Entitlement mentality gone wild: Birth control as crucial health care
Unfortunately “kids” today… have been told since before puberty that *everyone* has sex and it is impossible to abstain and anyone who tries will only be utterly miserable, unnatural, and socially stunted until they give up and break down and end up having sex “unsafely” because they didn’t plan for the eventual *necessity* of sex.
That’s why they have such an entitlement mentality towards birth control as a necessary “health care,” because they bought the lie they have been fed that expecting someone to forgo their sexual impulses is tantamount to cruel and unusual torture.
But since they *also* bought the lie that you shouldn’t get married until *at least* 25 and probably shouldn’t have kids until 30 or 35, birth control becomes as necessary for their “well being” as insulin to a diabetic or nitro to a heart patient.
~ Commenter Jespren, on Stanek post “Pro-life video of the day: Contraception question stumps Obama fans,” August 10
[Graphic via sodahead.com]
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
The primary sex organ is still the brain. For humans at least, one would hope. The phrase “falling into bed” is often used. But who are we kidding? They’re really “diving into bed.”
Look before you leap.
I say we give each woman wanting free birth control a penny….(that’s all I’m willing to pay) every-time they want sex they can go get that penny and hold it between their knees. problem solved!
Along with the “entitlement” mentality comes severely stunted growth and delayed adulthood. Continue vicious loop.
Jespren, congratulations on getting the quote of the day.
“Feminists” are often accused of persuading women to fear and hate men. They apparently have been remarkably ineffective. If you fear and are hostile to something, you want to STAY AWAY FROM IT. Thus, we should see a vast decrease in the demand for abortion and even for contraception as women eschew relationships with men.
But this hasn’t happened. Girls and women continue to depend on boys and men for comfort, affection, and eroticism.
Well said, Jespren.
Jespren! Well said and way to go getting quote of the day!! :)
Those words are so so true. “kids” are told that they absolutely, positively must have sex or they’ll die. They are told they can’t control it, that if you’re a virgin, that if you don’t lust after others, you’re a weird psycho.
And then the Christian culture creates a whole different dynamic. Because in my experience, they’ve really dropped the ball on teaching kids and young people who to deal with the problems, how to handle a culture that’s throwing sex at them from as early as five and six years old. The Christians often pass it off and say “Oh just keep your legs closed and your pants up.” Well, that doesn’t exactly address the deeper issue, now does it? Christian youth are told to wait till marriage, which is becoming increasingly harder in this culture, and yet we’re told to wait to marry until we’re 25 or 30. Something needs to give.
People need to change the way they approach and talk about healthy relationships and sex. We need to frame the issue for what it is – something great and wonderful, but also something that’s best enjoyed in the right context. Sex is incredible; it can also be incredibly damaging. And most of all, it’s a luxury – not something that’s owed to you as soon as you hit puberty.
Jespren is absolutely right: the core issue is that young people feel entitled to everything, including sex and including free birth control. But I think when many of them act on what they think is owed them (free sex whenever and with whomever they want), they’ll find that what they were seeking was rather empty anyway.
The whole Christian attitude of “Keep your legs closed” and slut-shaming I’ve seen here frustrates and infuriates me. Shaming and guilt tripping doesn’t work & it only contributes to low self esteem and creates a barrier to healthy communcation.
It’s no wonder because of the Catholic indoctirnation and shaming I received as a child that when I made the mistake of having pre-marital sex, I haven’t been able to forgive myself and suffer from low esteem & poor self-image (nothing I ever do is good enough, I’m probably going to hell & I don’t deserve God’s love anyways).
And before you all try to armchair psychoanalyze me, yes I am angry and hurting.
