(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The War Against Sex [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-02-18 I wasn’t going to do this. We’re on vacation on the far side of the world, and I should be focusing on that. But . . . I happened to see a Guardian story in Political Wire yesterday, and it wouldn’t let me go. So, here goes: We’re in the middle of a war on sex. It’s all part of a piece with the war on women, the war on LGBTQ, even the war against non-Whites (who might, you know, marry your sister or maybe just knock her up). But it goes deeper than that. It always has, but now it’s been made explicit: Republicans take aim at risque jokes and romance novels with anti-sex bills A wave of proposed legislation pushed by Republicans across the US at the state level is aimed at outlawing aspects of sexuality that could have a huge impact on Americans’ private lives and businesses. . . . The bills are part of a post-Roe nationwide strategy by the religious wing of the Republican party, now that federal abortion rights have fallen. They range from banning all businesses that sell sex-related goods to anti-drag queen bills. Tyler Dees, an Arkansas state senator who wrote an anti-porn bill said: “I would love to outlaw it all,” referring to porn. According to a professor of media studies at DePaul University, “These laws are really not about controlling minors’ access to violent pornography … In the conservative world view, pornography is information about LGBTQ identity, abortion, gay marriage,” said Bronstein. Pornography comes from the Greek word porneia, which as Paul used it in his epistles, essentially meant any sex outside of marriage. So, if anything, Bronstetin is understating the case; what these laws aim to do is prevent any sex outside of (religiously-sanctioned) marriage, and prevent their children from learning anything about sex, much less doing anything about it, until the priest or minister says “you may now kiss the bride.” [Associate professor of history at Rutgers University Whitney] Strub said this is an old trope: “The political figure of the innocent and imperiled child just has a never-ending purchase on American politics … [it] essentially shuts down debate because it immediately creates a binary in which anybody who disagrees with you is [a] perverted groomer.” There’s a lot of reasons behind all this, but since my current area of study is religious history, I want to (briefly!) go into the religious reason, specifically Christian religion. Early Christianity dismissed the need for sex because the end of the world was at hand (and there will be no sex after that). When the world didn’t end, Church leaders had to get people to produce the next generation, but by now they were constrained by the word of God (as relayed in the New Testament) that discouraged sex — and fun in general; Christianity has always had an ascetic strain to it. To this day, the Catholic church places a premium on lifetime virginity, and while Luther rejected that position, Protestants have still retain enough of the initial Christian uneasiness about sex that many of them still insist it be somehow tied to procreation. The idea of sex for no other reason than the sheer joy of it runs counter to the asceticism that still pollutes Christianity. (Side note: The Song of Songs is explicitly sexual, almost pornographically so. It openly celebrates sex for pleasure’s sake — and the two lovers aren’t married. Somehow it got into the Bible, so neither Jewish nor Christian authorities could take it out, but some of the ways they tried to deny that it says what it really says are absolutely hysterical.) The religious war on sex stems partly from ancient patriarchy that some men want to restore, partly from genuine discomfort over discussing sex with one’s children, partly over concerns that admitting there are more legitimate ways of having sex than the Bible countenances will attack the authenticity of the Bible (this one is a valid fear, and for good reason), and partly because power over other people’s sex lives is their ultimate goal. Let me explain that with a closing quote, this one from my recent book, the concluding paragraph to the chapter on sex: The challenge of our time is to prevent a return to the sexually repressive years of the mid-twentieth century, let alone those of centuries before. That includes crafting rules for sexual activity that are realistic and that can be sustained in practice. The greater challenge is whether we will continue to be a pluralistic society where everyone has a voice but where reason decides the issue on the basis of reality. Or will we revert to a society controlled by some branch of some religion whose rules cannot be questioned, no matter how antiquated, repressive, and unrealistic they are. The ongoing battles over sexual identity, sexual activity, and sexual equality are central to this challenge. Yes, human sexuality must obey limits, but they must be reasonable ones that do not promote any one particular religious revelation. Sex is so basic to our conception of ourselves that control over someone’s sex life leads to control over the whole person. Our very liberty requires the secularization of sex. (There’s more I could say, but dammit, I’m on vacation! I will try to respond at least once or twice a day.) And a PS: Yesterday, on our last day in Auckland, we watched a Gay Pride parade a block from our hotel. There were rainbow flags all over the city. Also a block from our hotel is a store called “HelloLover” which had sex toys in the window. Cover your children’s eyes! [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/2/18/2153785/-The-War-Against-Sex Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/