“sex is the most awful, filthy thing on Earth, and you should save it for someone you love”

So, I was doing some much overdue blog surfing… and went to one of my favorite blogs – http://parentingbeyondbelief.com/blog/, and I happened to see a post called: “sex and the balls of the evangelical”, and the following quote at the top of the page really cracked me up.

“Life in Lubbock, Texas taught me two things: One is that God loves you and you’re going to burn in hell. The other is that sex is the most awful, filthy thing on Earth, and you should save it for someone you love.“  –Butch Hancock, country singer/songwriter

Now, I don’t really know Butch Hancock’s work – but, this quote alone was enough to make me want to run out and buy his CD.  LOL

The rest of the blog post there was also verrrry interesting…  talking about the latest trend with many Christians – „Purity Balls“.  I love Dale McGowan’s take on this…   so go there and read it:  http://parentingbeyondbelief.com/blog/?p=235 . 

However, it wasn’t so much the Purity Balls, but the general topic of sex and religious outlooks on it that really hit home with me today. 

It just so happens that today I am recovering from yesterday and the night before…  when I discovered that my 11 year old son had been going on to some not-so-kid-friendly websites recently.  To put it bluntly – I discovered that when I thought he was doing his homework on my computer – he was actually looking at naked women. 

The poor boy wasn’t smart enough to cover his tracks…  and didn’t realize that his dear old mom knows a thing or two about computers.  So, it was easy to see that he started off searching for things like, “women’s underwear”, and  “see through underwear“  and  “games with naked chicks in them”…  which worked it’s way up to “naked women“, and “big boobs“…. and unfortunately those led to some fairly hardcore websites. 

I       was       shocked. 

Mortified. 

I literally never thought in a million years that he was even thinking about girls yet!  Which, I realize is pretty stupid of me.  I was mad at myself for not putting that porn filter“ back on my PC.  I actually just got a new computer fairly recently and am still getting it set up – and hadn’t gotten around to the porn filtering software yet. 

So, here I was… kicking myself in the ass for not seeing this coming… and also mortified and shocked by what he had seen.  I was worried about him.  Ok.  I admit it, this was as close to panicky as I’ve felt in a long time.  

I called my husband and rambled on somewhat frantically.  How could he have done this?  How could I have been so stupid to think he wouldn’t do this?  What did he think about what he saw?  Was he going to be ruined for life now?!?  

My head was spinning. 

Our kids had already gone to bed… which was a good thing because I was half ready to freak out at him…  and I knew that, really, that was the last thing I wanted to do… or should do.  I needed to calm down. 

So, my husband and I talked… and he said, he would talk to our son the next day after school.  It was his day to get him off the bus, so that worked out well.  We agreed that we didn’t want to make this into an already bigger deal than it was… that we didn’t want to yell and scream or freak out on our son about this. 

We wanted to let him know it was natural to be curious…  find out how he felt… what he thought about things he saw… did he have questions?  At the same time I wanted to let him know that while sex is natural and not a bad thing…  still, what you see on websites is not really “natural”, or “real”, and that it was easy to wind up on websites that even grown ups shouldn’t be looking at… and that people can do and post really bad things on-line,  kids and people can get hurt… and that people can even go to jail.. blah blah blah.  All this, while still not freaking him out or making him feel like he is a terrible kid.  We agreed that we would use this as a chance try to open the doors for communication and see if he has any questions or what he wants to know…  but, also let him know he can’t do it again…  (especially since NOW I have the filtering software back up!).  

So, two nights ago, I spend a good portion of the night searching thru my computer and my husband’s laptop…  talking to my husband about it… and researching on-line just what the best way to handle this might be.  What is “normal“?  (as IF I don’t know there IS NO normal, by now).  I even wound up ordering a couple books on-line.  One to give my son that talks about puberty and changes…. and one for my husband and I that talked about talking to your kids about sex. 

I then went to work yesterday and worried most of the day about this.  I couldn’t help it.  All I could think was, “I am SO not ready for puberty with my son! When did my little baby grow up?“. 

I wondered how my husband would approach him?   If my son would deny it or not?   Would my husband be able to make the points we discussed?  I mean, my husband is a great guy, but he’s not really known for his communication skills.  Could he even bring up the things we discussed?  I was worried… but, I also knew this talk was better coming from him.  Besides, my husband has a great way of handling big issues really calmly and rationally…  (it’s the little things that send him over the deep end). 

So, I worked… and I worried myself sick all day yesterday.   

I called home around 4pm yesterday.. figuring by then they should have talked… and I had to know how it went before I headed home from work.  I wanted to know what I’d be coming home to.  My husband told me calmly and rationally how it went.  It went smooth.  No denial.  Some embarrassment.  No yelling.  Some discussion.  Rules were made.  Lines of communication were opened.  Computer privileges were taken away temporarily. 

This sounded a lot easier than I thought it was going to be.  It sounded like no big deal.  Was that a good thing??  It is, right?  I was torn.

I still felt nervous about coming home.  How would my son look me in the eye?  How would I look him in the eye?  How should I act? 

