Magazine Examines Debate Over Spread Of 'Father-Daughter Purity Balls'

Main Category: Women's Health / Gynecology
Also Included In: Sexual Health / STDs;  Pediatrics / Children's Health
Article Date: 25 Jul 2008 - 7:00 PST

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TIME magazine recently examined the increasing number and debate surrounding "Father-Daughter Purity Balls," which are held to promote abstinence until marriage. The article has been posted online and will be in the magazine's July 28 issue.

According to TIME, purity balls have become a "proxy in the wider war over means and ends" for issues, including abstinence-only education funding and access to contraception for teenagers.

The Abstinence Clearinghouse estimates that there were more than 4,000 purity events in the U.S. last year, with programs aimed at boys also increasing. Randy Wilson -- national director of church ministries for the Family Research Council and co-inventor of the purity ball in Colorado Springs, Colo. -- said the purity ball movement was not so much about the daughters but the fathers whom he believes did not know their place in their daughters' lives. "The idea was to model what [a father's] relationship can be as a daughter grows from a child to an adult," Wilson said, adding that fathers "come in closer, become available to answer whatever questions [a daughter] has."

According to TIME, as the number of purity balls has increased, so has the "inevitabl[e]" criticism. Some critics have called purity balls "odd, creepy" and "oppressive of a girl's 'sexual self-agency.'" Others have argued that studies indicate that most teens that make pledges to remain abstinent have sex before marriage and also are less likely to use condoms, compared with their peers who do not make pledges. Some supporters of purity balls said that teens who make pledges usually postpone having sex, have fewer partners, become pregnant less often and, if they graduate high school as virgins, are twice as likely to graduate from college.

Wilson acknowledged that virginity pledges have a downside, but added that the message is about integrity. A virginity pledge "heaps guilt upon them," Wilson said, adding, "If they fail, you've made it worse for them." He asked, "Who is perfect in this world? One mistake doesn't mean it's all over" (Gibbs, TIME, 7/17).

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