Date: Wed, 1 Apr 1998 23:54:34 +0200
From: Hugh Rodwell <m-14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se>
Subject: M-TH: Re: Sex education


I wrote:

>>The general point of disagreement is that I would swap points one and two
>>and reformulate them, thus:
>>
>>1) Sex exists because of the evolutionary fact of procreation. It's an
>>instinct we can do nothing about. It's a biological necessity we have to
>>accept. Children come regardless of our conscious wishes in the matter.
>>Human beings are sexual animals.

and Yoshie replied:

>Your first point is conducive to anti-abortion sentiments + arguments +
>ideology. Why encourage them? As long as sex and reproduction are coupled,
>there are always folks who want to reduce women to our alleged 'nature,'
>'biology,' 'necessity,' even 'social necessity,' etc.

We are in total and utter disagreement here. You might as well try and blow
against the wind. The anti-abortionists are utterly peripheral to the
principals I use to decide my positions on this kind of thing. I don't give
a toss if they distort and twist what I say into support for their line.
Anyway, judging from reactions from religiously warped young minds (Muslim,
but Christians too) at school, no anti-abortionist will even give the time
of day to anyone who says people are sexual animals.

Sex and reproduction are coupled for the species. Learn to live with it. As
an individual you are in a position to decouple yourself from this. Have
your womb chopped out if it makes you feel better, and agitate for all
women to do so in order to maximize human sexual pleasure. Or be radical
and agitate for compulsory sterilization of all men. I don't think you'd
get much support in the revolutionary movement from revolutionary women for
this, but that's for them to say, not me. Not even if you compromized by
establishing the mother of all sperm banks first, along with the father of
all womb farms.

>Besides, how do you educate an "instinct"?

You don't. You educate people in how to handle an instinct, how to
recognize it, how to ride with the tide. An instinct makes you do something
regardless of your conscious will. Education can make you do it more
consciously, more pleasurably, more safely, more elegantly and so on.


>>2) That said,  sex works best for individuals and society when it is
>>practised for mutual + consensual pleasure, and our society permits this
>>more than any previous society because the advances of science and
>>production have liberated much of sex from the drudgery of compulsory and
>>never-ending reproduction. A good society would increase the knowledge and
>>control of our bodies and reproduction to include everybody so that poverty
>>and social disadvantage wouldn't condemn some people to bad sex
>>(prostitution, std's, battering, unsafe childbirth, etc) while other more
>>privileged people  could enjoy sex.
>
>So, much of sex is liberated, but not all sex, I see.

Exactly. It's very important that I'm talking about a democratic right here
(in "our society" ie imperialism), which is not at odds with the principles
of bourgeois society. That's why I said "liberated much of sex from the
drudgery of compulsory and never-ending reproduction", because there are
huge areas in the imperialist world where sex as compulsion and
reproductive drudgery still exist, and there are big pockets of this in the
imperialist heartlands. Yoshie's reply indicates she misunderstands me (not
for the first time) and thinks I'm talking about a good or even a socialist
society. I don't get this far even after the sentence beginning "a good
society", because this programme as I see it is a democratic one that could
be applied today in capitalist societies (and in fact there's very little
in it that would make ripples in Swedish schools or faze Swedish teachers,
at least when they're pretending to be enlightened and working for the good
of the kids).


Hopefully after very few years of proto-socialism, if a strong Dictatorship
of the Proletariat was set up, no reproduction would feel compulsory and no
individual woman would feel she was being used as a baby-machine, despite
the compulsion for humanity to reproduce itself. My view is that voluntary
reproduction (women and men like having kids) will suffice for the
reproductive needs of humanity.


>So under the
>communism you envision, women are forever subjected to compulsory sex
>because it's socially necessary.

As I said above, I don't see this programme as a communist or even a
socialist one, but as a democratic starting point. I was not talking about
communism. This reply distorts my views completely. Again as I said above,
in an even only partially developed proto-socialist society, the socially
necessary aspects of human reproduction will very likely be looked after by
voluntary procreative sex, with no compulsion either on the part of
individuals or public agencies.


>The alleged 'social necessity' dictates
>that women accept that 'life is not fair' and that there are limits to our
>sexual agency, autonomy, self-determined reproductive control, for 'the
>good of society.'

What Yoshie says goes for capitalist society and deformed workers' states
to varying extents. Only the social necessity isn't alleged, it's real, as
it is rooted in the human need for reproduction. Under protosocialism,
"social necessity" shouldn't dictate anything of the sort.

>Boys generally masturbate even now; why do they become frustrated and
>self-hating? They shouldn't be according to your logic.

Christ I thought you were the one who wanted quality in sex! Anyway, just
check out Gary D's stupid remarks on masturbation and you'll see what's
needed and why.
Problems include warped and erroneous fantasies about women and girls,
hatred of women for not relieving them of this humiliation by fucking them
instead, fear of women because of constant rejection throughout adolescence
(not getting it equals being rejected), and the list goes on.


>>One of the topics that comes up is whether anal intercourse is dangerous
>>(14-year-old Nigerian girl asked this, not during the sex weeks as it
>>happened, and she was voicing a general concern). The midwife told me later
>>that there's a good reason for the question. The Clintonesque morality of
>>our kids and their social setting only counts penile-vaginal penetration as
>>"having sex" as in "having sex before marriage" as in losing your
>>virginity. So anal intercourse is a handy way of having your cake and
>>eating it, so to speak. "Timin' the hymen".
>
>Ah, this is an awful result of limited views on sex engendered by sexism
>(saving the hymen for that special someone) and heterosexism (only
>penile-vaginal penetration is the 'real thing'). Both distort our thinking
>as to what counts as  'real sex' and when/with whom to have it.

Yup. Imagine the difference it makes being able to talk about it publicly
in front of class-mates and with adults. Imagine the difference for adults
being able to discuss this kind of thing over lunch.

>So what did the midwife and other educators tell them about anal sex?

The usual. Danger of tearing and bleeding if it's violent or inconsiderate,
problems of anxiety might cause tension, need for generous lubrication and
gentle treatment to make it go smoothly, pretty normal behaviour among
pretty normal adults, what happens to sperm in the rectum or in a condom,
so they don't get worried about accidental pregnancies, need for a bit of
caution so anal bacteria don't start making their home in the wrong hole --
oh and that it's the work of the Devil, of course ;-), along with some
lurid descriptions of what they did to witches and sodomites in the good
old days. There's usually some discussion on the whys and wherefores of
"timin' the hymen", too, anything to sow a little seed of independent
inquiry and possible liberation.


>P.S. It does look like you read all my posts!

Yes, fancy that!

Cheers,

Hugh




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