Twisty of I Blame The Patriarchy gets the concept 100% right but gets the terminology 100% backwards. Talking about the desperately no-win situation young women find themselves in when they send naked pictures of themselves to young men
A woman’s social status is inexorably tied to the manner in which her sex is used by men. It’s impossible for her to express sexuality precisely right, because the sex class is not sovereign over itself. It’s subject to dudely whim. The expression of a woman’s sexuality is purely a matter of dudely interpretation.
That’s actually a pretty succinct way of defining women not as the sex class but as the no-sex class, a class of individuals defined as having sexual interest or desire of their own, and therefore available for the projection (sexualization) or predation (transactional or coercive extraction) of a facility they themselves do not have (or better not have) any use for themselves.
The no-win part being, as Twisty points out, that when her boyfriend (who, as a member of the real sex class is expected and required to be perpetually in lust and to be emotionally and psychologically unaffected by having it) forwards said photo to his classmates the girl is expected to either kill herself, in which case she’s dead, or not to kill herself, in which case she’s a slut. The boyfriend of the girl who dies is expected and required to be unaffected by the outcome of his action because a) he’s just a life support system for a dick anyway and b) what do you expect: boys will be boys.
In fact the third option might be that a sexually assertive girl sends photos, the immature, unprepared boy is developmentally unequipped to handle it and so he behaves as childishly as possible, diverting a sexual overture he’s actually not prepared to handle into a bonding experience with his equally immature peers. The girl, who may be further into sexual development but not immune to the peer pressure adolescents exert on each other, acts not out of sexual shame, which she might not feel, but instead of the plain old extraordinary alienation and pain adolescents of any gender feel when they’re singled out, bullied, and betrayed by those they believe to be peer supporters.
The latter narrative won’t fly, of course, not because it’s more sympathetic to boys (it’s not, particularly, despite my passionate belief that boys are too-often sexualized before their ready) but because it’s sympathetic to girls (who are condemned if they express autonomous sexual agency and damned to become chattel or prey if they don’t.)
The only reason I can think that Twisty would persist in incorrectly calling women the “sex class” would be that a) that’s how some really, really old dead people first labeled women and b) because she’d have to confront the fact that by insisting that women withhold sex from men — even those who want1 to have sex with men, either eternally or at least until men agree to the terms of this leverage-for-sex strike — she’s perpetuating rather than subverting the dominant no-sex class paradigm.
One consequence of her incorrect use of terminology is that she sees patriarchy as inescapable — which in turn is a consequence of her endorsing a stance for women that both aids and comforts the patriarchy.
Except for that one quibble, and its consequence, I agree with her about most stuff.
_[1 Not that every woman wants to have sex. Another consequence of the stupid no-sex class paradigm is that society is unable to distinguish between members of the no-sex class it doesn’t want having sex, and members who themselves don’t want to have sex… either at the moment or ever… with men… or with anybody all. The no-sex class construction makes it easier to discern the difference. —fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Fri, 2009-05-22 22:25.
The no-sex class construction makes it easier to discern the difference.
I find it makes it harder. The more you write about it the more it just seems like meaningless gibberish. (yeah, I know, I said I was going to go away because you keep talking about it, but when you're NOT writing about it you write interesting stuff).
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Fri, 2009-05-22 22:38.
More on the topic of the actual post though...
I've sent naked and, uh, more than naked pictures to more than one ex. And I've had them send similar pictures to me. And I have another couple of friends who I got together with for the express purpose of taking sexy pictures of each other together. And the thing is, I trust ALL OF THEM not to spread these pictures around to people I wouldn't want seeing them. Even the one ex who I think is kindof a dickhead for the way he broke up with me and who I am not really on speaking terms with.
I guess the difference is, all of this happened post-high-school.
[I agree so much that being an adult makes an incredible difference. Not least because sexual, emotional, and intellectual development don't proceed apace in adolescence. It's not that being adult is *better,* or that we're all sage and rational. Just that by adulthood those developmental dimensions have had time to get into sync. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Fri, 2009-05-22 23:08.
