce it to only sexual functions (we haven’t covered the reproductive system yet but I hope that it will go the same as with the other systems when the time comes. The kids know the anatomical parts – we just haven’t discussed how they work).

We have a rule in our house to be respectful. Part of that is to respect yourself and others. I hope for this to be the framework of a non-believer discussion on morality. Do not objectify others or use them for sexual gratification – treat others as you want to be treated.

I am attempting a form of “principle” centered learning on the subject rather than rule based good vs. bad or right vs. wrong.

I am a little worried that this may allow my children to expirament more than they would under a stricter approach and the possible negative consequences are so high. However, when I take the long view, I believe this is the best approach for me to raise well adjusted and thoughtful adults.

[Anonymous]

It seems like the primary common-sense goal here should simply be to prevent harm and whenever that isn’t entirely possible then at least try to reduce any harm done as much as realistically possible. So one obvious problem with some of the largely unfounded fear and overreactions surrounding the idea of breaking any of these strict chastity rules is that millions of people have already viewed porn/nudity, had pre-marital sex, etc. without ever experiencing very serious, if any, lasting negative consequences as a direct result and this has already been happening over and over again for decades. If there are clearly many if not the overwhelming majority of cases where it doesn’t cause any obvious problems then why isn’t that already good enough?

I suppose the main reason that breaking these rules is never acceptable in the Church is simply because they never were about real-life results and what is best for the individual to begin with as much as mostly being about upholding the dogmatic tradition inherited from previous generations that in theory any sexual experiences and feelings should only involve your legal spouse without exception. In fact, it looks to me like much of the real-life suffering related to breaking these strict rules is actually largely a result of the Church itself setting the unrealistic expectation that masturbation, pre-marital sex or “petting”, etc. should never happen and giving people such a pointless and unnecessary guilt-trip about it when these things are certainly going to continue to happen in many cases anyway no matter how much people try to discourage it and insist that it is always wrong and completely unacceptable.

To me it looks like the Church’s hard-line approach is basically an example of good intentions gone wrong and they talk about it as if it is some kind of epic battle between good and evil because to some extent that’s all they really have left to try to prop up and justify some of these unrealistically strict standards nowadays. As far as I’m concerned, the best you can do is simply try to make people aware of any potential harm or problems and let them work some of this out on their own because acting like these things are more serious than they really are often results in even worse problems (in this life) than whatever Church leaders think they are trying to prevent and in many cases people will inevitably do exactly what they have been repeatedly told not to anyway because it is basically a built-in part of their nature to want to do so.

[Anonymous]

DevilsAdvocate wrote:

It seems like the primary common-sense goal here should simply be to prevent harm and whenever that isn’t entirely possible then at least try to reduce any harm done as much as realistically possible. So one obvious problem with some of the largely unfounded fear and overreactions surrounding the idea of breaking any of these strict chastity rules is that millions of people have already viewed porn/nudity, had pre-marital sex, etc. without ever experiencing very serious, if any, lasting negative consequences as a direct result and this has already been happening over and over again for decades. If there are clearly many if not the overwhelming majority of cases where it doesn’t cause any obvious problems then why isn’t that already good enough?

I think I understand and agree with your premise to a point DA. Except that I do believe that there are very serious and lasting negative consequences being experienced by people everyday. There are STD’s, unwanted pregnancy, abortion, feeling of being used and objectified, betrayal, cheating, etc. There is also real shame/ostracism associated with living in an LDS community as a young person and being known to have had pre-marital sex. These consequences are real. My hope for my children is that they are able to have committed, loving, fulfilling, mature and monagomous relationships. I believe that sexual intimacy should be reserved for select people and situations where this type of relationship is present. I hate that in movies and real life people are having sex with each other before they feel comfortable talking about their feelings and what sex means to them – sounds like a recipe for miscommunication and disappointment to me. I think that intimacy (of which sex is a component) should mean something. This does not preclude pre-marital sex but it does suggest making thoughtful choices about your actions.

OTOH, I largely agree that this whole issue is largely treated in church like the boogeyman and that we should be able have a much healthier dialogue.

[Anonymous]

I agree to some extent, but not all of your conclusions. I theorize that the church makes porn viewing so shameful and almost never gives sex positive messages (even within marriage) that when a young man inevitably views porn they are upset that they are drawn towards it. That huge shame trip makes then feel like they must be evil inside to the core and this makes them more likely to feel so discouraged they take another peek and feel even better. As they try and are unable to completely walk away they feel more and more defeated.

If you take someone out of church, they are less likely to feel all that much guilt and as such they are able to walk away knowing they could go back later on if they feel like they want to. Now not everyone fits this, but compared with the church I think the compulsivity is worse in the church than with the heathens in general.

