There it is. The top of my tumblr dashboard. This is my favorite social media platform and you'll never catch my denying it. Although the first rule of tumblr is very similar to the first rule of fight club, tumblr is quickly becoming a safe haven for the marginalized and a platform for social justice bloggers. (It is also my #1 source on the internet for pictures of cute kittens.) I can post whatever I want of my own original content, and reblog the witty Iquips, photos, and musings of others. Scrolling through tumblr is one of the ways I read real stories of real people. Of course, I wondered what is being said about sex-positivism.
There were many photos. Nude photos. People reclaiming their bodies. Bodies that had been told were not *whatever* enough: skinny enough, tan enough, fair enough, muscled enough, whatever. There were personal stories about ways people experience sexuality in the world. Sensuality and (deemed by some as) explicit content was revered, allowing those to be things to celebrate and share in safe spaces. Some people responded to things like intimate violence and opened up about the ways sex has been very negative in their lives.
There were many photos. Nude photos. People reclaiming their bodies. Bodies that had been told were not *whatever* enough: skinny enough, tan enough, fair enough, muscled enough, whatever. There were personal stories about ways people experience sexuality in the world. Sensuality and (deemed by some as) explicit content was revered, allowing those to be things to celebrate and share in safe spaces. Some people responded to things like intimate violence and opened up about the ways sex has been very negative in their lives.
There were famous quotes, celebrities and authors speaking out about the ways bodies should be respected. Some were critiqued for their behavior, designated as sex-negative or sex-positive. The sex-positive movement was critiqued for being whitewashed, still shaming and excluding people of color, trans*folk, people who are asexual, and forgetting the sexual trauma experienced by too many people.
I scrolled through pages and pages and pages of tumblr and didn't see one mention of spirituality. Not once was God mentioned in an affirmative way. None of the work of my classmates and colleagues appeared. Where is the mention of The Color Purple? Where are the reflections on a sermon someone heard that conveyed a sex-positive message? Where is the Song of Songs? Where are there photos of people in collars at protests and marches and rallies? Where is the prophetic witness?
The work of the church needs to happen in a manner that is so bold, so transformative that people will talk about it. We need to do work that will make social justice bloggers go nuts. Not just pastors-- if you are a parishioner who wants your children to have accurate and appropriate sexual education, approach your pastor about the Our Whole Lives curriculum. Talk about these issues in adult education classes. Let your values live in the organizations to which you decide to donate your mission dollars.
I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called. [ephesians 4:1]
The work of the church needs to happen in a manner that is so bold, so transformative that people will talk about it. We need to do work that will make social justice bloggers go nuts. Not just pastors-- if you are a parishioner who wants your children to have accurate and appropriate sexual education, approach your pastor about the Our Whole Lives curriculum. Talk about these issues in adult education classes. Let your values live in the organizations to which you decide to donate your mission dollars.
I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called. [ephesians 4:1]
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