A friend who gets the NYTimes' RSS feed forwards this crackpot Times blog post by Judith Warner, in which she draws a moral equivalence between Muslim women who feel compelled to have hymen surgery to "revirginize" themselves before marriage, and the "purity balls" some Evangelicals have, to celebrate female virginity.
Then Warner goes on to say that it's "only a matter of degree" between those purity balls and the berserker in Austria who imprisoned his daughter for over two decades and raped her, and fathered children with her.
Perhaps having a flicker of awareness that associating ordinary Evangelicals with a beast like Josef Fritzl is, you know, bats**it crazy, Warner writes:
I don't mean to imply that there's any equivalency between Josef Fritzl's acts and the Purity Ball. Fritzl's actions were uniquely horrific, and I am not accusing the men who danced in Colorado Springs of any crimes. But there is nonetheless a kind of horror to their obsession with their daughters' sexuality. There is a dangerous boundary violation contained in their vow "before God to cover my daughter as her authority and protection in the area of purity." And there is even greater danger to the fact that this particular aspect of the nationwide "abstinence movement" has not been broadly denounced as the form of emotional violence against girls that it indisputably is.
This is, frankly, insane. Judith Warner is declaring any Jew, Christian or Muslim who believes in his or her religion's moral teachings regarding sex and sexuality to be not just mistaken, but abusive. Besides which, this post just goes to show that certain members of the cultural left will twist themselves into any logical knot imaginable to portray orthodox Christians as monsters.
Add to Del.icio.us
Add to Technorati
Add to Digg
Add to Newsvine
Add to Facebook
Add to StumbleUpon
Subscribe
Ooohhhh...all this agreement is making my head hurt! ;-)
I have just one thing to add to the mutual admiration society burdgeoning right before my eyes. As the father of two daughters and a son, I considered it my obligation to give them the best example of fatherhood I could come up with. In my view, best includes making mistakes, rectifying them and learning to not make those mistakes again.
In my experience, teenagers are perfect scientists: they require exemplary proof of a thing before they will let down their anti-parent bias and believe what the parent says about that thing. In that category, nothing is more effective (I have found) than a sincere been-there done-that here's the scar to prove it.
One scar I have was given to me by the stereotyped jealous father. I'll spare you the details, but when my eldest was 9 I sat her down in front of a witness (my wife) and swore to her an oath: I will never be a jealous father. Your friends will be made welcome in my house, no matter what I might feel about any one of them.
My son got the friends/welcome part without the rest. Our younger daughter heard stories growing up, and all I had to say to her was "it all goes for you as well."
I've made mistakes. I have arguments and fights with my children. There are days when we mutually can't stand the sight of the other. But in the end, I can say "mission accomplished", because my children know exactly what integrity means, and any friend of theirs who proves to lack it is bidden goodbye without a second glance. They understand about choices and consequences; they define being grown up as facing consequences without hesitation, and doing their best. Chastity, purity, all of that becomes secondary, because they have integrity.
I am very proud of them, especially since they've begun to improve on my examples.
I'm feeling a lot of love here.
And as the father of a young daughter, I want to associate myself with this remark cited above: "Probably the strongest role, imo, for fathers with daughters would be one where the daughter becomes so completely accustomed to having her person/feminity respected that she would accept nothing less."
Happy father's day, all.
Those were great posts Franklin and Max. I hope I can manage the good Father thing one day soon.
Oh and commenting on who is and who isn't a bully, why don't Mark and Arthur just get a measuring tape and figure out who is more of a man that way, or perhaps have their fathers fight ;).
Happy Fathers Day!
Chris
I leave ALL declarations of bullyhood to Sig. ;-)
Post a Comment
By submitting these comments, I agree to the beliefnet.com terms of service, rules of conduct and privacy policy (the "agreements"). I understand and agree that any content I post is licensed to beliefnet.com and may be used by beliefnet.com in accordance with the agreements.