I walked thru the door, and my 11 year old son playfully tried to surprise me, like he always does.  “Boo!”, he shouted as he jumped out and ran past me.  I looked at him curiously.  He started telling me about his school project.  Nothing unusual.  He was all smiles.  Chattering on.  I saw no sign of guilt.  No shame.  I hid my confusion and listened on. 

After a while, I couldn’t take it…  I said quietly to him, “so, I heard your father had a long talk with you”.  He looked down and said, “yes”, a little embarrassed.  A little guilty.  But, no more so than when he got caught lying to me about something stupid.  I said, “OK.  Well, he told me what he said… and,  so I’m not going to lecture you or anything” (A look of relief on his face appears).  “Your father and I both know it’s natural to be curious – but, we need you to know that you can’t be going to those websites, right?”  (right).  “Ok – well – we can talk more later…  and if you have any questions you let Dad or me know, ok?“  - (OK). 

That was it.  ??  Two minutes later he was back to himself.   Talking.  Playing.  He certainly didn’t look scarred for life or anything.  I thought, at first, that maybe he was deliriouslyhappy… relieved that we didn’t kill him or anything. 

Then, I thought about how my parents, especially my mother, talked about sex to me when I was a kid.  Sex was evil.  Nasty.  Disgusting.  Something “bad“ kids and bad people did…  even talking about it or saying the word was bad.  Hell, even THINKING about it was BAD.  If I had been caught doing anything like my son was doing, I never would have heard the end of it.  I think I would have contemplated suicide if I knew they had seen the same naked pics I was looking at.  I would have felt so ashamed.  Of course, this mindset didn’t stop me from being curious or seeing things I shouldn’t have seen.  It just made me feel tremendously guilty about them for years…

No wonder I was so freaked out and worried about my son!   I was putting myself in his shoes – or putting him in MY old shoes.  ??   It didn’t occur to me until after seeing his reaction that, luckily for him, he is NOT in my old shoes.  No where’s CLOSE to those shoes.  So he has no reason to be panic stricken.  He has never had the evils of sin and lust pounded in his head.  He’s never been taught about the dark powers of the flesh, and how disgusting sex is… or how terrible and weak one must be to indulge…  Or had the kind of fear of hell and judgment instilled in him that I did. 

No.  He knew he did something he wasn’t suppose to do… and was looking at stuff he wasn’t suppose to be looking at.  That’s it.   No, he doesn’t know (and hopefully will never know) how terrible it is to have such much fear and guilt over something so natural.   If nothing else, I did something right when I threw out those old shoes of mine and didn’t put any other kids in them…

This taught me a bit about myself too.  Just how much I was affected (and still am) by the way I was brought up.  I mean, my reaction was like a knee-jerk one… and it took all my self control, common sense, rational, and my husband to keep it in check.  I still had to live through it to really feel that it was okay.  And, today was a whole new day and it doesn’t seem like so big of a deal at all.  This confirmed to me how I need to be careful not to carry  the unwanted, but so ingrained, feelings and reactions over to my own children.  

Oh yeah.. and it taught me that I need to install a porn blocker!

~smj

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Oooh… why do I bother?

I somehow (tag surfing) accidentally ended up on a blog the other night called “The Ultimate Goal”,  specifically a post entitled “Why Atheism Does Not Exist”.

Some young man there, Adam Smith, was basically preaching the old “let no man be without an excuse” (for going to hell, that is) argument – because he claims that ALL people, miraculously, really DO believe in God.

Yeah.. okay…
Tell that not only to all the atheists, agnostics, but also to all the people of other religions who don’t believe in the same god as his bible.  Not to mention all the third world people who don’t have the energy or time of day to learn about God because they are too busy starving to death. Apparently, they ALL KNOW they are wrong… and are either living in denial, or because they are just plain defying God on purpose and don’t WANT to follow his rules.  I guess, that latter bunch must relish the idea of a permanent retirement home in a a firey eternal pit of torment. 

Anyway – I don’t know why I bothered to respond… when, I know it is useless – but, I did.  Twice.  Basically, telling him he was wrong.  You can imagine how well that worked.  LOL 

I don’t know why I bother?  I guess, there’s some small part of me, that hopes common sense and common curtousy will prevail. It seems it never does in these type situations.  So, I supose I am foolish for thinking it ever will.

I mean, how do you reason with someone who thinks THEY have ALL the answers… even so far as to tell others what THEY really think. ??? (not to mention someone who would try to prove their point by comparing the reality of Hell to the reality of an electric chair.  Huh?).

My comments on his blog sparked a few others….
Some christians wanting to save me…  Some patting this kid on the back telling him how great he’s doing preaching the gospel.  One nice christian made a comment, with the best intentions, I’m sure that went:

“if we knew the cure for cancer and never told anyone, would that be love? the problem is that no one knows they are sick.”

I wanted to respond by saying,
“What if people only TOLD you that you had cancer, just so that they COULD provide THEIR cure? “.  It’s tempting to elaborate on that… but, I didn’t post it, and won’t bother to because it wouldn’t go anywhere anyway, I’m sure.  

