Christian Rock Thursdays: DC Talk don’t want your sex

DC Talk might be the most successful evangelical Christian group ever. Their 1995 album Jesus Freak sold two million copies in the US alone. And, if I might have a Christian rock hipster moment here, I liked them before they were famous.

Still, I was recently reminded (by an amusing list called “Top 10 Christian songs that also work as parodies of Christian songs“) of DC Talk’s all-time low point, “I Don’t Want It”.

Lyrics

Yo, s-e-x is a test when I’m pressed
So back up off with less of that zest
Impress this brotha with a life of virtue
The innocence that’s spent is gonna hurt you
Safe is the way they say to play, then again safe ain’t safe at all today
So, just wait for the mate that’s straight from God
and don’t have sex ’til you tie the knot

(This rap was so good they included it in the song twice)

Everyone [here meaning “all the people I grew up with”] knows [here meaning “was indoctrinated to believe”] that your ‘purity’ is the most precious gift you can give your spouse. Because they care so much about their fans, DC Talk wrote a song to help them stay pure: playing “I Don’t Want It” to a potential suitor is a foolproof way to ensure you don’t get laid.

My meaningless diploma

I am proud to present this post by Anaïs Chartschenko. If you are likely to be triggered, be warned that this piece refers to rape.

Anaïs Chartschenko

Every time I apply for a job I have a pang of fear. Some jobs want to check your references. I am not afraid because I have a criminal history. I am afraid because my whole high school experience was a fraud. You see, I was home schooled. At first, I had big, thick text books with spines that smelled nice. I didn’t mind this as much, even though I was mostly left to my own devices to do my school work. I wanted to be smart. Discipline was not an issue. I wanted to go to college. I now see my naivety. I should have paid more attention when church members kindly informed me that college wasn’t for me or that god had other plans…

Before long, my mother had switched the whole curriculum up. I now was to do ACE which came in shockingly simplistic booklets, called PACEs. I was told it was much better, and I could work at my own pace. PACEs, get it? So for three years I stared at the PACEs, carefully filling in bubbles with my number two pencil. I can’t explain the boredom. I can’t explain the anger I felt with every depiction of a submissive woman making dinner. The curriculum featured multiple choice questions with only one right answer. There was no critical thinking involved. 

Sex Education and Accelerated Christian Education!

Sex education with Accelerated Christian Education is… well, it’s bizarre. Biology 1107 is, to my knowledge, the only PACE which deals with human reproduction, and it manages to do so without ever once giving so much as a hint as to how reproduction might occur.

The nouns “egg” and “sperm” both feature, but there is no indication as to where these mysterious entities might be found (beyond “in the female” and “in the male”), and absolutely no suggestion as to how the two might come into contact.

Here are some nouns that I might expect to appear in an educational booklet about human reproduction: Vagina, penis, breasts, intercourse, erection, arousal, period, puberty. Combined number of times these words appear within ACE’s booklet: Zero. “Testes” does make an appearance, but they are not described, save to say that they “produce the male gametes.” Which is enlightening.

Students are given one clue as to how reproduction occurs, in the form of the following diagram:

This is what sex is, kids.

Well, I think they could work it out from that, don’t you?