At Patheos: TF: Rev. Barnes Regrets He’s Unable to Lunch Today

Fred Clark has posted a new post, TF: Rev. Barnes Regrets He’s Unable to Lunch Today, at Patheos.com.

This week Fred writes about pp. 437-440 of Tribulation Force.

Excerpt:

Buck knows what his own family needs to hear to be saved from the Antichrist and the Devil, and somehow, someday, he’s going to tell them about it. He’s been meaning to, really he has. Just because he hasn’t managed to find time for a visit or a phone call in the first year and a half of the Great Tribulation doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about them. There’s still plenty of time before the end. After all, we haven’t even seen the second seal opened with the second horseman of the … hey … what’s with this traffic jam?

[Fred Clark, TF: Rev. Barnes Regrets He’s Unable to Lunch Today, November 28, 2011, posted at Patheos.com]


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Comments

[Firedrake]

My first thought on seeing the title was "why Bruce is not at work today". "On my way down, I met the Raptured coming up. At this point I must have lost my presence of mind."

You don't want ethylene glycol. Good old alcohol is a much better poison, because it's not surprising when people find it. (Leader of a banned minority religion drinks himself to death? That's not even news. Maybe if he's been preaching temperance it'll get a short line in the "look what hypocrites these guys are" section.)

Now, we know this was written before 2001-09-11 - but it wasn't written before 1993-02-26 or 1995-04-19. So LaJenkins has no excuse for not knowing how people, especially cops, react to a major terroristical event.

[Mmy]

Fred skipped over one of the most nauseating and narcissistic passages in the book:

Chloe leaned against Buck and slipped her hand into his. He was grateful she was so casual, so matter-of-fact, about her devotion to him.

[Rodeobob]

You use ethylene glycol as a poison because it's easily masked by sweet drinks like Gatorade, is easy to get (antifreeze) and isn't easily diagnosed from obvious external symptoms. Or so I heard...

[Deird, who's been wondering for a while]

is easy to get (antifreeze)

What is antifreeze, anyway? Is that something that I don't have to know about because I'm in Australia, or am I simply unobservant?

[MercuryBlue]

Wiki:

Antifreeze is a freeze preventive used in internal combustion engines and other heat transfer applications, such as HVAC chillers and solar water heaters.

The purpose of antifreeze is to prevent a rigid enclosure from undergoing catastrophic deformation due to expansion when water turns to ice. Antifreezes are chemical compounds added to water to reduce the freezing point of the mixture below the lowest temperature that the system is likely to encounter. Either the additive or the mixture may be referred to as antifreeze.

[Deird, who is about to put her jumpers into storage for five months or so]

Ah. So the answer to my either/or would actually be "both". :)

[chris the cynic]

[Somehow, someday, he would convince them they were not the Christians they thought they were.]

Buck knows what his own family needs to hear to be saved from the Antichrist and the Devil, and somehow, someday, he’s going to tell them about it. He’s been meaning to, really he has. Just because he hasn’t managed to find time for a visit or a phone call in the first year and a half of the Great Tribulation doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about them.

I think Fred is being too charitable. Buck isn't thinking about how he'll save his family from eternal damnation and Hellfire here. He's thinking about how he'll be able to say, "I'm right and you're wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Wrong. Wrong."

Convincing them to accept salvation isn't what he's planning on doing somehow, someday, convincing them that they suck is.

-

I swear I must be in Twilight mode because I can't help imagine all of these lines being delivered by Edward Cullen. (Also note my contribution to Ruby's 'Twas the night before deconstruction.) The trouble is that it's just Edward talking to Edward talking to Edward. Bella might be rude and callous and condescending herself, but she at least occasionally calls out others for their actions.

At one point she did it so very well that I thought Ana had mistakenly included her own response to Edward in one one of Bella's quotations.

This story could use some more Bella.

-

“A coma!”

Edward chuckled, “Like I say, we’re a little worried about him.”

I focused my attention on my lemonade and said, "A little worried? You mean like how you'd be if your makeup started to run on a day that was turning out to be mostly cloudy instead of completely overcast, or more like you feel if someone asked my dad to to investigate the decline in the deer population and his response was, 'Maybe later,' instead of flat out, 'No'? Or is this more like an, 'I wonder if someone will notice that we're skipping school 1% more often than normal since this abnormally clear weather set in?' level of worry?"

