Living together, as opposed to marriage, puts women at increased risk of abuse. As such, Carolyn Moynihan asks whether it would be reasonable to warn women and men of the consequences. She asks this in the context of Reeva Steenkamp’s death, at the hands of her boyfriend Oscar Pistorius.
Why do we accept this trend? Why do we not warn young women and men of the downside — and the downright dangers — of giving themselves bodily and emotionally to someone they barely know? Why do we not give them the dismal statistics before they start experimenting, and the values and character training that will set them on the path of real friendships and marital commitment? Social silence on this matter means social guilt.
What do you make of this? I think it’s an interesting point. I don’t think living together killed Reeva Steenkamp. I do wonder, more generally, why we are happy to teach young people to engage in risky behaviour with regards to sexual ethics. It’s a long road to freedom for every single one of us on those thorny questions, and it might help, as a starting point, if we didn’t teach that sex is consequence free.
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It would be helpful to have statistics though the idea seems to be sensible.
In an age that vilifies courtship and its’ ‘getting to know you’ we have a culture that guarantees people don’t know what they are getting in to. Imagine being in the same residence with someone and you don’t know them yet there is ‘intimacy’. Sounds like that could be confusing, frustrating and confining. Sounds like a recipe for disaster.
On the other hand imagine an experience of getting to know someone and coming to the point where one sees they would like to live their life with the other. Then they decide that is what they are going to do. Sounds smart. Sounds promising. Sounds good.