Abstinence-Only Events Creep Me Out

Tracy Clark-Flory writes today in Salon about an abstinence-only high school pep rally full of cheerleaders in short shorts leading the crowd in what may be the most disturbing cheer I've ever heard. The costumed lolitas chanted:

""Stop, don't touch me there, this is my no, no square," while drawing boxes in the air in front of their va (clap) jay (clap) jays."

As a side note, in the future this blog will only refer to women's genitalia as "va (clap) jay (clap) jays." Ahem.

Call me a prude, but getting a bunch of sprightly young women in cheerleader outfits to point at and teasingly refer to hoo-has while a gymnasium full of family members and priests look on strikes me as a bit, oh, I don't know, SEXUAL. And also, oh, I don't know, CREEPY. Look, abstain if you want to [note: "abstain" substitutes hilariously for "don't dance" in Safety Dance. "'Cause your friends abstain and if they abstain, well, they're no friends of mine". --ed.], but the idea of gathering an entire community together to gaze at a gaggle of females drawing BOXES around their...you know what word I was going to use, so let's be adults and move on... it's just so obviously meant to titillate.

"This is my no, no square." I mean, come on. This event is only slightly less creepy than the Daddy-Daughter balls that you hear about every once in a while. As I understand these perv-vents, fathers and daughters go to the prom together to gross everyone out or something and then no one can have a healthy sex life because that would be shameful! That description might not be ethnographically responsible, but I think it does the trick. I will not be providing any links, because doing a google search of "daddy daughter balls" might return some hits that are not appropriate for the internet connection I'm using. Ironic, no?

Here's a video of the event, which I haven't watched yet, because I think it might send the wrong message to people I'm sitting next to if they see me watching cheerleaders pointing to their va (clap) jay (clap) jays. So...tell me how it is.

God and Abstinence from Stuart Productions on Vimeo.

As an afterthought, Russell Brand has a good bit about the hypocrisy involved in the abstinence-only business, specifically "purity rings." Can't embed because it's flash, but he makes several good points.

Oh, and also, this sex rally took place in Mississippi, which Clark-Flory reports, "not only has the highest teen birth rate in the country, but also the eighth-highest HIV rate among those in their early 20s." So there's that.