I don't want your X-K for now

In the early 90s, the "rap" group DC Talk came out with their "Free At Last" album, which included the song "I Don't Want It (Your Sex for Now)." The lyrics to this song include the lines "S-E-X is a test when I'm pressed / So back up off with less of that zest" and "I don't want your sex."

Apparently the singer (or writer) of this song had been having trouble with one or more women who insisted on piling on top of him, hoping for an orgy, and prepared this song for such occasions. The woman (or women) testing him with s-e-x seemed to need some reminding that he, the target of her X-rated feminine wiles, cannot be had until he "ties the knot."

"Back up off, ladies! Less of that zest, please! I don't want your sex--for now."

The intention behind the song--meant to be inspiration for teenage boys who want desperately to be sexually active but have moral (or practical) considerations preventing them, to keep them from straying onto a path they may regret--is not without merit, especially considering teen pregnancy rates, STDs, etc. etc.

But even if one allows, a priori, the rule "teens shouldn't be having sex," the focus in these lyrics is disturbing. The women that this all-male band is speaking to are cast as the source of the men's problem: it's not "I have difficulty controlling myself when I'm with you, so maybe we should pause and collect ourselves," it's "back up off with less of that zest." It's not "I want to wait until I'm married before having this experience," it's "I don't want your sex."

"Your sex"? What does that even mean? And where are the "I" messages? Where are the communication skills that we all learned in Com101? When did these men abdicate personal responsibility for their actions and begin to blame the women who tempt them?

The whole idea of sex here seems to be flawed. Besides the grammatical offense of "I don't want your sex for now," which is an awkward construction at best, there's the just-as-weird implication that "sex" is a commodity that women possess and can give to men. It might make sense if the phrase "your sex" were exchanged for "your virginity" or even "you to be in my personal space"--but it makes no sense as it is. (And even those options--the idea of virginity as a woman's state-of-being and yet also something that can be handed over to a man, in the first, or the bizarrely impersonal attitude of the second--have their own issues.)

It's the particular combination of the virgin and the whore, here, that interests me. The song assumes the presence of a woman or women who are waiting to prey on men (the singer, or, vicariously, the teen boy listening to the song)--your stereotypical "femme fatale," who will lure the unsuspecting male into a sexually compromising position and then defeat him--and admits the desirability of these women (saying their s-e-x is a "test") but champions the desirability of the virgin over these. This seems typical, medieval-morality-play-type stuff. The difference is that these women who are being cast as the whore are actually, according to the song, also the virgins.

The song implores the women in question to consider the consequences of giving in to their lust ("the innocence that's lost is gonna hurt you") and to find alternative ways to attract the singer ("Impress this brother with a life of virtue") rather than to continue to "test" him. "Respect is what we need to find the cure / For this disease (of lust)," the singer says, and relates that "Girl, it's gonna take a little time / For us to see (the truth) / That love is simply more than / Fulfilling the need (for S-E-X)."

The singer seems to be concerned that he and his potential partner are objectifying, rather than respecting, one another, which may be a valid critique; but this is the only point in the song where the objectification is admittedly mutual. The rest of the song implies that the (male) singer is being objectified by his (female) partner, who must be encouraged to wait "a little time" to see "that love is simply more" and not give in to lust.

Ultimately, the song offers no practical description of what advantage waiting until marriage will have. How, exactly, would abstaining until marriage rid the couple of the objectification inherent in their current relationship? How would waiting a little time temper the "lust" of dating into the "love" of marriage? Why is marriage a panacea for these concerns? The song is written for those who already adhere to the "wait until marriage" standard, so perhaps it doesn't need to include answers to these questions--the band is, literally, preaching to the choir--but the assumption that waiting until marriage is the only, or only good, option obscures the question of what these women are being accused of.

Essentially, they're being accused of two things: trying to lead the singer/men down an unrighteous path (femme fatale), and trying to give up their virginity, the one thing that these men want from them (the virgin wantonly becoming the whore). On both counts, they're destroying the image that these men have of the women they want to settle down with--and by destroying this, they're destroying the image these men have of themselves, as the chivalrous Galahadian knights who can overcome temptation in favor of the pure, entowered damsel.

So how would one define "objectification" here? If "using another person for one's own purposes" is a decent definition, then wouldn't this be another type of objectification? And would this kind of objectification--could it possibly--be something that could be overcome by waiting until marriage, or would it only be exacerbated by successful abstinence? Would the wedding-day virgin ever cease to be the object of this particular desire, the supplier of virtue to her chaste husband? Once you've waited, you've waited, right? Just like once you've given it up, it's gone.

Both of these choices define us, and it may be silly to talk about the differences in terms of giving in to objectification ("lust") versus respecting the other, when the true competition lies between one lust (for a particular self-image) and another (typical, old-fashioned lust). It may be silly to talk about the differences in most of the terms we apply. It is certainly silly to focus a song meant to keep men out of the sack on importuning women to remain virgins; if men want to fortify their self-images, they need to look to themselves.

I work in a residential program with a young woman who has just recently been allowed to watch R-rated movies. She's a bit overenthusiastic about choosing R ratings, perceiving herself and her choices as more adult when she chooses the "most adult" option. (She's long refused to watch any cartoons, though most of them would probably interest her more than what she ultimately decides on.) She can't stand anything "scary" (and this is liberally defined to mean anything even the least bit thrilling), which eliminates more than half of the R movies out there, and recently she also requested that I pick a movie rated R, but with "no X-K!"

Of course I understood what her code meant. And her honest reaction to a question of personal taste makes sense to me--in a way that "I Don't Want It" does not.