Massage businesses are sacred spaces where people’s bodies are cared for in ways usually reserved for those closest to you. This was my thought back in March, when I heard that a white man had shot up three spas in Atlanta, Georgia and killed eight people. Six were migrant Asian women: Xiaojie Tan, Daoyou Feng, Soon Chung Park, Hyun Jung Grant, Yong Ae Yue, and Sun Cha Kim.
According to the police, the 21-year-old killer claimed that he had a “sex addiction” and murdered the women to eliminate temptation. He was a youth member of Crabapple First Baptist Church and most likely indoctrinated by evangelical purity culture. As someone who was raised in a similar conservative, evangelical church, I know first-hand what experience with purity culture is like.
As a young child, I grew up believing that my virginity before marriage would affect whether I would go to heaven or suffer for all of eternity. I attended youth camps that would separate the boys and girls into different groups to teach us how to keep ourselves “pure for Jesus”. They told us that every one of our sexual decisions has life and death significance. It’s a stressful and traumatic environment where the simplest human urges were repressed, monitored, and shamed.
