Heavy sigh. This feels very accurate. And your comment near the end: "The subtitle of this book is how sex can explain 'almost anything.' What appears to be absent from the list of things sex can explain is women having sex." (!!!)
May 7, 2023·edited May 7, 2023Liked by Dr. Laura Robinson
Laura, you are honestly one of my favorite writers right now. I so appreciate how you’re able to explain all of the underlying Christian cultural assumptions that I never had words for. Re: women faking orgasms, I would also add that it is not out of the realm of possibility that many Christian women know so little about their body that they don’t even know they’re not having orgasms. There’s such heavy belief in sex being “different” for men, that I can see women believing that yes, this experience of sex and closeness, even without a real climax, is what “orgasms” feel like for women. I know a few women who are like “I think I’ve had an orgasm, but it doesn’t feel like that, it’s fine I guess, men seem to enjoy them a lot more” etc…and it’s like oof.
It takes some time for sperm to reach an egg and to form a zygote. Different sources cite different numbers: some speak of minutes, but others of 7 hours or more at a minimum and conception can sometimes happen days after sex. In other words, by the time the third party is formed out of that union between the first and second parties, the party (so to speak) has probably been long over. In that sense, the third person is never part of the experience, not even as a zygote. That may be a detail, but it is relevant to the imagery used, I think.
May 7, 2023·edited May 7, 2023Liked by Dr. Laura Robinson
Laura, I appreciate your writing so much. This makes it make so much more sense. I get the sense of you and I had fairly similar upbringings (white, conservative evangelical) and everything you write is just spot on to explaining the subculture
Genuine question: I wonder if the word “ideally” suggests that they view the “human climax trinity” as the “pre-fall ideal.” Like the fact that women don’t typically climax through penetration is a result of the fall, like cancer is or something. It seems that their thinking is “Because the trinity is three in one, and the word ‘in’ makes me think about PiV intercourse, then the ‘ideal’ intercourse must image the trinity meaning both male and female orgasm at the same time and the egg is there ready for the semen to become a baby.”
Obviously I’m not compelled by this, but it does seem to explain the fact they raise this image of intercourse as the ideal and also view contraception as marring that image. There’s a lot wrong with this line of thinking, one of which being the female anatomy—designed by God—doesn’t easily lend itself to this ideal, so there’s that.
Again I want to thank you Laura for this series. I'm reading every word.
I'm composing a poem about the whole BU mess and what we can learn from it. When I publish the poem at my blog, I will be citing your series.
I can understand you thinking that the text's foolishness and ignorance deserves to be laughed at. However, for myself, I cannot laugh or even crack a wry smile about the text. This is because I am a survivor of terrifying sexual abuse, and Butler's text re-traumatises me when I read it.
Thank you for pointing out the history of how the clitoris has been ignored and misunderstood. What a litany of injustice! And all because men's sexual pleasure is prioritised, and women are coerced and shamed into complying with that script.
Having faked orgasms many times in my earlier life (I'm divorced and chaste now) I can testify to the truth of your hypothesis that women don’t want to tell men they’re not having orgasms. I didn't want to tell because a) I wanted to please my partner and not hurt his feelings, and b) I was ashamed of not having orgasms from penetration. Only once in my life did I orgasm from PiV sex. All the rest of my sexual experience has been clouded by intense shame: shame that I can't orgasm, shame for faking orgasm, shame for not telling my partner I was faking orgasm, shame that "my sexual wiring is fused beyond repair".
I now (cognitively) understand that my sexual wiring was fused because of the sexual abuse that happened to me when I was a child and a young adult. But understanding that doesn't take away the trauma that my body remembers. So, I am deeply, viscerally, re-traumatised when I read flowery fancies from Josh Butler like this: "Like a bridegroom Christ went forth from his chamber.... He came to the marriage-bed of the Cross, and there, in mounting it, he consummated his marriage. And when he perceived the sighs of the creature, he lovingly gave himself up to the torment in place of his bride, and joined himself to [her] forever."
