An Attempt At Distinguishing Sexual vs. Sexualized
Photo by Flickr user morganthemoth. Used under a Creative Commons license.
So today in class during a professor-led discussion of the concept of "sex-negative" culture one of my fellow students said that, fairly or unfairly, feminism is seen as sex negative to a lot of people.
Our professor (the sex-ed professor, not the women's studies one) immediately said that if that's the impression it's an unfortunate one. And, I might add, that if our women's studies professor *had* been there she would have quickly cited one of several studies showing that not only do feminists have better sex than non-feminists, their *partners do as well.*
Now that said the misapprehension isn't exactly, 100%, completely false... in the sense that there's a misapprehension, not that feminism is sex-negative anyway.
If I'm not mistaken (and I really could be since I'm a man and since this is my first quarter of anything like formal women's studies) the issue isn't feminism but the misapprehension that "sexy" and "sexualized" are the same thing. And again if I'm not mistaken, very, very few feminists have a problem with sexy, as in the deliberate attempt to appear attractive through behavior or appearance in order to arouse one's self and one's current or prospective partner or partners, whether one ultimately has sex or not. But again if I'm not mistaken most feminists have a problem with the applique of those behaviors or appearances to individuals and situations where sex is neither intended nor welcome.
Think pre- and post-virginity Britney Spears. And I don't mean the singer herself, I mean public reaction to her appearance and behavior before and after it became known that she *actually was* a sexual being rather than an unconscious, untouched no-sex-class naif... who wore her jeans so low she evidently needed to wax her mons and had waxy, pseudo-innocent "Oops I did it again." Again, we can't be certain of Spear's inner life during her performing heyday but we *can* be certain about the public's sexualization of her... or, indeed, the *ongoing* sexualization wherein the once-innocently "provocative" virgin pays for her fall into mere has-a-vagina-after-all womanhood. (And note that said sexualized fall is playing out with all the intensity and perfection and... again on the public's part... deliberation as was her sexualized rise.)
Another possible point of departure? Yeah, while some separatists and, especially 2nd-wave feminists object to blowjobs, but not cunnilingus, on principle, a lot of feminists think they're fine when considered as one element in a rich, reciprocal, and mutually satisfactory collection of sexual activities two or more people can agree to engage in. That's just being sexual. But if, on the other hand, health clubs were to come along and start offering blowjob-ercise classes, and making claims that it wasn't actually about blowjobs at all-and-how-can-you-even-suggest-such-at-thing™ but instead was about the yoga-like qualities of kneeling and breath control, and that such classes were somehow (somehow!) open only to women? Well, this time I'm speaking only for myself but... that's sexualizing something that, in the hands of someone like, say, Jennifer of Libido Events would remain possibly eyebrow-raising to some but would nevertheless remain only sexual.
Know what I mean? You want to have sex with someone who wants to have sex with you, have sex. You want to be sexual with yourself or with others, *be sexual!* If you don't want to, that's fine too, and if someone you're with doesn't want to then respect that. That, not even coincidentally, happens to be the position both of "sex-positive" culture *and* virtually all feminism**. Trying instead to, oh, say, sell elementary-school-girl-sized thongs with "little hottie" in sequins on the front and then make a big production about how your corporation helps fund to sex abuse prevention programs as at least one of the major "family" department stores found in nearly all major malls? Sorry, if you found feminists complaining about such antics it's not *feminists* who were being sex negative there. Instead it would merely being feminists pointing out how egregiously sex-negative both the sexualization of both pre-teen fashion *and* child-abuse prevention really is.
So, one more time, this time with a clumsy table.
| Sexual (Sex-positive or Sex-Neutral) | Sexualized (Sex-Negative) |
|---|---|
| Britney Spear's private life | Public's opinion of Britney Spear's private life, especially as presented and discussed by media outlets with or without collaboration of Spears and/or her associates. |
| Blowjob classes | Nominally asexual "Blowjob-ercise" Classes |
| Undies that say "hottie" purchased by a sexually mature, self-aware adult | The same undies sold by a major corporation in pre-teen departments |
Again, I'm not speaking as a spokesman for... well... anybody but me although I *am* trying to convey something I've been learning in class. (And if I'm outright flunking the self-imposed exercise, which I'm pretty sure I'm not but you never know, *and you're at all inclined to participate* then pointers, however harshly administered, will be appreciated.)
But anyway, this is all by way of attempting to explain the frequently-but-incorrectly stated assertion that feminism is somehow "sex negative" when it seems more accurate to say feminism *opposes* sex-negativity, especially in terms of the special case of sex-negative denial called sexualization.
[** Note: And, seriously, it's not like even nominally "sex-negative" feminists don't want sex *at all,* right? Not wanting empty-headed, exploitative, heterosexual-even-if-you're-not-heterosexual sex isn't the same thing as not wanting sex *at all,* right? That's just not wanting to have sex with someone who isn't *authentically* sex positive. So, as Heather Corinna's famous for saying, when it comes to specific individuals "sex-negative" is sort of a red herring. --fl]
yes, great points made. It seems that feminists are a great scapegoat for a lot of things. It's really quite frustrating.
