Chastity promises: a waste of time?

Here's an interesting article that popped up on my newsfeed this morning.

While the analysis is not new, you pretty much figured that it would pop up in the news again with the recent announcement by Miley Cyrus that she had joined tween pop sensations the Jonas Brothers on no-sex island.

Now, before I go on, I'll admit to being a bit cynical about celebrity promises of this nature. Check out this cynical MSNBC article by Tony Sclafani to understand why. Sclafani goes so far as to theorize that it tends to be deft career move.

Sclafani does make a valid point. By talking about not having sex, aren't we really talking about sex? In other words, when American Idol winner Jordin Sparks or Julianne Hough of Dancing With the Stars talk about waiting till they're wed, aren't they really just upping the sex ante?

And, is that really wrong?

The problem with the celebrity chastity thing are the predecessors. Britney had one, if I recall correctly. Mariah Carey is said to have stated she waited for "complete intimacy" with current husband Nick Cannon (I didn't ask, and neither should you). Therefore, when you toss in the stats that make most chastity adherents look like stupid kooks, it is clear why most people take the whole movement as a comical waste of time.

So, should these pledges mean anything to us? I say "maybe." I cannot find anything ethically wrong about such a statement, and I feel as long as they are made with complete sincerity, we should be able to find something useful to get from it -- and the sincerity aspect is probably not for me to decide. We also need to fight the urge to start betting pools on soon they will fail.

*Sigh* I broke a few promises myself with this post... I promised to never, ever blog about Miley Cyrus.

Oh well...

Photo courtesy of Greg Crusco via ReelWorship.