When I have pointed out this entitlement attitude, and the culture of me first, to anyone I have generally been torn apart for failing to acknowledging “reality.” By “reality” they typically mean the economic realities of “needing” to get a job and a career. These economic realites differ considerably amont the people I talk to: for some they need money for rent; for others they need the latest video game system, i-Phone, two-week vacation, luxury vehicle, etc… Ultimately the notion of sacrificing for one’s family, or for family values, is completely foreign to them. When I ask them why they just don’t stay home with their kids and forgo their career they look at me like they would like to run a machete right through me. Yet, I know many families who do just that: either one or both parents have taken off time from their careers, or who have worked part-time careers, have started the families when they were young, and went to local spots for their vacations instead out of state, or out of country. Sacrificing material wants is difficult but it shouldn’t be ruled out entirely just because MTV says “you gotta have it.”
Mods, delete the first copy, there’s a reason I’m posting anonymously.
Hi Just Saying.
I’m very sorry to hear about your pain. One thing I can certainly tell you is that it seems that those who taught you the Catholic faith didn’t understand it themselves. There is nothing in Catholic theology about anyone not deserving God’s love or no possibility of forgiveness. You had premarital sex? Join the club. We’re all fallen sinners here. There is always forgiveness and nothing you or anyone can do will ever be beyond God’s forgiveness. If you would like to discuss this or anything else in private, please email me. You can find my email on the sidebar. God love you.
Hey Just Saying,
Please read my post again. I agree with you – both Protestants and Catholics who use the rhetoric of “just keep your knees together” or “Keep your pants on” only perpetuate the problem. And it’s painful, infuriating, and leads to all kinds of heartache.
No one’s perfect. Heck, my husband and I didn’t enter our marriage as pure little saints. God was gracious and allowed my and my husband’s first to be each other, but we definitely crossed some lines before the wedding. And there was a lot of pain even before him because I was getting from Christians “Just don’t do it and now shut up about it” and acting like all girls have to do is keep the nasty horny boys away – BS (at least in my case) and then there was the culture saying “do it whenever, with whomever, as often as you can!” So when I came across temptation and feelings and desires, I had no way to know how to navigate it. SO I feel your pain.
No one had a real, honest talk with me about sex – and a lot of my friends my age who were raised in Christian homes had the same experience. I learned a lot of it the hard way. But I think a lot of people here celebrate abstinence till marriage because in a perfect world, that’s what would happen.
God bless you. Just wanted to let you know you’re not alone in your frustration. Just Saying. ;)
Hey, Just Saying, I don’t know about God loving you because I don’t know about God, but I do know that I love you. And I know that you deserve to love yourself. I don’t just mean love as in “like yourself a whole lot” but as in “want, and always work towards, what is best for yourself.” Love, the action, as well as the feeling.
I have done some really, really terrible things. Things that I will always regret having done. Something that helped me a lot with letting myself move beyond them was apologizing to the people that my actions had hurt. So maybe you could try to do that. Who was hurt by you having premarital sex? It seems like one of the people who was most strongly hurt – if not the one most strongly hurt – was you. So instead of just feeling regret, try to also apologize to yourself. Maybe you’re like me and you find it much easier to apologize than to forgive. Neither are easy, and when you have to do BOTH – when you have to both apologize to, and forgive, yourself it can be really hard. But just try to see yourself the way you would see someone else, for a bit: as someone who did something that hurt you, and who wishes she had never hurt you, and who is genuinely apologizing for it. You would probably forgive that person. The truth is that you are no worse than anyone else out there, no less deserving of forgiveness.
I also have experience with having felt shamed by a person of religious authority. It feels crummy and I’m really sorry you went through that. I am not going to say that you should stop believing over that, and it’ll just be easier if you don’t believe in God at all than to believe that He can’t forgive you; because I don’t think that relative ease is ever really a valid reason to do something, and also I think that if you believe in God then just being ashamed is not going to make you stop – it’s not what made me not believe in God, it’s just what made me stop thinking that maybe I should try to, if that makes sense. But I feel sure that if a belief in God is a belief in something external – not just an inner, subjective interpretation of spirituality – then either He has already forgiven you (just like you would have already forgiven someone else who hurt you and who felt so torn up about it), or we’re pretty much all equally damned.
Just Saying God Loves You.
