Sex on Campus

Note - I know I have a few friends out there whose kids read my blog from time to time, so just to be forewarned, there are a couple of places in this post that lean toward being PG-13.  Just thought I would let you know in case you want to read this first.

I went to college in the 80's which, when it comes to sexual mores, certainly weren't the 50's, but neither were they the 00's. Sexual activity could be had for those who wanted it and there was plenty of "hooking up" going on, but most of it was in the context of a dating relationship.

However, there were times when I would get a bit shocked. One evening I was doing laundry in the dorm laundry room and this guy I had never met came over to me and said that his girlfriend was up in his room and she had brought a friend of hers who was a nymphomaniac, and did I want to come up. Much to his surprise I said "no thank you," and he was incredulous. He went away shaking his head probably thinking I was gay, not knowing that in actuality I was something far worse - a right wing religious fundamentalist zealot Christian. 

I forgot about that incident until a few years later when I was a youth minister. We took the youth group to a weekend conference on dating by a well known youth worker. At one point in the weekend he explained the current situation - that we all know that kids are having sex, but most of us thought it was happening in the context of dating relationships. Not so anymore he said, now students were into hooking up. On any given night, high school kids might have multiple partners, going from party to party and person to person.

After that session I spoke to a couple of girls in the youth group, who were leaders and asked if that happened in their school. I must have had a look on my face that said "nah, probably not - that's the kind of thing that happens in the big city, not a small town in Florida." One of them replied "Dave, where have you been, that's exactly what happens in our school. Everybody's screwing everybody - they go to one party and have sex with one person and then to another party and another person." 

All of these memories came back to me when I read the article Dorm Brothel in Christianity Today by Vigen Guroian. He contrasts his own college experience at the University of Virginia in the sixties with the college experience of kids he teaches today at Loyola College in Baltimore. Even though the sixties were the era of sexual liberation there was still a tension in society. It was still en vogue to be a "nice girl," and many of the guys had an internal struggle between being a gentleman and Don Juan. Gentleman dated the 'nice girls" and treated them like a lady, and Don Juan's dated the "loose" girls and treated them like whores. Don Juan won out many times but at least there was a struggle. Furthermore, even the Don Juan's wanted to marry nice girls and would revert to their gentlemanly ways when it came to pursuing a partner.

Not so anymore, and by the way I realize that I am not telling anyone anything they don't already know. It's just that Guroian writes about this in such a way as to move us to truly lament the way things are. Here is his description of a recent interaction with a student: 

I recently gave a lecture at Loyola on Brave New World. During the question-and-answer period, there was a brief discussion about the similarities of dormitory life with Brave New World. I opined that whatever the resemblances, there is a clear difference between the two: Sexual promiscuity and hooking up among college students is voluntary, I said, whereas in Brave New World this behavior is mandatory. A young woman and dormitory resident adviser walked up to me afterwards and chided me: "Dr. Guroian, you are mistaken about that. The peer pressure and the way things are set up make promiscuity practically obligatory. It doesn't matter what the school says officially. The rules are to be broken. This freedom can make girls dizzy and unsure of whatever else they believe about 'saving oneself' for marriage. When it seems like everyone else is 'doing it,' it is hard to say no. It is more like Brave New World here than you think. I deal with it or, more frequently, turn my eyes from it, every day as an RA."

The same student later wrote about what is actually going on at Loyola and other campuses.

It may not be that dating is at the brink of extinction, but … it has taken a back seat in the modern-day lives of students. Hooking up, going out, going steady, and dating, contrary to what some may think, are not the same thing. … If you are "going out" with someone it means that you have a boyfriend or a girlfriend, you are in a "steady" relationship with that person. However, a couple needn't actually go anywhere [go on dates together] to be in this kind of relationship. Hooking up is basically dating without the romance. It has become customary for young adults to simply cut to the chase, the sexual … part of a relationship. A hook-up can be a one-time thing, as it most often is, or it can be a semi-regular thing, but not a full relationship. Although it may take on the signs of one.

