Worth repeating

Posted on March 24, 2011 by Eric Francis

The formula embodies the nineteenth century conception of the innocent child unaware of poverty or sex, and parallels the construction of women as innocent and non-sexual. Victorians believed that any sexual activity would cause women grave psychological harm, whether or not they realized it, since women would never initiate, consent to, or desire sex – especially outside marriage. They could only be seduced. It was also denied that women could enjoy sex even when they said that they did. Subsequently masturbation was seen as producing various terrible (and contradictory) symptoms. Later it was thought that homosexuals had to be guarded against. In all of these campaigns there was a plethora of books and articles by various experts on the harmful effects of the particular sexual practice that was being condemned. As the debates on homosexuality make evident, the views of the different sexual practices reflect ideology and politics, and research is molded to fit the dominant paradigm.

– Prof. Harris Mirkin, Department of Political Science
University of Missouri at Kansas City
Full article is here.

Eric Francis

About Eric Francis

Eric Francis is the founder, editor and publisher of Planet Waves, Inc., an internet publishing company that created the Planet Waves internet sites. Planet Waves Daily Astrology & Adventure publishes four times daily with a focus on astrology, politics, sexuality, relationships and photography.
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4 Responses to Worth repeating

  1. awordedgewise awordedgewise says:
    March 24, 2011 at 8:04 pm

    I thought Mr. Mirkin’s closing statement was worth repeating here too:

    “Marshal McLuhan wrote that we adapt to new technologies by first framing them in categories that were created for the old technologies – that we drive forward while looking out of a rear-view mirror.

    This article has argued that we have done that with sex. It has entered politics and become a central issue. But despite the popularity of the phrase “sexual politics” the dominant political concepts still reflect a time when sex and politics existed in separate spheres. Those outdated concepts distort our vision and need to be replaced.”

    Thanks, Eric. Excellent.

  2. Stellium in Sag says:
    March 24, 2011 at 5:02 pm

    damn! OK now I’m definitely putting on my corset and heading Underground, backwards.
    see ya in 3+.

  3. Eric Francis Eric Francis says:
    March 24, 2011 at 4:51 pm

    Wave of Anti-Abortion Bills Advance in the States
    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
    Published: March 23, 2011
    Updated: March 24, 2011 at 3:02 AM ET

    NEW YORK (AP) — Dozens of bills are advancing through statehouses nationwide that would put an array of new obstacles — legal, financial and psychological — in the paths of women seeking abortions.

    The tactics vary: mandatory sonograms and anti-abortion counseling, sweeping limits on insurance coverage, bans on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. To abortion-rights activists, they add up to the biggest political threat since the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973 that legalized abortion nationwide.

    “It’s just this total onslaught,” said Elizabeth Nash, who tracks state legislation for the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive-health research organization that supports abortion rights.

    What’s different this year is not the raw number of anti-abortion bills, but the fact that many of the toughest, most substantive measures have a good chance of passage due to gains by conservative Republicans in last year’s legislative and gubernatorial elections. On Tuesday, South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard signed into law a bill that would impose a longest-in-the-nation waiting period of three days before women could have an abortion — and also require them to undergo counseling at pregnancy help centers that discourage abortions.

  4. Stellium in Sag says:
    March 24, 2011 at 4:23 pm

    !! wow. a lot going on there. I must remember MR is kicking in…off to the Hobbit hole,
    oh, wait! one last scan on the horizon for someone interesting, someone I’m actually attracted to……
    hmmm is that a shadow? a figure? I can’t quite make it out..
    because if it is, and I can,
    I’ll have NO problem seducing them….it would be my pleasure….
    you can take matters into your own hands and THEN you can take matters into your own hands….

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