Wait... wait... I think I figured something out! I went and read Twisty's whole post and suddenly something clicked! Feminism already HAS language for this "no sex class" concept you're always carrying on about. It's the classic "woman as object man as subject" discussion. And yet you felt the need to wander in and invent your own brand new terminology to muddy things up. As someone who has spent some non-trivial amount of time studying gender and feminism, I find that rather presumptuous of you. Twisty strikes me as someone I REALLY shouldn't try to read. I'm not into blaming the patriarchy. But her LANGUAGE doesn't grate on my nerves. Yours does. But here you are posting trying to say she's the wrong one.
[Eh. I've never said there wasn't already a different language for it -- in fact I used to say (to the point where I think you groused at me for saying it too often) that I specifically derived the term from the language of feminism *as an extension* and not a refutation of it. And, more to the point, I was really, really clear that I chose that term because it more accurately compassed *men's* ideology about women. More importantly, though, I also said, possibly ad nausium, that I wouldn't expect it to resonate as much for women because whereas men can decieve themselves into believing women are tabula rasa when it comes to sexuality women's experience cries bullshit to the moon. And so it makes total sense that you'd find it totally annoying. But what you find annoying I'm rather hoping men find transformational. Calling women "the sex class" leaves men unphased because we can just say "well yeah, we want to have sex with women. But they never want to unless we bribe them or force them or otherwise oblige them. So sure, they're the subjugated sex class. We, meanwhile, are just 'standard' and not therefore our interests aren't subject to deconstructtion or interrogation." Telling men that, instead, we project women as a class of people we wish to have sex with when they don't want to, but forbid to be sexual when *they* want to... and furthermore project men as not just "more" interested in sex but *obliged* to measure themselves in terms of wanting/having/seeking it, is more engaging since it gets to *why* we think men "want sex" and women "aren't interested." Anyway, sorry if it bugs you, and I know it does. But... if it doesn't resonate count yourself lucky -- you live in a great subculture (and there are quite a few) but not everybody does... yet. And finally, yes, I think Twisty uses the language even more incorrectly than I do. See Sungold's explanation. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 02:22.
To me, Twisty's text didn't seem to mention what the female thought at all, whether or not she was expressing any sexual desire - I was under the impression she was just making a narrative of what happens, seen from the outside, in the conditions we live in now, if a girl sends out naked pics of herself.
[Agreed! The text mentions neither what the female thought or the male, which made it an exercise in narrative buffing. (Not that *I* ever do that... oh wait!) But part of why I spent a little time proposing a counternarrative was to try and point in a direction that might lead us *out* of the situation instead of just sitting on a porch somewhere saying "yup, just intrinsically suck." It's not that we don't suck, we just don't *intrinsically* suck... which means we can *do* something about it besides carp. Thanks, F. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 04:22.
Figleaf is putting a lot of the ideas into language that actually makes sense when seen from a male perspective.
I don't think the "woman as object/man as subject" debate actually does that, and I don't think it covers all the things that the "no-sex class" formulation does.
One thing that the no-sex class formulation helps to elucidate is the way in which gender-class oppression and economic-class oppression are supportive of each other, because it brings out most clearly the concept of artificial sex-scarcity, which creates at once a gender-oppression and a class-oppression dimension. It is this artificial sex-scarcity that creates this situation:
The "woman as object" formulation also fails to bring out the logic of the "gatekeeper" role that women are supposed to play, and it makes it less intuitive to explore the ways in which, in the gatekeeper role, women are still expected to follow the rules set up by men.
One last comment: the no-sex class formulation is not about explaining women's experiences back to women (or it shouldn't be) but it is about explaining how inter-gender interactions look from this side of the divide, and how the way they seem to be described by some feminists at least seem totally off-beam when applied to men's experiences of gender.