My bigger issue with porn is the objectification and misuse of women and to a lesser extent how it makes men want a woman that is just dying to jump their bones. That isn’t the norm.

[Anonymous]

I don’t believe in a Satan figure either.

But kids really do need boundaries. I assume my kids will see porn in one way or another online, just like they’ll hear bad words in school. They just will.

My job as a parent is to help them at appropriate ages understand sex and their bodies and what things are important and what are harmful. Porn becomes part of the discussion, not the focus of the discussion.

I have told my 16 yr old, he can probably assume almost all other members of his priest’s quorum have looked at porn sometime or another. He doesn’t need to fear natural forms of sex, but needs to understand irresponsible behaviors and avoid negative and harmful substances and influences in our lives.

He felt comfortable coming and talking to me about how guilty he felt after a bishop talked to him about it, and made him feel terrible about his feelings. It was good we could talk about the difference between feelings and actions and how to control them. I’m glad he can talk with me. I need to keep that door open.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the responses –

Heber13 wrote:

He felt comfortable coming and talking to me about how guilty he felt after a bishop talked to him about it, and made him feel terrible about his feelings. It was good we could talk about the difference between feelings and actions and how to control them. I’m glad he can talk with me. I need to keep that door open.

I think this is key, being able to have that type of relationship where you can talk openly about these things.

Roy I like your approach – teaching principle based ideas (which is the approach my wife and I have taken as well). I think there are lots of good/practical reasons that can be incorporated into teaching kids about their bodies and about sexuality.

DA, I also agree with a lot of what you said. I don’t feel that we have a good approach to confronting this in the church. We make it so people can’t talk about it (or share a different perspective about it), shame people for their feelings, and tell them to pray it away. I know personally the guilt I felt about some of this stuff growing up caused a lot of problems. I have vowed to make sure my kids understand what the consequences might be (good and bad) for being smart or dumb about these issues, but I will not bog them down with the guilt around this stuff that I experienced as a youth.

Appreciate the perspectives.

-SBRed

[Anonymous]

Roy wrote:

DevilsAdvocate wrote:

It seems like the primary common-sense goal here should simply be to prevent harm and whenever that isn’t entirely possible then at least try to reduce any harm done as much as realistically possible. So one obvious problem with some of the largely unfounded fear and overreactions surrounding the idea of breaking any of these strict chastity rules is that millions of people have already viewed porn/nudity, had pre-marital sex, etc. without ever experiencing very serious, if any, lasting negative consequences as a direct result and this has already been happening over and over again for decades. If there are clearly many if not the overwhelming majority of cases where it doesn’t cause any obvious problems then why isn’t that already good enough?

I think I understand and agree with your premise to a point DA. Except that I do believe that there are very serious and lasting negative consequences being experienced by people everyday. There are STD’s, unwanted pregnancy, abortion, feeling of being used and objectified, betrayal, cheating, etc. There is also real shame/ostracism associated with living in an LDS community as a young person and being known to have had pre-marital sex. These consequences are real. My hope for my children is that they are able to have committed, loving, fulfilling, mature and monagomous relationships. I believe that sexual intimacy should be reserved for select people and situations where this type of relationship is present. I hate that in movies and real life people are having sex with each other before they feel comfortable talking about their feelings and what sex means to them – sounds like a recipe for miscommunication and disappointment to me. I think that intimacy (of which sex is a component) should mean something. This does not preclude pre-marital sex but it does suggest making thoughtful choices about your actions…I largely agree that this whole issue is largely treated in church like the boogeyman and that we should be able have a much healthier dialogue.

I’m not saying there aren’t any potential risks or problems related to pre-marital sex much less infidelity, unrestrained promiscuity, or other crazy stuff that goes on sometimes but there’s a big difference between worst-case scenarios and what actually happens most of the time in real life. I guess I see some of the examples you mention as being similar to the risk of dying in a car crash; basically as scary and real as this threat is it is simply not going to deter most people from driving altogether or even end up being something they worry about that much because most of the time it turns out that they are able to drive to and from wherever they want to go without any problems.

For example, I have known many people that had sex before they were married but so far I haven’t personally known anyone that actually got HIV, gonorrhea, syphilis, etc. in real life. I have seen some examples of unwanted pregnancy but it looks to me like this could have easy been avoided with some simple precautions and if anything the idea that pre-marital sex should never happen actually contributed to these outcomes because people didn’t want to plan on the possibility ahead of time. As far as any emotional scars, regrets, or what is the best way to build a solid, long-term, committed relationship I’m not sure what to think about that but I suspect that in reality it is much more complicated than a case where you can safely assume that abstinence is generally a better idea than pre-marital sex regardless of individual circumstances.

