Must read for parents, college-aged young risking loss of essence

Running on Empty

Hookup: Evidence of Meaninglessness:

Culture of the neglected,  the bored, the empty, the emotionally barren

Excerpt, minor editing by Carolyn Bennett

Author and educator Donna Freitas has held positions on academic faculties at Hofstra and Boston universities and St. Michael’s College.

In her review of Dr. Freitas’s latest book The End of Sex: How Hookup Culture is Leaving a Generation Unhappy, Sexually Unfulfilled, and Confused About Intimacy, Toronto writer Georgie Binks writes

Hookup stimulant
Depressive

“The hookup is defined as ‘fast, uncaring sex you don’t remember.’

“The problem is [that] most students surveyed for the book admit not only did they remember it, but rather than feeling good about it, it left them isolated and lonely.

“Drinking is vital to the hookup and the prevalence of hookups increases with alcohol consumption …; unfortunately, so does unprotected sex and sexual assault.

Author Donna Freitas

The End of Sex “is ─

 …informative, non-judgmental, a must-read for parents and for their university-aged kids … [important for] figuring out a new conversation with the kids — or they may never know ‘what love has got to do with it.’

“Author Donna Freitas first encountered hookup culture when she was teaching an undergraduate course at a small Catholic university in the United States.

“Students were accepting of it, she says, as if it were the cultural norm until a lone student piped up about how much she disliked it. That opened the floodgates; and before Freitas knew it, many students were revealing their unhappiness.” In 2006, Dr. Freitas “put together a nationwide study involving 2,500 students at religious and secular universities in the United States and “found pretty much the same result.”

Good Reads’ review reads:

Loneliness
lacking perceived
options

H

ookup culture dominates the lives of college students today and many feel great pressure to engage in it. 

This pressure comes from all directions—from peers, the media, and even parents.

But how do these expectations affect students themselves? And why aren’t parents and universities helping students make better-informed decisions about sex and relationships?

In The End of Sex, Donna Freitas uses students’ own testimonies to define hookup culture and propose ways of opting out for those yearning for meaningful relationships.

Unless students can find alternatives to hookup culture, Freitas argues, the vast majority will continue to associate sexuality with ambivalence, boredom, isolation, and loneliness instead of the romance, intimacy, and good sex they want and deserve.

An honest, sympathetic portrait of the challenges of young adulthood, The End of Sex offers a refreshing take on this charged topic—and a solution that depends not on premarital abstinence or unfettered sexuality, but rather a healthy path between the two.

Sources and notes

Review by Toronto writer Georgie Binks of Donna Freitass’ book The End of Sex, May 10, 2013, http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/2013/05/10/the_end_of_sex_by_donna_freitas_review.html

“The End of Sex: How Hookup Culture is Leaving a Generation Unhappy, Sexually Unfulfilled, and Confused About Intimacy by Donna Freitas (Goodreads Author) review, http://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/49378-the-end-of-sex-how-hookup-culture-is-leaving-a-generation-unhappy-sexu

Dr. Donna Freitas 

Assistant Professor of Religion, Boston University

(Zoomed Info profile may need updating)

Employment History

Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion, Boston University

Visiting Associate Professor of Religion, Honors College at Hofstra University

Professor of Religious Studies, St. Michael's college

Religion Professor, St. Michael's college

Teacher: St. Michael's college

Associate Professor of Religion:  Hofstra University

Religion and Gender Studies Teacher: Hofstra University

Professor of Religious Studies: Education Sector

Board Memberships and Affiliations

Fellow and Writer, Honors College at Hofstra University

Fellow and Writer, Hofstra University

Academic credentials

Ph.D.: (religion) The Catholic University of America (Washington, D.C.)

B.A.: (philosophy and Spanish) Georgetown University (Washington, D.C.)

http://www.zoominfo.com/p/Donna-Freitas/1318132362

“The End of Sex: How Hookup Culture is Leaving a Generation Unhappy, Sexually Unfulfilled, and Confused About Intimacy by Donna Freitas. Hardcover, 240 pages; published April 2, 2013, by Basic Books (first published January 29, 2013); more details...ISBN: 0465002153 (ISBN13: 9780465002153); edition language: English, http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10814548-

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