flirting is very underestimated. i don't know if it's the BEST part, but it's a necessary part, for me. sex (intercourse) is a wonderful physical expression of love, but without preparing a protective, playful emotional atmosphere that can takes weeks, months or years, i can't imagine it being any more meaningful than a sneeze.

i do wonder what sex means to someone who has had many, many different partners. or for prostitutes. how do they separate sex with a partner they love from the act of sex with someone they do not know? i guess they must be able to.

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we have not been to Dyfrig's wedding

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That was a cheap shot, Father Fiddleback. I hope other people will have realised that as they read it.

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Originally posted by frin:
[QB]Fiddleback
I do not appreciate your attempt to drag my wedding into the evidence you use as part of your long running campaign to encourage disrespect of the hosts.

[QUOTE]we have not been to Dyfrig's wedding

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PEEEEERRRRRRRRLLLLLLLEEEEEEEEEEEZZZZZZEEE!!!

I have read through this thread - haven't been on the boards for ages. I've only just recovered from the RSI incurred during the 'offended' thread, and here we go again.

Do you really think, Frin that Fiddleback was 'having a go' at your wedding ? I read it as a passing remark - I didn't detect in it any resentment that he wasn't invited, or suggestion that it was an underhand event during which Secret Ships Business occurred. I have found myself in agreement with Erin on this thread - funnily enough. I do think that Cosmo and Fiddleback are a bit OTT, their wit is often savage, and is possibly off putting to many who post here. I am among those here who find it interesting to question and find my anonymity helpful. I don't like to be made to feel a fool for asking questions - though to be fair neither of them has ever made me feel that way. Your post simply isn't helpful in all this.

By the way, some of the hosts here who reprove are rude and sarcastic but seem exempted from the same rules that we 'mere shipmates' are supposed to follow. I think that that is what he was trying to say.

Let's all grow up a bit, the SOF is becoming tedious.

He also finds the attitudes he was brought up with hard to reconcile. On the one hand taught that sex before marriage was wrong, on the other - anything goes. There wasn't any sort of middle ground.

The conservative evangelical attitudes to sex that I have encountered have been laughable - partly because I've found them not to have been thought through properly by those propounding them. Many of them were too simplistic in nature, and hadn't been thought through, so that, when challenged I was constantly being told "that's different". Mostly I would be talking to them about "whoever looks at a woman lustfully...." - a lot of them were taking this very literally, and consequently (though safe with me) some of the men struggled with relationships with women. Then they'd wind up swinging so far in the opposite direction - because there was little or no consistent guidance about the middle ground.
Are there any good sites/guides about the conservative evangelical view of sex, to counteract my current warped perception thereof?

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Originally posted by Angel of the North:
OK, I've spoken to a friend of mine on this one. He's had many sexual partners - more than 10 times as many as me. And yet, in his current relationship, he finds sexual intercourse far harder - he knows the moves, what works in practice, yet he's had the loving side of himself so numbed by the life he's led, that, now he wants to express that, he's finding it horrendously difficult.

He also finds the attitudes he was brought up with hard to reconcile. On the one hand taught that sex before marriage was wrong, on the other - anything goes. There wasn't any sort of middle ground.

The conservative evangelical attitudes to sex that I have encountered have been laughable - partly because I've found them not to have been thought through properly by those propounding them. Many of them were too simplistic in nature, and hadn't been thought through, so that, when challenged I was constantly being told "that's different". Mostly I would be talking to them about "whoever looks at a woman lustfully...." - a lot of them were taking this very literally, and consequently (though safe with me) some of the men struggled with relationships with women. Then they'd wind up swinging so far in the opposite direction - because there was little or no consistent guidance about the middle ground.
Are there any good sites/guides about the conservative evangelical view of sex, to counteract my current warped perception thereof?

Angel

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Pre marital sex is great fun. Post marital sex is much better.

Pre marital flirting is fun. Post marital flirting with any man but ones husband can be very dangerous indeed!

I don't think that sex before marriage is wrong. It isn't risk free, but provided both partners go into it in the same spirit it can be informative and exciting.

I firmly believe though, that once married a couple should stay faithful to each other.

For example, I was driving the female friend of the couple I mentioned in the OP around (she was legally blind and engaged at the time), when out of the blue she said 'You know, you really are rather attractive' in a come-on tone. Oh dear, I thought, and said 'Well. You're not on the blind pension for nothing'. We both collapsed in gales of laughter, and it was really the best response in the circumstances. This anecdote tickled me enormously and I related it to a mutual friend in this friend's presence. Afterwards, she took me aside and anxiously asked me to be careful who I told it to because 'there are people at church who would never speak to me again if they heard that'.