["...is not about explaining women's experiences back to women..." Bingo! The main point is to choose language that explains men's experience back to men. Which is material because men are the authors of the dominant paradigm feminism is trying to subvert. And men are indoctrinated, and we indoctrinate ourselves, to perceive and project women in ways that don't appear to reflect women's perceptions of themselves at all. Calling that "the sex class," as classic feminist texts do, resonates like wet cardboard to men. And, since men are *largely responsible* for the oppression, objectification, and subjugation of women, picking language that pricks our bubbles seems like a worthwhile enterprise. Also, shifting the designation of "the sex class" to men not only makes more sense to men, it better fits the not insignificant observation that men don't reserve our sexual outlets, or our sexual objectifications, to women. At all! A point that eludes those who imagine, that as a Marxist-theory "sex class," women could band together and strike against men because we'd have nowhere to turn and be forced to concede. And finally, as you say so well, SnowdropExplodes, referring to the class condition imposed by men on women as the *no* sex class illuminates, to men anyway, the otherwise incomprehensible underpinnings for the whole, persistent charade: using women as an artificially scarce medium of socioeconomic exchange... which works best when women's actual say in the matter, their interests, their agency, their desires, are denied, condemned, overridden, and explained away. Which overriding occurs at extraordinary cost to women... without accruing any real benefit for men. So yes. As I said almost at the start, I'm consciously inverting the terminology because it makes more sense to those of us who have been responsible for the flipping mess. Thanks for putting it so nicely, SE. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 08:13.
I think the solution to the problem is to encourage teenagers to trade pics rather than just have the girl send hers to the boy. If she's also got his wang on her phone, it's mutually assured destruction. (It's also a step closer to the saturation point at which freakin' everyone has skanky photos on the Internet, so "I hear she posed for naked pics" is about as scandalous as "I hear she has sex with her husband.")
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 11:05.
The problem with that, Holly, is that it's *not* mutually assured destruction unless it's socially just as humiliating/skanky/morally questionable for *boys* to take naked pictures as it is for girls. The double standard is flourishing, I can guarantee that.
Your point about naked-picture saturation is well taken, though.
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 11:34.
Regarding those pictures: Isn't the biggest issue here not dudeliness (as Twisty might have it) or even bullying (abhorrent as that it)? Isn't the core problem one of consent? I see the unauthorized distribution of naked pictures, given to a person in confidence, as a violation of consent, which puts it somewhere on the continuum of sexual assault.
Regarding the no-sex class: I agree with SnowdropExplodes that thinking in terms of a "class" is very useful. In addition to what he said - seeing women as a class helps avoid the trap of seeing each instance of objectification in individualized terms.
But. It's not accurate to conflate Twisty's use of "sex class" with the meanings that early radical feminists intended. If you trace it back to Shulamith Firestone, it's quite clear that she's not talking about "sex as in fucking" (Twisty's usage). She uses "sex" to mean the basic biological division of humanity into two categories, men and women, which she regards as prior to class divisions. (This difference in usage also points to a fundamental rift in feminism - between the actual radical feminists of the early 1970s, and people like Twisty who can be more accurately called cultural feminists.)
Here are the opening lines of The Dialectic of Sex:
"Sex class is so deep as to be invisible. Or it may appear as a superficial inequality, one that can be solved by merely a few reforms, or perhaps by the full integration of women into the labour force. But the reaction of the common man, woman, and child - 'That? Why you can't change that! You must be out of your mind!' - is the closest to the truth. We are talking about something every bit as deep as that. This gut reaction - the assumption that, even when they don't know it, feminists are talking about changing a fundamental biological condition - is an honest one." (my emphasis)
Firestone was far, far more concerned with reproduction than with fucking. I had lots more to say about this, but it spun out into a couple thousand words and a raft of links that would clog the spam filter here. So my digressions on the misuse of the term "sex class" - and why this results in blaming women and alienating them from feminism - are here.
