<p>The biggest health risk from multiple sex partners today is Hepatitis C and Aids. The only disease a male cannot get is cervical cancer, for which there is now a vaccine. All the other STD can be passed to either sex.</p>
<p>If you are referring to pregnancy, legally, both are equally culpable, and DNA tests can prove who is whom, and courts uphold paternity issues.</p>
<p>It seems to me that whenever sexuality is removed from feelings, the victims of a casual sex approach might be both males and females equally, even if the boys feel they somehow succeeded momentarily. How does a male move from that way of living into a more emotionally intimate way? I wonder about that.</p>
<p>For that reason, and that I observe girls behaving equally aggressively in high school as boys, I raised both my boys and girl that saying “yes” and “no” to a proposition are in their realm of control. And part of staying in control is not getting wasted at parties.</p>
<p>Excellent points, payingthreetuitions.</p>
<p>I think I need to clarify my previous post. My daughter has only had sex with her steady bf. She wasn’t at the parties where the drinking and casual hooking up went on; she was gathering info on AIM from people who were there. Most of her comments were that she felt sorry for these girls. “It was her first kiss and it wasn’t even special!” etc. She had initially felt hurt that she wasn’t invited to the parties (she wasn’t invited because she had a steady BF and people figured they’d have plans of their own, and because as I mentioned earlier, her former friends had turned her out so she wasn’t getting invited places). After she read about a few of these parties, she made it clear she was glad she didn’t go, and later she turned down a few invites. Hearing what other kids did when drunk was enough to convince her that drinking wasn’t something she was interested in - thank heavens.</p>
<p>Paying3tuitions is right. I wish there were a way to get through to these teens that the day will come when they will regret what they did and even be embarassed by it.</p>
<p>In the mean time, it’s our job to try to guide them as best we can.</p>
<p>I, too, think your story is very valuable here, MomNeedsAdvice. If our younger teens could read and really grasp what MNA is saying - that girls pretend they are okay with the casual sex but they really are not okay with it; that they are labeled sluts by the boys with good values and other boys only want them for their “usefulness,” it would offer them a life lesson that it usually takes way too long and way too much heartbreak to grasp.</p>
<p>
Except that binge drinking and drug use are also significantly among the lowest rates at colleges (ex BYU and similar) and that guys, that for 20-30 of the student population the school’s orientation is an aid, not a detriment, to, ah, social excess, and that Amherst and U/Mass are within easy range of a quickie unless you insist upon it in the next ten minutes.</p>
<p>Good post, JMMom #185.</p>
<p>How does a male move from that way of living into a more emotionally intimate way? I wonder about that.</p>
<p>My experience is that men are much more romantic than women- women are more pragmatic.
Men may shut down their emotions and mechanically go through partners- but from what I have observed- they are often the ones who can’t let any one in at all- because they are so dependent on their armor, that to let * anything* or * anyone* in, would open floodgates that they can’t control.</p>
<p>Its pretty sad really- and I admit for a while I was attracted to guys like that, because I * didn’t * want any attachment. My father had killed himself when I was 17, and I had shut down as well, I didn’t want to feel anything- but I had invested just enough effort in my relationships to make sure I was still alive.</p>
<p>I feel bad for people who put labels on others- like slut- whore- etc, because those kind of people, are very afraid of themselves- and labeling others, lets them put people in a box, where they don’t have to deal with them.</p>
<p>Those who have moved beyond that - recognize that being strong enough to be vulnerable and show your feelings, is part of being more fully human, and being human requires that you connect emotionally and mentally as well as physically. Being human is a wonderful gift, and taking risks is scary, but by not putting people in categories like good/bad, slut/madonna, we are able to make more progress toward really getting to know * ourselves* & I think that is what we are here for.
:)</p>
<p>So to bring it back to what I see as the OP concerns- if you have raised your child with strong values- so that she feels comfortable about her place in the world and about her ability to effect change- she will be OK.</p>
<p>If she is in a dorm or a school where she doesn’t feel comfortable- she will be able to make those adjustments so that she does.
Even if she has to go as far as transfer- this will be positive, because she will be able to strengthen her idea of herself as in control of her own destiny.</p>
<p>Being at a college- that isn’t necessarily a great fit, of course isnt’ optimum, but isn’t the end of the world any more than taking a job that you aren’t necessarily suited for, is.
If you are open and willing to learn, there is something you can take from it, that will serve you well in the years to come.</p>
<p>The only time I every heard my son use the <em>slut</em> word was after we had a gathering/party at our house. A young woman was talking within a group of kids (about 6-8) and she was talking about how “bad” one of the guys she’d been with was (how inept as a lover/kisser/whatever). My son was livid afterwards- he didn’t say anything at the time, but he did rant and rave to ME later on, and used the bad word to refer to her.</p>
<p>Edit: I should say that she named the boy and he was a classmate of all of them.</p>
<p>It may very well be that it’s not just being promiscuous that drives young men to call girls names; rather it may be their attitudes and behavior TOWARD guys. Very interesting- has anyone else heard younger guys refer to girls that way, and if so, what were the circumstances? That’s the only time I’ve heard my sons (two of’em) use that word.</p>
<p>I’ve never heard my son use that word. It’s a somewhat ugly word IMO. However, I’m not sure I would be at all upset to hear him describe a female who behaved in a slutty manner as a slut. Like DP, I don’t mean it is okay to throw it around to describe any girl one doesn’t care for, any girl who is thought to have had unmarried sex…</p>
<p>There is at least one other four letter word I can think of sometimes used to describe females that I cannot ever imagine, EVER condoning. But to call a slut a slut? As in the case of the situation DP describes. Well,… if the shoe fits.</p>
<p>There is at least one other four letter word I can think of sometimes used to describe females that I cannot ever imagine, EVER condoning.
I was a little shocked- when I saw a book with that title on my daughters bookshelf by Inga Muscio ( I mean, my grandmother called hookers- ladies of the evening)
but that word for some reason- isn’t as offensive to me- because I see women described that way can be powerful- the men who use it seem to be threatened and use it because it *is *a charged word-</p>
<p>A sociologist named Leora Tanenbaum wrote a book called “Slut” around l0 years ago, researching some of these dynamics. I didn’t read it but remember the title, of course.</p>