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Randy Alcorn: Warning, This Column Is X-Rated
Sex sells. Just ask the folks who produce Viagra or Internet pornography. The more lurid or unusual the sexual behavior, the greater is the interest. The media predictably go into hyper drive over the sexual escapades of celebrities like Tiger Woods or politicians like John Edwards. The various issues involving homosexuality fill the news. Ultimately all the attention is about sexual behavior that both fascinates and disturbs the public.
The obsession with human sexuality and the concomitant consternation it arouses present curious contradictions. Sexuality is as natural to the human species as is hunger and thirst, and judging from the burgeoning growth of human population, there aren’t too many folks who aren’t actively engaged in it. Yet, certain consensual sexual activity and any popular culture that openly depicts human sexuality are regarded as grave threats to civilization.
So grave that we have increasingly allowed government to establish and maintain standards of sexual decency. For example, the Federal Communications Commission, intending to maintain the erection of broadcast decency and to prevent the penetration of civilization-ending immorality into American society, stiffened the penalties for broadcast indecency following the infamous Janet Jackson breast-baring episode during a Super Bowl halftime show. To the profoundly prudish, this incident provided indisputable evidence that the underpinnings of American society were being publicly unfastened by unprincipled broadcasters groping for audience share by appealing to the prurient interests of the morally susceptible.
The protection of children is often the primary justification for determining decency standards. Continuous efforts to expand federal government censorship of broadcast media, including cable, satellite TV and radio, are typically justified by concerns for protecting children from indecent content. Theoretically, exposure to Jackson’s nipple could cause irreparable damage to the psyches of children, but continual exposure to savagely homicidal video games will not. Is viewing a naked body more dangerous to the mental health of children than is their viewing a body being hacked to bits?
Censorship is always an arbitrary undertaking, whether conducted by government or by parents, but in a free society parents are the rightful censors for children, not government. While parental censorship restricts only the children’s freedom of choice, government censorship restricts everyone’s freedom of choice. And government is too easily influenced or controlled by narrow interests and ideologues. It is folly to trust transient elected officials or busy-body bureaucrats with our freedom.
Congregations of theocratic conservatives whose flaccid thinking often renders logic impotent have used government to impose subjective morality on the nation through expanded censorship and untenable restrictions on sex education. The latter denies teenagers access to condoms and insists on sexual abstinence. Sexual abstinence, however, is simply unnatural. American boys and girls reach puberty in their early teens but typically do not marry until their mid- to late twenties. Thrust this hard reality into the tight confines of moral certainty, and it is ludicrously unrealistic to expect these young people, who are at the peak of their libidos, to forgo sex for a decade or more. Celibacy may be a virtue to some, but it is aberration to others.
The entire frame of reference of sexual morality in America is screwy. Americans insist on tolerating the charade of a sexual probity based on antiquated religious moralities selectively applied. Ancient moralists condemned homosexuality as a threat to society because it depressed birth rates that needed to be high to offset high infant mortality rates, but for the same reason had no issue with polygamy.
Today, however, polygamy is an immorality condemned by law. Yet, in most states a man or woman can legally have multiple sex partners, even have children by them, but if he or she is married to more than one of these partners simultaneously it is illegal and immoral. Sequential multiple marriages, however, are OK, as long as each is preceded by an official divorce. Is child welfare any more threatened by polygamy than it is by divorce? It depends on the parents.
Sexual commerce is another issue where the seeds of senselessness are ejaculated. It is not illegal for adult couples to have consensual sex, even if one of them bought the other flowers and a dinner. But, if after sex one of them pays the other cash for the act it is criminal prostitution.
The arguments against prostitution include economic victimization, psychological aberration and disease.
Essentially moralists are contending that those who do not share their ideas of morality must be maladjusted, or victims of economic destitution whose sexual practices threaten public health. But, if prostitution is employment of last resort, the same could be said of any job people take rather than endure abject poverty. And more disease is spread by unclean hands than by genitalia.
The fundamental founding principle of America is freedom, but self-righteous ideologues have been recalibrating that principle to fit a narrow definition based on personal, anachronistic ideas of morality. If adult freedoms are restricted to screen society from possible exposure to everything that moralists consider indecent, our freedom is forfeit.
