I agree with Monica that denying who we are as sexual (and sexy!) beings is the problem, not the sexiness itself. It seems that exhortations to young women to exercise “modesty” are essentially shame-based, though perhaps less obviously than the Hurleygate video. If “sexiness doesn’t belong in the public sphere”, we might as well put back the fig leaves back on, convinced of the inherent shamefulness of our bodies.

Thanks to “Nudy Garland” for a thought provoking and “revealing” response, not to mention a fun name! I agree, it is tough to discover who we are sexually after you’ve made a lifelong commitment to someone. We are taught in churches to deny or hide who we are as sexual beings, I believe it is disempowering for both men and women. Bravo to Becky the therapist for addressing this issue with her clients and helping them to recover their full selves.

On a professional level, after working in sex therapy and education for a few years now, I can attest that many of our clients are Christian women who have been emotionally, spiritually and physically damaged by misinformation and ignorance about their bodies and about sex.

I was one of those people, and my personal journey is what led me into this field. I love being able to help women (and men and couples for that matter) develop a healthy appreciation for their bodies, for the wonders of sensuality, and for the sexual experience.

i’m female and heterosexual, these are two important details for this story i am going to share:
when i was 5 years old, my best friend (who i’m still friends with 21 years later, and she is also female and heterosexual) and i had a fun game we played, we called it “fashion show.” i am 100% sure my only exposure to a “fashion show” at this point was the one miss piggy is involved in in “the great muppet caper”- not exactly brimming with sexy imagery, there, but i could be convinced that perhaps there was some sexual confidence that seeped out and stuck with me about the way those women (and piggy) sauntered down the run way and showed off the latest styles.

my friend and i were two completely innocent girls- grew up in christian homes, were never-exposed to sex on tv or anything at that stage of the game. i think i knew the basics of sperm and eggs, but not much beyond that. we used to play “fashion show” in the bathroom at my house. i am not sure what my mom thought we were doing in there behind the locked door- playing with bathtub toys in the sink? or maybe that we were just keeping each other company whilst the other took a dump? what we were really doing was taking all our clothes of and taking turns walking down the make-shift runway (the long, bathroom counter top), strutting our fully nude “stuff” (hips swaying and everything)!! somehow, my friend and i just WANTED to be naked and flaunt ourselves around.

i distinctly remember NOTHING about when it was her turn. i didn’t watch her thinking anything of it, i don’t remember caring about her nakedness in one way or another- it just was what it was- there was no sense of any child-form of arousal from viewing her flauntiness (can it be called ’sexuality’ that young? i kinda think so…). all i can remember is how it felt to be the one showing off my body when it was MY turn. it felt sooo great! not tingly, not arousing in the way i associate with feelings of sexiness now, just very freeing and independent, in some way that was unique to any other way i ever expressed myself. it even felt great in the process of stripping down, i remember the fun of gradually wearing less and less. it didn’t feel dirty, or shameful (although… we still somehow had that gut feeling that we needed to do this behind a locked door, and i may never know where that instinct came from… but maybe there is a distinction between “shameful” and “private/intimate” that could also stand to be made in this conversation about sexuality). it was just all about ME. me being naked, me showing off my body, me feeling… i think… SEXY in some strange, 5 year-old way.

many years later my same friend was telling me about some pictures she had just seen of herself as a 5 or 6 year-old in which she was wearing a little sun dress with one strap pushed down her shoulder, and she was making a pouty face at the camer. i recounted memories i had of being in totally “unsexy” situations (in my third grade class room, or walking down the street with my family, etc) and the simple act of rolling a shoulder backwards in a circle used to feel … well … i don’t know how i would have described it as a kid, but now the only word i can think of to describe it is “naughty”!! but in that *wink wink* good kind of way ;)

???!

where did we get these ideas?? i think it’s built in. i think i AM sexy, and i mean that not just in a “self-confidence” kind of way, i mean it like that mallard duck comment, earlier- you can’t ask me to tone down the colours of my feathers- i’m just built for attracting a mate. sexy is something i am by nature.

the sad thing is, at age 16 when i had my first serious boyfriend, we had been trained and taught not to have sex or to THINK about sex (also known “lusting,” in my upbringing) until marriage- so we didn’t. we got married at age 20, and… 6 years later here we are getting divorced. i am very certain that our lack of a chance to explore our sexuality a bit more before marriage does play a big role in our divorcing now. i am not sexually attracted to him- whether or not i was (or even “should be”) is not a question i was “allowed” to ask prior to marriage, because of my christian upbringing. sex and sexual “compatibility” (or whatever you want to call it) didn’t play into our decision to be together forever because we never had a chance to explore sex (with each other OR anyone else) until we had already tied the knot. so, i spent 5 years having sex with him anyway. because it was my “duty” as a wife, and because that’s what is “normal” when you are married. you are just supposed to. don’t get me wrong, i loved him and cared about him as a good man and close childhood companion, and i even learned the ways to make it enjoyable for myself, too. but now i’m a grown woman trying to figure out for the first time what it means to be sexually attracted to people and how to engage with those feelings. i mourn the loss of my late teens/early 20s to have been figuring out this vital part of becoming an adult.

i’m sad that the confident, seemingly inherently sexy girl i was at age 5 got trapped in a sexless youth and eventually a sexually unsatisfying young adulthood the more and more i was brought up under the banner of being a “good Christian.”

i love this conversation you’ve started, rachelle. thanks for a place to talk about it.