You may wonder why I read anything from Butler, now that I know he re-traumatises me.
I read it in order to write about it for my blog readers, many of whom are victims of sexual abuse in childhood and abusive marriages. My readers are helped by my writing, by me exposing the lies and injustice they have been subjected to. By me validating their experiences.
I know you've written more than could ever be expected on this book, so this one's not an ask of you:
Can someone document all the errors in basic anatomy & physiology, reproductive systems, and reproductive biology? There is so very much wrong, even aside from ignoring the clitoris.
The first quoted text here says the third person is present at the moment of orgasm. But how can that possibly be? The egg and the sperm don't connect at the point of orgasm. There isn't even a zygote at this point, much less a growing fetus.
"It would also be a plausible reading that... a lot of unserious people didn’t think through the implications."
YUP. If you read the replies and listen to the podcasts of people desperately trying to defend this book or "make it work", this comes through over and over again.
Laura, this reading feels so right on so many levels. Particularly the level at which well-intentioned humans blunder into things we don’t fully understand (but think we do!). How human of us!
As Chris Voss says in *Never Split the Difference* -- “no matter how we dress up our negotiations in mathematical theories, we are always an animal, always acting and reacting first and foremost from our deeply held but mostly invisible and inchoate fears, needs, perceptions, and desires.” This is true of our negotiations with others and it’s true of so many other ways we interact with our lives. What seems to be calculated and careful is so often the opposite. And of course, reveals what we truly believe (whether we realize we believe this way or not!).
Thank you for finding and bringing out the real-life humanity in this situation :)
Why, oh why, oh why, oh WHYYYYY (I cannot stress this enough) is it necessary for sex to be some kind of image of the Trinity? Why must sex explain (almost) EVERYTHING??
Heavy sigh. This feels very accurate. And your comment near the end: "The subtitle of this book is how sex can explain 'almost anything.' What appears to be absent from the list of things sex can explain is women having sex." (!!!)
Laura, you are honestly one of my favorite writers right now. I so appreciate how you’re able to explain all of the underlying Christian cultural assumptions that I never had words for. Re: women faking orgasms, I would also add that it is not out of the realm of possibility that many Christian women know so little about their body that they don’t even know they’re not having orgasms. There’s such heavy belief in sex being “different” for men, that I can see women believing that yes, this experience of sex and closeness, even without a real climax, is what “orgasms” feel like for women. I know a few women who are like “I think I’ve had an orgasm, but it doesn’t feel like that, it’s fine I guess, men seem to enjoy them a lot more” etc…and it’s like oof.
Just want to chime in to say: thank you.
Funny, erudite, clever, charming: your writing is a gift.
Crying. Laughing. Crying.
This article was phenomenal. Instant subscribe. Keep up the good work.
Your use of the word "elide" ... *chef's kiss*
It takes some time for sperm to reach an egg and to form a zygote. Different sources cite different numbers: some speak of minutes, but others of 7 hours or more at a minimum and conception can sometimes happen days after sex. In other words, by the time the third party is formed out of that union between the first and second parties, the party (so to speak) has probably been long over. In that sense, the third person is never part of the experience, not even as a zygote. That may be a detail, but it is relevant to the imagery used, I think.
Laura, I appreciate your writing so much. This makes it make so much more sense. I get the sense of you and I had fairly similar upbringings (white, conservative evangelical) and everything you write is just spot on to explaining the subculture
Oh Laura, yes.
Genuine question: I wonder if the word “ideally” suggests that they view the “human climax trinity” as the “pre-fall ideal.” Like the fact that women don’t typically climax through penetration is a result of the fall, like cancer is or something. It seems that their thinking is “Because the trinity is three in one, and the word ‘in’ makes me think about PiV intercourse, then the ‘ideal’ intercourse must image the trinity meaning both male and female orgasm at the same time and the egg is there ready for the semen to become a baby.”
