Image by Flickr user Mark Klotz. Used under a Creative Commons license.

In a review of historic opposition to contraception in the face of President Obama's directive that (virtually) all employee healthcare plans fund contraception for women the way they fund Viagra and Cialis for men E.J. Graff first reviews the biggest standard, historic objection to contraception

Late-19th- and early-20th-century pundits said that the nation would become a bordello if anyone could have sex without consequences and warned of the death of the American family.

Source: TAPPED

And finds it wanting (emphasis mine)

In other words, women can work for Catholic hospitals, colleges, social-services groups, and so on—and still have the same rights to sexual health coverage as men, under the same plans. All that Viagra needn't lead to either 19 children and counting; to abortions; or to impoverished women.

Ouch!

The Viagra-but-no-pill argument actually cuts two ways with hidebound institutions such as the Catholic and many Protestant churches. Their argument against contraception is that it interferes with women's "natural and normal" functioning, and thus constitutes an unnatural intervention in human reproduction.

The problem, of course, is that even if one were to argue (as the Catholic hierarchy in fact still does) that "virtuous" men could use Viagra "only" for reproduction there's the issue of the Church's ban on other forms of "unnatural intervention" like in-vitro and artificial insemnation. Sort of by-definition if a guy can't get a woodie without medication then "nature" has decreed he should do without.

And yet to the very best of my knowledge there is no Church doctrine forbidding its employee insurance plans from covering, or indeed its healthcare facilities from dispensing, Viagra or Cialis.

But I digress...

At the end of the day, neither Viagra or Cialis have created catastrophic baby booms, orgy outbreaks, upticks in divorce, or any of the other bugaboos projected by opponents of contraception. Certainly not among the kind of people willing to become employees of the Church.

Therefore prior evidence suggests that contraception availability will also not produce similar licentiousness.  Nor, as we have seen, above, is contraception any more of an "unnatural intervention" in fertility than is Viagra or Cialis.  Both claims, therefore, are red herrings.  There may be <em>some</em> legitimate reason that conservatives object to giving women control over their own fertility.  But if so they don't seem very comfortable saying it.  Thus the prevarication.

It's often observed by college students that one is most inclined to clean one's room when one should be writing one's term papers. Similarly ones term papers urgently demand attention to the precise degree that one's room needs cleaning.

This morning I have been doubly productive -- not only cleaning to the uttermost depths of the refrigerator but also knocking out posts with aplomb. I have not, however, made an inch of progress on a project that a) I'll actually get paid to do that is b) due Monday morning. :-P

Meanwhile, though, I might as well mention something I've been meaning to write about in greater detail for several weeks. In one of my whirlwind patrols of the Tumblr erotic self-photograpy circuit I've started to notice more and more women seem to be picking up the vulva equivalent of male cock-shot syndrome. While increasing numbers of women seem to be engaging in this allegedly exclusively male behavior I don't know if they're yet emailing them to random recipients on dating sites. But I sort of imagine that as time passes and social permissions equalize we'll probably start seeing a little more of women doing it.

Another observation about the male-cock-shot syndrome. Just as not all women are likely to start exclusively posting 8x10 color glossies of their vulvas, it turns out that neither do most men!

It also occurs to me that, gender narratives notwithstanding, a lot of men may have been sending out those photos for the same reason women seem to have started doing it. Because they can, sure. But also not so much because they're aggressive or even utterly, esthetically clueless. I think instead it's because they imagine that everyone else will be as fascinated by the poster's locus of erotic pleasure as the posters themselves tend to be.

Well.

Duty calls.

Oh, not that duty though! I can't work on my paid, near-deadline project now, oh no. Now I have to go shopping for the week!

After that I may have to mop the roof! :-P

Image via TalkingPointsMemo.

Part 1: Massachusetts Senate Candidate Elizabeth Warren stupidly declared that unlike her opponent, incumbent Sen. Scott Brown, she didn't pay for college by posing naked (for Cosmopolitan back when the magazine published monthly nude male pinups.)

Part 2: When asked by a talk-show host whether he had "officially responded to Elizabeth Warren’s comment about how she didn’t take her clothes off?" Brown stupidly laughed and said “Thank God!"

What. Ever.

A couple things here. First of all, if Elizabeth Warren used as many cosmetics as Scott Brown she'd be as conventionally attractive. This isn't a knock on Brown, but it's not a knock on Warren either. Cosmetics are a choice. They can have a profound effect on our appearance even though they make no difference in our abilities to function.* Brown has generally chosen one way, Warren another. Both are petty to have brought it up.

Second, fuck Warren for trying to slut-shame Brown!

Third, fuck Brown for slamming Warren's potential sex appeal!

Since both present entirely within generally-accepted parameters for life in contemporary culture it's none of one's businesses either how the other chooses to present nor is it anyone's business how the rest of the general public ought to interpret their choices.

Oh, and fourth, the role reversals -- Elizabeth Warren playing the "dismissive male" with her disapproval of frivolity and Scott Brown playing the "compromised but prideful ingénue" with his arch riposte is just too precious for words.

And finally? Fifthly? Good for Brown for posing naked for beefcake photos in a national magazine at a time when there was tremendous pressure on men to gaze rather than be gazed upon. And for similar reasons good for Warren for putting accomplishment ahead of appearance. Each played then, and to a certain extent could play now, an important role in breaking through centuries of gendered expectations... but by now fishtailing past each other like Boston drivers in snow they're not helping anybody.

Note: Image and all quotes taken from TalkingPointsMemo.com.

* Well, technically it can make a difference in terms our our ability to "psyche" ourselves. For instance an always-meticulous editor I used to work with (not as a writer) always wore a precisely tailored suit, tie, and polished shoes on the days he did his final edits. His argument was that dressing extra carefully helped him work extra carefully. But I digress...

Image of "Viberect device via Gizmag.com.

Noah Brand asks

What does it say about the state of shaming of male sexuality and masturbation that when what looks like a WONDERFUL male sex toy is developed, it’s only going to be available with a prescription?

Source: No Seriously, What About Teh Mens

It's a great question. The device, the Reflexonic Viberect™ is nominally for the treatment of erectile dysfunction, but it allegedly works by mimicking "rapid and repetitive manual/vaginal stimulation of the penis at high frequency." And you'd want to buy this with a prescription instead of over the counter in the same aisle where Walgreens routinely and uncontroversially stocks vibrators for women as exactly why?

My guess would be that thanks to the same daftly dominant paradigm that brought you the bogus Two Rules of Desire, people are able to preserve the delusion that women use vibrators only for "orgasm training and relaxation" purposes where as men would just jack off with them.