Heavy Topics

On the way home today, I was listening to Sean Hannity. I ordinarily don't listen to Hannity because his argumentative personality, but the station he is on is the one I listen to in the morning. his topic today kept me from changing the station right away. He was talking about a website put together by pharmaceutical companies in the UK that helps you figure out how many sexual partners you've had. Let me explain. According to this study, when you sleep with someone, you are essentially sleeping with everyone they've slept with, and so on and so forth. This is important because of disease transmission possibilities. According to this study, "The average British man or woman has indirectly slept with 2.8 million people." (http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/love-sex/men-women/pharmacy-launches-sexual-partners-calculator-1791847.html) 2.8 million people!?! Well, how did they get that number? According to the study this website did, the average British man has slept with 9 women and the average British woman has slept with 6.3 men. Well, put together all of your partners' partners, their partners, their partners, and so on, and viola, 2.8 million partners. (By the way, this calculator is being called the Sex Degrees of Separation.) Let me say this bluntly: That is frightening. Hannity also mentioned that in the city of New York, 1 in every 4 adults has genital herpes. 1 in 4! Not to mention all of the other lovely STDs that are out there. Is it any wonder that so many people have STDs if the average person has slept with 2.8 million partners? I don't know about you, but that totally disgusts me. (By the way, if you have the urge to check that calculator out, it's at http://calculators.lloydspharmacy.com/sexdegrees.)

After giving these very frightening facts, Hannity moved on to talking about the beliefs that people have about premarital sex. He talked about how people just expect that teens and adults alike are going to be sexually active with multiple partners throughout their lifetimes. He flat-out stated that he believes sex before marriage and outside of marriage is wrong. He also stated that he believed it is realistic to teach your kids not to have sex before marriage and expect them to follow what you have taught them. He stated how he knew people would be furious with him for stating this, but that didn't stop him from believing that this was wrong. And you know what? I'm with him on this one. We are a sex-obsessed culture that promotes loose living and this is wrong. I will state the following as fact, for I believe it to be fact. Sex before marriage and outside of marriage is immoral and therefore wrong, and it is not only right but is essential to teach your children and expect them to believe and practice this belief. I didn't sleep with anyone before I was married, nor did my husband. None of my siblings have been or are sexually active because they are not married. Deg's brother and his wife waited until they were married. And do you know what? I could list hundreds of other people I know who did the same.

Some of you who believe differently are probably saying to yourself, "What do you know? You're 25 and LDS, so you probably got married so that you could have sex." Let me counter this. If I was only concerned with having sex as a reason to get married, I wouldn't have waited till nearly 24 to get married. Yes, I married early, according to the world's standards, but I married when I did because, for me, it was the right person at the right time. It was worth it to me to wait. Why? Well, first off, because God commanded it. Secondly, it just seems inherently wrong to be messing around with something so intimate as sex. Third, and I'll be honest here, I have absolutely no desire to have genital herpes, gonorrhea, chlamydia, genital warts, and the list goes on. The only 100% foolproof way of preventing those is abstinence or monogamy with someone who practiced abstinence before your relationship began and then throughout your relationship.

I know this is a heavy topic, and I know that most of my readers will wonder why I'm going off like this, and chances are that I'll offend someone. However, I believe that someone has to stand up for my beliefs, and I can't expect anyone to do it but me. Am I saying that you are an inherently evil person if you choose to live differently? No, I am simply saying I disagree with your lifestyle. I can still respect you; this doesn't affect who I can and can't be friends with. Am I saying that if you went through a wild streak in your life and have since amended your ways that you are damned to hell? No; I wouldn't be a very good Christian, let alone a very good person, if I believed that. I am simply raising my voice for what I believe in. Call me old fashioned, call me a prude, call me ignorant if you will, but I'd rather be an old fashioned prude than an STD-ridden modern woman.

Like I said, someone has to raise their voice, and trust me, I can be quite loud when I want to be.