Sigh. This friend's home group also were in the habit of looking around furtively and asking 'Are we all married here?', before having any conversation about sex.

While I might privately think the majority of conservative evangelicals have views on sex that are absurd and pathetic (especially when I'm seething with frustration), the best I'd come out with in reasoned debate is that these views are narrow and oppressive.

Cosmo's posts can be intemperate, and I like his style, but I would be sad to think that evangelicals coming out of communities with narrow views on sexuality who are questioning or trying to look beyond their tradition might be frightened off the ship.

The Coot,
The One True Bent Evangelical Tat-Queen.

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Originally posted by The Coot:

Cosmo's posts can be intemperate, and I like his style, but I would be sad to think that evangelicals coming out of communities with narrow views on sexuality who are questioning or trying to look beyond their tradition might be frightened off the ship.

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I come from a community with very narrow views on sexuality, and I'm not frightened off the ship in the slightest.

I am, however, rather grateful to Erin for wading in and dressing down Cosmo. Sometimes, out there in real life - and even on the Ship - those of us who are "good little Evangelicals" feel that the world's attitude is that it's wrong to make prejudiced, stereotypical remarks about blacks, liberals, homosexuals etc etc, but absolutely fine to say that all GLEs have their heads stuck up there own backsides. Thanks Erin, for sticking up for us, even if you don't agree with us!

As to the subject of the thread - I think that perhaps there is something different about actual sexual intercourse, than about other sexual acts on the sliding scale that has been described. I interpret the biblical phrase "becoming one flesh" as meaning intercourse, since this strikes me as the most intimate act that 2 human beings can experience together. I believe that this act leads to some kind of spirtual connectedness between the 2 people that I don't really understand. In marriage, this act cements two distinct individuals becoming one. Not two halves making one whole - but 2 wholes coming together, to become one.

Whilst I am NOT about to get drawn into what I personally am willing or unwilling to do outside of marriage, or to condone or condemn anyone else, I wanted to mention this because I think this may be where the engaged couple The Coot mentioned are coming from.

Having said that - I'm happy to admit to being a virgin and therefore probably can be thought of as not having a clue. Ask me again after I get married.

All the best,

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Originally posted by rachel_o:

I am, however, rather grateful to Erin for wading in and dressing down Cosmo.

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It still seems to me a bit odd to ask the question "what is sex"? and not seem to reach a concensus at this stage in a thread.

So what is it? Sex is either of the two divisions of organic beings distinguished as male or female - or some quality relating to that. The word has the same root (sec-) as in section and sect.

Surely the problem we have here is that we are coming to things the wrong way round - only when you have got your brain round the concept the word seeks to describe can you then describe how it relates to adjunct concepts (sexual relations, sexual attraction etc.). If you try to do things the wrong way round you will end up trying to include exceptions in an understanding or definition.

Please understand I only speak etymologically. It may sound tough but that's what is meant by the word.

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Originally posted by Cosmo:
I remember at university some particularly naive members of the Christian Union raving about how wonderful the 'don't touch what you don't have yourself' teaching was. 'So simple', they said, 'so clear and understandable'. They weren't very happy when I pointed out that that meant anal sex between straight people was OK as well as all gay and lesbian sex.

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It is the intent behind the action that is important as much as the mechanics. Is it to build intimacy, or for sexual gratification, or both, or neither - a mechanical act?

I have less problem with a one night stand, than I do with certain long term intimacies, where a great deal is shared, without it being physical. In some cases it can be more damaging than an actual affair. And yet, because it's non-sexual, it can be conveniently ignored.

To give you an example of my own. I have never met P. We have known each other for 3 years in virtual form. we talk a great deal, about a lot of things. And for a time, it could, rightly, have been seen as an affair. As it happens, neither of us was attached at the time. But if one of us had been, and we were spending several hours a week working on one of our mutual projects, a few phone calls here and there, on top of hours put in at work that actually brought money in, neither of us should have been surprised at our partners being jealous. Especially when we denied it was anything more than just professional and necessary contact for the completion of said mutual ongoing project.

The friends of mine that are not involved in this virtual world say that this is bollocks. And some people that are involved in this virtual world quite well, and are in a similar situation would apply such an epithet, as a convenient means of avoiding some highly uncomfortable truths, like their mutual project is wrecking their real life relationships.

The nature of sex is kind of nebulous, because it in part depends on the tags that one wishes to put on it. As a society both too much and too little emphasis is put on sex. Too much is placed on the physical act. Too little is placed on the feelings behind it.

You cannot disengage the one from the other, in a relationship. I have friends who, though they have never touched beyond a friendly hug, you know will marry, in that they have agreed thus. It wasn't intentional that they didn't kiss, or anything physical, but you and they can feel the tender emotion there. And it will happen. And I sincerely envy them that they can be so intimate like that, and try and follow their example in my own relationship. And I have other friends, though they use each other for penetrative sex, have no great feeling for each other. These are two extremes.
I'm afraid i cannot be more erudite than that.

