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1. Anthony Kennerson
   May 7th, 2006| 4:19 pm

   You’ll have to excuse me for not responding as quickly, Ms. B…I’m too busy taking in Amanda’s smart bomb (no pun here) of a response:

   The truth of the matter is that conservatives don’t oppose fucking in and of itself. They just think a pleasure that delicious doesn’t belong in the hands of people who don’t make enough money or have the right connections. Ann Coulter excuses herself from her little tirades about slutty women because she’s rich and rich people are expected to be sleazy, having “earned” the right to that pleasure. (One thing rich right wingers do sincerely believe, in my opinion, is that they really are better and more deserving than the rest of us.)

   Right down the line, you can tell who’s considered righteous in the eyes of Wingnutteria by who is permitted sexual pleasure. That’s why, in every class, women’s sexual pleasure is more suspect than men’s, because in every class, the women are beneath the men. That’s why the Log Cabin Republicans are mostly white men, because they’re banking on the idea that those privileges override the official anti-gay stance of conservatives. It’s why rich men like Bob Dole are giggled at when they get Viagra to cure a problem that is a common side effect of aging but healthy young but low income women, married or not, are told firmly that if they aren’t willing to make new soliders for the Fatherland, they shouldn’t be allowed to experience sexual pleasure. At all.

   The recent dust-up over the rumored hooker-infested parties at the Watergate is just another gross example of how the conservative movement is most definitely not anti-sex, they just want to reserve it for the powerful. And they want it to be about power and privilege but certainly not about affirming life or love or anything dippy like that.

   Of course, the leadership can’t be upfront about their views on sex being a pleasure too good for the rest of us, so that’s where the church steps in. The church’s part in this is to take the basic principles at stake–that ordinary people shouldn’t have pleasure, that sex should be treated as an affirmation of social dominance, and that women have a duty to crank out soliders for the Fatherland–and give it some semi-logical spiritual gloss to sell it to people so they take on a worldview that is adamantly opposed to their own interests on for themselves. This NY Times article does an awesome job at explaining all the various weird justifications that the anti-contraception forces come up with for why people shouldn’t have pleasure and should have more children than they can handle.

   Selling the idea that you personally don’t deserve pleasure, you peon, is done by the church’s tacit acceptance of Natural Family Planning. NFP gives lie to the idea that the church is completely anti-contraception. NFP, after all, is a form of contraception. Proponents of NFP say they like that it’s “natural”, which implies all other forms of contraception involve hormones or changing your body in some way, which isn’t true at all of barrier methods. Where NFP is different than other forms of contraception, and why it’s the only acceptable method for the anti-choicers is that it’s the only one that demands that you sacrifice spontaneity and pleasure, because you can only have sex at appointed times. NFP is acceptable to anti-choicers because it’s anti-love and demands that lovers refrain from sexual pleasure and bonding, at least some of the time. It drives home the message that your body isn’t yours to share and enjoy as you see fit.

   Which is funny because the official line of the anti-choice Catholics and now Protestants who are enamored of this anti-joy approach to sex is that their approach to sex is somehow more loving than those who use more reliable contraception.

   [...]

   Pandagon: The War On Peons Fucking

   Reading righteous prose like that makes me feel really, really bad about downing her in a previous post at the SmackChron. All is now forgiven, I hope; Amanda just earned herself back into my Wall of Fame.

   And her essay cracking today’s WaPo Style column feature on men supposedly threatened with performance anxiety and “impotence” by “raunchy women” is a instant classic as well:

   Pandagon: Mouthy Broads Destroy The Holy Phallus…Or Do They?

   Ain’t smart and sexy women grand??

   Anthony

2. Freeman
   May 8th, 2006| 4:20 am

   Ah, sex. The all-purpose boogeyman. The reason I love it so much is the reason so many fear it: No matter who we are–or think we are–no matter what our station in life, no matter what our accomplishments; deep inside the posturing and posing, we’re all just a bunch of sweaty, freaky animals looking to do the ol’ bump and grind. Kind of smashes one’s perception of human beings as being a truly superior form of life.

   Every time I look at someone ranting about sexual immorality, I wonder how their pulses would measure on an EKG. I wonder if they’re not maybe straining at a bulge in their pants, or privately soaking their panties. I wonder about these things, and grin, knowing that I’m just looking at yet another sexual timebomb, waiting to go off.

3. bitchlab
   May 8th, 2006| 7:06 am

   @ freeman

   isn’t that, in part, why some of these people want to confine it to marriage? sex that is? if we act like animals, then we’re just animals. but we have to power to attach deeper meanings to sex andto control our instincts. that’s there superficial view anyway.

   dunno. i guess i’m not fond of arguments that try to tear down the opponent simply by claiming they’re hypocrits. it’s using logical fallacy and i think there’s more to it.

   also, if you’re familiar with evangelicals, if you tell them they’re hypocritis, they aren’t terribly offended. they’ll just shrug and say, “yeah.”

4. Freeman
   May 8th, 2006| 7:40 am

   *Shrug*

   If I were attempting to argue with such types, I’d agree. But I’m not. In their case, I’m just watching the freak show.

   Evangelicals don’t interest me. Most have long since abandoned human virtues of reason and compassion, and so I don’t waste the time trying to hold discourse with them.

   I prefer to worry about the rational minds they’re still trying to reach.

5. bitchlab
   May 8th, 2006| 8:53 am

   Right, but using fallacious argument to reach rational minds …? If I’m rational, I won’t be persuaded by logical fallacies about the supposed hypocrisy of the people I’m criticizing. It doesn’t make any sense and it makes me, the person using logical fallacy, look like an idiot because I couldn’t argue my way out of a paper bag if all I have is the charge of hypocrisy.

6. Sage
   May 11th, 2006| 9:59 pm

   About containing sex within marriage to mark us as superior to the other animals: What *really* makes us different than most other animals is that women don’t need to be “in heat” or ovulating in order to have sex. We’re one of very few species in which the males have no idea when the females are ovulating. (Thankfully, I’d hate to have a bunch of guys peeing around my house every month hoping to get some.)

   Acting like an animal, means only having sex during ovulation like some righteous groups would like us to do. Animals only have sex in order to procreate.

   So, it follows then that not acting like an animal could mean elevating sex to a higher plane, but it could also mean having sex even when we’re unable to conceive. Humans have the unique ability to have sex without procreating. So shouldn’t we honour this difference by continuing to have “unproductive” sex?

   Obviously I’m being a bit facetious here, but not entirely. The church/sex discussions always make me think of Riane Eisler’s “Sacred Pleasures” in which she takes apart christianity’s hatred of bodily pleasure brick by brick. An excellent read if you have a few months of free time.

   About the article: I can see why contraception might be connected to promiscuity, how it promotes an unhealthy obsession within marriage is beyond me.

7. Creative Destruction » Link Farm & Open Thread #24
   May 15th, 2006| 8:02 pm

   [...] Bitch | Lab: The War on Contraception [...]

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   Creative Destruction » Link Farm & Open Thread #24

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