Let's get technical...

I have a new book on my list to buy and read from Hayley Dimarco, called Technical Virgin, How far is too far? Not because I expect to like the book or even agree with most of it, but because of a recent broadcast that featured the author on Family Life Today. a-new-standard-or-an-old-sin And now, like a person who sees a train barreling down the tracks at a stuck vehicle, I must read it. 

I listen to Family Life today fairly regularly. On the whole, I enjoy their broadcasts. Although there are things that are sometimes said that make me cringe inwardly and trigger my inner fundy, I tend to enjoy their programs when they are talking about blending step families, strengthening your marriage, dealing with different phases of parenting, etc. Whenever I'm out for homevisits to Amish country in particular I listen to the program because it's a lot of driving around and I like the distraction.

However, this broadcast was a doozy. A misinformative, toddler shaming (why is that a thing?!), rape culture promoting mess of a broadcast. 

So firstly, let's examine the presenter Hayley DiMarco, from her website, hungryplanet.net 

Hayley DiMarco  is the best-selling author of more than thirty books, including Dateable, Marriable, Mean Girls, Sexy Girls, God Girl and The Woman of Mystery. She spent the early part of her career working for a little shoe company called Nike in Portland, Oregon and Thomas Nelson Publishers in Nashville, Tennessee.

In 2002 Hayley left Nelson and founded Hungry Planet, a company intensely focused on feeding the world’s appetite for truth by producing books and new media, taking on issues of faith and life with a distinctly modern voice.  Shortly after founding Hungry Planet, Hayley successfully completed a nationwide executive search for someone to run the company so she could focus on writing. She describes her husband, Michael, as her most successful business acquisition!

Hayley has been a featured guest speaker for such large events as Women of Faith, Precept National Women’s Convention, and MOPS Intl. Leadership Convention among others. She has also consulted on the creation and enhancement of some of the largest stadium events tuned to teens and young women in North America.

Does it bother anyone else that she describes her husband as a business acquisition? 

In the broadcast, Hayley reveals that she has one daughter who is eleven months old. And yet, we are to take her as some sort of expert in parenting teens and sexuality of teens. I don't see in her description on her website any sort of background in childhood behaviour or teaching or....or anything really other than working for nike, working for a publishing company, and being an author.The only expertise that she has is the fact that she is a woman. I'm not dismissive of this fact, just that it is her only qualification. But perhaps her husband is an expert in the field? Maybe he is a pediatrician? A pschologist? Social worker? Youth Minister? Teacher? Sadly, but not surprisingly, no. 

Michael's background includes a degree in mass communication, hosting talk radio, coaching volleyball at the university level, working in digital publishing at the largest Bible software company in the world, and stints as a marketing and creative strategist for international organizations and ministries.  He is general manager of Hungry Planet, a publishing company founded by his wife, Hayley, that works with fresh authors who want to reach an increasingly postmodern culture with premodern truth.

Hayley and Michael are married, and live with their daughter, Addison, on the shores of Old Hickory Lake just outside of Nashville, Tennessee.

So we have two non experts, with no life experience raising teens, telling us how to approach teen sexuality. That sounds...great?

I knew I was in for a doozy of misinformation when the broadcast opened up with this quote from the show: 

Bob: For years, teenagers, who have a boyfriend or a girlfriend, have been asking the 

question: “So how far can I go? What does the Bible say about how far I can go?” 

Hayley DiMarco says that's really the wrong question. What they need to be asking is, 

“What is a virgin?” 

Hayley: I don't like to draw lines. A lot of kids just want to know: "Draw the line for me. 

Just tell me, ‘Here it is’." The trouble with drawing a line is that they tend to fall over it 

very easily because they didn't decide, in their heads, "This is how far I'm going to go," 

or, "This is what constitutes virginity." 

But I think that a virgin is someone that doesn't allow her body to become sexual 

temptation or to become an object of lust to her boyfriend. 

