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Showing posts from April, 2013

I Was a Teenage Jezebel

That's not true, but I've always loved the scene in the original version of the movie "Hairspray" when Divine complains that her daughter is, "All ratted up like a teenage Jezebel!" By the standards of our society at large, I was a very good kid who got good grades and never got into trouble, but by the ridiculously perfectionist standards of the church of Christ congregation we attended, I was a source of major turmoil. When I was 15, I decided that I didn't want to attend the teenagers' Bible class any more. I was the only girl, and the boys teased me viciously. The male teachers (because of course, women weren't allowed to teach boys older than 12, lest they usurp authority over a man) just sat there and did nothing, no matter how much I complained. This had been going on for years, and I finally reached my limit and announced to my parents that I wasn't going to that class any more and that I would be more than happy to sit with the adu