Praising Perverted Purity
My 8th grade teacher’s valiant attempt to not look at our boobs
As a Christian school student, I spent every day from 8:45 to 3:15 immersed in religion. Desert Christian School’s obsession with “holy living” infiltrated every academic subject. Teachers dissected every verse of the Bible to figure out God’s plan, and then we tried to follow those rules exactly.
But how do we fight fleshly impulses and base human desires when temptation to sin lurked high and low?
Our conversations about temptation stayed mostly theoretical. It would not be wise to admit to a sin out loud.
When it came to things like sexual activity, use of illicit substances, or swearing, it was better to talk about temptation and how you were trying to avoid sins than to admit to the actual committing of said sins. Sin was not only a slight against God, but it was punishable by school policy.
In other words, God may forgive you, but you could still get detention.
One afternoon in 8th grade I sat at my assigned seat with my textbook open and pencils at the ready. Our desks in this classroom consisted of individual plastic chairs with a metal rod that came around the right side holding a smooth, wooden desk. Approximately five rows of desks, each row six seats deep filled the room.
The teacher paced around the classroom as he talked. Though usually at least mildly interested in class content, I waged a battle against after-lunch sleepiness. I propped my right elbow on the desk and examined my pencil. My eyes started to close slightly, and so I forced myself to sit up perfectly straight with my shoulders back to keep myself awake. I tuned back into the teacher’s words.
“And so that’s why I make the choices that I do. It is very important to think about the ramifications of your actions.”
Wait, what? I thought. What did I miss?
He walked along the perimeter of the classroom and paused dramatically.
“Have you noticed that I never walk down the aisles?” he asked the class.
In fact, I had not noticed. Some teachers stood at the front of the classroom and lectured while writing on the board, some sat on a stool while talking, others roamed the room through the aisles helping us with questions.
Oh, I get it, I thought. He must be referring to the narrow aisles of desks and how hard they are to navigate.
I personally hated trying to get down the aisle to my seat with other students already seated. My butt was right at face level, and I was already self-conscious about my weight.
I sat up even straighter and nodded in encouragement on behalf of those of us who were bigger than the others. Maybe he could ask the maintenance staff if the desks could be placed a little farther apart and give us a little breathing room.
He continued:
“You have to understand that I, spatially, am much higher than all of you when I am standing. And, well, some of the female students have started to develop.”
My heart froze. Oh my God. This can’t be happening. He cannot actually be saying…
“You see, God made men subject to visual temptation, and when we see female bodies, we can’t control our thoughts. Our thoughts go straight to the sin of lust. Therefore, I choose to not put myself in that position so I can’t see down your shirts in the first place.”
He smiled and opened his arms wide with a gesture that proudly said, “Isn’t that smart?”
My face flushed. I immediately crossed my arms over my chest and shrunk down in my seat. I couldn’t bear to look over at any of the other students, so I stayed very still and tried to disappear.
Supposedly, women need to cover up their bodies to prevent men from thinking sinful thoughts. This purity culture myth that women are responsible for creating thoughts of sin in the minds and hearts of men is at the core of so much violence against women.
Purity culture blames women for leading men into temptation instead of placing the blame where it rightfully belongs: on the men who harass and violate women. But back then in my world, these teachings seemed normal, if still shameful.
In this case, the teacher made it seem like he had no choice but to think impure thoughts whenever he saw a girl’s body. Therefore, the only remedy was to not see the girls’ bodies in the first place.
This story, for another 8th grade girl, might have played out in a more conventional way. A girl in a class was embarrassed that a teacher was thinking about her boobs. The end.
It was embarrassing and horrifying to think about a middle-aged man in a position of power sexualizing and shaming young girls in the name of doing God’s will.
But after the initial wave of embarrassment, another thought came to my mind.
I was humiliated because I knew he wasn’t talking about me. I was very flat-chested, and there was no way a person could see any sort of cleavage even from above. When the teacher said, “some of the female students have started to develop,” I knew he didn’t mean me. I was once again ashamed of my body in relation to the world.
My life so far had been about being the biggest person in the room. Now I was not big enough in the right places. I had twice now failed at having a correct body. Always too much, but never enough.
Which is worse: your body leading your Christian brothers into the sin of lust, or the humiliation of realizing that your body never will? In purity culture, everyone loses.
Religious folks obsessed with honoring God may do well to take a step back and see what harm can result from their spiritual pursuit. When your words and actions leave humiliation, shame, and hopelessness in their wake, it’s time to rethink what living a “holy life” really accomplishes.
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Thank you for reading! I’d love to hear your experiences in the comments.