Add my name to the list of women who regret waiting until marriage to have sex, by the way. It was an odd feeling to sort out “what are my feelings about sex and dating” in my mid thirties.

Whoops! Lindell and Amelia are here – gotta go!

The stories told here are an insight for me. I have no idea what it is/was like for women and girls of any age. I never had to experience that and I can never fully understand what it is that any woman has/is going through. But I can say that holding yourself back from being yourself or from being sexy because you are ashamed is tragic.

I don’t think that there is any reason that one should hide their sexuality. It is as much a part of themselves as the color of their hair. Sexiness is obvious. Whether it be in the form of confidence, or in the form of modesty or in the form of the human body. We can all see it and in some way shape or form we tend to be attracted to it.

Hiding oneself has never done anyone any good. Backing down from those that would have you submit to them has rarely ever turned out well.

This is why I love your stories Rachelle. The words that you write and the way that you say them, and having the fortune of knowing you, the picture your words paint can only be described as ’standing tall’. Being strong and determined and trusting your own feelings and intuitions. Pardon the french, but that’s fucking awesome.

I wonder whether we as women are just totally mixed up.

I’m constantly watching my 6 and 8 year old (innocent, I think) girls, raised in a small town ’sheltered, conservative, Christian’ community, exploring who they are and what they are. A few years ago they found this little super short halter top and tight capris at the thrift shop and begged to come home with it. They were 3 and 5 and in my opinion hadn’t really been influenced by the media (directly anyway .. no Hilary Duff, Miley Cyrus etc.). This was their favorite little outfit to wear. They’d put it on and stroke their bodies and flip their hair. Me, the mom, told them they were only allowed to wear this at home, in the backyard. Inside, I was worried, concerned, and frustrated!!!!! What had happened to my sweet innocent girls? What kind of stuff had they been watching at friend’s places (the *few* times I’d left them alone)? All of our friends and family are very modest, so I wondered what kind of potentially sexually promiscuous girls I was raising. This is one way to react and a lot of my head space was consumed by these thoughts.

The other way to look at it is that they were being girls. And girls, who eventually become women are, in their soul, in their purest being, sexual. What do you think? What if being sexy is what we are? And what if we’re not being true to ourselves if we’re constantly worried about being too sexy. If we’re always worried about committing some sin. What if NOT being sexy is the sin? I just asking these questions. I don’t really have an answer.

I think of the world God created, and I think of the many animal species who have certain ways of being with their sexual counterparts. We wouldn’t think of telling the male Mallard Duck to tone down on the colourful feather action b/c the female is getting too excited. The primping, the licking the sniffing.

Maybe the sin, for us women, comes in denying who we really are. SEXUAL. @@ Maybe we’re more about sexiness than about washing dishes, doing laundry and raising the kids. And maybe our sexuality is more about the soul than about the act of sex itself, or how it makes a man feel.

I’m playing devil’s advocate here. Not necessarily personally attached to all the opinions I’ve written. I’m thinking off the top of my head to a large extent.

I guess that’s where I think that another perspective is needed. Both of those above unhealthy messages are from 2 different camps, I think; 1) the culture/media, etc. at large, and 2) many conservative religious circles (but maybe not all religious circles).

The 3rd view is modesty and beauty. I’m saying we can leave sexy out of it, because I don’t think it belongs in the public arena much, if at all. Is there a purpose for it that we could do without, publicly speaking? Yeah, one could argue that my view is a man’s view and one that’s all messed up as far as sexiness goes, too. And one could say that it is an archaic view, as well. We’ve come so far as a culture, perhaps, to ever go back in this area. But what if we and our children stuck out for our modesty? They might not fit in with their friends. But isn’t it worth it?

Seems like either way we fight a difficult battle, but I would argue for the protection of the soul over fitting in, I guess. But you’re right, who defines modesty and when and by who’s standards does it become sexy? That’s precisely why sexiness doesn’t belong in the public sphere, in my opinion. It’s pretty easy to see something as innocent as a pony tail from afar and think “that’s pretty hot,” only to find out when you get closer to the person it’s an old hippie dude with nice hair. It’s just a pony tail! but because “sexy” is such a widespread, bought and sold concept, that pony tail is easily “sexy-fied.” I’m not arguing for a no-pony tail dress code. Sure, one could argue that boys (and girls?) would think about sex even without the sex-machine influences. Okay, true, but there is such a thing as discipline (very valuable character trait, I hear) but we feed our whims and impulses so much easier than we fight against the forces that go against discipline and morality. (There again, who defines morality? There must be some authority we can look to… or are we just out here on our own?)