Somebody needs to tell Mrs. Dimarco what a virgin is. The dictionary is pretty clear. A virgin is someone who has not engaged in sexual intercourse. That's it. We don't need to redefine it and and we certainly don't need to heap shame upon girls whose boyfriends might find them sexually attractive. Also, Mrs. Dimarco, children need definitive boundaries and lines. And they definitely need honest answers, not your made up definition of what you "think" something is. 

So, I sit back, sip on my coke and continue to drive on, waiting to hear what other pearls of information this young, inexperienced mother has to give to me. 

Hayley: ...There was recently a study done by Yale and Columbia 

Universities that stated that girls that sign up to these pledges you're talking about—

abstinence pledges—agree to stay pure until they're married are contracting STDs at 

the same rate as girls that haven't signed the pledge. So, there's something wrong. 

I agree with True Love Waits and all those pledges—I think they're fantastic—but we're 

missing—somewhere along the line, whoever is communicating it to the girls is missing 

the mark of what, as you say, innocence really is. 

I agree, there is something wrong, and that something wrong is that parents aren't talking frankly to their children about sex and STI's. It's an all or nothing policy that is damaging a whole generation of young men and women. At least she at least acknowledges that studies are showing that abstinence pledges aren't working the way parents are wanting them to.

Hayley: A technical virgin would be somebody who believes that anything, short of 

intercourse, does not count against her virginity. She thinks if she does any kind of 

fooling around—oral sex is a very big issue—a very big, big, big problem—even in the 

Christian church. I know that word is not even popular. It's hard to say in a lot of media 

outlets, but it has to be said because parents don't understand that it's happening to 

their kids. It's happening in 8th

 grade. It's happening in high school, and it's happening 

because we're afraid to say the word. We're afraid to talk about it. So, our girls are just 

assuming that what the world says—"Yes, that's like a hug. It's no different. It's not 

intimate. No problem. Don't worry about it,"—they're buying that line. 

Here's an idea, don't be afraid to say the words, Oral Sex. There, I said it. Oral sex. Oral sex. Oral sex, oral sex, oral sex. Parents, say the words, give the information. Oral sex, it's not like a hug, it's better than a hug, and it's a bigger commitment than a hug, and you can get STI's from oral sex. There ya go, easy.

Hayley: Yes, pediatricians are being warned—that if they have girls coming in that are 

showing signs of being sexually-active or being intimate with their boyfriends—that they 

should be sent to counseling for depression. Sexual activity—and even just—they say 

even relationships, when they're young girls—leads to depression. 

Yes, she said that. She lied. There is no such warning that I could find on the american academy of pediatrics website. I have never head anyone say that their daughter was sent to a counselor for depression just because they had become sexually active. What is common is for a pediatrician to counsel the sexually active teen on birth control options and STI's. That's it. The only thing I could find that she might be referring to with her assertion that sexual activity leads to depression is this: link-between-sexual-promiscuity-and-depression-in-teens Notice it is sexual promiscuity, multiple casual sex partners, not simply being sexually active. The lowest rates of depression are found in abstinent teens, that is true and why abstinence in teens is the gold standard used. However as those of us who have been in relationships can attest, if you break up with or have difficulties in your current romantic relationship, you may go through short periods of depression. That's not abnormal, it's normal. Its also part of growing up. Also, notice how she only mentions that if it is girls coming in, they need counseling. There is no mention of boys needing counselling. Again, a prime example of girls being at fault or damaged by simply having sex.

So now, on to "prosti-tots". No, I didn't make that up. Here she is talking about how important it is to talk to your kids about sex, which I agree, it is important.

Hayley: But, Dennis, the important thing is it's more than just "the talk." I think it has to 

start as soon as they're old enough to understand that their body is different—even that 

it's separate from the mom—you know, that when they're starting to pick out their own 

styles and their own fashions. If we don't start to talk about what little girls' bodies do—

you see a lot of little girls that—well, what we call them is "prosti-tots." They're dressing 

them very sexually because: “Well, they're little girls. They can wear little miniskirts and 

little tank tops.” That is just starting the conversation, silently—that this is okay and that 

you can use your sexuality to attract people. 