One might conclude that modern-day youth have simply gotten lazy and careless. Most … are not looking for a romantic relationship; they see the new freedom and plethora of sexual opportunities and simply take what they can get. They get to college, and it's an amusement park with so many different enticing rides, one would be missing out on the whole experience to settle with the first one they tried. And why should they bother with the responsibility and formalities of a date when they have a better chance of getting immediate satisfaction after buying a few drinks at a bar?

This makes you wonder if I am Charlotte Simmons should be classified as fiction or documentary. 

The most interesting quote of the article again came from the same young lady:

"Coed dormitories," she continues, "are they an ideal situation or a sad form of prostitution? You go out with your friends on your terms, after a few drinks you're both attracted. … Interested and lonely, you go together, no obligations, no responsibilities, and no rules. Then there is that late-night 'booty call.' This has become such a custom of the college lifestyle [that] most have come to accept it, although maybe not respect it. If it were really the ideal situation, the walk home the next day [to one's own room] wouldn't be called 'the walk of shame.'"

Hmm . . . so loneliness, lack of respect and shame still play a role in the lives of college students today.  There still seems to be some kind of moral compass. Not that anyone is paying attention to the moral compass, but it seems to still be there. Maybe, even in this postmodern age, the requirements of the law are still written on the heart (Romans 2:4), no matter how much we try to suppress them (Romans 1:18).

Even though there still seems to be a “walk of shame” in the life of students, it still isn’t powerful enough to get most to refrain. And it’s not just college students facing this battle; it is common in much lower grades.

A few weeks ago a 10^th grade young lady came into my office to talk about her boyfriend. She thought I was his pastor and was hoping I would straighten him out. It turns out that I didn’t know the boy because he is part of a separate group that just uses our facilities. I listened to her heartbreaking story for some time – she loved this boy, but he treated her badly and ran around with other girls.  It was the old “I know he’s bad for me but I love him and can’t let him go” situation. Although I didn’t ask, she sheepishly volunteered that she had been having sex with him. I responded that this explains a lot. In another circumstance you would have no problem walking away from someone who treated you so badly, but the sex has given you a bond you can’t easily break. As I sought to change the conversation to the gospel she suddenly remembered she had somewhere else to be and left. And, I doubt that we made any progress. 

This past weekend I went to one of those abstinence talks for the youth of our church that was put on by a local crisis pregnancy center. I met the director who told about going into a local junior high school to give an abstinence presentation. The director said they have a standard program they give, but when she got there the Principal asked if she was going to talk about the problem of girls raping girls. This is a big problem, and this in a junior high school!

So, all around us the signs indicate that sexual obsession isn’t letting up. And, my personal opinion is that all of our abstinence programs aren’t as successful as we might hope. Most Christian abstinence programs that I have attended ask kids to refrain from sex because of the potential consequences.  You know how it goes – don’t do sex because you might get pregnant, you might get an STD and you might create memories that come back to haunt you later. 

Those things are all very true and are all very unpersuasive to hormone driven, risk-inclined kids. The only real convincing reason I can come up with to avoid pre-marital or extra-marital sex is simply to please God.

In a sidebar to Guroian’s CT article, Frederica Matthews-Green says:

All the warnings about the dangers of promiscuity, all the vaunted bliss of marriage, can be irrefutably countered by somebody's experience. Doing the right thing is not guaranteed to make you happy, and the wicked sometimes thrive. But because the love of God constrains us, because our bodies are not our own but bought with a price, we persevere in a difficult path, pressing on toward the light ahead.

Now, this is a difficult sell to people who don't believe in God. For them, this is like a shiny new car with no engine. If you don't have the motive of love for God, passion for purity looks like an empty shell.

Ultimately, sexuality is a gospel driven issue. G. K. Chesterton was getting at something like this when he said that every man (or woman) who enters a brothel (even a “Dorm Brothel’) is looking for God. 

The gospel gives a love for God that can create a passion for purity. Our moralizations may be true, but they will be unpersuasive apart from the gospel.