I glanced up to see Edward's obvious amusement. I couldn't look for long because whenever I did I lost the ability to form polysyllabic sentences. I looked back at my lemonade and continued, "He's in a coma for fuck's sake. He might die. Even if he lives he might never wake up. Even if he wakes up he might never be the same. This is a big, potentially life altering problem the likes of which you and yours will never have to personally face again, and all you can muster is a little worry?"

Edward said, "I don't see why it matters. Alice said that most everyone in Chicago was going to die soon anyway."

-

Of course, in the above I've combined Buck and the person he's talking on the phone with into Edward, which is sort of my point. Left Behind: Everyone is Edward Cullen.

[chris the cynic]

Doesn't antifreeze also increase the boiling point of the stuff it's added to? I seem to remember something about it being useful in extreme heat as well as cold.

[Rodeobob]

Bruce Barnes is in a coma. Why?

Let's back up a bit. Bruce Barnes travelled to Indonesia. Why?

We already know that Bruce is going to die at the end of this book, and it's not going to be because of whatever put him in that coma. So why is he in a coma?

Apparently, in the next book, it's revealed that Nicky Matterhorn poisoned him somehow? Or something like that? But for now, let's just spin out the possible reasons why the authors would do this....

a.) Bruce is in a coma to show how dangerous the world is, and how no one, not even a holy man of God, is safe.
Nope, sorry, not buying it. L&J communicate that there is a massive crime wave by writing "Buck turned off the radio after hearing news of a massive crime wave". These guys are so bad at storytelling they'd get an "F" at "Show & Tell".

b.) Bruce's coma is foreshadowing both his personal death, and the dark times ahead.
This might almost be plausible, except that Bruce dies in a half-dozen pages or so. Since the Turbo-Jesus 9000 eventually shows up, this sort of storytelling device would only make sense if Bruce fell into a coma, and then later recovered. (especially if comatose Bruce were taken by the OWG, and kept in a military hospital at New Babylon until his miraculous recovery!)

c.) As a character, Bruce's purpose has come to an end, and the authors need to explain his absence.
Bruce has barely been present at all in this book, and the authors haven't really bothered to have him do much beyond building his little hidey-hole. Bruce could have been in a coma for most of this book without changing any of the plot points. If he's going to die in a major earthquake, he can do it on his feet!

Nope. Bruce's coma makes no narrative sense. So what does that leave? Meta-Bruce, a character we've seen almost nothing of at all. For all of the first book, Meta-Bruce was a limited Author Insert for LeHay's evangelizing. But in this book, that role has been almost completely usurped by Rabbi Hannukah Brockelstien Tsion Ben Judah. Meta-Bruce has enough awareness to realize he's no longer needed, and like a sick dog, he's engaged in the literary equivalent of crawling under the porch to die quietly. By taking away the role of 'Basil Exposition' from Bruce, the authors effectively silenced him; aside spouting LeHay's Bible-babble, he really doesn't have much to say. It only makes sense that Meta-Bruce would find a way to literally be silenced and cut-off from the active characters of the story.

[Ruby]

The Buck-Not-Telling-His-Family bit is especially infuriating because we get to know his family much better in the prequels.

(TW: discussion of cancer and death)

So Buck's mom is dying of cancer. She's in Arizona or something, he's at Princeton (IIRC). Everyone keeps telling him that she's dying, and that the only thing she wants is to see him one more time. They keep telling him and telling him, and she keeps getting weaker and weaker, but Buck is just too busy Being a Hotshot Journalism Student to bother finding a way home to see his dying mother. Finally, FINALLY, he gets a plane ticket, but of course there is a blizzard and the flight is cancelled and he doesn't get home in time. His brother (who has been caring for his mother and basically running the family business for their dad) greets him at the airport as follows (paraphrasing): "O hai, mom's dead, she died calling for you, you're a selfish prick."

The conclusion of this is that Buck's brother is sooooooo mean.