[Thanks, Sungold. I seriously appreciated your post. And yes, having cheerfully drunk the Firestone cool-aid I agree that neither mine nor Twisty's use of sex class is accurate. (Firestone might have said "sex class*es*" since she saw men and women as each occupying a class.) While I agree that consent in distributing photos is a problem, the difference in *reaction* to such distribution depending on whether they're of men and women (and, even more tellingly, of who's *designated* as shamed when a photo contains both) suggests there's more to it than just consent. And that's because, being assumed-sexual, boys are at worst embarrassed where being assumed-not-sexual girls are at worst destroyed. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 16:50.
You're, right, there's a double standard, namely that boys who take naked pics of themselves are closeted fags who need to be murdered. Until we deal with homophobia, this would not be an effective solution.
(note: While I'm being sarcastic, I'm only half-joking.)
[I agree with your semi-sarcasm around that double standard, Nightfall, and agree that homophobia is a big driving factor in, of all things, misogyny. Thanks! --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 20:47.
And yet, it's not just For Teh Menz.
When I first got pointed to Figleaf's no-sex class writings, I went through them and found them tremendously insightful -- for the primary reason that my experience of sexuality was entirely that anything that I did or desired on my own account, sexually, was Wrong.
The boys of my acquaintance were sexual, were in fact pressured into displaying sexuality, and this was entirely forgivable and expected by local authority figures. "Boys will be boys", after all; one can't expect them to restrain their desire to harass and assault. Other - and more egregious - examples came into my life later, but that much was clear.
But any choice I made about my sexuality was clearly wrong. I had internalised the cultural presumption of asexualisation of women so thoroughly that I spent years blaming myself for being sexually assaulted because I had not been an adequate restraint on the party who was permitted to be sexualised. This isn't a "sex object" problem, this is a failure to serve as a proper nonsexual being who takes all possible actions to preserve corruption by the sexual - a failure to be an iconic madonna.
Twisty buys the whole thing. Large portions of what of her schtick I've come across are all about how sexuality is the worst thing that could happen to a woman. And it's always "happen to", it's never something that that woman has of her own accord. Women are naturally madonnas in her book, and the ones who disagree are whores.
Me, I'm human.
Maybe it would be clearer to say "sexualised class" and "asexualised class" or something, though mostly that makes me wanting to quote Lady McB.
[Thanks so much for saying this! It really helps to hear it from someone else's point of view. And yes, it's exactly right that inside present cultural assumptions *having* your own sexuality there's simply no way you can express it anyway but wrong. The flip side though, which Twisty's world view doesn't address, is that the same assumptions say pretty much anything men do (regarding women anyway, in a hetero context anyway) is just naturally, genetically, imperatively "right" -- that anything regarding sexuality, at any age or psychological state, is the *best* thing that could happen to them. Including, oh, say, sexually assaulting you. (I mean, dear God, he may have thought it was your fault too!) Which is also just so out of control wrong it hurts. Also, "This isn't a 'sex object' problem, this is a failure to serve as a proper nonsexual being..." Wow, that's a really powerful way of putting it. Thanks, Dw3t-Hthr. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sun, 2009-05-24 04:43.
Y'know, Figleaf, this really came across, on first reading, as, "I invented a much better way to talk about this, so any feminist who doesn't use it is incorrect."
On second reading, I don't think that's what you had in mind - but it helped my perspective to have read Sungold's post describing why Twisty's usage is incorrect in context of feminist theory.
I'm a big fan of your "men as sex class/women as no-sex class" construction; it's why I became a regular reader - it fit my personal observations better than anything I'd previously encountered from a "theory" angle. But I also still find the "women as (source-of-)sex class" (or, "fuckable class") construction to be a useful lens in some instances; the implication, however unwitting, that your construction superseded previous constructions really didn't sit well.