Maybe in an ideal fairy-tale world people would only ever have one romantic relationship their entire lives and be satisfied with this condition but how often does that really happen versus all the times that it simply doesn’t work out that way? It seems to me that breaking up will often be very painful and hard to deal with even if the couple only ever kissed and held hands and I’m not sure how much worse having sex really makes it in most cases if at all. I see obedient TBMs that got married in the temple that are getting divorced left and right, extremely dissatisfied with their marriage, feeling like maybe they should have married someone else instead, etc. and at the same time I see people that lived together before they were married that are still married and doing just as well as anyone else 15-20 years later.

I’m not sure that abstinence is necessarily that important for building stable long-term relationships either; in fact in some cases I think it actually makes marriage even more of a crap-shoot than it already is because there are young adults in the Church that basically don’t really know who they are or what they really want out of life and don’t have much financial stability yet that will rush into marriage based mostly on infatuation because they want to have sex ASAP. I agree that the social pressure and fallout surrounding chastity in the Church is very real but to me that hardly looks like a very good reason for someone that isn’t completely on-board with the Church’s program to play along with this. Actually to me this looks like a good reason to never confess anything to priesthood leaders and keep your personal life relatively private.

My guess is that more Church members lie about chastity than any other temple recommend question (or at least repent really fast and temporarily without ever telling the bishop anything) with the possible exception of dealing honestly with your fellow man and to be honest I don’t blame them because going through the public shaming of not getting married in the temple was not fun and I imagine that confessing to the bishop and going though the whole extended groveling repentance process would be even worse. Personally I feel like the Church has set up their own man-made slippery slope that typically leads directly away from continued activity unless members never deviate very far from the suggested path because it seems like every step of the way there was a convenient and comfortable way to do things and a ridiculously hard and painful way and every single time the Church’s way was the hard way.

[Anonymous]

I think we are largely on the same page DA.

DevilsAdvocate wrote:

I guess I see some of the examples you mention as being similar to the risk of dying in a car crash; basically as scary and real as this threat is it is simply not going to deter most people from driving altogether or even end up being something they worry about that much because most of the time it turns out that they are able to drive to and from wherever they want to go without any problems.

To take your analogy even further I would suggest that in the case of driving there are age requirements, driver’s education courses, there are learner’s permits, driver’s tests, licenses, seat belts, blinkers. Nobody should drive intoxicated – not even once… even if they make it home safely it is irresponsible.

I would hope that my children would abstain from sex when they are too young to make thoughtful decisions about their actions. In my opinion this would include all of high school. I just feel that my kids would be better able to know themselves and who they are compatable with after high school.

DevilsAdvocate wrote:

As far as any emotional scars, regrets, or what is the best way to build a solid, long-term, committed relationship I’m not sure what to think about that but I suspect that in reality it is much more complicated than a case where you can safely assume that abstinence is generally a better idea than pre-marital sex regardless of individual circumstances.

I would be more ok with my kids engaging in a sexual relationship with a long term partner after they are 18 and living on their own. Perhaps the age of 18 is arbitrary and I know that some sections of the brain are still not fully developed but I figure if they are old enough to be paying their own bills they should be trusted to make decisions about their own bodies (and drive cars…hopefully with relative safety ).

There is a statistic that pre-marital sex is linked to later higher divorce rates. There was another study that suggested that pre-marital sex in committed relatively long term relationships (especially when living together as a form of “trial marriage”) did not correlate to later higher divorce rates.

So I guess in general my position can be summarized by saying that I want my kids to work towards stable long term relationships and I believe promiscuos sex would be counterproductive to that purpose.

In any case, I think there is a great argument to be made for preparing our kids to make good decisions regarding sexual activity (similar to driving). I hope to be laying the groundwork for open and honest conversations with my kids about sensitive topics such as this right now. As with any parenting topic, I am doing the best that I can with good intentions – prone to mistakes along the way.

[Anonymous]

If you take God and Satan out of the discussion, you have already lost the battle because you are ignoring the very real spiritual aspect of the issue.

The “practical” arguments against early sexual activity, if approached from a purely secular standpoint, are subjective and can be pretty easily refuted. For example, one could make the point that if nature did not intend for pubescent 12-year-old girls to have sex, why are they pubescent? Furthermore, one could note, in previous eras it was considered normal and acceptable for young pubescent girls to marry and have children. Additionally, one could observe that many 12-year-old girls are more mature and wiser than some 18-year-old boys. So, from a purely secular point of view, one could make a credible case that pubescent 12-year-old girls should be allowed to explore sexual activity.

[Anonymous]

It’s difficult being an Single Adult. I feel like I have been castrated. I see no marriage prospects for me but at the same time I have retained my natural urges.

[Anonymous]

SamBee wrote:

It’s difficult being an SA. I feel like I have been castrated. I see no marriage prospects for me but at the same time I have retained my natural urges.

Sam, I have been there, I have felt like this, and I am sorry.

[Author]

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