[Pthalo]

Mmy: Fred skipped over one of the most nauseating and narcissistic passages in the book:

Chloe leaned against Buck and slipped her hand into his. He was grateful she was so casual, so matter-of-fact, about her devotion to him.

Yeesh.

[Andrea]

Chris: Yes on your antifreeze question; it acts as both antifreeze and coolant. This really confused me at first when I was doing billing for a trucking repair company.

[Spalanzani]

The "Oh Wait, I'm Not Frantically Checking My Watch, Am I? I'm In A Bloody Coma!" Bruce Barnes’ Death Countdown: 8 pages

“What’s this?” he heard Rayford say. “And we’ve been making such good time.”

This is the quintessential Rayford line, perhaps even the quintessential Left Behind line. Death, destruction, disaster, human suffering on a previously unimaginable scale? Shit, and we were making such great time!

Besides Fred's murder theory, another way to explain the church lady's extreme under-reaction to Bruce being in a flippin' coma is that so many horrible things have already happened that she's just become totally desensitized. I mean, after all the children in the world vanish and you know for a fact that the world will be ending in a few years, your pastor being in a coma would probably seem like small potatoes.

[Ross]

I am still singing "Surrender" in my head. "Just the other day I heard of a soldier's falling off / Some Indonesian junk that's going 'round"

[Kit Whitfield]

Chloe leaned against Buck and slipped her hand into his. He was grateful she was so casual, so matter-of-fact, about her devotion to him.

Horrors aside - holding hands is a sign of devotion? Is this the whole wait-until-marriage-to-do-anything-sexual-at-all school of thought being felt here, or is it just bad writing?

[Rodeobob]

@Kit - think of it like those "Meth: not even once" ads...

"Holding hands isn't a sign of devotion. But on RTC, it is!"
"Post-Millenial Dispensation: Not even once!"

[Firedrake]

Mmy: it's not enough that the women be willing slaves, they have to be willing slaves who don't cause their menfolk to get all "emotional". (And Kit, later: my reading of this is that a "normal" RTC-man would be embarrassed by a sign that his wife actually cared for him, but Buck, being a super-RTC, is prepared to let it pass without comment. What a guy!)

Rodeobob: in the film version, the NWO distributes poisoned Bibles and those are what kills Bruce (and a bunch of other people). But actually I think your point (c) is probably the right one, as you go on to explore: he's served as a dispenser of Biblical(tm) Wisdom (which was his narrative role, insofar as that's a valid concept in these books), but now there's SuperJew.

Though actually I think it's more that Bruce's player doesn't bother to show up to the games any more and the party's tired of carrying him around.

Ruby: ah, those crazy non-RTCs, scurrying around as though anything they did actually mattered.

[Ruby]

Firedrake: in the film version, the NWO distributes poisoned Bibles and those are what kills Bruce (and a bunch of other people). But actually I think your point (c) is probably the right one, as you go on to explore: he's served as a dispenser of Biblical(tm) Wisdom (which was his narrative role, insofar as that's a valid concept in these books), but now there's SuperJew

I think this is definitely the primary point of Bruce's death. And the secondary point is that Bruce states explicitly that only one in four people will live to see the (second? third? fifth?) return of TurboJesus. And that is taken so frakking literally that it means that three of the four people sitting there when he says it must die, otherwise the Bible isn't true.

[Kit Whitfield]

think of it like those "Meth: not even once" ads

I might if I'd ever seen one; I don't think they ran in the UK. YouTube link, perhaps?

[Rakka]

Why not have Bruce killed by an uncaring hit-and-run, especially if there's supposedly this record-breaking crime wave going on? I mean, what would be a better way to showcase the failing morality than someone running someone over and not bothering to do anything about it, and the next 30 people also not bothering to do anything about it? A quick treatment would have saved his life, but...
Of course, trying to make sense is not on L&Js record.

[Phoenix]

He had a four-person family again, albeit a new wife and a new son.

Am I the only person who finds this line intensely creepy? It's not exactly a groundbreaking revelation that Rayford doesn't give a pigsfoot about his wife and son being suddenly absent from his life, because they're in heaven and he KNOWS that for totally certain absolute fact and everyone who's not an idiot therefore also KNOWS for totally certain absolute fact that it's all happy angel rainbow farts for them from there, and yet...

