Here’s one of those expensive government studies, this one for Britain’s Dept. of Education, performed by the University of London, that discovers something that a lot of people already know.
According to this study, young people, “millenials,” are more and more turned off by sex, with one in eight “still a virgin” (gasp!) at 26–a statistic that speaks volumes, to anyone who’s listening. Anyway, the older they get, the less likely they are to have sex (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/05/06/millennials-turned-sex-study-suggests-one-eight-still-virgins/).
How come? Two reasons, say the scientists. A) They’re so glued to social media, they don’t have time for anything as real as sex. And, more importantly, B) they have a “fear of intimacy” arising from a “culture of hypersexuality.” In other words, they’re afraid they simply can’t live up to the sexual expectations raised in their minds by the “entertainment” media and other sources.
According to our benighted “entertainment”–which, remember, is always a form of passive self-education–you’re all supposed to be having sex every cotton-pickin’ day with as many “pratners” as you can catch before they run away. No excuse for not having sex! And very few people can live up to that.
Patty and I once read a book in which a fifty-plus-year-old cop, working far into the night at a very messy crime scene featuring a spectacularly mangled corpse, on the hottest night of the year in New York City, comes home in the wee hours and immediately embarks on a sexual marathon with his 17-year-old girlfriend. This made the book ridiculous.
So much easier to just sit around text-messaging!
This makes a lot of sense. In the minds of many people, sex is some Olympic event where one must strive for the highest score. Apparently love, and tenderness are sidelined as obsolete notions. One of the main reasons I don’t date is that fornication is expected, even among persons claiming to be Christians. The other is that the notions many people harbor with regard to sex are based on pornographic movies, which reduce sex to some animal experience, bereft of any meaning whatsoever. I don’t want anything to do with that world.
Uh.. if I may make an observation. You and Patti likely didn’t read the book at the same time over each other’s shoulder.. so do I presume that Person A read the book, then reported to Person B that the book was ridiculous for your given reason, and Person B read it anyway?
Did you both finish the book? 🙂
I don’t think either of us finished it.
I don’t quite get your point. We are quite capable of coming to our own conclusions about a book or a movie.
My somewhat benign attempt to be light-hearted and you assumed if it came from me it must be something nasty. Understood. I was just making the observation that if you both thought the book sucked then why did you both read it. I wasn’t being critical of anything.
No problem: I guess what I said sounded sharper than I mean it to be.
We were on vacation at the time, supply of books was limited.
Besides, it’s so unusual to read a mystery that’s ridiculous.
It’s interesting that now we use the phrase “having sex.” There was a time when people spoke of “making love,” which implied some emotional engagement, or even “sleeping with,” which still acknowledged the presence of another person and perhaps some relaxation and the commitment to more than the time it takes to perform the act. But “having sex” is a gluttonous term, indicating a commodity that we help ourselves to or expect someone else to serve us with — as in: “Have some mashed potatoes.” “Have some chocolates.” “Have some sex.” Possible response: “Thanks, I’ve had plenty. But I’ll take some home for later.”
Great points, Phoebe.
It’s one of those things we really have to change about our culture–before it changes us.
I’m afraid it already has changed our culture. I’ve been called insulting names, because I don’t fornicate. I keep my personal business to myself most of the time because living a sexually moral life casts me as an outsider, even a weirdo.
Probably a Racist, too.
Undoubtedly. 🙂
Millennials may be having less sex because it has been so widespread and expected that to be different is to abstain. Or maybe the message of STDs is finally getting through to them. In the early 1960’s only the “bad” young people went all the way. And the term “having sex” is hardly an euphemism for fornication. And the term “sleeping together” when most of the time it is “slam, bam, thank you mam” is silly – there’s no sleeping involved. FYI Phoebe: I am having mashed potatoes with my roast dinner tonight, and will have chocolate for dessert later on 🙂
Your post reminded me of quote I once read from Rushdoony from his book on pornography that the ones who talk the most about sex probably haven’t had it, while the ones who are modest in their conversation about sex probably have done it more frequently…
This has probbaly held true since the earliest days of civilization.
As a so called ‘Millennial’ i am 27 and can admit i’m still a virgin. But it’s not because i don’t want to or i think it will meet expectations. But because i haven’t met some i feel comfortable enough with, I do not have lots of confidence but i do know i don’t want my first to be with some stranger i’ll never see again. I am sure there are others that feel the same way. So yeah this might be true for some people but not all. I wonder where they get their statistics i always find it interesting because i only know one other person my age that is a virgin, Most of my friends are in committed relationships.
You missed the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s (don’t feel deprived: it was lousy). Back then, sexual activity was, indeed, expected of young people. But some of us had a hard time living up to those expectations!
Liberals are always trying to push other people into sexual activity as early in life as possible. I don’t know why it’s such a thing for them.
Anyhow, I salute you, I wish more people, young and old, felt as you do–but the article I was quoting in my post was based on “studies” and interviews: see the link.
Sex is important. It’s not supposed to be some meaningless, insignificant experience to be gained from some stranger. Many people in our day forget that for most of history, sex has equated to significant likelihood that reproduction will occur. That is a natural consequence of sexual activity and the Creator willed it so. When sex is viewed as separate from reproduction, it can be perceived as less significant, but that’s not the way it worked for most of human history.
If someone stops and asks themselves whether this person is someone they would want to share parental duties with the question of sex becomes a bit more serious. I’m not speaking against birth-control, or anything like that, but I feel that some people may have forgotten that sex is much more than a moment of pleasure.
There’s nothing wrong with holding out for the right person and a committed relationship.
In fact, there’s something very right about it.
It’s the backbone of our civilization.
Thanks guys, you kind just confirmed what i have always thought. Yeah i agree sex is important and i’m not worried about anyone knowing i’m a virgin. I know the article you quoted i thought it was important for people to see that although it may partially be true, there are many reason why someone may be or choose to be a virgin.