VIRGIN NATION
Sexual Purity and American Adolescence
By Sara Moslener
OUP USA. 232 pages. £19.99
ISBN 978 0 199 987 764
Dr Moslener’s fascinating, but in my view one-eyed, work focuses on issues surrounding adolescent sexuality (especially that of females!), purity, religion, US nationalism and the apocalypse from the early 20th century to the present. As such it is far more likely to interest (and infuriate) American readers, who may well get the feeling that Moslener neither properly understands nor appreciates the wider and more alarming implications of these issues.
For Moslener, ‘in the moral economy of sexual purity, the rapture of sexual ecstasy is only offered to those who wait for divine beneficence… Consequently, the moral economy of sexual purity is doubly charged with individual and collective implications [i.e. saving American civilisation] (see p.168).’
Downside
That Moslener ascribes motives and puts words in the mouths of social and moral conservatives is irritating; that she appears to have little understanding of the serious downsides to the pan-sexual revolution on the bodies and development of the young is even worse. Indeed, I remain unconvinced by her primary thesis.
No doubt Moslener has accurately critiqued aspects of right-wing moral subculture in the US and I for one will not defend all its aspects, but I believe her work is wrong-headed and, as such, fatally flawed. A key point in all this is the toxicity of the pan-sexual revolution, especially for kids, of which she appears woefully ignorant.
The way in which she would seem to believe that condoms provide good protection against STIs is an example. She mocks what is arguably an OTT portrayal of this issue by Silver Ring Thing, but here in this country, SMOKING KILLS is printed on every pack of cigarettes. If health authorities can scare kids on the smoking front, why not in relation to far more serious STI/STDs?
That gonorrhoea is fast becoming untreatable and that HIV/AIDS and other STIs are spreading regardless of condom usage are other whitewashed facts. Furthermore, half of gay black men will get HIV (according to the CDC, February 2016).
The mantra of Kinsey – fornicate early; fornicate often; fornicate in every possible way – is toxic for sexual and relational well-being and health; interested parties are making a killing from getting kids ‘sexually active’. Great ammunition for fighting back can be found in Judith Reisman: www.drjudith reisman.com/ and Miriam Grossman www.miriamgrossmanmd.com/