You'd think he'd still be allowed to miss them. Like, miss them in the sense that they were individual people who added certain unique things to his life by virtue of being those individual people? The way humans do? Part of missing someone who is no longer a presence in your life has to do with the fact that people are not toasters - you can't just go to Sears and pick up a brand new one that looks exactly like the old one.

Yet he speaks of his "wife" and son" as you might expect him to speak of his private driver*: He was back in his cozy and palatial limousine, albeit with a new driver.

I find that extremely creepy. It's like he didn't even care about his wife and son as individuals, only as roles** to be fulfilled in his life. Man's gotta have a wife and son; Rayford's got a wife and son. Check.

*Of COURSE Rayford has a private driver. Doesn't everyone?

**ZOMG SHOCKER, I know.

[Phoenix]

I would have forgiven Rayford for remarking on the irony of having a new wife and son to "replace" the old wife and son, but I can't forgive him for acting like such an thing is part of the natural sequence of events.

[Jeff Lipton]

I can't post to patheos at work -- but I'm shocked by the lack, both there and here of the shout-outs to Mr Porter.

[Phoenix]

The Buck-Not-Telling-His-Family bit is especially infuriating because we get to know his family much better in the prequels.

@Ruby - Refresh my memory? Did BuckMomma actually tell him to stay at school until break or something like he said she did in the first book, or did he make that part up outright?

I remember reading that in the prequel and thinking that Buck was very lucky to walk away from that interaction at the airport with Jeff. Were I in his shoes, Bucky would have had a recovery time.

[Phoenix]

Horrors aside - holding hands is a sign of devotion? Is this the whole wait-until-marriage-to-do-anything-sexual-at-all school of thought being felt here, or is it just bad writing?

@Kit - I was wondering the same thing. Normally I don't hold my husband's hand for the sole purpose of announcing to him and the rest of the world that I am RLY DVTD to him. And I doubt Chloe does either (well, at least Meta-Chloe wouldn't).

Most people hold their spouse's hands as a signal of affection, at best.

Also, I hold hands with my friends sometimes (because: sign of affection). Has Buck really never had a woman take his hand in any other context?

[chris the cynic]

Has Buck really never had a woman take his hand in any other context?

One might imagine that some have tried, but Buck immediately rejected them as dirty rotten harlots.

I considered trying to write a short scene, but it really seems like it would be way too much of a downer: someone, perhaps a friend, tries to comfort him in a time of trouble and he snaps at her and calls her horrible names. Here she was, only trying to help, and she gets verbally attacked by someone who she thought was her friend (and doubtless shunned forever more.) Write that scene in detail and it would be heartbreaking.

Then again, if we assume she makes new friends we know they'll be not-Buck, so there is a light of some kind.

[Laiima]

@Phoenix, I, too, thought that line was especially creepy. I like your reasoning through some of it, but for me, it veers into personal history a bit as well.

My sister and I were both the black sheep of our family, and as far as we could figure out, that stemmed solely from us being girls. Our two brothers were lionized, even for the most trivial activities. Fast forward to adulthood: within 18 months of each other, we both got married. My parents *knocked themselves over* telling everyone they met about their "new sons". Not son-in-laws. And they didn't like me or my sister any better than they ever had; they didn't treat us any better than they ever had. But they lionized our husbands, just like our brothers.

(I don't know how my BIL felt about my parents during the 18 years he was married to my sister, but I do know that Spouse never liked my parents. He was disturbed by how much they favored him over me, especially considering that since he's an introvert like me, they never really knew him at all: he's much more similar to me than he is to either of them.)

So when I read that line, I realized that Chloe doesn't matter to Ray at all, except as a way of getting a (replacement) son. It is never, ever, a good sign when someone reminds me of my parents. :(

[Phoenix]

Here she was, only trying to help, and she gets verbally attacked by someone who she thought was her friend (and doubtless shunned forever more.) Write that scene in detail and it would be heartbreaking.

I would actually be VERY interested in your interpretation of this scene... especially if the friend trying to comfort Buck was male. Whole different set of questions!

