Sunday, January 15, 2012

Cultural Obsexxion?

Pastor Ed Young of Grapevine's Fellowship mega-church has followed up his advice to his congregation two or three years ago, where he suggested to his married congregants to practice boinking for seven days in a row, by staging a 24 hour 'John & Yoko' bed-in atop his church under the DFW air traffic flight path, to raise awareness of the importance of intimacy in marriages.



OK, I think it get that, kind of.  But it does make me question whether it's about healing marriages or creating a bit of sensationalism in our already sex-obsessed culture.  Pastor Young says that Church is the logical place to discuss sex, after the home, and I agree that it's surely a better place to hear God's plan for human intimacy than seeing it on TV, the movies, and the internet.  I'm just not sure if God's trying to put it as much in the spotlight as Pastor Young is trying to do.

The pastor at my Church doesn't shy away from the subject, calling sexual intimacy between a man and a woman one of God's great gifts.  But, so far, he hasn't challenged the congregation to a stamina-fest, passed out little blue pills, or made it the centerpiece of the message.

About three years ago, I signed up for one of those online dating services - never dated anyone from there (that I hadn't already met), and finally decided to turn off my profile.  But, occasionally, I still get emails telling me I have new 'matches' that I should check out.

So, I logged onto the site, which displays thumbnails of the gals it thinks I would be compatible with.  Some of the screen names lack images, but I notice one that has an image unlike the others - it's a tray of cupcakes with cherries on top of them.  Of course I wonder "what's up with that?" and click on the link to find out.

The profile in question says the woman's 51 or 52 - no spring chick, but neither am I, so it's all good.  The self-description is rather sparse, includes the typical caveat 'must not be looking for intimate encounter', and under Interests lists only 'ANR'.

ANR?  Active noise reduction - is she a Dolby fan?  Alaska NORAD Region - an Air Force vet?

No.  I'll save you the Google search...it's apparently Adult Nursing Relationship - an alternate name for erotic lactation fetish.  I guess that explains the Latte in her screen name, huh?

But, I was a bit confused, as back in my dating days, if one got so far as to, uh, you know, check out the nursing goods, one was probably as good as home to having an intimate encounter.

There's a whole world out there I know nothing about.

And, lastly (for this post anyway) on the subject of obsession, we hear that Steven Tyler has issued sort of an amicus statement in favor of curtailing the language and prurient content of broadcast TV.
As a libertarian/conservative, I generally favor minimal government intrusion into our daily lives.  But, as Paul Harvey used to say "Self government won't work without self discipline."   The producers of 'entertainment' on the left and right coasts seem to have little use for self discipline.

Many evenings I have the TV on, and hear a constant stream of (OK, I'm gonna sound like a prude here - get over it) trash from such programs as How I Met Your Mother, 2-1/2 Men, Whitney and others.  Maybe I'm overly sensitive, since my daughter does not live with me, that I don't know if she's  being exposed to this kind of fare.

The libs and Larry Flynt types will surely scream that they have a First Amendment right to fill our airwaves with as many of George Carlin's Seven Words (I've written elsewhere that as a high schooler, I could recite, spot-on, several Carlin and Pryor routines - ultimately, that wasn't much of an accomplishment) as they wish.  I disagree - let them do as they wish on cable and dish, but as long as the airwaves are deemed 'public', then 'community standards' apply, and I'm part of the community.

Isn't it interesting that even Steven Tyler, who I think we can agree has more than a passing familiarity with Sex, Drugs, and Rock-n-Roll, says prime-time TV has crossed the line and needs to be dialed back?

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