I don’t think anyone here is slamming sluts (no pun intended). I think they are trying to show how certain attitudes can lead to certain behaviours and that certain behaviours have consequences. These behaviours can affect our lives in a lot of unexpected and non-intuitive ways. Most people here want to share that Wisdom, garnered either from experience or revelation, with the next generation of people willing to listen.
I plan to teach my daughter the HOWs and WHYs of waiting, not just the “don’t do it till marriage” empty BS. There is the biological fact that sex binds 2 people together, as it is intended to do. As a woman, I will always remember my first time–the person, place, everything about that night–and I will tell my daughter to choose very carefully whom she wants to remember for the rest of her life, whom she wants to bind herself to. I will help her to have enough self-respect to not give in to any old horny boy who pressures her, to know she CAN wait if she so chooses, and to proudly stand up for that choice against the crazy anti-virginity sex-soaked world we live in. And I will also make sure she knows, should she “make a mistake,” that I will still love her!
Slut-shaming and pregnancy-shaming are both damaging, I agree. However, along with this “everyone’s doing it” indoctrination that’s happening to our young people, we are also failing to give them the training and encouragement to deal with sexual pressure on a daily basis. When I was young (in dinosaur times) and I was at a social gathering, if a boy tried to pressure me for sex, it was easy to say, “Oh, I just can’t risk getting pregnant.” It was quick and easily understandable. It also diffused the awkward situation of a boy you just don’t like who comes onto you after a couple of beverages.
What’s a teen girl to do today? She’s at a party for example, gets cornered by a young person who’s encouraged by social pressure, beverage, or drugs. He has a condom so her excuse of “I can’t risk getting pregnant is not being heard.” Let’s say she just plain doesn’t like him, or is intimidated by him, what tools has she been given to get out of the situation? What does Planned Parenthood tell her to do? What does he say? “if the condom breaks, I’ll pay for the abortion”?! It’s not about slut shaming, but giving young people the training to gracefully and safely escape a tricky, and maybe dangerous, situation.
@Just Saying: I think that there is a material difference between someone who has extra-marital sex and regrets it and someone who says “I don’t care whether you think extra-marital sex is wrong or not. I still want you to pay for me to have it!” The first is not only forgivable, but totally understandable. The second is angering, arrogant, and the source of a lot of the “keep your legs closed!” comments you see here. It is not the source of all of those comments, and even in cases where it is, sometimes the direction of the message is sloppy. And the important thing for you to remember in those moments is that there is only one person who has the authority to judge you in your soul, and He has already offered you forgiveness for any reason you might need it. No matter what anybody says.
Oops, my quote marks are a little off. But I am reminded of a crazy thing a guy said to me, my senior year of college: “If you get pregnant, you can say I raped you.”
Seriously. He really said that. Fast forward to the present: no I didn’t accept his facebook friend request. Ya gotta laugh, but at the time, not funny.
Cool! I got quoted :)
LibertyBelle, I’m not sure which Christians you’ve been hanging around. I’m a Biblical Christian and in every church I’ve attended for the last 20+ years the youth of the congregation normally married, with full church and parental approval, in their late teens or early twenties. Almost all the Biblical Christians I know who were raised within the church (as opposed to being saved later in life) were married by 21 or 22, most a year or two earlier. I was 21 myself and one of the last of my peer group to tie the knot. It’s standard Biblical teaching that it is better to get married than to burn with lust for one another so, once you have found someone you are strongly drawn to, it’s time to settle down and start your family. The notion of waiting until you are 25 or older to get married is a strongly secular one and depends strongly on two things 1) allowing sex before marriage and 2) thinking both men and women are better off with a ‘stable’ career and a fully developed sense of ‘self’ before marriage. Both of which run opposite of what the Bible teaches, sex is not allowable before marriage and marriage is supposed to grow two people together, allowing them to mature and grow as one in the Lord and as a married couple. Your spouse is supposed to be your other half, how foolish is it to purposely wait until you are ‘whole’ by yourself to seek out your other half! I certainly hope my children find their life-mates and marry before they are past their early 20’s! To quote an old movie: “nothing can compair to what happens between two people, with all that growing together”.