Oh those little tramps, those little prosti-tots, using their sexuality to attract people.

Oh, so sexy? At least the little tramp in the top has a sweater on to hide those sinful, lust inspiring shoulders, but my eyes! Agog are my eyes are at her knees! No, no knees on a little girl! She is using her sexuality to attract me, sinful child! Look at what they are using their bodies to do!

Obviously, I am joking. No sane person looks at a toddler in any state of dress and thinks about them sexually. This overt blaming of women, from toddler years and beyond, for anyone having sexual thoughts about them, is pervasive within the church and needs to stop. If you look at any toddler wearing a short skirt or tank top and think that they are sinful or trying to sexually attract you, you need to seriously examine your own heart and mind. Now just scroll back up and enjoy how absolutely adorable, gorgeous, and innocent those little darlings are!

However, it's ok for the author to violate her own sense of modesty for the sake of selling a book! Oh yay, I love loopholes like that! What's good for you doesn't apply to me!

Bob: Okay, I have to stop you right here because I'm looking at the cover of Technical 

Virgin. 

Hayley: Yes.   

Bob: This is somewhat provocative right here; right? 

Hayley: Well, one might say—that one and Sexy Girls as well. 

Dennis: No, no, no, no: “one might say”—one would say. [Laughter] I mean, it's the way 

they dress today. 

Hayley: It is the way they dress today. That's the reason all the covers that you'll see 

coming out of Hungry Planet are designed so that the girl—that's dressing like that—will 

pick it up and say, "Oh, that's a cute top." 

Bob: You're being intentionally provocative with this. 

Hayley: That's exactly right. I want them to read these books. There are a lot of books 

out there on immodesty and sexual purity—that are being bought by parents with good 

intentions—they bring them home / they give them to their kids. I talk to those kids—

those books are under their bed. They're not being opened because they look like 

parental propaganda. 

Our books don't look like parental propaganda. They look like something they might, 

you know, see at one of the stores where they shop. We want to make sure that we 

connect with the teenagers so they'll read it because, if they don't read it, they're not 

going to get the message.

Alright, so their books don't "look like parental propaganda". And yet, they are. So, again it's ok to be dishonest? I must also be missing something because I don't see the provocativeness in this cover.I suppose it's the inch of abdomen that is showing? So I looked up Sexy Girls, the other book she wrote and references.

This one is more provocative because there is more flesh showing, but hey, that's ok because Mrs. DiMarco needs to sell her book and tell you what a tramp the girl on the cover is!

The conversation goes on, with the quote from the beginning about what her definition of virginity is. Then, it takes this turn...

Hayley: I want them to understand God's Word, when it comes to sexuality and sin. 

Jesus tells us that if a man even thinks about a woman lustfully, he's already committed 

adultery with her. Okay, so what responsibility does the girl have in that problem—in 

that temptation?  

I think that—when you have a boyfriend and you are fooling around with him—if you're 

doing something that's causing him to think about sex—which, keep in mind, that boys 

think differently—and this is what I'd want her to know. This is, obviously, still, a very 

long conversation—that she has to understand that guys think differently and they're 

very sexual beings.  

Bob: Yes.  

Hayley: So their minds—even if they see skin—their minds can immediately go to 

sex—but if you're fooling around with them, that is preparation for sexuality—which 

means that he, in his mind, could be, potentially, having sex. I would want her to back it 

up and really realize that it starts in your mind. 

Here's the scriptures that she is referencing: Matthew 5:27-30 27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. Notice this, there is no blame put on the woman for the man's thoughts in this passage. Also, it says adultery, which is to tell us that this man is looking at someone's wife and lusting after her. We can presume that the woman in this fictitious scenario is married because of that word alone. And, if the man has these thoughts, he is to make changes (extreme changes granted, and please don't go gouging your eyes out fellas) to keep himself from sinning. See, he has to make the changes, not the woman.

