Addendum to My Post on Sex

Well, my post was intended to provoke response, and it certainly succeeded. Now that the dust has settled (a little) I will now take this opportunity to take stock of some of the main arguments placed against my attempt at a wake-up call.

One commenter by My Obiter Dicta complained about the post being coarse and that I should have gone about in a more "tsniusdig" fashion. My response in this case: forget it. For me, the message "say things in a more tsniusdig fashion" is a code term for either "shut up" or speak in tones so vague and sacharrine so as to be worthless. I cannot, in all honesty, do so. The hafrada and anti-sex craze has gotten to the point where I felt, and still feel, that only rattling the cages will get people to face uncomfortable facts. I very much feel like Peter Finch in the movie Network: "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!". I most certainly will not dumb down the problem so you can feel better.

A second argument that came up was that "the problem isn't so bad because I didn't personally see it". Apparently people who live in a society where sex, masturbation etc are issurim nevertheless discuss the issue openly and freely instead of hide it and feel irredeemable and worthless. The idea that becuase we don't see a problem in our community only works if we close our eyes to the truth. Consider the following story (available in the middle of this article):

Rav Yuval Sherlo has spent much time helping religious homosexuals deal with their problems of being such. Needless to say, this caused an outpouring of anger from the more right-wing elements. A prominent Rosh Yeshiva attacked him when he met him. Rav Sherlo then asked him if he has homosexuals in his yeshiva. The RY, of course vehemently denied the possibility - he didn't see it (sound familiar?). After obtaining their permission, Rav Sherlo revealed the names of four individuals learning in the yeshiva who are gay. The RY, shocked, now gives his full support to R. Sherlo for his efforts. If this is the case regarding a relatively rare phenomenon - homosexuality - how much more so when it comes to heterosexual intercourse and masturbation, the latter being very easy to hide?

OTOH, Shlomo did make a valid point when he pointed out that I didn't really make many suggestions for how to solve the problem. In my eagerness to raise questions, I didn't really think out the answers. Even the suggestion regarding the "post-Niddah" marital bliss is far from flawless. I don't pretend to have all the answers, but here are some tentative suggestions (commenters are more than invited to share their own):

1. Continue the trend begun at Yeshivot Bnei Akiva - giving a basic sex-ed course. People should know these things are not other-worldly and foreign but a natural part of life and calm the hell down. Anxiety will go down and so will the disgust. Students will learn that we are all just human begins not disease-carrying space alien devil creatures aiming to ensnare one another. Maybe people will also learn that there can be contact between genders without it immediately leading to sex.
2. The "zero-tolerance" Orthodox social policy for sexual sins has got to go. No more rants on the horrific evils of masturbation or treating women like the devil. No more seperating women unnecesarily or treating those who put on make-up or wear skirts a little too high as harlots. These will no more prevent sins than the constant diatribes said against Lashon Hara every second. All they will do is alienate those who struggle.
3. Corrolary (and the most important part): Take, and teach teshuva seriously. All too often I get the feeling that many Orthodox Jews belive teshuva is for halachic misdemeanors like forgetting to say ya'aleh veyavo or not having proper kavanah during Shofar blowing. More serious sins, meantime, are completely and irrevocably beyond the pale.

   Many young Jews who falter in these areas end up throwing everything out the window because their teachers become so shrill about how horrible their acts were. They then decide that it's hopeless and chuck the whole thing. Educators should instead spend time with their students, either individually or in class, and take a calmer approach. They should make it crystal clear that sins, even sexual ones, are not the end of the world; God himself waits even for the teshuva of (lehavdil) a rasha till his dying day.

   I recently read a beautiful example of such an attitude from a (gasp!) Charedi RM. A student of his confessed to having erred in this area (don't remember what exactly). The RM said that he will bear his burden and serve his sentence in Hell as long as he continues to learn (for us, this could mean continue to strive to be a good Jew). We would be remiss if we didn't have similiar loving attitudes towards our younger generation...