Obviously I’m not compelled by this, but it does seem to explain the fact they raise this image of intercourse as the ideal and also view contraception as marring that image. There’s a lot wrong with this line of thinking, one of which being the female anatomy—designed by God—doesn’t easily lend itself to this ideal, so there’s that.
Again I want to thank you Laura for this series. I'm reading every word.
I'm composing a poem about the whole BU mess and what we can learn from it. When I publish the poem at my blog, I will be citing your series.
I can understand you thinking that the text's foolishness and ignorance deserves to be laughed at. However, for myself, I cannot laugh or even crack a wry smile about the text. This is because I am a survivor of terrifying sexual abuse, and Butler's text re-traumatises me when I read it.
Thank you for pointing out the history of how the clitoris has been ignored and misunderstood. What a litany of injustice! And all because men's sexual pleasure is prioritised, and women are coerced and shamed into complying with that script.
Having faked orgasms many times in my earlier life (I'm divorced and chaste now) I can testify to the truth of your hypothesis that women don’t want to tell men they’re not having orgasms. I didn't want to tell because a) I wanted to please my partner and not hurt his feelings, and b) I was ashamed of not having orgasms from penetration. Only once in my life did I orgasm from PiV sex. All the rest of my sexual experience has been clouded by intense shame: shame that I can't orgasm, shame for faking orgasm, shame for not telling my partner I was faking orgasm, shame that "my sexual wiring is fused beyond repair".
I now (cognitively) understand that my sexual wiring was fused because of the sexual abuse that happened to me when I was a child and a young adult. But understanding that doesn't take away the trauma that my body remembers. So, I am deeply, viscerally, re-traumatised when I read flowery fancies from Josh Butler like this: "Like a bridegroom Christ went forth from his chamber.... He came to the marriage-bed of the Cross, and there, in mounting it, he consummated his marriage. And when he perceived the sighs of the creature, he lovingly gave himself up to the torment in place of his bride, and joined himself to [her] forever."
You may wonder why I read anything from Butler, now that I know he re-traumatises me.
I read it in order to write about it for my blog readers, many of whom are victims of sexual abuse in childhood and abusive marriages. My readers are helped by my writing, by me exposing the lies and injustice they have been subjected to. By me validating their experiences.
Amazing work, Dr Laura.
I know you've written more than could ever be expected on this book, so this one's not an ask of you:
Can someone document all the errors in basic anatomy & physiology, reproductive systems, and reproductive biology? There is so very much wrong, even aside from ignoring the clitoris.
The first quoted text here says the third person is present at the moment of orgasm. But how can that possibly be? The egg and the sperm don't connect at the point of orgasm. There isn't even a zygote at this point, much less a growing fetus.
The crime novel 💀
That “ideally” is very revealing.
Thanks for all of this.
"It would also be a plausible reading that... a lot of unserious people didn’t think through the implications."
YUP. If you read the replies and listen to the podcasts of people desperately trying to defend this book or "make it work", this comes through over and over again.
Laura, this reading feels so right on so many levels. Particularly the level at which well-intentioned humans blunder into things we don’t fully understand (but think we do!). How human of us!
As Chris Voss says in *Never Split the Difference* -- “no matter how we dress up our negotiations in mathematical theories, we are always an animal, always acting and reacting first and foremost from our deeply held but mostly invisible and inchoate fears, needs, perceptions, and desires.” This is true of our negotiations with others and it’s true of so many other ways we interact with our lives. What seems to be calculated and careful is so often the opposite. And of course, reveals what we truly believe (whether we realize we believe this way or not!).
Thank you for finding and bringing out the real-life humanity in this situation :)
Why, oh why, oh why, oh WHYYYYY (I cannot stress this enough) is it necessary for sex to be some kind of image of the Trinity? Why must sex explain (almost) EVERYTHING??