I was going through some old boxes and came across that old book on sex education from the late 60s, "about life and love."

Back then it was an easy cop out for parents to toss this church approved book at you and tell you to read it yourself.

Other than the first part which clinically describes human reproduction complete with almost accurate drawings. (The female drawing has no clitoris). The rest is a preachy diatribe of no masturbation, no petting etc etc.

It ends with standard mormon horror stories. Jane was not chaste and wasn't allowed in the celestial kingdom. Tommy visited women of ill repute in the military and was killed before repenting and missed the celestial kingdom. Sarah got pregnant. Y a non LDS boy and didn't get a celestial marriage, too bad for her, no eternal family.

Anyone else remember this book?

“The female drawing has no clitoris”

If the author was male, he was probably clueless as to the existence of a clitoris.

Is this the book, "For the Strength of Youth"?

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/bc/content/shared/content/english/pdf/ForTheStrengthOfYouth-eng.pdf?lang=eng

This book way predates for the strength of youth. It was published in 1968.

The first part reads like a biology text book. Covers human reproduction. Was informative.

The rest of it was mormon dribble.

It didn't say squat about one-handed de-blousing and de-bra'ing.

I was totally on my own, but I think the Spirit of ghawd, like a fire was burning and that helped!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/15/2020 04:56PM by elderolddog.

elderolddog Wrote:
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> It didn't say squat about one-handed de-blousing
> and de-bra'ing.
>

Your remark brings to mind Monty Python's "Twit of the Year" contest. One of the events was "Remove the Bra of the Debutante," bras on mannequins: the contestant twits had to unhook it with one hand.

Did they go to the movies and then cruise Fremont St. first?

Hi EOD. As you well remember, it’s all in the flip of the thumb and middle finger... a move similar to shooting a bottle cap. Since we were not educated in today’s proper protocols in obtaining proper permission, creativity was required.

Heartless, if you have the book, what's the title, you got me curious?

My intro to LDS was the late Sixties, and some girls I dated would talk about some lessons when things would start to get interesting.
Never got to see the book, only to see if there some loopholes I could pursue.

I think Garfunkel and Oates explained the loophole quite well.

I'm pretty sure the loophole was closed with, "I'll never have .......with you".

Stay optimistic!

Sorry I wasn't clear.

The title is "About life and love. Facts of life for LDS teens"

I have my dad's old copy of copy of "For the Strength of the Youth" that was published in 1965.

I'd love to know the name of this book so I could scour my parents' library the next time I visit. Imagining the clitoris-less females diagram is giving me nightmares. I need to see it and get it out of my system.

OMG. I thought I was the only one who still had that book. It was horrible. And yes, my mother threw it at me to read myself and I guess that was her idea of sex ed. If I didn’t hate myself before that book, I certainly did after. I keep it now to show people what I was raised with. Blows them away. But good for a laugh when you’re with girlfriends and have had a little too much wine. Stupid damn cult.

Fortunately, Amazon has one available at a reasonable price.

https://www.amazon.com/About-life-love-Facts-teens/dp/B0006BTRDY

Enjoy it in good health!

Another thing that seems to be missing is ANY SORT OF ADVICE ABOUT ACTUALLY FINDING AND NURTURING LOVE WITH ANOTHER PERSON. AM I RIGHT?

Sorry for the all caps, but my decades of experience have taught me that Mormonism is deliberately designed to denigrate the idea of developing actual loving relationships. You get separated by genders at eight years old. You are hustled into a mission at the very time when nature wants you to explore romance. Then the minute you get back you are expected to dash off to the temple and get sealed- not married- as an ecclesiastical assignment, where you are instructed that your whole purpose in life is to follow narrowly defined social roles under the direction of your church overlords. You are never allowed to just be yourself, on your own timetable, and learn to help your partner to follow his/her goals. That is one of the biggest things that I hate about the LDS system.

partly bc of social stigmas & inadequate education (parents resist in schools),

I think sex for teens is a minefield, many aren't emotionally mature enough to make good decisions when hormones are raging.

I believe our bodies are ready for sex before our thoughts are ready to have healthy sex...

Few teens are ready / prepared to be parents!

to that extent, ChurchCo advice not to engage in sex is good advice.

Holy crap! Are you saying that at some point hormones stop raging?!!!!

While you are correct that our bodies are ready to engage in sexual activity before our minds are engaged in caution (and STDs, Herpes, and AIDS can be added to the pregnancy issue already noted), nevertheless ignorance and "Just say no!" (advice given by nearly all religions about sexual activity) is terrible advice. As several experts on the topic have noted, if you don't give teenagers advice on how to have safe sex that is not likely to result in the issues listed above, they will participate anyway and reap the problems you are trying to keep from them.

No, ignorance is not strength, and this past LDS church sex book is just as bad as the current one.

Elderolddog the Prophet Joseph was very clear on this. No!