"Body Count:" WTF Is This A Culture Topic Now?
And since when did we call it that? Sex is ... a crime scene?
I’ve been on TikTok approximately six times in my entire life, and each time I scrolled for maybe 30 seconds to one minute. I don’t find it that awesome. But maybe because of my lack of TikTok-y-ness, I didn’t know about the term “body count,” which feels like something you ask a Marine or a guy on death row — but no, now that terms “sexual partners.” I have no idea how we got from an analogy for mass murder to discussing someone’s previous sexual history, but sheesh, the world is an interesting place these days.
The “body count” conversation has a natural place in the culture wars of today because it’s thought to be tied to various things about the unraveling of society. If (especially) women are having more premarital sex, which seems to be true, does that mean they won’t evolve into the good wives and mothers that society expects them to be? Absolutely not. I know at least 15 women — and this is off the top of my head — who were ostensibly sluts in college and became tremendous mothers. How you are at 19 and how you are at 44 are often very different. We need to remember that.
Then it gets into societal rules, I.e. “Can you ask another person about their body count?” Absolutely you can, especially if you’re going to sleep with them or date them. It’s good stuff to know. And a high body count (I can’t believe I keep using this term) isn’t some scarlet letter. A lot of times, a woman and/or a guy with a “high body count” was just experimenting or trying to have fun in a specific period. It doesn’t mean they’re morally bankrupt. It could mean that, yes, but it’s not definitive.
Way back in 2007 or 2008 in New York, I had some friends who played on a kickball team, and one of the women on that team supposedly had a “body count” of 110–120.
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