[Will Wildman]

Horrors aside - holding hands is a sign of devotion? Is this the whole wait-until-marriage-to-do-anything-sexual-at-all school of thought being felt here, or is it just bad writing?

We were previously exposed to Buck's contemplation on whether his relationship with Chloe had 'progressed' to the hand-holding stage, so I would guess it's the former scenario. There was a time when hand-holding would have been serious, nigh-scandalous business, but now they can Do It whenever they want, without having to sneak around, they can just be sitting in a traffic jam and Do It right there in the car.

Which conceptually makes sense to me - I can understand the 'echo thrill' of realising that something that was once a rarity is now an omnipresent possibility. It just probably wouldn't be 'hand holding', for most married worldly-wise jet-setters.

[Laiima]

I forgot to say, during the part of our marriage that I was in contact with my parents, Spouse couldn't bring himself to call them a variation of 'mom and dad', nor by their first names (which is how he addresses his own aunts and uncles). So, for 12 years!, he called them Mr. and Mrs. TheirLastname. I truly cannot fathom how they were not able to read this as his complete disinterest in emotional intimacy with them, but they never did seem to figure it out.

[Laiima]

If Buck had grabbed Chloe's hand, would that have been described as him "showing his devotion to her"? Probably not, I'm guessing. It just seems weird that it's so important to the authors to highlight "Chloe's devotion to Buck", rather than their mutual devotion, or affection, or just thankfulness at having someone who cares as the world is ending. Even now, as the Second Seal is Opened (or whatever), Husbands Rule Wives. Really?

[Phoenix]

My sister and I were both the black sheep of our family, and as far as we could figure out, that stemmed solely from us being girls. Our two brothers were lionized... they lionized our husbands, just like our brothers... So when I read that line, I realized that Chloe doesn't matter to Ray at all, except as a way of getting a (replacement) son.

It is never, ever, a good sign when someone reminds me of my parents. :(

@Laiima - How fascinating and heartbreaking at the same time. And I wasn't even thinking of Chloe, but you're right; she's not only there to fulfill the requisite daughter slot for the perfect nuclear family, she can ALSO serve as a conduit to replace her brother with a husband in the event that something happens to the former and her father needs a replacement son.

How excellent to learn that girls are mildly useful to their families in TWO DIFFERENT WAYS! Chloe was clearly raised to have great self-esteem.

The line in boldface... is a tragedy.

(((((Laiima)))))))
(((((Laiima)))))))
(((((Laiima)))))))

Thank you for reminding me to be grateful for my parents.

[Will Wildman]

If Buck had grabbed Chloe's hand, I expect that the emphasis would have been on his thrill of access to her and general ownership. He doesn't need to be devoted; what matters is that he's got rights now. Bleh.

[Laiima]

@Phoenix, Thanks. On the really rare occasions where something reminds me of something specific like - how my mother celebrated the Feast of St. Nicholas (which was lovely and heartwarming) - I just feel really sad that more of our relationship wasn't like that. That I can't be around her or my father without being constantly reminded that I wasn't even 4th-best (out of 4 kids), but 10th-best, or 100th-best, or not on the list at all.

So for my peace of mind, it's really better to just not think about them. Which is also sad.

[Ruby]

Phoenix: Refresh my memory? Did BuckMomma actually tell him to stay at school until break or something like he said she did in the first book, or did he make that part up outright?

Sadly, my LaJenkins collection is not quite complete, so I can only go by my memories of the audiobook and GoogleBooks. Basically, his brother Jeff impresses upon him (multiple times) that this is Really For Real It, mom is dying, get your ass home. When Buck talks on the phone to his mother, she does an, "oh, don't put yourself out, Favorite Child, you just concentrate on being the best darned journalism student evar."

So, it wasn't any kind of order to stay at school or anything, more an "I don't want to be a bother" thing. And Buck admits that she sounds weaker and weaker every time he talks to her, so it's not like he didn't get it.

[Phoenix]

Which conceptually makes sense to me - I can understand the 'echo thrill' of realising that something that was once a rarity is now an omnipresent possibility. It just probably wouldn't be 'hand holding', for most married worldly-wise jet-setters.