Sunflower
[Hi Sunflower. I think my construction enhances rather than supercedes the previous one for several reasons. I was snotty in this post because I was feeling really, really angry and frustrated about the situation Twisty was referring to and, accurately or inaccurately, fairly or unfairly, I felt like her critique was participating in rather than opposing a set of painfully confining cultural assumptions. Anyway, I don't think any feminist who doesn't use my terminology is incorrect. In the first place that would imply some feminists are better than other feminists, a point there's too much friction over anyway and which probably wouldn't be productive even if it were true. But secondly because there are more, and possibly better, ways than mine to productively express discontent with patriarchal constructions. I happen to think the way I use mine offers more solutions than the way she uses hers... but since she's acknowledged she doesn't believe there's a way out (short of extinction of all humanity, no less) and I'm more optimistic (I think it's a matter of pointing out *to us men* that their construction of gender dynamics isn't just limit us but makes us look really stupid) I feel ok saying it. That doesn't mean I don't think she's bad, stupid, or wrong. I'm actually kind of in awe of her. And besides I totally credit her for inspiring my realization that men perceive *themselves* as the sex class... which created room for me to consider how men actually perceive women. No Twisty then, seriously, no theory of the no-sex class paradigm from me. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 11:37.
Telling men that, instead, we project women as a class of people we wish to have sex with when they don't want to, but forbid to be sexual when *they* want to... and furthermore project men as not just "more" interested in sex but *obliged* to measure themselves in terms of wanting/having/seeking it, is more engaging since it gets to *why* we think men "want sex" and women "aren't interested."
I agree with ALL OF THAT. Very nearly 100%. I just don't see how that sums up to "no sex class". That sounds exactly like you are describing "men as subject, women as object".
[That's so close! What I'm doing is *objecting* to the assumption that men can't be anything but subjects and that women can only be objects. I use the term "no-sex class" to *challenge and mock* those assumptions in a way that I hope better reaches those (mostly men) who make them. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 11:38.
Maybe it would be clearer to say "sexualised class" and "asexualised class" or something, though mostly that makes me wanting to quote Lady McB.
Yes! That!
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 13:04.
Hi,
You know, I don't think you and Twisty disagree as much as you think.
Essentially the point is that women can't win.
When Twisty says:
'It’s impossible for her to express sexuality precisely right, because the sex class is not sovereign over itself. It’s subject to dudely whim. The expression of a woman’s sexuality is purely a matter of dudely interpretation', I understand that as meaning women can't win.
I don't read her as saying women should be pure and unsullied madonnas (granted, some rad fems seem to think like that, but most don't).
She isn't denying that women have our own sexuality, but that sexuality is often taken from us by patriarchy.
Yes, Sungold is right that originally feminists meant 'sex class' as 'male as default' - but that doesn't mean Twisty is wrong to redefine the term. I like it.
You see, when she says 'women are sex' that sums it up.
Women are sexualised...from the office sleaze who insists he can't help leering if women will wear low-cut tops...'sex sells' meaning 'scantily clad women sell'...'sexy' is a term applied to women 99% of the time.
Yes, men are also portrayed by patriarchy as sex-crazed beasts, but despite this they get to be fully rounded humans.
Women are judged and defined by their sex lives, as virgins/ whores.
This of course doesn't reflect reality. As in your example, of course some men are sexually unassertive and some women are assertive. But Twisty is talking about the dominant social construction in society. Stereotypes never reflect reality, but they do impact the way we experience reality.
Most of the comments on the post explicitly said that the teenage girls are *not* to blame.
