Hipster Christians are “saving” London. And they’re doing with with Morrissey quotes and hangovers.
Obscenity is made up of photos of fairly well-known people from Spain’s culture industry (Think Rossy de Palma, Alaska), posing with religious paraphenalia like sacraments and rosaries (all of which you can buy over the counter in religious supplies stores). Maybe I’m desensitized by all the raping and killing I get up to, but the photos don’t seem all that shocking to me. Self-consciously shot in a fashion magazine style, aside from some bleeding trackmarks and a lascivious looking gayngel, there’s nothing all that explicit about them. Even so, the exhibition has caused an uproar, with senior polititians like the mayor of Madrid calling for it to be closed, religious groups protesting outside, and then, last Friday, someone threw a firebomb through the window. Due to some miracle it didn’t explode (maybe God is on Bruce’s side after all).
“Pastor Mark is the coolest pastor ever. He’s got some real street cred, and I can’t believe he’s got the cajones to publish such honest advice for couples, like how wives should drop their husband’s trousers and suck their dicks while murmuring “I am a repentant woman.” I’m just surprised he forgot to mention the part where the guy fucks her throat so hard it gets bruised and she can’t talk back to him the next day—but maybe that’s just a given.”
—Cliterature - Finally, a Pastor Who Wants Women to Suck Dick
In the last few years in North American culture, abstinence-only education in the US has proved unsuccessful, yet federally funded “Purity Balls“—where daughters pledge virginity to their fathers until marriage in a public ceremony—are strong and alive (and weird). Just look at TLC’s The Virgin Diaries, which highlights, among others, three famous virgins named Lisa, Danielle, and Tamara, whose specific brand of purity is everywhere: Dr. Drew, The Ellen Degeneres Show, Telegraph UK, and CBC.
Doesn’t the idea of “combating a sex-obsessed culture with purity” just validate the idea of a woman’s moral compass being her vagina? Staying pure, virginity by choice… it’s fine by me. What I do have a problem with is where the notion of “purity” leaves the others. The sluts. People like me. If it is morally right to wait to experiment with sex until you are married to a man, then that must make those of us who don’t wait morally wrong. Where is the middle ground? Beyond this, why is a woman’s morality always intertwined with her sexuality?
I was raging with questions. I’ve read Jessica Valenti’s The Purity Myth: How America’s Obsession With Virginity Is Hurting Young Women (now a documentary) like a bible-manifesto combo. I’ve angrily gawked over documentaries of Purity Balls and abstinence-only educators (like that psycho Pam Stenzel). I have a degree in gender studies, too. These virgins were pulling me in. I had to talk to them, get them to hear my side, the smarter side of the whole purity debate.
I decided to go and talk to Lisa, Danielle, and Tamara. I emailed them explaining that I was a feminist writer and even though I didn’t agree with their choices, I respected their right to have them. Surprisingly, they invited me over for a chat and a photo shoot. They even let us dress them up in Laura Ashley-style country-girl garb.