It is helpful to once again remember that sexual sin does not construct an insurmountable barrier to grace. The Scarlet Letter was fictional, not biblical. There is a walking path from the dorm to the household of God, but it is not a walk of shame, it is a walk of grace.  And it is a walk that addresses the loneliness, lack of respect and shame in a way that sexual gluttony never can.

Comments

[Amy's Humble Musings]

Instead of teaching abstinence, I wish the Church would take the Titus 2 mandate seriously, and teach the younger women how to BE women. (I'm not letting men off the hook; I just like to speak to my own responsibilities...) Men (and boys) do not treat real women like objects. Usually.

A fine lady is a rare thing nowadays. If women were trained how to be women, I suspect we'd be back to talking about whether it's OK for a lady to telephone a lad... What women long for most--committment, marriage, respect, and admiration--comes only from holding the fellows at arms length, and yet they do the exact opposite.

Hasn't anyone clued in modern girls that men like what they can't have???

[sweetpea]

Just a correction: Instead of 50's and 80's, etc., it should be '50s and '80s. The apostrophe has meaning. In this case it signifies the omission of the 19s. If you write 50's or 80's, you are indicating possession, which in this case in incorrect.

Just a gentle little lesson.

[Chris]

I agree withe the previous posting and the entire blog. It is only a true personal relationship with christ that can give us the ability to conquer temptation. If no true relationship is there or if we are in a state where we are not reading the bible daily, or involved it fellowsip, or praying we have no strength to overcome any sin that we might incounter. Fogive me for use a quote from a book title Only God Makes Men. Only God Makes women. How can we expect those who do not know God, nor who are not taught about God, to Be moral. Look at ancient cultures in the Old Testement. The nations surounding Isreal practied extreem sexual debauchery. What happend to Isreal when they stoped following the commandents of God? They fell into the same sin. In Numbers 22 It tells a story about a guy named Balaam who caused the childeren of Isreal to fall. How did he do it? He brought the world to them. The world entered thier life and they Stoped reading the word, they stoped praying and worshiping god. Balaam uses sex and idol worship to cause the jewish nation to stumble. This happens in my life when i allow the world to enter my heart, I stop praying, I stop reading the Bible, I find myself not a man, defenatly not man of God, i find myself following base passions and grasping at temporaty happines. I have forsake a joy that never ends for the pleasure of the moment. But when God draws me back to Him, I repent and am forgiven. I start reading God's word, I start praying, I find that God eradicated the world from my life. Its always a choice God or the world? Joy or momentery happness? No matter how many time i choose wrong God is alway willing to forgive me. Every time you choose wrong God is wiling to fogive and restore you. The easist way to stop sexual promiscuity in colleges, high schools, jr high, and yes even in elementry school is to use the light of God's word to illumenate the darkness. With bible and prayer out of schools how do we, rather why are we amazed at what takes place? Sorry for taking up so much space. God Bless!
Chris

[Dustin]

I would add what we are already implying, but not overtly saying. Reading the Bible, praying, having relationship with God, it not only shows us the character of a loving, forgiving God . . . it shows us our own character as a righteous and redeemed people saved from our own falleness and given purpose. As we grow to understand more of God, He reveals more of who we are created to be. That understanding helps us to act in line with the character of Christ. Our young people are reaching out to all the wrong places because they do not know who they are in Christ. They believe living a promiscuous lifestyle is part of who they are, part of how they are wired. Why else would their bodies drive them toward that? Why else would it feel so natural?

They are like people who glance into the mirror, but as soon as they look away they forget their own face.

By the way, let's not get into thinking that reading our Bible everyday is the key to righteous living and that we are not "good Christians" if we fail in these disciplines everyday. Bible study, quiet time, and prayer life are beneficial to us. As I stated above, they help us have a greater understanding of our God and ourselves, but do not guarantee a righteous life, it is not necessarily the litmus test of our relationship with God. Knowing Who created you and why He did so is incredibly motivating, but ultimately we just need to be sure we are loving our God with all our heart, mind, and strength.