Check your "I-Spy" book of orifices. You have got the wrong one.

The anus is surely the orifice of choice when posting here on SOF. One simply inserts one's head up it and then types away. I frequently do it and look how spiritual I am.

Sex is intercourse, oral sex and anal sex (never had any anal, my wife wouldn't allow me and she has never been sufficiently drunk to the point of not knowing the difference). All other forms are giz on the side - a halfhearted attempt to the real one body thing.

As enlightening as this all is, it is veering away from serious debate. Prurience is not becoming to Purgatory, and this thread is itching to get into Hell. Either take a cold shower, or prepare for the flames ...

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Originally posted by Ultraspike:
I dated a fiercely conservative Irish Roman Catholic for several years and he refused to have intercourse on the grounds that it was against his religion to have pre-marital sex, but had no problem with oral sex. Is this hyprocrisy or was he just secretly gay as I suspect? Part of the problem was that he didn't believe in contraception and supposedly believed in the whole "sex is only for procreation" nonsense, but I believe oral sex is just as much sex as intercourse. Is this common among RCs or am I making a sweeping generalization here?

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This reminds me of a friend of mine from school who claimed proudly after spending a night with a young man that she hadn't had sex with him, merely given him a "blow job."

She was most upset when I pointed out that with that under his belt (as it were) he achieved success beyond his wildest imaginings and was rather unlikely to call her in the near future. (His ongoing respect, or lack thereof, for my friend was an avenue I had no wish to go down).

So then, Ultraspike, I would say that your fierce Irishman was no more gay than the next man, rather he simply knew when he was on to a good thing.

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Originally posted by RuthW:
As enlightening as this all is, it is veering away from serious debate.

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Originally posted by Septimus:
So then, Ultraspike, I would say that your fierce Irishman was no more gay than the next man, rather he simply knew when he was on to a good thing.

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It sears me to the very loins that in four years your other half didn't have the decency to arrange a fall from grace or six.

I do assure you, being a "man" myself, that anything comprising insecurity, desire and fantasy can be termed a "normal man" and dismissed as such.

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Originally posted by Ultraspike:
So would phone sex or computer sex be sex?

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Preferably both and with two different people (whilst eating fois gras to the sound of trumpets).

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Originally posted by Happy Abby:
This experience of phone sex was definitely almost identical to the real thing.

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It's strange, isn't it, what bakelite can do to a girl.

I'm not sure that silicon holds quite the same sway.

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Originally posted by Cosmo:
Why do you, RuthW, imagine that reading a trashy novel should be discrete from improving literature? I always find that the trashier the novel (or preferably film) the more improving I find it. This is particularly true of tracts concerning sexual conduct and morality (even more so if they contain pictures or photogravures). So RuthW, do not be ashamed of your trashy novel fixation. Glory in it and be proud.

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The enjoyment of trashy novels is greatly enhanced by hiding said trash behind "improving" reading.

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Originally posted by Septimus:
It's strange, isn't it, what bakelite can do to a girl.

I'm not sure that silicon holds quite the same sway.

Septimus

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Septimus - I'm confused! What is Bakelite and why would it be preferable to phone sex?

Now that this thread has descended to the netherdepths (how's that for a tautology?) tomb would like to reiterate a couple of guidelines based on his reading of the above fascinating discourse:

• Don't become a spokesman (or spokeswoman) for someone else. No matter how much you love them (you know who you are, dear) they are responsible for defending themselves and not behaving badly by posting-and-running. The good-cop bad-cop routine won't wash in hell. tomb is watching you....
  
• Don't post disgusting graphic details of sexual activites or residuae. tomb almost hurled when he read one of the posts above. If you are wondering if you have been guilty of the particular sin that has occasioned this oblique post, send tomb a PM, and he'll be happy to tell you if you win the prize. On the other hand, if you persist in posting graphic detail, tomb will let you know in an unpleasant fashion.
  
• And finally. Don't whinge about the hosts and make nasty passive-agressive posts that upset very nice people who sacrifice their time (and in some instances, their health) to make this little corner of the web a safe place for people to talk about their faith and their struggles and people and Christians. If you do, It Will Not Go Well With You.
  

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Originally posted by tomb:
[list]

....tomb almost hurled when he read one of the posts above.

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Originally posted by tomb:
tomb refuses to discuss the triggers for his bodily functions on this or any other thread.

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Originally posted by Amos:
UltraSpike: I always understood that William Jefferson C. did give as good as he got, and that was the reason for the massive support he received from female voters.

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