[Hi Butterflywings. "I don't think you and Twisty disagree as much as you think." No, seriously, we *really don't* disagree about much at all! Or at least I don't much disagree with her -- frustration isn't the same thing as dismissal at all. In particular we agree that women are sexual*ized* by men -- expected and encouraged to compete with each other for men's attention through increasingly sexy-like speech, act, and attire, for instance. And we agree, completely, that sexualization is almost the antithesis of sexualtiy -- such that women who actually express their own sexual *interest* instead of man-pleasingly sexualized *appearance* tend to get smacked down, sometimes visciously. Although I would argue that by only allowing (healthy, "normal," non-"saintly") men to appear as sex-crazed, no-strings-attached-loving beasts society denies men a full range of being as well. (Men who express, say, emotion or attachment are branded as "fags" or "emo" and those who do are put at considerable risk of verbal and physical assault.) And all in defense of the dominant social construction that Twisty and I *also* agree about. We part terms on terminology though, and terminology shapes thoughts. For instance if women are the "sex class" because they have sex thrust upon them then what does that imply women have *before* sex is imposed? Nothing. And since, women being human beings, women have *innate* sexuality , then, Twisty and I agree, society says women can't win because there's *supposed* to be nothing. And society goes to a great deal of trouble to enforce that. Anyway, given that society puts way, way, way more time and energy into insuring women are not sexual, except for brief intervals when their custodial male wants it, the way the custodial male wants it, and never when he doesn't, and not with anyone else, and sometimes only "for reproduction," and since, when women *are* permitted to be sexual, as on their wedding nights... or maybe prom night... they're expected to be simon-pure inexperienced to the point they may not even know about contraception then... yeah society puts a lot more effort into making them a "no sex" class: *empty* of sex until it's *pushed into* them. Instead of asking, oh, say, "hey, how do you usually like to do it?" (Imagine *that* ever happening anywhere in Ozzie and Harriet's world o' heteronormativity!) Anyway, the areas where I disagree with Twisty are important (I think there's a way out, she says not; she says it's empowerfulling for women to withhold sex from men, I say nothing could make the Patriarchy happier) but the only one that matters is that she speaks as if men are part of a giant, organized, unified, competent, and *intentional* monolith, and I think we're a bunch of shmopes who'd begin streaming for the exits if we could find a clear path through all the (largely self-inflicted) indoctrination *we* get. Which is where I'm trying to come in... as best I can given my *own* indoctrinations. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 18:02.
If the paradigm were treating me as an object, it wouldn't have been my fault I was assaulted; that would have been simply proper use of the object. Objects have no volition.
[Hi Dw3t-Hthr. The contradictions are pretty bitter that way. If the rules of their system was even fractionally consistent or fair then no, you couldn't have been blamed if you were really only an object to them, and *wouldn't* have been blamed if they recognized you as a human being. And not to return to the title of this post or anything, but it wasn't till I read Twisty that I started to get that contradiction or realized the extent we're invested in it. But the bottom line is *of course* it's not your fault that the rest of us forgot, or never learned, that nobody should behave towards a human being as people behaved towards you -- before, during, or after your assault. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 18:07.
I don't read her as saying women should be pure and unsullied madonnas (granted, some rad fems seem to think like that, but most don't).
My introduction to Twisty included the phrase "funk-filled bratwurst". I have never seen anything to defeat the impression I have that she considers women naturally and intrinsically asexual and certainly never interested in sex with men.
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 22:16.
Dw3t-Hthr -
I'm not saying that's the only paradigm that ever happens. There are a lot of different ways in which gender coded cultural interactions take place. But I think the one figleaf is talking about in this post can best be described by the subject/object dichotomy.
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-05-25 22:35.
More importantly, though, I also said, possibly ad nausium, that I wouldn't expect it to resonate as much for women because whereas men can decieve themselves into believing women are tabula rasa when it comes to sexuality women's experience cries bullshit to the moon.
Well it's not like when I say the "men as subject, women as object" language is appropriate it's because I think I'm an object. I mean, you know this, or you wouldn't still be talking to me (or do you talk to objects? ;)).
And so it makes total sense that you'd find it totally annoying. But what you find annoying I'm rather hoping men find transformational. Calling women "the sex class" leaves men unphased because we can just say "well yeah, we want to have sex with women.