[Mike]

Amy has made a very important point: without relationships with older, wiser (read: "learned the hard way") Christians, all the Bible study and preaching is going to be limited in effect. Kids - and I include my own daughters here - need someone to come alongside them and love them for Christ's sake. People who will share the pain and tragedy of their own lives and help kids learn from their own mistakes.

As a counselor, I pick up the pieces of these broken children - from Christian families - and it sickens me to have to do so. There is an epidemic in our churches that many of us would just as soon not talk about - but our children are dying because of our silence. Thank you, David, for speaking out about it.

[Dustin]

David,

Is this something that could be mistaken as a "culture war" as was discussed earlier? If we try to engage on the culture level, instead of the community level, we could be addressing the result instead of the cause (as The Dane postulated).

Cultural: We could address the social understanding of sex and its place in relationships. We boycott Abercrombie and petition MTV to tone down their sexual explicity.

Communal: Engaging our youth personally and in establishing tradition which reinforces the beliefs of the Body of Christ and help create an identity of belonging.

Seems like we abstain from recognizing the rite of passage of a boy into manhood, a girl into womanhood. We pretend like the transition to college is the most important of their young lives, yet that is insignificant if they do not know what it means to be a man or a woman of God. Maybe the Jewish culture benefits more from bar mitzvahs than we give credit.

I'm just kind of thinking out loud here. A work in progress, if you will.

[jpe]

A hook-up can be a one-time thing, as it most often is, or it can be a semi-regular thing, but not a full relationship.

It can, however, develop into a full relationship.

[Michael]

Wow, that's good to know. My wife and I just became youth leaders and I would never have imagined that we would have to deal with anything like this. It's good to hear it now, instead of being hit with it blindsided.

[Mark Olson]

Your PG-13 disclaimer at the beginning forgot to mention that all of us fathers of pre-teenage children should be sitting down (with drink in hand?) before reading this piece.

So far, I'm holding to the line that my girls have to read Kass & Kass Wing to Wing prior to dating. Hopefully, that will "clue them in" as Amy implores ... Any other postive advice would be appreciated.

[David Wayne]

Mark - I've never heard of Kass and Kass Wing to Wing - what is that? Is it a book?

Dustin - good thoughts on the thinking out loud part. What Guroian wrote about are certainly some cultural expressions and I am all for having A & F and MTV tone down their sexual expressions, but it does go deeper than that. If you read Frederica Matthews-Green's little sidebar she discusses all of the usual ways we try to address sex and how they fail. Ultimately, this is a gospel issue. I think your second point about the community is more effective than the cultural method, but even establishing the traditions and the sense of belonging in a community has to flow out of the gospel.

[Mark Olson]

David,

"Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar: Readings on Courting and Marrying (The Ethics of Everyday Life)" by Leon and Amy Kass. I discovered after getting married, I guess I was just lucky.

[CornChuckinChamp]

Dave, Here's a crass, one-liner that Chris Rock could use in his act:
"'Hooking up' is the lite beer of relationships -- you get all the sex without all the commitment."

My theory is that men, by hitting that homerun (What sport!), justify to themselves why they can't respect the woman they just had; someone who gave themself with no legal strings attached (i.e. - marriage license). What man would want to make any kind of commitment to such a loose woman? That's why co-eds are called 'dumpsters', and Meatloaf is forever waiting for the end of time in "Paradise by the dashboard light". It's strange fruit.

[Dustin]

David,

Yes, absolutely such tradition/sense of belonging should flow out of the gospel. That isn't such a tall order. My thought has been that I would take my son on a camping trip with my father and possibly my brother. This would be his rite of passage. During this trip I will have prepared scripture to share with him (maybe even compile a book of scriptures and writings on what it means to be a man of God), encourage his grandfather(s) to share with him, and will give him time to be alone with God in nature. The idea would be that such a tradition would emphasize his spiritual and physical lineage he belongs to and give him a better alternative to the "man" presented by the world.