“Shaming and guilt tripping doesn’t work & it only contributes to low self esteem and creates a barrier to healthy communcation”
I agree, why don’t we stop shaming those people who choose to be virgins, then? In our “modern” society it’s more socially acceptable to sleep with everything that moves than it is to be chaste. Now birth control is presented as “health care” as if chastity is something that is impossible.
And as for “Catholic indoctrination and shaming”, doesn’t ANYONE pay attention during the mass? It is stated and repeated at EVERY mass that we all fall short, we all sin, and we all require the Holy Sacrifice. The Pope calls himself a sinner over 200 times a day, since he prays through all 20 mysteries of the Rosary every day. Where did this idea come from that the Catholic Church is trying to shame sinners, or that doing so is acceptable?
Hey there Jespren! Haha yeah, it seems crazy, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, it would seem (at least in some circles I run in – though not all) that that secular mentality has slipped into many Christians’ thinking. They think you need to accomplish x,y, and z before you can get married, and that typically includes a degree or two and a good job. Which for most people these days, means about 25.
I totally agree with your points about marriage – my husband and I married a little over a year ago and he was 19 and I was 21. So we’re on the same page! :) But while there was lots of Christian support, we were also a little suprised at the amount of Christian friends and relatives who advised us to wait until we had degrees and had landed jobs. Much motivation behind that probably came from the current economic climate, but it still wasn’t very helpful. Then, when we joined a Bible study about marriage in college, we were shocked at how many of our Christian peers had bought into the notion that each spouse needs to “find themselves” before they get married, and get a degree and a job, etc.
But I was more referring to how talking about sex is handled before marriage – most of the talks didn’t help much, weren’t entirely honest (ie, pretending that girls are not the ones that are tempted and are only temptresses), didn’t give practical tools on how to deal with passion and how to find that potential mate. Because I’m also not an advocate for 16 year olds marrying the first person they get the tinglies for, it would be helpful if youth groups/Christians were more open about desires and thoughts and vetting potential mates. And when kids do make sexual mistakes, that they wouldn’t be ostracized. Sexual sin seemed to be THE ULTIMATE sin in a lot of peer groups I was in. People who had sex were shamed and gossipped about and were one of “those” kids. I just didn’t feel like, where I grew up, there was a lot of grace given to sexual sin. The kids who had sex were treated like they weren’t as close to God as the virgins. Oh, you’d find forgiveness for gossipping and drugs and whatever else. But sex? Ohhhh boy. At the same time, there wasn’t really a strong alternative presented. Yeah, marriage was thrown out there, but it was always discussed in vague, far-off, happy-ever-after terms.
The church we’re in now, though, seems to be much better. So anyway, just wanted to let you know I’m totally on the same page as you. ;) Hubby and I spent months and months in the Word, in prayer, talking with our pastor, reading books and defining our beliefs as to what Biblical marriage is and how it should be handled and whether or not “now” was the time for us. I’m the oldest girl in my family in a really close-knit family so I kinda had to sell my dad on walking me down the aisle earlier than perhaps he had hoped. ;)
And what movie is that from? Cause that’s spot-on about what marriage should be – growing together, melding our lives into one, becoming one flesh. :)
Just saying: God loves you no matter what, that’s why Jesus died for us. He died for you too. I also love you and totally feel your pain.
Maria, you must be very unimaginative if you think that sex is impossible with a penny between your knees.
Laura, Then I would be willing to donate an aspirin to go with the penny.
this whole article was on ENTITLEMENT. I didn’t mean to open a can of worms. I take back the penny comment..even a penny is too much for me to fund your “healthcare” which was the whole premise of my comments here. yesh! I WILL NOT COMPLY WITH THE HHS MANDATE. I have a higher authority to answer to. I’m just saying! Literally, “I’m just saying”.
HIGHER…sorry. LOL
Jespren: “It’s standard Biblical teaching that it is better to get married than to burn with lust for one another so, once you have found someone you are strongly drawn to, it’s time to settle down and start your family.”
