Erica Smith is an award-winning sexuality educator, advocate, and author from rural Pennsylvania, where she grew up casually Christian, went to public school, learned sex ed from a gym teacher, and somehow became the most responsible teenage sexual health nerd with birth control, condoms, spermicide, and library books before having sex for the first time.
In this episode we talk about purity culture, religious sexual shame, high-control groups, Christian nationalism, marital consent, "duty sex," the pressure placed on both women and men in evangelical purity teachings, and why healing from purity culture is not just about learning sex ed, but reconnecting to your body, your signals, your autonomy, and your right to desire without fear.
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Where to find Erica:
Website: https://www.purityculturedropout.com
Instagram / Threads: @ericasmitheducates
Book: The Purity Culture Recovery Guide: Shame-Free Sex Ed You Deserve
Where to find Arielle:
Instagram: @birdsandbeesdontfck
TikTok: @birdsandbeesdontfck
Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/cw/birdsandbeesdontfck
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Episode Cheat Sheet
00:37 Why purity culture impacts everyone regardless of religious upbringing
02:01 Reclaiming spiritual language, God, universe, source, and finding meaning outside of shame
03:35 Erica's rural Pennsylvania upbringing and not coming from purity culture or evangelical Christianity
06:52 Conservative Judaism, kosher, Shabbat, fear of God, and the god of religious sexual shame
10:13 Why controlling sex is the central power tool in high-control groups and cults 13:15 Twin Flames, New Age purity culture, divine feminine and masculine, and forced relationship roles
15:11 Non-monogamy, the one-person mythology, and not knowing ethical non-monogamy was an option
18:22 The pressure on children to save souls and why evangelical recruitment causes anxiety
20:15 AIDS education, high school sex ed, birth control, Cosmo handouts, and a raw egg as a fake baby
23:35 Family planning at 16, condoms, spermicide, Planned Parenthood, teen pregnancy, and pre-internet sex ed
26:03 Curiosity as the common thread among sex educators and talking explicitly with friends about sex
30:26 From women's studies to abortion clinic counselor, September 11th, anti-abortion terrorism, and fake anthrax
33:46 Seventeen years doing sex ed and HIV prevention with incarcerated youth in Philadelphia juvenile detention
35:09 Exvangelicals, deconstruction, the 2016 election, and the mass exodus from evangelical Christianity
39:28 Wedding night trauma, the flip-the-switch expectation, marital rape, duty sex, and long-term sexual dysfunction
43:09 Consent in marriage, the every-72-hours myth, Christian patriarchy, and denying women the right to say no
46:14 Rape culture, dissociation, blaming wives for husbands cheating, and the harm purity culture does to men
48:41 Duty sex, maintenance sex, intimacy dates, responsive desire, and why sex should never be expected
50:06 Men in purity culture, being taught you are a sex demon, bounce your eyes, and associating desire with disrespect
53:01 How purity culture silences body signals around consent, danger, hunger, and attraction — and somatic healing
56:08 Why purity culture is not a thing of the past, Christian nationalism, fascism, voting, and bodily autonomy
01:01:07 Where to find Erica Smith, The Purity Culture Recovery Guide, and purity culture recovery support groups