The other difficulty I have with the above conversation is the presumption that if boys see skin, their minds immediately go to sex. That's just not true either and is highly insulting to boys and men. Yes, men are wired differently and they are very visual creatures, but that does not mean that the instant that they see skin they are thinking of sex. The other thing that she says is that in his mind he is potentially having sex with the girl if they are fooling around. That could be, or it could not be. No matter if it is or isn't true, he isn't actually having sex with her and the girl is not responsible for his thought life, that's on him.

Next topic, Danger signs!

Hayley: ...But almost every day, when I get dressed, I say: "Okay, can you see anything? Is there 

anything that is a danger sign?"  

You know, just a little example—when your top is a little bit low—where you can't see 

any cleavage but, when you bend over, you can see something—I discovered 

something that's fantastic—toupee tape.  

Bob: Oh, really?  

Hayley: Yes, you just stick it on the back of your t-shirt or your tank top—stick it to 

yourself—then, when you bend over—nothing.  

Bob: Now, you know, some people will hear that; and they'll go, "Okay, you're just 

psycho on this deal"; right?  

Hayley: They might do that; but, Michael, you might—all of you can probably speak to 

what a stolen glance can do to a man.  

Bob: That's the point. I don't think you're psycho. I wish more people would get psycho; 

you know? [Laughter] 

Lovely, Bob wants us ladies to be more "psycho" to prevent him and other men from having "stolen glances". If she wants to go to such lengths to protect the rest of us from the danger that is her cleavage more power to her, however, I find it incredibly sad that she takes on the sole responsibility for how men perceive her. 

Hayley: Right, yes. Well, you know, we have a tendency to be very self-absorbed: 

"Well, I want to wear this. This is cool," or I mean, you know, “…not so hot. I'm 

comfortable.” We spend so much time thinking about ourselves—we think, "Well, men 

should just be able to control themselves. That is ungodly.” 

We are not called to just be self-focused, but to care more about the sin that we could 

be imposing upon our brothers. God’s Word says everything is permissible, but not 

everything is beneficial. 

Bob: Right.

Hayley: If what you’re doing is not benefiting others, then you might even be able to 

take the leap and say it’s sinful.

No, I am not able to make that leap. That isn't Biblical and it's more than a little bit ridiculous. What I do agree with is that, on the whole, we should not be so self absorbed. In fact, don't be so self absorbed that you believe that your body holds this amount of power over another human being. That's rank with pride.

Hayley:...the trouble is—every guy—cute and gross, from 13 to 80—is looking at you and

having fantasies, potentially, about you. Your grandfather and all his friends might be 

just checking out your chest—it's not just the young guy. When you start to think about 

all those "Ooooh" moments, it really helps you understand, "Oh, I don't want anybody 

thinking about that."

So here we are again, blaming the girl's way of dressing as making her a sexual target and painting all men as potential perverts. This is a part of rape culture that is so pervasive in the church. Every guy is painted as an oogling perv. Every guy, even your grandfather and all of his friends are potentially checking out your chest. But it's all the girl's responsibility, she has to dress more modestly. How does she come to this conclusion? A bit earlier she made mention of when she was first a young, on fire for God Christian, and another younger woman came up to her and showed her Ephesians 5:3 "But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality..." and helped her to dress more appropriately so that she would not be a temptation for others. I can't tell you how sad that makes me that another woman heaped shame upon her, making her think that how she dressed would show a hint of sexual immorality. 

We need to change this way of thinking, we have to speak out on this, and tell our girls that they are not responsible for how men think. Men are responsible for how they think. Teach your sons to respect women, to not see them as sexual objects, regardless of how they dress or don't dress. A girl's worth is in her heart, in how she treats her fellow man (and woman), not in whether or not she bares some cleavage or shows her legs above her knees. 

It's ok to acknowledge that straight boys are visual and appreciate a woman's beauty, curves, and the female form and not make it out to be a sinful thing. It can be ok to acknowledge that girls have curves, beauty, and that they will be sexually attractive to others without being afraid of that. These are the things that we should be teaching our children, ideas that are empowering for both genders. Stop the shame, stop the blame.