I agree with this statement. You are the first person I have heard say this in a long time. It was a pleasure to hear. Thank-you.
LibertyBelle, the quote is from my favorite ‘romantic comedy’, McKlintock, an old John Wayne movie, although I think I may be slightly misquoting it, maybe “nothing compairs to what happens between a man and a woman, with all that growing together” or something similiar. (My 2nd favorite ‘romantic comedy’ is also an old John Wayne movie, The Quiet Man. Back when ‘romantic comedies’ were actually about romance and comedy instead of just sex)
Tyler, thanks. :)
Maria, I won’t comply either; and I rescind my offer of aspirin. I am offering them pants instead. They are 100% effective when you keep them on.
It’s not just kids who are indulgent about their entitlement to sex and other things tempting - aren’t many of the adults guilty of the same thing? Have they been role models for these kids to look up to?
@Just Saying, if you want to know how much God does love you, I invite you to read the Bible. The book of John is one of the easiest Gospels to understand and is written from the viewpoint of “Jesus as King of Kings and LORD of Lords”. Jesus (God in the flesh) paid the price for sin (the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our LORD). God’s love and His FREE gift of salvation is offered to you if you will repent of your sins to God and His spirit will then indwell you forever. I made this decision over 20 years ago and it was not only the best decision I ever made but the most life-changing in terms of abundant living. I will pray for you.
LauraLoo <3
Why isn’t there more discussion of ways to avoid situations leading to partnered male-female activity?
My friend Eleanor Cooney got pregnant — and aborted — because she was 17 years old and she and a boy of similar age were alone together. They “got stupid” and did what comes naturally.
The pregnancy did not proceed “naturally” because her feeling was “no way in hell” about the physical changes inherent in pregnancy.
The only way to have prevented that abortion was to have prevented the pregnancy.
Jespren,
Oh I’ll have to check them out!! :) I dislike most modern “Rom-Coms” because the Com aspect just isn’t funny and the Rom category isn’t really that romantic… just a bunch of sex and broken relationships being touted as the norm. : )
And I concur with Tyler’s statement! Yay for Biblical marriage. :)
I can see what you are saying about how it can be harmful to encourage waiting so long to get married, Jespren and LibertyBelle, but I don’t think that a lot of young people are ready to get into something as serious as marriage. I swear, if I had waited until I was older and more stable to get married, maybe I wouldn’t be getting divorced now. Not that I regret marrying young, I am glad I had my kids at least, but I really don’t think the way society is set up now really screams success for a lot of young marriages.
My friend Eleanor Cooney got pregnant — and aborted — because she was 17 years old and she and a boy of similar age were alone together. They “got stupid” and did what comes naturally.
Not if a child is given proper guidance and instruction. At 17, I was well-aware that intercourse had the biological function of reproduction. That is why, at that age, I was terrified of it. I’d been alone with boys at the age of 17. There was no irresistible magnetic pull of genitals. Teaching children to understand that adult activities are adult activities for a reason is not impossible.
Now…once I hit 20 or so…and started thinking that babies are neato (I was born when my parents were 20, so I didn’t think starting a family then was something outlandish), yeah, my behavior changed a bit. And combining my mentality with the mentality of someone like you were talking about that apparently could not fathom that sex = babies…it ended up bad news. But that’s a different story.