The Adam Smith’s of the world are convinced that people like me are in denial, living a lie, and living in sin and darkness.  If that’s not the pot calling the kettle black…   *sigh*

Ok – I’m done venting for now.  Like I said in my 2nd post on his blog (and last) – I’m over it. 

~smj

Is Disney evil??

A friend of mine emailed me today regarding being worried that her brother in law has gone over the deep end with religion.  This is interesting, since this friend is a fairly new convert to Christianity herself.  Yet, even she see’s there’s something not right here…  She said that she came back from a visit with her family for the holidays.  And, that her brother in law is becoming more and more religious.  She said she couldn’t help to think about all the stories I had told her about growing up with my mom. 

One of the things she was upset about was that her young neice and nephew were not going to be allowed to play with most of the presents she and her parents had bought them.  She said they are probably all in the garbage by now.  Apparently, Disney is evil…. and they are not allowed to watch Disney movies or play with Disney items because they have witches and evil spells. ? She said they are afraid to watch anything, and my friend thought this was all a bit extreme.  She asked if my mother was the same way about stuff like that when I was a kid, etc. 

I wrote back:  

My first reaction when I read your note was a deep sigh and a sad feeling for the kids.  It’s a terrible thing to live with so much damn fear of everything all the time… and that’s what it is.  Fear.  Fear of hell.  Fear of anything “evil”.  Fear that you are not doing what God wants.  It’s ridiculous.   

So, she won’t let their kids watch Disney?  Come on.  Does she know the witches are PRETEND!!?!?.  It’s a freaking STORY people.  And, not for nothing, but do you know how many gory, violent, and sexually deviant stories there are in the bible??  You don’t hear about those ones as much.   I’m sorry.. I know it’s suppose to be “the good book”… but, there’s a lot in there that I don’t particularly want to have to go into detail with my kids anytime soon.  And talk about scary.  ??  What about all the sacrifices, demons and devils, HELL, daughters sleeping with fathers, babies being slaughtered, famine, plagues, wars.  Sheesh! 

But, unfortunately, I am not TOO surprised either.  Because, yes  – My mother was like that.  She saw evil in EVERYTHING. I’ve often joked about how we could be watching the old 50’s sitcom “Happy Days”, and she would walk in right when someone kissed or something – and she’d say “THAT’s DISGISTING!!”.   

I laugh now… but, it was rather nerve-wrecking when I was a kid.  It’s terrible to always be on the lookout for evil lurking around every corner… to feel like you’re always doing something “bad”, “wrong”, ”disgusting”, or “sinning”.  I always had one finger on the channel changer on the TV and on my radio in case my mother walked in.  

When you are really young – you believe everything your parents tell you… and you naturally want to please them.  What happens when you can’t?  I was afraid and worried a lot.  As I got older and more skeptical (thanks to my atheist father and common sense), even though I didn’t believe everything my mother did… I still was always worried about how she would interpret things, or what she would think about something (or me).  It forced me to still see everything as “evil” – knowing how SHE thought.  Talk about living on egg-shells.  For young children, this is abusive – if you ask me.  Intentional or not.   

Since you asked… if I were you – I would probably try to talk to my brother.  Ask what he thought.  How or why he was “okay” with the things that I thought were pretty “out there”.  Tell him how I felt and saw things… what worried me and why.  Take it from there. 

When it comes to something I think is really important – I tend to prefer to speak my mind with the hopes that it MIGHT help… and knowing I at least “tried”… even if there’s a bigger chance that it might just tick someone off.  But, that’s me….  and I have a big mouth.  Actually, that was how my Dad was… and my brother’s are to… so, it probably would make it easier for me to approach them.   

Although, I remember having it out with my one brother once –  years ago. They were on the verge of a divorce, and while I didn’t really want to get involved, I felt like I needed to try to help.  It was not easy even for me to talk to him that time because I knew he didn’t like what I had to say… and it didn’t go over well at the time… and we did get in a big fight.  I do think it actually helped in the long run and am glad I did it.  But, yeah… it doesn’t always help… and there probably were times I should have just kept my mouth shut.  Still… never stops me.   

Maybe I can call you later… 

 

I am almost afraid to call her.  I doubt highly she will actually try to reason with her brother, and doubt even more that even if she does that it will help.  I almost am afraid to talk to her on such matters, because I figure it’s a matter of time before her family or Christian friends tell her that she shouldn’t even BE talking to me since I’m not Christian and therfore can’t help her. 

UGH

I can’t help going back to my initial reaction to her words…”a deep sigh, and feeling sad for the kids”.

  ~smj

A lil comedy break…

Ok – This is a little crude humor from Margaret Cho…. called, “These Christian Groups Have Lost Their Minds”. In the below clip she is covering so much of what my friend and I were recently debating…   I couldn’t help but laugh… a lot…. cause… ya know…sometimes… I like crude rude humor… and she was totally making my points… but, in a much more humorous way… LOL

I want so bad to send this to my friend…. but, I won’t… because I know it would offend her… and I don’t think that she is like this… or that ALL Christians are… but… ummmm…  I’ve met my fair share that have made me feel like this.  

So, if you are Christian…. don’t watch it… I’m not looking to offend anyone… but, if you’re like me? You might get a kick a laugh from this…