@Will Wildman - I recently read* the companion books I Kissed Dating Goodbye and Boy Meets Girl by Joshua Harris (this is one of the only places where I feel free to admit that!), both of which revolve around the idea of purity within pre-marital relationships. (Harris did not kiss his wife until their wedding day; the most they ever did before marriage was lie in a hammock together, and he quickly decided that even that was too much physical contact since it was causing him to "lust" after his wife-to-be**)

Two of his many reasons for advocating as much purity as possible before marriage are 1) to protect the sanctity of marriage by not acting as though your bodies belong to each other before they actually do, and 2) to reserve as much physical pleasure for marriage as possible so that the simplest touches will always be special to you once you've "earned" them.

So for them, cuddling on the couch while they watched a movie together (an example of something that was on their pre-marital no-no list) really did represent a special privilege for which they had patiently waited.

Anyway, what you said about an "echo thrill" reminded me of that. Sometimes seemingly insignificant things can be a very big deal to other people.

*Reread, if I'm being honest. I read them both in a high school all-girls Bible study during my fundamentalist Christian days. Except back then, it was meant to be more of a how-to guide. Something I tried very hard not to think about for too long as I was rereading them, lest my brain explode...

**It's easy to mock him and gape at his puritanical and sometimes openly misogynistic ideas - and believe me, I did - but I will say this for the man, he practices what he preaches, and I appreciate that kind of integrity. Surprisingly, I also liked some of his ideas on respect for sexuality and the need to be careful with one's heart. I thought the building blocks were pretty good, even though I disagreed WILDLY with 99% of the conclusions he drew from them.

[Ross]

It's easy to mock him and gape at his puritanical and sometimes openly misogynistic ideas - and believe me, I did - but I will say this for the man, he practices what he preaches, and I appreciate that kind of integrity. Surprisingly, I also liked some of his ideas on respect for sexuality and the need to be careful with one's heart. I thought the building blocks were pretty good, even though I disagreed WILDLY with 99% of the conclusions he drew from them.

Most compelling lies are *almost* true. Ruthlessly oppressing your sexuality to channel it into a single socially-approved conduit is *almost* like taking actual control and responsibility for your sexuality.

(The rest of compelling lies are nowhere near true, but reflect what the listener *wants* reality to be)

[Phoenix]

Ruthlessly oppressing your sexuality to channel it into a single socially-approved conduit is *almost* like taking actual control and responsibility for your sexuality.

@Ross - I agree with that statement as you wrote it. However, I would add that taking actual control and responsibility for your sexuality can include some of the same decisions that appear, to an outsider, ruthlessly oppressive. The difference has to do with why an individual conducts hirself the way zie does, and how zie feels about that conduct.

I have come to believe it is entirely possible to severely restrict and control one's sexual decisions without repressing or denying one's sexuality in the slightest. And that doing so is often mistaken for choosing repression. So I'm very careful these days about deciding that certain decisions are automatically repressive to other people just because they are to me. In my mind, that is no different from deciding that someone else is wrong to sleep with 100 people based on my own belief that you shouldn't sleep with more than 5 (random example).

For me, it always comes down to the fact that it's wrong to make judgments or (heaven forbid) decisions about other people's sexuality on their behalf.

[Pthalo]

what I don't get is why the people who believe in abstinence before marriage always use such shoddy arguments both when arguing with adults who believe differently than they do and also when they are making their case for teenagers. The good arguments never get made. It baffles me.

[Phoenix]

@Pthalo - I couldn't agree more. It's especially funny (weird, not ha-ha) when people argue that it's wrong based on what they admit to be personal conviction. The point of personal conviction (I thought) was that it was, in fact... personal.

[Pthalo]

To expound, in the first place, I think all of us would agree in "abstinence until a person is ready to have sex." and that in a relationship sex should wait at least until both parties want to do it. I have never seen it argued that anyone should be forced to have premarital sex that they don't want, so there is some common ground here, and I would argue that common ground is larger than it seems at first glance.

I heard a lot of arguments for abstinence when growing up, many of them along the lines of "if you don't have sex until you're married even though you were so in love, you will know your partner will never cheat on you because your partner was able to restrain him/herself despite how much they loved you" and "isn't it romantic" and similar arguments. The first argument may be true for some individuals but I doubt it's true for everything -- there's a logical hole in there somewhere -- and the second is an appeal to the emotions. You can counter it by saying "no, I don't find that romantic at all."

