And now, it's really getting on my nerves...

Or, how Church of Christ gender discrimination is now screwing up my writing. All of this could have been averted by not having seperate classes for the boys and the girls.

So, I'm trying to write a character. Name: Lawrence. Male. Early twenties. Raised CofC, conservative side of mainstream Tennessee. Still is CofC. Not a sheltered Freedom-Hardly boy though, would probably fit in nicely with the Abilene crowd from what I've seen of the Abilene crowd on the Internet. And not the type of guy whose morals are based on exactly what he's been told since birth, but he places more weight on tradition/letter of the scripture than I do.

All of this makes him a delight to write. He's got a nicely complex system of morality. And I have to work a bit to get into his head because he and I don't have the same and or closely overlapping views on things. But you would think that the raised CofC thing would help with figuring out my character's mental landscape. I should know, at least, what programming he got on X subject and then be able to figure out how that will interact with the other influences and ideas floating about in Lawrence's skull. Right? Well, it depends on the subject.

See the sticky moral dilemma I've pitched my Lawrence into involves *cough* sex *cough* Now, this is not to say I haven't had a full CofC sex-education. But, I've had the programming for the "young ladies." Mind you, this programming was all about the boys, and how the boys just don't have control, and how we young ladies have to be extra careful to not cause the boys to lust. Never ever heard anything that about dealing with, sublimating, or repressing lust, because it was apparently assumed that young ladies never experienced lust. Frankly, I think that's all bollocks. Both the first and the second propositions. My opinion on all that wouldn't matter so much for the figuring out what's in Lawrence's skull (there are other things I believe to be bollocks that Lawrence takes quite seriously), but I also highly doubt that that's the CofC sex ed that the boys got. We were carefully segregated for these things. If Lawrence were Larissa I'd be confident of knowing what lurks in her skull. (But that would also add another fish to the kettle now wouldn't it.)

Anyhow, I need to know what programming the boys got. Did they even focus upon the dating, marriage, dating, marriage, find a mate, with the intensity that the girls were forced to? I've suspected for quite some time that they didn't. I'm managing to get a bit of an idea from male responses on Facebook CofC group threads, but it's not enough for a full reconstruction. And, I get the feeling that just flat-out posting a question, of "hey, what'd they tell you, man?" wouldn't get a good reception. I've poked around some of Focus on the Family's online material for the boys (I hope the CofC isn't quite that screwy, fyi), because the CofC doesn't have a standardized propaganda system of their own. But, I can only do so much of that at once.

It's getting tempting to just e-mail the youth minister and ask him what they tell the boys. He already knows I'm as strange as they come. Not quite there yet though. Time for poking about the website for one large CofC youth rally and some more discussion board lurking.