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Casual sex.

I was asked recently why I’m opposed to casual sex.

I’ll tell you:

The purpose of sex is twofold: procreation and unity (spiritually, emotionally, biologically). A lot of people among the people who disagree with that embrace an assumption that we who believe sex is for babies and bonding don’t also believe sex should be pleasurable. That assumption is false. Sex should, in fact, be pleasurable (spiritually, emotionally, biologically) — yes, even according to we who believe sex is for babies and bonding.

But we who believe sex is for babies and bonding also believe the following:

1. We aren’t supposed to decide to unite because uniting is pleasurable. We are supposed to experience the pleasure because we decided to unite permanently.

2. When sex is as it should be, it isn’t about getting. It’s about giving.

And we don’t take that lightly. Both the unity and the procreation imply that sex should be selfless.

In uniting, sex is meant to be selfless: Each person gives self to the other, turning two into one. It’s at once a metaphor for the marriage covenant and a reflection of Christ’s covenant with the church. Procreation also requires selflessness: If sex partners make a baby, each person gives of self to and for the child, before and after the child is born.

In our culture, unity (the biological part of it) happens in multiple contexts:

  • marital sex
  • pre-marital sex (the partners intend to marry each other)
  • non-marital sex (the partners either don’t necessarily intend to marry each other, definitely don’t intend to marry each other or haven’t gotten that far in their thoughts about the future)
  • extra-marital sex (one or both of the partners is married, and neither partner is married to the other)

Mostly within the contexts of non-marital and extra-marital sex, the sex might just be casual. Casual could mean no strings attached, no commitment. It could be a “friends with benefits thing,” or an “I just met you” thing. It is, in any case, “happening by chance, without serious intention, careless or offhand, apathetic,” according to dictionary.com.

By default, to engage in sex that is casual is to be closed off to the possibility for procreation. Few who have casual sex are ok with it if it results in the making and subsequent co-parenting of a baby, in other words. Also by default, to engage in casual sex is to take sex lightly. And since the purpose of casual sex is not procreation and unity, the purpose of casual sex is pleasure, be it physical or emotional or both. But whether one, the other or both, the sex, therefore, is self-focused.

It’s a decision to unite temporarily because uniting is pleasurable.

It isn’t about giving. It’s about getting.

And when sex is about getting, sex is distorted. It becomes mutual use.

And to use your partner is to turn your partner from “person” to “object.”

And to objectify someone is to rob him or her of what comes standard with hearts and souls:

dignity.

And that is why I’m opposed to casual sex.

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Abortion, contraception and egocentrism.

A day or two before the start of winter break, my high school class congregated in our English teacher’s classroom. We were freshmen. From her desk, the teacher described for us the food she planned to prepare for her family’s impending Christmas dinner.

“Our turkey is already thawing,” she said.
I shook my head and furrowed my brow and my jaw probably dropped.
“A turkey?” I laughed. “Who eats turkey on Christmas?”
I scanned the room and waited for signs of solidarity from my (now awkwardly) silent classmates.
One of them finally spoke.
“Um… everyone?”
Taken aback, I couldn’t concoct a response. Everyone eats turkey on Christmas? I thought. No way.
Somebody else had to ask: “What do you eat on Christmas?”
“Lasagna…” I said. “I thought everyone did!” 
Red in the face but a good sport about it, the incident ended in laughter. I’ve shared the story before, but it warrants a retelling, as it’s a great illustration of egocentrism. Egocentric describes a person when he or she lives like what’s normal for him or her is (or should be) normal for everyone, like the way he or she perceives something is how something is (or should be) universally perceived. So it’s egocentric, for instance, to assume that because my family eats lasagna on Christmas, all families eat lasagna on Christmas.
Egocentrism is normal in childhood and adolescence. Kids still have a lot to learn.
Apparently, so do adults.
Twice today, I stumbled upon online commentary — one post about abortion and one post about contraception — written by people whose opinions on both are, basically, the exact opposite of mine. To sum up both arguments, the abortion writer asserted that consenting to sex is not consenting to pregnancy and that because sex and procreation are disconnected in our culture now, we ought to treat them like they should be. The contraception writer asserted that a woman deserves the right to control her fertility and any other perspective (i.e. that of my church) is an assault on people who have vaginas.
(For the record, I have one, and I do not feel assaulted.)
But to the point:
I’m reminded of some of the people I’ve encountered whose opinions also oppose the aforementioned two — the people who hold up signs with pictures of aborted babies on them, who picket in effort to see Roe v. Wade reversed, who say bad things to and about the women who choose to use the pill.
There’s always been, and always will be, a lot of argument between both sides.
Like…
“It’s just a bunch of cells.” v. “It has a soul.”
and
“Sex is recreational.” v. “Sex is for babies and bonding.”
You catch my drift.
Well I’ve reached a point at which I’m pretty frustrated with both sides.
Why?
Because of egocentrism.
Because you have the half who believe it’s just a bunch cells telling the half that believes it’s a baby that abortion ain’t no thang because it’s just a bunch of cells. You have the half who believe it’s “my body, my choice” telling the half that believes our bodies are not our own that we should be pro-choice because these are our bodies and therefore our choices.
Then you have the half that believes a baby in utero has as much value as the woman in whose uterus it grows telling the half that believes if it’s in utero it isn’t a baby… that abortion is wrong because it results in the death of a baby. You have the half that believes “it’s ok to have sex when you’re not fertile, but it’s not ok to turn off your own fertility” because it turns sex from selfless (as it should be) to self-focused telling the half that doesn’t believe sex should be selfless that we ought not to control our fertility, lest we turn sex into a selfish act.
In other words, you have a bunch of people saying “Because I believe X, you should live your life like X is true.”
So basically, you have a bunch of people living like what’s normal for them (like the belief that what’s inside a pregnant woman’s uterus is a baby) should be normal for everyone, and like the way he or she perceives something (that sex is recreational, for instance) is how it should be universally perceived.
And there are two hunches I have about this.
1. That there is an incredible lack of empathy for each other on both sides.
Try for a second to see the world through the eyes of somebody whose opinion is the opposite of yours. Because if I believed what’s inside a pregnant woman’s uterus is just a bunch of cells, I’d think abortion ain’t no thang, too. And if you believed what’s inside her uterus is a baby — no matter how small — your heart would break, too, every time you hear about an abortion. Stop arguing and start talking. Say, “I feel this way because I believe X.” Invite the person who disagrees with you to empathize with you, and offer them empathy, too — even if they don’t. It goes a long way.
and
2. That on both sides, this is actually less of a fight for rights and more of a set of impassioned efforts to turn the world into one where believing what you believe will be easy.
I only can speak for my side — that is, the side that is for neither abortion nor contraception — when I say this, but I have seen so much judgment and so little modeling. If we are going to be pro-life, we ought to be pro-life consistently. What is life-giving about wearing a grim reaper costume outside an abortion clinic? What is life-giving about parading across a college campus with pictures of aborted babies? And why is it that we really fight for the reversal of Roe v. Wade? “Too many abortions” is not the problem. Abortion is a symptom, and the reversal of Roe v. Wade would be a Band Aid. So do we fight for its reversal because we want to see an end to abortion, or is it because we want the world to validate what we believe?
Do we engage in wars with each other because we’re trying to change the world for the better, or because we’re trying to change the world into us?
Do we want laws and institutions to cater to us because we’re right and they’re wrong, or because we’re dying to live where it’s always safe to believe what we believe?
(Note to self: it’s never gonna be.)
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Cell phone shopping.

