chastity MercynRe It's all about the money, baby. That and the feeling of power you get when they call you crying and begging you to take off their restraints. 010427 ... misstree an almost ghandilike approach to the perpetual power struggle, to declare oneself a noncombatant. i wonder if i would be taken seriously, if i would be believed in my earnest effort, or if it would be one more challenge on the list. i wonder if i would be taken seriously, if i would be beyond body, earning all that i had with soul alone, or if i would be easily dismissed. i don't want to wonder. i need to know. 060621 ... superleni is overated 060621 ... superleni overrated 060621 ... misstree i'd be interested to see what kind of yardstick you've used in that lovely discouraging unexplained blanket value judgement. 060621 ... the lovely superleni 'is overrated' is what my mind vomits whenever i see the word ... an opinion rather than a blanket value judgement and intended to discourage people only from beating themselves with ill-considered preconceptions of virtue. physical love is nice. why deny yourself? people stress out about their body's needs ... but why? they are natural, pure & innocent ... while attempts at celibacy drive some people to terrible things. chastity is not an ideal, for me. it's a christian convolution that tortures people about their natural needs. the guilt of shame can be fun, too. but expressing & feeling physical love with people who feel right to you is happy & healthy. if chastity is taking you somewhere good, go for it. if it's torturing you, let it go. twirling the yardstick. 060622 ... misstree oh_noes! not brains randomly vomiting words as responses to other words! what do you think this is, blather? *grins sheepishly* my fifteen cents on the subject... for lots of reasons, many of them tracing back to america's christian roots, yankees have some serious problems dealing with sex in healthy ways. chastity is a blind ideal, and rather than leaving some room for loving sex or harmless fun sex or brutal bombastic sex or even taking one's matters into your own hands without feeling like god were peeping through the keyhole, damning us for sinners (but it feels so good!), well, no wonder we're nuts about nuts (and ovaries!). and when we finally disbelieve the white-haired deific peeping tom, we're not left with any sort of firm structure to guide us, which is amplified by all the sloshing squishing hormones and attachments, and we get downright insane. i agree that, chastity as you concieve of it, is verymuch overrated. (oh_noes! people have different connotations for the same word? what blithering blatherers, skipping merrily past dictionary pages to express their thoughts!) meself, i've seen, been, and caused more than my share of the craziness. never having been imprinted with thinking chastity was something to strive for, and spending my adolescence at rocky_horror... let's just say that if i were chaste for the rest of my life, i'd still have known far more than my share of debauchery (and i wouldn't give up a minute of it). but sex makes people insane. i had a recently met friend suggest that a camping trip become a "love_fest." to think that he had this ulterior motive, that i couldn't just be someone's friend, that that tension would always exist. *that* is what makes me crazy. i can live a while without sex, and right now is a good time for me to do it. if i can, even for a little while, be a person, not a tumble and not even a kiss, if someone can see me without that film of lust coating their vision, it'll be worth it. and there's interior reasons too, but to be honest, i've run out of steam, and it's some odd stuff involving creative energies and application of will, and i'm just not feeling up to it. 060622 ... superleni mmm, lust has driven me to various levels of insanity before. as sheri tepper's aliens inquire in 'the fresco': are humans constantly affected by breeding madness? but lust is a delicious form of insanity ... i read something recently about sex being related to migraines, too. it's dangerous stuff. it can be so overpowering, can take so much out of you. i believe you can use that energy for other purposes, like artistic creation, or concrentration on a skill, and that's a great thing to do. a higher purpose. maybe that's what christians are on about when they obsess about keeping it in their pants. but they shouldn't force that on people. it should be a choice. i also think that not being obsessed with someone else's body makes for a more still spirit. it's kinda tricky though. sex can drive you crazy when you're getting it, drive you crazy when you're not ... ! good luck xxoo 060624 ... Emptyness Alive Couldnt do it 060625 ... Lemon_Soda Chastity is not only a christian injection(I'm so clever) into our society. African tribes and oriental overlords all saw a chaste bride as precious, and refused to marry a woman who was not. This attitude has propagated well before christ showed up. Reasoning is quite natural. A chaste bride doesn't have any STDs. Also, a chaste bride does't have any other kids floating around, something that many husbands-to-be are happy they don't have to deal with (more mouths to feed has always been a negative when we lived purely by the land). On that note, the same can be said for men and STDs and unexpected children. It allowed purety of breeding. What made noble families noble was a lack of genetic diseases, STDS, and so on. One could only count on a well bred mate to not give things like that to the children. This tradition helped propagate the human race and thats why it was so important. Now-a-days we have blood tests, condoms, contraceptives, and a plethora of other things that mitigate or annihilate the inherent risks of being sexually active. This said, it becomes a question of moral, social, and spiritual value. I have tremendous respect for female and males who choose to wait and link that fantastic feeling with just one person. As for masturbation, it can relieve stress and be all-around good time(like playing in your own personal theme park by yourself). However, with no object of affection to link it to, it becomes uncontrolled and unhealthy. Part of every persons drive, whether they realise it or not, to find a significant other, is the mating instinct. This instinct is mitigated or directed away from other people when its constantly fulfilled on your own. It inspires unrealistic expectations for intercourse. It can inspire a n eed to fill the missing half of the arrangement, leading to porn addiction. Though not the whole of it, having someone you can rely on for mutually enjoyable intercourse is a large part of what keeps long term relationships together. How many husbands or wives out there wouldn't be worried or offended if their mates refused to have sex with them ever again? Many would take it as evidence of an affair, or atleast proof that the significant other isn't happy in the relationship and wants to leave. When precautions are taken, sex is great. Once in awhile, masturbation can be great. Chastity is great. Tis ALL great. Really it comes down to personal drive(I'm so clever). As for God, I've never thought of him as a peeping tom. I think sex is a joke in heaven and he has a good laugh whenever he sees it along with everyone else. Sex is a mortal problem, like eating, and breathing. I'm sorry that so many of mans institutions have forgotten that the biggest gift God gave us was free will. You can't give free will and then put limitations on it. Everything he's ever asked us not to do was advice from the highest authority, and nothing else. Organised religions made it into "commandments" and "sins". We all might "have" to kill someone, argue with our parents, or be intimate with someone. All the guilt and empty spiritual threats are mans invention. He knows and plans on us doing whatever we're going to do. Everything we do DOES have consequences, both good and bad. For me, the hardest part is excepting responsability for those consequences. 060705 ... LS ON that whole "advice from the highest authority" here's an example: When your playing with a new program, who do you think knows how to use it most effectively? Duh, the programmer who wrote it! 060705 ... . . 060719 ... amy vs. noah websters newworld dictionary noun the quality or state of being chaste specif. a)virtuousness b) sexual abstinence c) decency d) simplicity of style 080430 what's it to you? who go blather from