Theresa Smalec
Performance Studies, NYU
E-mail: tsk201@nyu.edu

Work Group Abstract: "Sexuality and Religion: Seduction and Surrender."

In my paper, I will explore the local and hemispheric implications of a high profile abstinence education campaign recently launched in America. Bearing the title, "The New Virginity," the December 9th issue of Newsweek magazine features an attractive young couple: a clean-cut white male and white female in a warm embrace. Inside, articles discuss how abstinence education is catching on, and fewer teenagers are having sex. Apparently, Newsweek considers this to be big news in America's sex-obsessed culture. MSNBC network also deems the "New Virginity" as remarkable stuff; several passionate spokeswomen were invited to make their case for abstinence education on that network's "Phil Donahue" show in early January. These well-dressed women happily quoted statistics asserting that the number of high school students "who said they'd had sex has dropped precipitously, from 54 percent in 1991 to 46 percent in 2001." They also argued vehemently: "Sex education is really sex invitation!" Despite these women's cheerful data about what teens say they don't do, (the source of which was unspecified), the Center for Disease Control reports that 60 percent of high school seniors have had sex, and that sexually transmitted diseases among young people are dramatically on the rise.
So what is really going on in American sexual life, and elsewhere in the Americas? According to an article published last year in Digitaljournal.com, President George W. Bush hopes to boost abstinence spending to $135 million in 2003. This figure more than doubles the $60 million spent on abstinence education in 1998.1 In effort to evaluate the White House's unprecedented backing of abstinence at the expense of other types of sex education, I will examine the intersecting modes of performance and politics underlying this purportedly 'faith-based' campaign. What is at stake in this government-funded effort to teach the value of abstaining from sex until marriage? For what socio-political reasons do religious morality and secular money combine to produce a 'sexy' campaign about remaining a virgin until one is married? What sorts of young people does this campaign benefit, and whom does it exclude and/or hurt? Aside from his unyielding focus on abstinence education in America, one of the first acts of legislation passed by the President upon his 'election victory' in 2000 was to sign an executive order cutting off federal funding to international agencies which support women seeking an abortion.2 While the implications of such a move are chillingly clear, the future directions of the "New Virginity" campaign currently being performed in the United States are not entirely certain. I would like to research the possibilities in a short paper, focusing on the images of chaste young people being projected, and on the images (of racially marked others and non-heterosexual others) who are being left out of the picture altogether.