JackBorsch, nothing against a specific situation, because there are always exceptions and valid excuses…but on a whole the reason why people are not ‘adult’ enough to marry at 17-22 has nothing to do with biology, brain chemistry, or basic ability and everything to do with parenting failures. This notion of an extended ‘adolscence’ is a *very* new and dangerous developement. We are just as intelligent and capable of being an adult at 15 or 16 than the Pioneers, Pilgrims, or Ancient Egyptians. The only thing holding ‘children’ back from becoming proper adults when their bodies are ready for that transition (which tends to happen in the mid to late teens for women and slightly later for men) is parent’s inability to raise adults instead of raising perpetual children. All my substantial personality traits have been in place since I was 12 or 13. Sure, I’ve gained in experience since then, but the same can be said in comparision to my current 29 year self to my future 50 year self. there isn’t a single reason why the average person can’t be perfectly capable of settling for life, caring for harth and home, and beginning the process of raising the next generation by the time they are of legal age to marry, just like they were 100 years ago. I didn’t marry until 21, but I was *ready* for marriage by 16, and would have been just as competent a wife and mother then, just like women have been forever. An 18 year old who can’t make a reasonable decision to say ‘I do’ and keep that promise for the rest of their life is an 18 year old who has not been properly raised. If they lacked that proper raising then, yes, it might take them many more years to figure out how to get there on their own. But this can not be blamed on ‘society’, society is just the totality of individuals, this falls squarely on the shoulders of the individual parents.
I’m not raising children, I’m raising adults who are currently children.
My friend Eleanor Cooney got pregnant — and aborted — because she was 17 years old and she and a boy of similar age were alone together.
Your friend didn’t get pregnant because she was alone with a boy, she got pregnant because she had sex with a boy. I was alone with boys throughout my whole life and even attended co-ed post-prom slumber parties (in my friend’s basement, with her parents home – we watched DVDs and ate tons of chips, oh the scandal). I did not have sex until I was nearly 23 so no matter how many boys I was alone with throughout high school, I never got pregnant.
Having sex as a teenager is not necessarily unnatural, but that does not mean it’s unavoidable. Or rather, avoidable only by locking teenage girls in high-up castle rooms like friggin Rapunzel.
Jespren, your post at August 16, 2012 at 9:03 am was another excellent reply – perhaps, another quote of the day!
Thanks Tyler :) although I expect that’s both too long winded and not truly ‘on topic’ enough to be a quote of the day ;)
Alexandra, I second you heartily, nearly all my friends from early childhood up til marriage were men. If being ‘alone with’ a guy caused pregnancy I’d have a lot more than 3 kids! I married a virgin at 21, despite nearly all social interaction being with members of the opposite sex.
Denise Noe, your almost pathological fear of being around men is neither normal nor healthy. The only thing people, children, teens, or adults need to avoid ‘falling into bed’ with a member of the opposite sex is will power and the expectation that they will be held accountable for using that will power, and in turn the absolute knowledge that their will power is sufficient. We are not base animals held in sway by our urges, desires, or biochemistry. We are thinking, rational, free will human beings who are more than capable of a simple ‘no’. Yes, sometimes to flee temptation one must actually flee, but the vast majority of the time all one must do is make a conscious choice to not give in to temptation. Men and women are created and both emotionally and biologically compatible first for friendship and then for deeper emotional connections, and ultimately for sex. Telling people to avoid the natural order of things, re your repeated suggestions that people should engage in homosexual pairings, just to avoid a completely natural situation which is fully controllable and can easily be managed and handled by anyone taught to use their will power, begs for the huge litany of problems that are not natural, easily managed, or part of the natural continuum of life. There is no big mystery, no convoluted answer, or brilliant flash of insight needed to fix this mythical problem you keep bringing up about how to cloister girls away from boys to avoid sex. Life is rarely easy, but it is simple. Anytime you find yourself trying to answer one of life’s questions with some complex, convoluted answer, it’s because you are ignoring the simple answer because you think it’s too hard. It’s not, it’s just life. Don’t want your kid (society’s kids) to have sex before they are ready for children? The answer is simple. Teach then that they have full control over their free will, the responsibility to make the correct choice rests soley upon their application of will power, and that we, as their parents and as society, expect them to not fall prey to their urges like some base animal but rather use that free will and will power to act like a responsible human being. Simple, straight forward, and 100% doable.
Jespren,
Are you trying to make a habit of being chosen for a “Quote of the Day”? :)
Ahh, Hans Johnson, you guys are going to make me blush. No, not really, I just generally try to have something worth saying if I’m going to take the time to say it. :)
Why didn’t I think of that before? :)