This Purity Ball shit is pretty horrifying. I have no idea how common such a thing is. To echo many of the interesting thoughts in the comments on the post linked above, it is bizarre in 2 ways and brings up at least 1 significant social issue.
It’s bizarre because discussing sex with such very young children and linking it to their father is weird. I expect parental guidance in regards to young women’s sexuality to come primarily from their mothers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m an advocate of fatherly involvement as well, but to pledge to your dad that you’ll save yourself for marriage when you are 4 years old (or 8 years old for that matter) is weird.
The other reason it is bizarre is that most of us had sex before marriage. I personally seemed to have lived through it. It looks like you did too. I want my kids to make good, safe decisions about sex. But I’d never be so ignorant as to think that I could or should brainwash them to my point of view, whatever my point of view may be. All parents know, you can’t make all the decisions for your kid but you can give them a moral and rational basis on which to base their decisions. This leads to the social issue.
What responsibility, if any, does the State have in making sure kids get an education that includes secular morality and plan ol’ rationality? What is the difference between teaching and brainwashing? If I teach my kid to think for himself am I “brainwashing” him into that attitude? If I raise my kid in a godless home, am I “brainwashing” him to that point of view? How about a Christian who raises their kid that drinking, sex and rock-n-roll are sins? Is that brainwashing?
I would argue that teaching is when you help develop skills of independent and rational thinking which can be used to create personal opinions of god, sex, drinking, etc. Brainwashing is imposing a predefined opinion.
This Purity Ball stuff seems to me like the latter.