Actually, it kinda sounds like you're hoping men find it annoying. You know, the opposite of unphased. Women as the sex class resonates for me. Women as the sex class resonates for men. How exactly is this setting us apart? It's not! Gotta say, people trying to tell me men and women speak different languages is one of my biggest pet peeves.
p.s. - I think I may have to abandon this thread soon for the simple reason that there are too many nested comments and it's getting annoying to follow. It always puts my comment box at the bottom no matter which comment I'm trying to reply to. Not your fault - just poor formatting design for whoever wrote the blog code you're using. So if I vanish don't think it's because you finally scared me off :)
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-06-01 13:07.
Figleaf - we agree on the first part.
'Although I would argue that by only allowing (healthy, "normal," non-"saintly") men to appear as sex-crazed, no-strings-attached-loving beasts society denies men a full range of being as well. (Men who express, say, emotion or attachment are branded as "fags" or "emo" and those who do are put at considerable risk of verbal and physical assault.)' Completely agree - patriarchy hurts men too.
'We part terms on terminology though, and terminology shapes thoughts. For instance if women are the "sex class" because they have sex thrust upon them then what does that imply women have *before* sex is imposed? Nothing.'
Hmmmmm. I don't disagree with what you say about women being supposed to be pure, and empty of sex until defiled by the mighty male - but at the root of that is a fear of women's real, innate sexuality.
Society puts a lot of effort into policing sexuality and sexual behaviour; if we *really deep down* believed women to be pure asexual angels, we wouldn't feel the need to.
I mean - the point of the 'nice woman are too nice to be defiled' 'madonna/whore' thing is not that we really think women are pure, it's that the patriarchy wants to stop women enjoying their sexuality - and so their full humanity.
Hmmm - society sure puts a lot of effort into sexualising women, too. We have gone from the days when nice girls didn't to porn culture without ever having actual authentic sexuality.
Yes, language shapes thought; I don't see 'sex class' as meaning women have their *own* sexuality, but as explaining the way they are sexual*ised* - not sexual. Passive objects. Have sex imposed on them, as you put it.
And as I said, it describes how women are defined by the sex they have (or don't have).
Not that your conception of the no sex class is not interesting. Maybe 'sex class' and 'no-sex class' are different ways of looking at the same thing, though. Language shapes thought, and I see the 'sex class' aspect as more important; it describes as objects for men's use, as defined by sex, as sexualised.
I haven't seen where Twisty advocated women witholding sex from men - and I've been reading IBTP for over 2 years - do you have a link?
'she speaks as if men are part of a giant, organized, unified, competent, and *intentional* monolith'
I don't think she does. Men (or most men, anyway) don't set out to intentionally be misogynist, any more than most white people set out to be racist. I seriously don't think Twisty has said that they do; her tone isn't for everyone, and I hate to say it, but you are male, which is perhaps why you're interpreting it that way - I'm white and there is only so much of 'angry' 'white people suck' black feminist bloggers I can take, even though much of the time they're right.
'and I think we're a bunch of shmopes who'd begin streaming for the exits if we could find a clear path through all the (largely self-inflicted) indoctrination *we* get. Which is where I'm trying to come in... as best I can given my *own* indoctrinations. --fl]' Sure, and (genuinely) good for you. If only more men actively worked against masculinity. Sadly few do, and while as I said above, I don't think they are consciously perpetuating misogyny, I think there is a lack of actively doing anything to end it either.
Gender indoctrination hurts men too, which is the ironic and frustrating thing.
Dw3t-Hthr - I'd say that phrase certainly indicates that Twisty is gay, no more, no less. It doesn't say anything about other women; nor about being asexual. Sexual doesn't mean heterosexual.