I read the Frederica Matthews-Green sidebar (by the way, your link is broken to the original story by Guroian). I have a lot of respect for her based on everything I've read by her. She's dead on, but I'm trying to flesh it out a bit more. I see that our children must be strong to retain sexual purity in this culture. My thought is that a strong sense of identity as a man or woman of God would undergird them. Isn't the gospel a declaration of God's love that is so powerful that He has claimed us as sons and daughters? A declaration of our identity? A declaration of His power to transform us?

Romans 12:1,2
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God–this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is–his good, pleasing and perfect will.

Ephesians 1:4,5
For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will–

[Robert from brightmystery]

I'm a college professor, and I find this whole situation absolutely heartbreaking. I know, given my perspective as an older adult, that real pleasure is to be found in enjoying what God has made in the amounts and to the degrees which He intended -- and college is a great place and time to get started in that direction. Instead, the culture around us pushes students -- barely adults -- to loneliness and self-hatred and waste. I don't deal with the sexual lives of my students directly through my work, but you can see the shame and the longing for more, written on their faces. I'm going to post a trackback to this article because I know some of my students read my blog and I really want them to get what you and the CT article are saying.

It's doubly heartbreaking because I have a 14-month old daughter, and there are times when I think about what it will be like to try and raise her in the light of God's grace... If we think it's bad NOW, imagine 12 years from now. Yes, grace is what we ALL need.

[DLE]

Forty years and two generation later, we finally have the full-flowering of "If it feels good, do it."

You can't give away pieces of yourself and expect to be a whole person that rises above the shallow. I can't believe that it is possible to be more expedient than our culture already is, but if it truly is "all about me--right now," there's no deeper hole for us to fall into. That thinking violates every moral circumstance we can confront in a day and does not bode well for the future.

[SilverBubble]

As a senior in high school, I can say with some authority that this article barely scratches the surface. I remember when I entered junior high (7th grade), boys were asking girls for sex, and the girls were giving it.

Sex is nothing more than a chance for some gratification anymore. And trust me, nobody is going to avoid having sex because of the consequences when condoms are being handed out free of charge and their health teachers are telling them that using said condoms constitutes "safe sex". They think that a tiny piece of latex is a guarantee that they can have the fun without the risk.

I could tell all sorts of stories about what kids at my school do between the sheets. It's all harmless fun, right? And you're only a slut if you get pregnant.

[wendy]

Wow, It sure seems like we as a society are replicating the grievous lifestyles of Sodom and Gomorrah. Most people believe that those cities were destroyed because of rampant homosexuality and while that may be a factor, if you read the whole story it appears to be about a society that was bent on experiencing sexual pleasure with whomever they wanted. The prophets later expand our understanding of the sins of Soddom and Gomorrah, not only where they into sexual gratification with strangers, but lying, adultry, and living lives being "overfed and unconcerned." If we are so like them in our culture, will we not experience the same outcome?

[Miss O'Hara]

Good post. I have to agree with you, David, as well as the commentors; it's a sad, heartbreaking state of affairs. Of course, the kids can claim ignorance now, but I suspect it will turn round and bite them viciously before too long, if they don't shut their hearts down first. So, so sad!

I do want to point out that it isn't just high schools and colleges, though - from what I have seen and experienced, it's church youth groups (at my old church, we had 3 girls get pregnant within a few sad months), as well as adult singles, who are kind of left in a dead man's zone until they marry. Amy is right, too. I'm so glad I was taught to be a lady, a woman.

I think your "please God" idea is the best, but of course, it's the only thing that has kept me 'safe' all of this time. I just couldn't imagine breaking His heart that way - that was always what really gave me pause. I suppose that if you talk to a lot of Christian virgins, they would say the same thing.

"Wing to Wing" is supposed to be a terrific book, I've just not read it yet. If that counts for anything. :)

[Rhett Smith]

I just wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed your post. I'm about four months late in reading it, but I thought it was great. I preached for the first time this year, to my college ministry, on sex. And some of the articles you referenced, etc., were of much help. Not surprisingly, my blogs on this topic were some of the most read.