The argument I'd make, though, is that if you want a lasting relationship -- and not everyone does, but if you do --, you need to be able to communicate really well, and a lot of that communication has to happen outside the bedroom.

In teenager terms, this means you want to date someone that you can have a good conversation with in the cafeteria at lunch, someone who respects you and doesn't put you down, someone you like talking to and doing stuff with -- be that playing chess together or going rollerblading. Maybe you don't have everything in common, but when your tastes differ, you aren't putting each other down all the time, but live and let live.

In grown up terms, especially if you're looking long term and want to live together, you want to date someone you talk about money with and can talk about chores with and someone you enjoy being around in the other rooms of the house, not just the bedroom. If they drive you crazy outside the bedroom, no matter how good you feel with them in bed, it's not going to last, because you can't have sex all the time. If you're not looking for a relationship and just want a little fun, that's different (but use a condom), but if one of your goals is "I want to be with someone for more than a few months" then there has to be more going for you than just sex.

So the argument for abstinence is that communication is hard and sex is easy. It's easier to cuddle and snuggle and not talk about the hard stuff, and your relationship will last longer if you learn how to say all the hard stuff in words and how to disagree and make up. Too much focus on sex early on can cause you to ignore red flags and can cause you to sweep stuff under the rug. So it's best to ease into things, do a lot of talking and see how you get along, and then leave the sex for an arbitrary point in the future, for when you're sure that the two of you get on really well outside the bedroom.

In the bedroom, everyone is different and prior sexual experience doesn't help all that much and in some of my relationships has been an experience -- when the asshat i was dating couldn't get it out of their head that i wasn't their exgirlfriend and just because she liked her neck touched didn't mean i liked mine touched. Every person is new, and you have to set aside all the things your previous partners liked and disliked and learn how to do it all over again with your new partner. This is an argument neither for nor against abstinence, btw. It's just an argument for the idea that learning what this person likes in bed is really fun and even if there are a few hiccups in the learning process, if you've gotten good at communicating, you can use those communication skills in the bedroom too and better sex will be had by all. Personally, because of my history of abuse, and I would never be willing to have sex with a person I didn't trust well enough to be able to have conversations about consent and likes/dislikes in bed. I know some adults work differently and don't mind having sex with people they don't know that well, and that's fine for adults, but it's different with teenagers.

Most teenagers are not ready to have sex when they start puberty. I started menstruating when I was eleven, for example. At that age, sex wasn't something I was interested in, not even with other eleven year olds. Because teenagers are young, and because teenagers don't have much experience with setting boundaries yet, and because most teenagers are shy seriously about talking about sex, especially in the beginning of their teenage years, I would advise them to remain abstinent until they are able to have a honest discussion with their partner along the lines of "I really like you and I'd like to kiss you but I don't want to do anything more just yet." or "I'd like you to touch me here but not there." If they're too embarrassed to say something along those lines then they're not ready to be having sex. I really think that lessons in communication and boundaries and how to be assertive are extremely important and should be a part of any sex education. I also believe that sex ed should talk frankly all about pregnancy and STDs and condoms and the pill (and how the pill prevents pregnancy but not STDs) and other contraception options, and also about puberty and how their bodies are changing and the wide variety of normal looking genitals and breasts -- how it's perfectly normal if it's a bit lopsided or what have you. I think teenagers girls should also be told that their breasts may continue to grow until they're well into their twenties, that even if they're a size AA their breasts will work fine for feeding their children and how larger sizes can cause back pain (and strategies for dealing with that), but no matter what size they are, you're probably fine.

Additionally, because learning to communicate is so important, it's best to be abstinent until an arbitrary point in the relationship when you're "sure" about the other person. A lot of people pick "my wedding day" as that arbitrary point because that's the day when people make a formal commitment to spend a long time in a relationship together, and since you wouldn't want to marry someone you couldn't communicate with, by then you'll hopefully have a lot of good communication strategies mastered. The day you move in together or the day you get engaged can also be a good "arbitrary date".