I’m gonna try to go through and annotate this post (if that’s okay!). I think you make a TON of good points. Really, really well written. I highlighted my favorite quotes, and also the places I think you’re reaching. My main objections are 1) that I think there are a lot of statements here that you take for granted that I simply don’t. I think they need a much sounder defense than you’ve given them. I’ll annotate where I’m talking about. 2) while I agree with a whole lot of points you make (and somewhat feel that you’ve missed the point of my original blog), I feel like you’re still thinking through the old paradigm of “balance,” or “Liberty vs. license,” which I think is really unhelpful. Clearly (and I’ve tried to make this point in other comments, and even in the first paragraph of my blog), our culture is obsessed with sex, and it’s not healthy for any women, Christian or not, to buy into the lie that you are your level of sex appeal, as defined by the grocery store checkout line. But that to me is a different discussion entirely, and doesn’t really belong in a discussion about modesty (which I continue to contend is defined as “humility”) as much as it does in a discussion about identity. Identity is a universal problem, transcending culture, and I believe Scripture has much to say about it. Modesty, it seems to me, is incredibly relative to culture, and I find scripture has very little to say about, if anything.
Love to discuss with you in public forums or not in public forums, either way. I think you’re a really articulate writer, and I appreciate you taking the time to respond. I’m flattered. :)
