My Ex and My Future Wife

Last week we learned about the history of purity culture, and this week Theo, Maggie, and Bridget dive in and discuss how Purity Culture effects people today. They discuss how Purity Culture leads to internalized sexual shame, how it promotes rape, rape culture, and child abuse, and they also discuss how unsuccessful abstinence-only sex education really is.

CW/TW: This episode contains discussions of sexual abuse, rape, rape culture, child abuse, misogyny, sexual shame, and racism

**Thank you to Tiktoker Rachel Cain (@iblamebill) for the metaphor about the vertical vs. horizontal view of sin

**Peggy Reeves Sandy is the researcher mentioned who researched the characteristics of rape prone cultures

Episode Transcript Available here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11vsX6TPwQwaG5PYfLibPOTgSV_e1IHS6/view?usp=sharing

Sources for this episode

“Rape-Prone Versus Rape-Free Campus Cultures” by Peggy Reeves Sandy

Rachel Cain, @iblamebill on TikTok

“I Have the Power in My Body to Make People Sin': The Trauma of Purity Culture and the Concept of 'Body Theodicy” by Katie Cross in Feminist Trauma Theologies: Body, Scripture & Church in Critical Perspective.

“Daddy’s Little Girls” by Breanne Fahs

“Producing High Priests and Princesses: The Father-Daughter Relationship in the Christian Sexual Purity Movement” by Elizabeth Gish

“‘ARE YOU A ‘TRASHABLE’ STYROFOAM CUP?’: Harm and Damage Rhetoric in the Contemporary American Sexual Purity Movement” by Elizabeth Gish

“Suffer the Children: National Crisis, Affective Collectivity, and the Sexualized Child” by Susan Knabe

Developing a measure of Purity culture: Sexual messages in evangelical Christian culture, an unpublished doctoral dissertation by Amanda Ortiz

“Broken Promises: Abstinence Pledging and Sexual and Reproductive Health” by Anthony Paik, Kenneth J Sanchagrin, and Karen Heimer

“What is the Prosperity Gospel” by Dr. Anderew Spencer

The Impact of Patriarchal Religions on the Creation of Oppressive Cultures of Female Purity and the Contribution to Rape Culture, and unpublished doctoral dissertation by Haley Stepp

The purity myth: How America's obsession with virginity is hurting young women by Jessica Valenti

What is Purity Culture? How did it emerge and evolve in the United States? How is it related to American Christianity's history of racism and misogyny? How did it become politically terrifying? How is it related to the Lavender Scare and the unsolved murder of JonBenet Ramsey?
Join us for this episode of My Ex and My Future Wife as we discuss the history of Evangelical Purity Culture in the United States.

**Episode Correction: Nat Turner—not Nat Taylor—lead the 1831 slave revolt mentioned in this episode.

CW/TW: This episode contains discussions of racism, abusive theology, misogyny, sexual abuse, rape, rape culture, and child abuse

Sources:
“I Have the Power in My Body to Make People Sin” by Katie Cross, found in the book Feminist Trauma Theologies
“Daddy’s Little Girls: on the perils of chastity clubs, purity balls, and ritualized abstinence” by Breanne Fahs
“Producing High Priests and Princesses: The Father-Daughter Relationship in the Christian Sexual Purity Movement” by Elizabeth Gish
“Suffer the Children: National Crisis, Affective Collectivity, and the Sexualized Child” by Susan Knabe
“It’s like Playing with a Nuclear Bomb” by Sara Moslener
Developing a measure of Purity culture: Sexual messages in evangelical Christian culture by Amanda Ortiz
The Impact of Patriarchal Religions on the Creation of Oppressive Cultures of Female Purity and the Contribution to Rape Culture by Haley Stepp
“‘Some Could Suckle over Their Shoulder’: Male Travelers, Female Bodies” by Jennifer Morgan from Women’s America Refocusing the Past Ninth Edition
Beyond Loving: Intimate Racework in Lesbian, Gay, and Straight Interracial Relationships by Amy C. Steinbugler
Maggie’s True Crime Obsession

In this “minisode” we discuss the term supersessionism. What does it mean? Where does it come from? How can Christians challenge this anti-Semitism that is deeply rooted within their religious tradition? Join us as we continue to explore all the complexities of “bridging the gap” between Christianity and Judaism.

Episode Transcript: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oVVxJ47R3PPQiO9LiRFAq3I7nkzKfald/view?usp=sharing

This Episode’s sources

God is Not One by Stephen Prothero

“Why the Jews: History of Antisemitism” by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

“Ideas & Trends: ‘Supersessionism’ Reconsidered; a leap toward closing the basic gap between Christians and Jews” by the New York Times

C.S. Lewis

Maggie’s Pastor Dad

Theo’s favorite quote

Maggie’s Deconstruction

Theo’s DBT knowledge

Transcript available here: https://mxmfwpod.buzzsprout.com/1759327/8350622-mxmfw-teaser