The Bachelorette

No, I don't watch the Bachelorette, but I couldn't help but comment on this article that I saw on the Yahoo home page.  I often think I would like to choose a new home page, but then I think it's helpful for me to see what is being pumped out to the public as "news."  

In actuality, Yahoo 'news' is really a propaganda machine for Leftist values, but, see, no one realizes that because it's under the guise of 'news.'  If you differ with their attitudes on any number of subjects you must think you're a bigoted loser who is out of touch with reality because they rarely present other perspectives.

Ok, ok.  I'll move on.  

So here's the deal: apparently, "Bachelorette fans and spectators collectively freaked out last month after it was revealed that the show’s star had sex with a contestant early on in the show...Bachelorette Kaitlyn Bristowe was immediately labeled as “'sleazy'” and “'low-rent' (among other harsh adjectives)."

The article goes on to explain how Bristowe was annoyed that she was 'shamed' and 'judged' because she slept with this guy so early.  

The guy Nick Viall tweeted: "Both men and women have a right to have sex without judgment."  

Bristowe said in an interview: “I don’t think that’s a crazy thing to sleep with somebody when you’re trying to be in a relationship with them.” 

The article then muses over why people were so bothered by all of this (Does any normal person with

common sense need any insight here?).  So they turn to a psychologist who explains that "casual sex is 'rule-breaking behavior in society.'"  Another psychologist explains, "'Sexual shaming is usually about some sort of fear and concern about powerlessness.  Because sexuality is fluid and impressionable, there is a worry that it will catch on and get ‘out of control.’ The panic that it can ignite in people is ultimately an attempt to regain control over the status quo, he says."

Finally, one more "expert" is quoted as saying, “Certainly, attitudes toward sex have shifted over the years, but the topic itself seems to always be one in which people have always had wildly different opinions as to what is OK and what’s not OK.  As long as these differences exist, there will always be people who judge and criticize the acts of others.”

What all these experts, and apparently the authors of the article, are missing is what all of us with common sense have known for thousands of years: sex is not merely a physical act, but an emotional and spiritual one.  People who engage in it bond in powerful ways.  This is by design, God's design I would add.  

Therefore, we all can recognize that treating sex as "casual" is an oxymoron.  It's like wearing a suit to eat at McDonald's.  You can do it, but it's dumb (meaning 'unwise' considering the gravity of the act).  

Now, as a Christ-follower, I believe that God's ideal is to save the beauty and power of sex for the marriage bed.  There all that potency is safe and protected for each other.  

But even people who don't follow Christ understand that casual sex or in Bristowe's words, "sleep[ing] with someone when you're trying to be in a relationship with them" is problematic.

But apparently, to say so means that I am judging and criticizing.

Are we judging and criticizing the guy who killed those people at a church recently?

Were we judging and criticizing when former President Bill Clinton had an affair with a White House intern?

Were we judging and criticizing when we were bothered by the anti-semitic remarks Mel Gibson made when pulled over for a DUI?

Yes.  This is how we collectively challenge each other to honor values.

On the flip side, there is no good in calling Kaitlyn Bristowe nasty names.  She is a person, a real person deserving respect and honor and she is loved by friends, family, and God.  Nor is it honorable that she receives most of the name-calling and not, to my knowledge, Nick Viall.  

Who is guiltless?  Not me.  Not you.  Not anyone.  But to blow off important values in an article by arguing that our reactions are coming from "fear and concern about powerlessness" is, well, "shaming" to those of us with values.