Anyway, just more thoughts. Yes it is tiring. And yes, Shelli and I do hope we can raise our boys to respect others’ bodies, as well as their own.

Good dialog here BTW. You always strike a chord with your readers as the comments show.

Yes, It’s a double edged sword ins’t it? Because the message is that girls should look a certain way to have value; yet when they go ahead and dress to look that certain way, they are condemned for doing so. (see the Miley Cyrus scandal of a month or so ago.)

What seem obvious is that dressing ‘provacative’–or not–is _not_ what keeps your husband from cheating. Your _husband_ keeps your husband from cheating. I think this message needs to be much stronger in religious circles, where women are far too often considered responsible for their spouse’s infidelity. The fairly recent affair with Ted Haggard and prominent pastor’s comments regarding how pastors are more likely to cheat if their wives ‘let themselves go’ are testimony to this sad reality.

Sigh. Sometimes it just makes you so tired, doesn’t it?

I hear what you are saying about confidence. Something I heard years ago in a Barbara Walters interview has stuck with me. Walters was interviewing Madonna, who had recently become a mother. They were talking about Madonna’s public history, including her “Sex” book, which had come out several years prior. Walter’s asked Madonna what she would teach her daughter, Lourdes, about men. Madonna paused for a long moment, then said something like, ‘If I teach her to be confident, I shouldn’t have to teach her much about men.’ I’ve often thought there was a lot of wisdom in that.

As I think a bit tonight about sexuality and modesty, some questions come to mind. Who gets to define what is sexy? Can one person’s concept of beauty be another’s definition of sexy? Does the woman who is dressing herself in the morning get to define that for herself, or does our patriarchal and consumer culture get to create those parameters–or is it both?

I feel that I’m a confident women, and yet my perspective on modesty has been repetedly questioned in the church (though not in the rest of the world.) And while I have striven to be a friend and to love with wisdom, grace, and charity, I have been been acused, more than once, of having seductive and ulterior motives–each time by men who’s own dysfunction has been projected onto me as a bystander. (Which came out later in the storyline.)

For instance, I was once accused of ‘dressing seductively’ while working the overnight shift at a church shelter. Becuase I would be required to sleep part of the night on the floor in a sleeping bag, I was wearing my husband’s oversized sweatshirt, which went down to my knees, and a pair of thick leggings. My fellow volunteer was wearing a baggy peasant dress with leggings. Both of us were asked not to wear these items any more. (This is just one memorable example.) So, who is defining sexy–and who has to carry the weight of that definition?

This is hard to bear, but common enough. A woman in today’s (American conservative) religious culture develops survival techniques for this experience –although she often carries wounds with her along the way.

As I watch my girls grow up I’m so grateful they are confident in their bodies, and that they feel free to dress and move in the ways that feel right to them. I hope I can protect that healthy place–in the religious world and in the secular world as well. And even more, I live in hope that parents like you are raising the the next generation of boys — boys like your little wonders–to carry healthier attitudes towards women’s bodies, and towards their own bodies, than the generation before them.

Can I get an Amen?

So, I would say to girls: nothing you do, no way you dress can make a guy be the perfect guy or even guarantee that he’s not going to break your heart. He will have problems that you can’t fix and that aren’t your responsibility. So start with the parts of you that really matter: your character, your confidence (in your spirit and your body!), your ability to be a friend and to love with wisdom, grace and charity.

How would that be empowering? Well first of all, with a little more dialog it takes the guilt off the woman where it does not belong. But I think it can become liberating because the message out there is that girls have to look a certain way to have value. Contrary to what I read in a lot of posts about freeing the body image, the message does not even need to be about being free to be sexy. Who made being sexy so important, anyway? Probably men, and the women who have been fooled into thinking that liberation necessarily includes the right to be provocative. Don’t get me wrong, please, I’m not saying that beauty is bad, I’m not saying wanting to be attractive is bad, I’m not even saying that being sexy is necessarily bad. It just seems to me that so many times (and yes, I’m admittedly on the outside looking in, in a way) that the drive to be sexy is a desire to be lusted after, perhaps by the opposite sex, perhaps by our friends, maybe even to a degree by ourselves. That’s not healthy, it’s not even the truth of beauty. It’s a substitute for confidence. Bodies are good, yes. Lust leaves out the soul, though.

I do think the message for girls should be confidence. With confidence, if/when they are presented with someone who is a potential mate they can think through their options and make a decision based on their heart, beliefs, etc, not on pressure.

So, I would say to girls: nothing you do, no way you dress can make a guy be the perfect guy or even guarantee that he’s not going to break your heart. So start with the parts of you that really matter: your character, your confidence (in your spirit and your body!), your ability to be a friend and to love with wisdom, grace and charity.

Is sexy in that list? No. is beauty? That list is all about beauty! Who would not be attracted to a person like that regardless of the clothes or body type?

What I’d love to hear sometime in discussions of body image and sexual readiness is a confident woman’s perspective of modesty.

(Sorry for the rantiness of these comments; I just really feel that there is another perspective missing sometimes)