Just Do It: Ten Reasons Not to Wait Until Marriage
In September 2006, when the class of 2010 streamed into the Science Center for the mandatory “Sex Signals” presentation, they were accosted by a horde of Burberry-wearing, Andover Shoppe-frequenting upperclassmen handing out pink slips of paper. The fliers contained a list of reasons to wait to have sex until marriage, among them, “Because married sex is hotter” and “Because Jessica Simpson waited, too.” There is, alas, no accurate estimate of the number of Harvard students who have chosen to take the chaste road, other than the number of students handing out said fliers, who ironically numbered sixty-nine. In the interests of presenting a balanced perspective (pun intended), we humbly offer an alternative, hopefully preferable, view: our ten favorite reasons not to wait until marriage.
1. Because the condoms won’t be free forever. Harvard might be expensive, but at least you know your parents’ money is going to a good cause: free condoms, lube, and dental dams at the Women’s Center, the Resource Center, the Contact office, and every house. But don’t get too used to it – when you graduate and get out in the real world, you’ll have to pay for your own safe-sex supplies. So be fiscally responsible, and take advantage of the freebies while you can.
2. Because your boyfriend might get quadded. Freshpeople, already found a significant other? Good for you – but take it from us, it might not last. Survey data reveal that a full 30% of freshman relationships at Harvard end when one partner is assigned to a river house and the other is relegated to the quad. Non-survey data reveal that walking to the quad is worse than the colonoscopy you can look forward to twenty years from now. Don’t let this happen to you – take advantage of your proximity while you still can!
3. Because it will answer all of your questions. There’s what we know we know, what we know we don’t know, and what we don’t know we don’t know. Where do you fall? Remember when you had to take your questions about sex to your parents, your big brother, your gym teacher or that anatomy textbook you nicked from the Medical School library thinking it would teach you the basics but really just edified you about the three major nerves penetrating the left-kidney-fallopian-tube-neuroendocrine axis? Save yourself the embarrassed questions, awkward responses, and uninvited med school detour; take the “hands (and everything but your clothes) on” approach.
4. Because it will answer all of our questions. The arrival of the telematic age raises profound, largely unresolved quandaries of academic interest pertaining to mankind’s oldest passion: If you lose your virginity to the Japanese-engineered Kawada HRP-2 Humanoid Helper Robot, does it still count? If you bang at the speed of sound, can you still hear Sarah Palin trying to coherently answer a question? If you have sex in the woods and no one is around to hear it, will Fred Thompson finally get a round of applause? Investigate these and other sextacular conundrums, and let us know.
5. Because we’re in a recession. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the U.S. economy has been in a recession since December 2007; economists predict that the recession will last at least until the end of the year. When even the porn industry is asking for a bailout, you know it’s time to take drastic action – and by that we mean get some drastic action. In the spirit of saving America from an unrestrained, meteoric descent into the toilet of chaos, give the economy a little boost with a “stimulus package” of your own.
6. Because you can’t get married. If you’re not willing to at least pretend that you’re heterosexual, “abstinence until marriage” is particularly difficult. In fact, there’s no guarantee that you’ll ever be able to get legally married. Thirty states have passed constitutional amendments barring same-sex marriage, and 37 have “defense of marriage acts” on the books. So unless you’re planning to permanently reside in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Belgium, South Africa, or a state of denial, don’t gamble away your sex life waiting for a marriage that might not be legal for decades. (The cost of publishing this paragraph is covered in part by the estates of Ted Haggard and former Senator Larry Craig).
7. Because the MAC is far away. Sex burns 240 calories an hour, about as much as a match of championship-caliber intramural badminton. Folks, this is the kind of endurance your significant other wants you to build (they don’t care how long, fast and hard you can whack that … shuttlecock). Plus, sex doesn’t require you to buy running shoes, find workout clothes, or take the cold walk to the gym. Instead, get your exercise indoors and make a new friend while you’re at it. Heck, you might even make more than one.
8. Because weddings are expensive. The average American wedding costs close to $24,000, which is almost what we pay to spend a week here. Waiting until marriage means waiting until you can afford that much, or marrying an iBanker who can – and between student loans and the collapse of the financial sector, neither of those is likely to happen anytime soon.
9. Because it’s environmentally friendly. Headed out for a night on the town? Perhaps dinner and a movie? Think you’re saving gas by taking the T instead of driving? Well, if you’ve been reading the latest EPA reports, you clearly need to try a lot harder. Consider not going out at all; stay in, make your own dinner, and get busy like it’s 1978. You’ll thank us after you spare yourself a ticket to the film industry’s latest overtly commercialized bourgeoisie consumer spectacle feigning empathy with the Other.
10. Because sex, unlike the Presidency, gets better with experience. The historic campaigns of Barack Obama, Sarah Palin, Fred Thompson, Mike Gravel and Roger Waite aside, we urge you to support the experience ticket for your next (or first) encounter of the dirtay kind.