— Santa Barbara political observer Randy Alcorn can be contacted at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Comments
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» on 02.17.10 @ 07:17 AM
Are you suggesting there should be sexual anarchy, sexual freedom without bounds? There should be no sense of morality? There should be no moral standard for children? Didn’t that happen in the 60’s? Isn’t that what brought us syphilus,etc. AIDS (not spread by unclean hands and quite more devastating then the colds and flu that are) ? Isn’t that what brought us the joys of teen pregnancy, associated child neglect, resulting in gangs etc? Isn’t that what brings us cheating, divorce, associated acts of violence, depression, substance abuse, suicide?
By the way since when were ancient moralists “against homosexuality but ok with polygamy”? What a broad unfounded statement. Doesn’t this depend on just which particular ancient moralist you are talking about? I actually have no idea what a “moralist” is. Was that a profession in times of yesteryear? I expect better from you Randy.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 07:45 AM
Who cares about Tiger? Elin should dump Tiger, and let him join Amway, along with his “girlfriends”, as Amway also screws anything that moves. Amway is a scam, and here’s why: Amway pays out as little money as they can get away with, so they support the higher level IBOs ripping off their downline via the tool scam.
As a result, about 99% of IBOs operate at a net loss, while the top 1% make several TIMES more from their Amway tool scam than from the Amway products. This practice was outlawed in the UK in 2008.
Read about it on my blog, I suggest you start here: http://tiny.cc/D5oJh and forward the information to everyone you know, so they don’t get scammed.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 09:01 AM
Can I get some L.O.C.?
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» on 02.17.10 @ 09:48 AM
It’s hard to take any of your points seriously when the article is littered with pubescent attempts at humorous phrases like:
maintain the erection of broadcast decency and to prevent the penetration of civilization-ending immorality, stiffened the penalties, Thrust this hard reality into the tight confines, publicly unfastened by unprincipled broadcasters groping for audience share, flaccid thinking often renders logic impotent, and seeds of senselessness are ejaculated.
Clever? I think not.
You took a subject that is worthy of serious dicussion and brought it down to the level of Beavis and Butthead.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 10:16 AM
I almost forgot - isn’t that what brings us abortion/babymurder?
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» on 02.17.10 @ 10:18 AM
Isn’t that what brought us crazy mothers that murder their unwanted young via stabbings and dumpster tosses? Rampant unchecked promiscuous sexuality?
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» on 02.17.10 @ 10:24 AM
It is not hard to figure out Randy; if you actually listened to your biology teacher you would know. We are hard wired to like sex, and when you have a sexual orgasm you are hard wired to reinforce the behavior that produced it. The hard wiring comes after millions of years of evolution where natural selection has encoded sexual behavior into our genes. So, in that context one could say that any sexual behavior that does not produce offspring is bad and should be weeded out (just throwing you Darwinists out there a bone). So why don’t we? Because we treat sex like a drug and we have become drug addicts. The addiction is reinforced by the very genetic code that reinforces sexual behaviors for survival reasons whether we do it for that or not.
So, yes Randy we need to look at our addiction and decide if we are really serving our species well by dismissing it. Religions and some cultures have already figured this one out and even though they did not have the advantage of modern biology they still saw the consequences of addictive behavior socially. That is why sex is taboo, rape is bad, homosexuality is useless and you should be married (to the opposite sex) and wait until you want children before you have sex. All very logical from an evolutionary natural selection Darwinist point of view. Does that mean hating homos, masturbation or casual sex between consenting adults should be banned? Of course not. But making up all kinds of excuses for bathing your brain in endorphins and oxytocin because you don’t want to admit to an addiction problem is not only stupid but dangerous. We let the cat out of the bag in the sixties because we could not believe old social norms regarding sex were of any use to an “enlightened” culture. Unfortunately, we failed to realize that much of the taboo toward sex was out of millennia of disasters as a result of not having those taboos. Chalk one up for good old intellectual narcissism; we’re too damned smart to listen to the voices of the past, which ensures we will repeat all of our past mistakes.
So have all the sex you want, but if your purpose is not making babies then you better have that nagging question aching in the back of your head, “I’m I just using organs meant for procreation as a drug?”
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» on 02.17.10 @ 11:01 AM
What is your point, calm down.
