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Here is the text, in case the image is not readable: "To all the girls who are in a hurry to have a boyfriend or get married, a piece of Biblical advice: 'Ruth patiently waited for her mate Boaz.' While you are waiting on YOUR Boaz, don't settle for any of his relatives: Broke-az, Po-az, Lyin-az, Cheatin-az, Dumb-az, Drunk-az, Cheap-az, Lockedup-az, Goodfornothin-az, Lazy-az, and especially his third cousin, Beatinyo-az. Wait on your Boaz and make sure he respects Yoaz."
My first thought, upon reading this, was "so uhhh, you realize Boaz was her SECOND husband, right?"
In other words, no, this argument is invalid. Because the story the church teaches teenage girls (and guys too I guess?) is don't have sex, don't "go too far" emotionally/physically/whatever- which is so vaguely defined that I think it is usually based in fear rather than actual information- and then someday, God will come through with this one guy, and you'll get married young (or, you know, eventually, but don't worry, God will come through) and be happy forever with the guy. Because that's God's plan for your life. You (a virgin) get married, and then you guys live 60 years together.
So what does that mean for someone like Ruth? Her first husband died. Now what? What does the story about purity, which we hold up in front of teenage girls as the plan God has for every one of them, have to say about Ruth? There was no part of that myth that said hey sometimes people's husband or wife dies. Sometimes people get divorced. (And this myth also seems to tell gay people they don't exist.)
Do the church have this myth with the unrealistic happy ending because we just really really want teenagers to not have sex, and we'll say anything? Because, dude, no. There are actual GOOD reasons for Christians not to have sex before marriage, and none of them are "because God has DEFINITELY planned for you to meet a perfect guy and be with him for the rest of your life."
God never promised that. God NEVER promised that.
And one more little thing I need to point out: that quote "Ruth patiently waited for her mate Boaz." That is so not in the bible. And I would not describe anything about the story as "waiting." What actually happened was Ruth and her mother-in-law Naomi were both widows and very poor, and Ruth started working in Boaz's field because poor people were allowed to take the extras from people's fields. He was nice to her, and it turns out that there's a law that if a man died, his relative should marry the widow and take care of her. So, Boaz happened to be a relative of her first husband. So Ruth and Naomi not-completely-directly-but-pretty-directly told Boaz he should marry Ruth.
I mean, if by "wait" you mean "she worked hard to take care of herself and her mother-in-law, and when they found an opportunity to get some actual economic stability by getting married, she totally went for it" then I guess it's legit.
I mean, I don't know how much of it was "romance" as we know today and how much of it was a very practical financial need.
Oh, and I'm a bit skeptical about whether Broke-az and Cheatin-az were real people.
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So, what do you think? What good ideas about dating we can LEGITIMATELY get from the story of Ruth? (My personal favorite: it's totally not true that the guy has to make the first move.) What does "waiting" mean? What's up with this myth of "marry 1 guy and live happily ever after" they teach in church? Is there at least some bit of good advice we can get out of it? What is "purity" supposed to be anyway?