College Debt and the Sugar Daddy

Yesterday, the Christianity blog for women (Her.meneutics) published a blog post I wrote on the troubling trend of young women seeking older, wealthy men to pay their college debt. In the last week I have seen at least three news venues (two from The Today Show) talk about the "sugar daddy/sugar baby" arrangement. There are all sorts of opinions on whether this is an acceptable way to pay of debt. Some call it prostitution. Some say that it's just women using their sexual power for their advantage. And in a hyper-sexualized world, why wouldn't they be allowed to do something like this? While some Christian women might look at this story and think "that would never be me," what I wanted to highlight in the post was that we are all susceptible to the temptation to compromise something (whether emotionally or physically) in order to get what we think we need most. For these women it's financial security. For some women it might be emotional or marital security.

"What are you willing to sell for relational or economic needs? It’s a question I asked myself over and over again in my single days. Sometimes the answer surprised me most when I was tempted to give a little in order to get what I wanted. This sort of arrangement is so far from the heart of God, who offers us abundant grace freely despite the fact that we give him nothing in return. This payment — this debt removal — is what all of us, from the sugar baby in Manhattan to the church single’s-group regular in the Midwest, need more than any seemingly overwhelming financial or emotional crisis."

Read the rest of the post here.