[And it really *is* frustrating... sort of like people grousing about the fire fighters instead of the arsonists. Thanks, M. --fl]
I'm not sure what Heather Corinna's "When it comes to certain individuals, sex negative is a red herring" means. It is an interesting idea and I will need to think about it. I have been having similar thoughts about the difference between erotica, which I like, and sleazy truck stop pornography and why I hate Hugh Hefner so much. I can't stand those Playboy catalog ads that pop up sometimes when I am trying to read Feministing (I think that Feministing probably has no control over which ads are there, but it bugs me anyway). The thing is that in the Playboy world, women are the sex servant class and I think that in this fantasy, women feel sexy when they are serving drinks in bunny outfits, and in the Playboy world, only women who are tall and thin with breast implants are attractive, and the rest of the women are either nonexistent or undesirable, or, or, there is so much more to say and I am late for preschool.
[I'm going to say that if you're getting Playboy ads off of Feministing that your computer might have a "spyware" program that's hijacking their ad space and substituting someone else's. Because I'm pretty sure they don't accept ads for Playboy directly. But yes! You not liking truckstop porn doesn't mean you don't like sex, right? Now if the porn you're talking about is the kind of scarcity-model stuff men, especially, are reared in, then you're not even the one being sex-negative for not liking it, *they* are! Thanks, Mag. --fl]
Figleaf, Sugar Mag and I figured this out one day in a conversation at her blog. Feministing.com gets banner ads from some third-party ad provider (not sure of the lingo for it). So one day it's Circuit City, the next it may be Playboy. And Playboy has definitely appeared there with some regularity - maybe because some sort of bot picks up on the sex references in the blog and makes stupid bot assumptions? Anyway, it sure is jarring.
Nice ReCaptcha: musicals woman
[It must be something sort of new then. I never noticed it when I read their site directly, but since I now read most sites from an RSS reader I guess I just miss most of the ads. Thanks for the head's up, Sungold. --fl]
Y'know, I think that's when I liked Britney Spears best (which isn't saying a lot, but, hey): that brief period when she was honestly a sexual being instead of a sexualized nonsexual being, but hadn't yet descended into Teh Crazy.
The misconstruction of feminism as sex-negative seems to be a conflation of several only-somewhat-connected strands, none of which are outright sex-negative. Heterosex-negative might fit some of it, and/or sex-alienated. There's been controversy about what sort of "trying to appear attractive" was a legitimate expression of sexuality and what was sex-negative or inappropriately sexualized. There was (and still is) the "porn wars" fracture, which was sort of the same "legitimate or inappropriate" conflict, squared and cubed. There are, and have been, individual feminists who, even on close scrutiny of their stances, appear to be, if not actually sex-negative, at least deeply distrustful of the stuff.
But, yes, feminism in almost any of its manifestations is far more anti-sex-negativity than it is sex-negative.
(I didn't pull that out of some vast knowledge of history of feminism; I've been boning up.)
This may be an appropriate comment in which to mention that I've begun what I threatened to do in a comment a while back, started flapping my own gums (or fingers) on feminism and sex. My comment-name link goes to my LJ, if anyone cares to look, but don't expect anything even close to Figleafian prolificity.
Sunflower
[Agreed on all points, Sunflower. We always *will* find individuals who just *aren't into* sex, of course, or not clear to themselves which sex they're into, or who've been so driven by other externalities (oh, say, assaultive, coercive, or simply obligated sex) that their associations overwhelm their ability to express themselves. But then one of the critical hallmarks of real sex-positivity (if such there could really be) would be complete and 100% tolerance of people's right to *opt out.* Which, by the way (ask almost any asexual), isn't as well tolerated as one might imagine from lip-service paid to abstinence. But I think rather than try and track down, say, abuse survivors who rage against the existence of all reminders of the form their abuse took, it's just more productive... not to mention more humane and respectful, and, especially, not to mention *more productive* ... to try to identify and address broader patterns of negativity first. Thanks! --fl]
Figleaf, I love it when you make little charts. I know this makes me sound like a hopeless nerd, but it's somehow endearing and sexy (as well as often thought-provoking).
The main problem with being sexualized, in my view, is that it's all about someone else's pleasure. Sexualization makes a person into an object, and only an object, of someone else's desire. It drains that person of sexual agency. And so it's actually part of reinforcing the "no-sex class" idea.
Another problem with sexualization is it's often so cliché that I can't find it very sexy. That's why I'm not so sure the "hottie" underwear example works for me as something sexual; its cheesy predictability sort of bumps it into the other column. I'd much rather remove the way too obvious "hottie" label and just wear something (or nothing?) that my partner and I both think makes me look sexy.
[I actually had trouble making the parallels fit on a couple of those (and scratched out quite a few more that didn't work at all.) Still and all, if an adult and her partner authentically respond to sequined undies more power to them. Literally. As opposed to a lot of other stuff that goes down that takes power *away!* Thanks, Sungold. --fl]