Friday night, I stopped at my cell phone service provider’s store, with plans to purchase a new phone.

“Something better than this,” I said.

I held my flip phone up for the store manager, who had greeted me upon my walking into the store.

“Anything’s better than that,” said the manager, who — using an iPad or comparable tablet — sent my name to the next available salesperson, and smirked.

I laughed, and recited the list of what I want and don’t in a phone.

“Preferably one that doesn’t flip open, but I’m flexible,” I said. “I don’t text. And I don’t want a phone that requires a data plan.”

“Follow me,” he said.

We wandered through a maze of displays to the “Basic Phones” kiosk at the center of the store.

“You can pick any of these,” he said.

I had my pick…

of exactly six phones.

Only one of them sturdy, none of them sleek, and none for under a hundred bucks. Of fifty phones in the store (give or take), the folks who refuse to use the internet on phones are forced to choose from six crappy options.

In truth, I am part of an overwhelmingly outnumbered minority for my age and country. We, the phone users who only use phones as phones and whose phones are routinely mocked by salespeople in cell phone stores, can’t expect the cell phone world to cater to us. But I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t sting a little to know my options are forever limited. I think we’ve reached a point at which basic phone users are largely coerced into switching to smart phones, not just for their apps and their looks but their quality. And I wonder whether we’ll eventually reach a day on which my options cease to exist, when “cell phone” and “smart phone” are synonymous, after the demand for basic phones is so small manufacturers stop creating them.

I shudder at the thought. (Click here if you don’t already know why.)

So Friday night, I left the cell phone store empty handed.

I’m keeping my good, old fashioned flip phone.

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The escalator.

I rolled my giant suitcase off the cruise ship into a Port of Miami corridor, toward the elevator lobby.

A crowd of other cruisers congregated in front of the lone elevator that led downstairs to customs. The crowd fell into a long line, dragging their big bags and tucking their Border Patrol forms into their passports. I would have followed suit. But I saw an escalator.

An escalator without a line.

So in one fist, I held my passport, my floppy beach hat and my purse. I wrapped the other around my giant suitcase’s handle. And at the top of the down escalator, I stepped on, expecting physics or science or magic to require the giant suitcase to trail behind me.

But the suitcase didn’t trail. It tipped, and fell forward, just shy of onto the escalator. In the process, physics or science or magic required my fist to release its grip on the suitcase’s handle. And while I descended toward customs, I watched my giant suitcase — now blocking the entrance to the down escalator — become smaller and smaller and smaller.

Which is when I shouted the only word I quickly concluded to be appropriate upon accidental abandonment of giant suitcase:

“HELP!”

As it turns out, it takes a special set of skills to drag a giant suitcase onto a down escalator. A set of skills I don’t possess.

A witness to my plight, the port authority employee at the top of the down escalator pulled on my suitcase and put it upright.

Which is when I pulled the only stunt I quickly concluded to be appropriate upon accidental abandonment of giant suitcase:

An upward climb on a downward-bound escalator.

As it turns out, it takes a special set of skills to run up a down escalator. A set of skills I don’t possess.

I tripped.

And I fell.

And on my hands and knees, I watched my giant suitcase become even smaller.

I still have bruises.

– – – – –

This post is part of a series of true stories, called “True Story.” Click here to read all the posts in the series.