["...at the root of that is a fear of women's real, innate sexuality." Oh yeah. I haven't dug into that one, in part, because it's a *huge* area that doesn't just go way back but also comes way forward -- the whole "precious bodily fluids" rant in Dr. Strangelove was pulled straight from mainstream "medical advice" Kubrick might still have read in his father's or grandfather's health books. But yes, absolutely, there's a huge... dare I call it hysterical?... unspoken theme in patriarchy that seems to have a lot to do with men basing our self-estimations on a "virile vitality" that's not actually sexually sustainable. Despite the *atrocious* human cost of attempting to maintain the fiction. The bigger reason I haven't, though, is I think others have done a better job than I would of unthreading that fear. And the final reason is that, in my experience, while there might be Freudian-style "primal" fears, the origin of a lot of the sex/no-sex class thinking is instilled in men before they've had any sexual experience, with the result that discussing chthonic fears at a point when men *imagine* themselves most insatiable just isn't going to have the traction that saying "you're lying to yourself when you say you can't get enough sex, let's talk about why that might be" will be.
"... if we *really deep down* believed women to be pure asexual angels." I haven't talked about this much lately but early on that was a point I kept coming back to again and again. I think I finally encapsulated it my "first rule of desire" with the "inconceivable and intolerable" construction. Because yes, if the fucking paradigm was *true* then we wouldn't go around carving women's clitorises *off!* Second because if the paradigm were true men wouldn't rather die, or be celibate, than admit to a doctor they have erectile or libido problems. And yet... again with the atrocious human cost to both women and men.
And finally (for now) "Maybe 'sex class' and 'no-sex class' are different ways of looking at the same thing, though." Yes! My very first breakthrough -- from reading one of Twisty's posts no less -- was that I was in complete agreement with almost all of classic feminist analysis except that word. And that's why until I felt I'd beaten it to death I put the disclaimer that nothing I ever say is meant to contradict the theory, especially in terms of women's constructed experience of the patriarchy. Instead it's just to restate it in a way that extends it to men's experience of the same thing. (Eveb there I'm *not* saying men and women are different, I'm saying our *indoctrination* has been.) Anyway, long response, but because it's a good set of comments. Thanks for taking the time to write it, BFW. I appreciate it. --fl]
Submitted by 2965 (not verified) on Sun, 2009-06-14 01:09.
Not to put words in Twisty's mouth, but as I understand it, the point of referring to women as the sex class is to draw attention to the fact that, in our society, women are defined and understood based on their sex, whereas men are defined and understood based on their humanity. It really doesn't matter, from a social perspective, what position a particular woman takes or what her practices are or what her desires are, because in a patriarchy, the functions of women are to please men and to make babies, and so whether a particular woman has sex or does not have sex, the evaluation of the woman is still based on sex. You can view the mother/whore or virgin/slut complex in the same way - whatever women happen to do with regards to sex, they are always judged with respect to sex. When women are in bad moods it's never long before some dude assumes that the woman's uterus is malfunctioning (hysteria) or perhaps simply functioning normally (menstruation) but it's never a question that it is because of her sex that she is the way she is.
And from a more Marxist standpoint, the sexual class structure is not about sexual relations, it's about political and economic relations. It can't be reduced simply to desires, but must be understood in terms of a system of transactions in which women's principle commodity is sex, but sex is also the site of their oppression - in much the same way as the principle commodity of the working class is labor, and labor is also the site of their exploitation.
From a linguistic viewpoint, it seems to be a bold assertion that Twisty is using the term "backwards" or "incorrectly" given that she is using the term roughly as it is understood by the vast majority of people in the field. I certainly wouldn't criticize a project to turn the "sex class" designation around and use it against men, but such a project doesn't render the traditional use of the term "incorrect." Imagine if I said that I think that straight people are the ones who are truly "queer" in that I find them very strange, and then having made such pronouncement, "corrected" all my gay friends when they called themselves queer. People would think I was idiosyncratic, at best.
[Hi Panoptical. I agree I can be idiosyncratic about terminology, including idiosyncraticstraight vs. kinky. And I have explained elsewhere that nothing about no-sex class terminology contradicts the classical "sex class" terms as used by classic/radical feminists or Twisty's cultural femiinism. I just think it does a better job of landing responsibility on men who, after all, are the agents of the phenomenon whatever it's called. And it better encompasses the contradictions of men's prescriptive and *proscriptive* attitudes towards women and sex. Thanks. --fl]