LTTE: Michael Jordan on Sex at Houghton

            I've been reading the editorials on sex at Houghton with great interest.  It's always interesting to see what students are saying these days.  A few thoughts from an alum (‘99) who loves this place enough that I moved back here with my family:

First, it is sad that the perception among students is that there is no frank conversation about sex.  When you are responsible for setting the agenda for conversations at your churches, as you surely will soon be if you are not already, I hope you rectify that situation.  You surely will have a better appreciation for why it is so difficult for your pastors and parents to deal with.

Interestingly, an angle that all three writers missed was premarital sex as a social justice issue.  Severing sex from marriage does demonstrable harm to women.  It unleashes the sad science of sexual economics: men as buyers, women as sellers.  In such an economy, an ideal woman demonstrates restraint by having a low number (of sexual partners) but yet communicates that she is unable to keep her hands off this one guy.  A woman who can't balance that properly loses: she either gives sex away too easily, which makes her undesirable, or she doesn't give herself away easily enough and the guy loses interest and moves on to the next woman who will.  On many heavily female campuses (hello, Houghton?), the "price" of sex is remarkably low—men can demand sex earlier and earlier in a relationship, sometimes detached from dating altogether, while the woman is left with the unthinkable burden of how to parcel herself out simply to have a social life.  Imagine the life of a woman in such a culture.  "Should I sleep with this guy?  I'm attracted to him, I enjoy his company, and I see him as relationship material…but if I have sex with him too soon, I'll be that much less appealing to the next guy…I've only got so many times to do this before I get a reputation, and I'm not 100% sure this guy is worth it…but still, I like him." No Christian can be comfortable with half the population (and almost two-thirds of Houghton) struggling like that.  It's simply not fair to women who, remember, are created in the image of God. 

When sex is divorced from marriage, men win and women lose. It's that simple. When you bravely announce that premarital sex is not a black-and-white issue, you may think you're throwing off the repressive shackles of fundamentalism, but in reality you're taking on a whole new set of problems most 21-year-old evangelicals have scarcely even considered.  It would be funny to me (if it weren't so sad) that there are students trying to ban Coca-Cola from campus on (as yet unproven) suspicion of various corporate sins, and yet think it progress to allow a behavior that would visibly harm nearly 2/3 of our campus.

             Just my $.02,

Michael Jordan (‘99)