7/15/09
Confession: I Thought “Christian Sex Columnist” Was an Oxymoron

jesusphoto by kevindooley

Our contributor Kristine deGuzman, a junior at UC Berkeley, has a confession to make:

When I was a sophomore in college, I drooled over the idea of writing the “Sex On Tuesdays” column in the The Daily Cal, UC Berkeley’s main newspaper. I applied for the job at the end of my sophomore year and was fortunate enough to score the coveted weekly column for the fall semester of my junior year.

When one of my friends from back home found out about my new gig, he sent me samples from his school’s sex column in the Cal Poly Pomona newspaper . It was penned by a  Christian virgin who “hates” dating, is waiting until marriage to have sex, and believes most relationships (outside of marriage) are better off without sex.

WTF?!

At first, I couldn’t understand how someone who’s never hooked up or even had any experience with romantic relationships could have the audacity to pen a “sex” column. I found his attempts to dissuade readers from having premarital sex to be completely inappropriate, considering the fact that he had no idea what he was trying to talk them out of. I thought it was completely irresponsible for him, as the school “sex” columnist, to withhold facts and relevant information about actual sex and sexuality from his readers that a more experienced writer, in every sense of the word, would have probably included. And I didn’t think his column should have been used as his own personal pulpit. Now, if he’d had a Christianity column, then okay.

Eventually, though, I realized it was hypocritical of me to judge and dismiss the expression of his opinions. After all, when I wrote the sex column for my school newspaper, I certainly received my fair share of criticisms, critiques, and hate mail (mostly from anonymous people on the Daily Cal website and forums). I wrote frankly about roleplay, cunnilingus and sex toys — and many people were not pleased. I even heard that a friend of a friend didn’t like my columns because I didn’t use euphemisms when I could have. People  accused me of trying to be “edgy” and “controversial” when I was really only talking about sex in the way that I understand it. And the way that I understand it doesn’t include roundabout euphemisms and flashy metaphors.

The last column I read of my Christian colleague made me a little more sympathetic, as he acknowledged his weaknesses when it comes to dispensing information on sex — which is something I never really did in my columns. Ultimately, if I thought it was my prerogative to discuss my relationship with my vibrator in a widely read publication, then I should have understood his prerogative to discuss his relationship with Christianity (even if that’s the only relationship he’s ever had). We sex writers need to stick together, because no matter which side of lovin’ we’re on, there will always be people hating what we do.

Kristine deGuzman



3 Comments

  1. ok, I gotta say – I’m still with you on the oxymoron. I never rode a motor bike in my life, partly because I have no desire to and partly because I think that it’s extremely dangerous. I do, in theory, know what a motor bike is and how to use one. However, I am NOT writing columns about it for a motor sports magazine. And neither should the christian guy write about his views on sex. I am a little sick of how the strangest things (like, say, a virgin writing a sex column) can suddenly turn into a ‘good idea’ just because religion is involved …

    Anyway, I just my 2 cents …

  2. aww. i’ve missed you and your writing, kristine. =]

    i understood your columns ’cause i sort of knew that’s just who you were. you weren’t TRYING to be anything.

    that’s big of you to understand the other sex columnist, though. you’re right. you guys get enough crap from everyone else i’m sure.

  3. Yes, a little self-awareness and humility are a good idea in an advice columnist of any kind. And I’d probably print that in capital letters when talking about a 20-year-old providing important sexual advice. As a character in one of the late John D MacDonald’s novels said, while looking fondly and sadly at a very young, very pretty young woman, “they send you up in those things without ever giving you lessons.”

    I suspect that a key requirement for giving advice about such a key part in one’s life is “knowing that all things break.” Some things don’t heal. Some pain is not transient. Indeed, think of a gut-level appreciation of that as a mandatory job requirement. Anybody can learn which end of a vibrator to use.

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