Syphilis has been around for hundreds of years and so has teen pregnancy, cheating, divorce, child neglect, violence, depression, substance abuse, suicide etc. etc. etc. There will always be “Rampant unchecked promiscuous sexuality” in all cultures, whether someone writes a lame article about it or not.
Instill your values in your own children. That’s about all you can do about it. Maybe volunteer to work with kids and inflict your judgment on them. Neither this article nor your rant is going to make any difference.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 12:27 PM
These prudish moralizers below are the very thing you are talking about, Randy! and it is their puerile, simplistic and superstitious views of sex that are why we are so messed up in the first place.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 12:52 PM
For the record, I agree with most of what he said. I just thought the childish attempts at bodily humor were a distraction from what could have been a thought provoking article.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 03:05 PM
A terrific aticle by Randy Alcorn with interesting and very clever use of words.I have long enjoyed the writings of Randy and always look forward to his next column. Keep up the great work Randy and thanks to Noozhawk for carrying his articles.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 07:49 PM
As Scottish comedian Billy Connoly (sp?) once said “The problem with Americans is that they act as though they just discovered sex yesterday”. (Or words to that effect)
What I find funny is that on the “E” channel there are many references to sex yet they blur out the unmentionable body parts.
Here is some more irony: There are people who have made a career out of getting naked and having sex on the R/X-rated screen yet if those same people go skinny dipping or simply enjoy laying naked on the beach they will be fined—if not arrested. Go figure.
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» on 02.17.10 @ 10:33 PM
Yes, CW - those things have been around for centuries, and so has rampant unchecked promiscuous sexuality. Does that mean we lower the standards or give children higher standards to appeal to, even if they don’t make it?
Randy claims:
” it is ludicrously unrealistic to expect these young people, who are at the peak of their libidos, to forgo sex for a decade or more.”
Yet somehow, millions of us have managed to do just that. I forewent sex until 21, I am sure there are those among us who have forgone it until later in life. So, it really is not in fact “ludicrously unrealistic” but that must depend on your context of peers (those you hang out with).
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» on 02.18.10 @ 01:59 PM
What’s your point, thanks for making my case for me. I don’t want government, religion or my mother telling me how to live but I also recognize that many of our traditions and taboos were built on recognizing our human weaknesses. Waiting to have sex until marriage for the express purpose of procreation was not done because human beings became prudish over the years but as a result of the social chaos experienced when people fornicated for nothing but pleasure, out of wedlock births, STDs, broken homes and misery, the kinds of crap you would expect from people who treat a bodily function like a drug. Yes we still want to do it and we will look for any reason possible to rationalize the desire but the bottom line is the bottom line and you can never get away from the consequences. So lighten up Randy, we need a little prudishness sometimes if for no other reason than to protect the one and true purpose of sex those wonderful children the act produces. Remember it’s not about you and your desires but about them and the survival of our species.
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» on 02.19.10 @ 04:14 PM
One a serious note..
I’ve observed a lot of people in my life and it’s clear to me that the one’s who practice lifetime monogamy are the happiest.
A cursory glance at the plethora of rock stars and Hollywood celebrities shows that while these people can sleep with whoever they want, they never seem to be content. Tiger Woods is a perfect example of someone who simply cannot be satisfied. I cited in another blog that Paul McCartney—whose fame and fortune and ability to attract women are off the charts—figured out as a young man that marital monogamy was better than waking up with someone you’d just met yesterday. Same thing with (Believe it or not) Alice Cooper. The issue isn’t about morality or religion, but about simple anthropology.
Look at the average celebrity couple and look at some middle aged couple back in the midwest who have been married for 30 years and you’ll find a lot less stress in the latter case.
One more thing: If someone lacks the maturity to be able to commit to a marriage, then they should not drag kids into their dysfunctional lives. Why should these kids have to compete with the various lovers and step-parents their parents bring into their lives for their parents’ attention? How many kids leave home early because their mom’s boyfriend or their dad’s new wife didn’t want them getting in the way of their agenda?
The “Follow your bliss” mantra has been tried and has turned out to be disastrous. Being content with what you have makes more sense than spending one’s life in a quest for the greener patch of grass on the other side of the fence.
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