I’ve spent the night perusing various radical feminist websites, ranging from the ulta-misandrist ravings of I Blame The Patriarchy to the friend-of-twisty look-a-like to the aptly named Rage Against the Manchine.

My conclusion runs that radical feminism is actually a far more binary obedient movement and ideology than it likes to imagine. This became clear fairly quickly, indeed grew immediately apparent simply from the wariness shown towards male contributions. This was both upon an structural level (comments policies making men feel clearly unwelcome) and upon an ideological one (the endless reference to “male privilege” make it fairly clear that the accounts of men are going to be treated with a scepticism women will not be subjected to).

To their credit the radfems are at least believers in the binary. Indeed Andrew Dworkin described biological essentialism as “the most pernicious ideology on the face of the earth” and it is pleasing to know that the absolute anti-assimilationist elements she recalls encountering in that accounts have mostly faded into historical characters. This does nothing save reinforce the absurdity of the present approach towards gender reconstruction by Dworkin’s ideological inheritors, who seem to have taken her urging to “Fuck up” the Patriarchy by gathering in small, thoroughly sealed groups of like minded ranters, who remind themselves constantly, incessantly, of the divisions within society that they can outline with immense eloquence but seem to wish to identify and emphasise more than they do to move beyond, transcend or obliterate.

In short, embittered cliques are established, then fiercely sustained.

The radical credentials for this are highly limited: the notion that the best fashion in which to attack the binary is assembling into websites which are written by women and commented upon by women is surely both utterly disingenuous and entirely self-defeating. To attempt to destroy a set of prejudices (indeed, a set of concepts, or even identities) that by their very nature apply to all of humanity using a single half of it is a bizarre approach, doomed to failure.

Perhaps this leads us to my core difficulty with feminism in the contemporary Anglosphere: it has become virtually impossible to further women’s rights, as is the aim of feminism, without attacking the gender binary. But feminists are largely hesitant to do exactly that, distracted by focusing upon what the successes of their movement have left unaltered instead of noting the vast amount that has changed.

This realisation of progress made since death of the 1950s is at the heart of post-feminism, and brings us onto my next point:

C.G. Brown, in his magnum opus ‘The Death of Christian Britain’, posits that the cause of the demise of the titular religion within this nation was the collapse of the concept of “Pious Women” during the 1960s. Prior to then women were seen as the sole source of active religiosity: men could be saved, but only once sufficiently strong-armed by the earnest females filling their lives (be it wives or mothers). Christianity could not recover as there was only a conception of female piety, as “Boys would be boys” and men would inevitably run awry unless carefully instructed and trained. Men were depraved creatures incapable of controlling themselves and it was only through the positive influence of femininity that salvation could be brought to the coarser sex.

Now this concept had a shadow side: men as corruptive, women as pure beings that men could degrade. A large amount of the concepts of seduction, deflowerment and general robbery of innocence seem to be tied tightly to this.

It is here that the rhetoric of radical feminism strikes the most noticable harmony: women are beings which the creation of pornography tears down from some imagined state of purity and defiles, argue the radical feminists. There are deeds that can not be done without besmirching the actor, and pornography insists upon their performance, by women. However, is it possible to miss the assonances with the other side of this ideal? Think of the attitude feminism takes towards the supply side of pornographic matter. Through feminism the otherwise helpless, base men may be rescued from their own masculinity. Rescued, that is, by pious women.

Men alone are incapable of recognising their foulness. They must be shown. Men involved in the production are demonised, in the acting conspicuously disregarded.

The women engaged in pornography are flecks of foam upon the ocean, pure and borne aloft, swept along by grand cultural forces, then thoroughly befouled.

Had they not kept their movement so purged of penises (men are at best “allies” that could well be fradulent and merely adopting the mantle of “feminist” falsely, to gain advantage and unearned trust, to avoid confrontation) or had they not engaged with the women who choose to participate in the sex industry in a fashion so starkly devoid of any acceptable of female autonomy (and I speak here as a determinist) in a way that makes it clear that they simply wish to avoid thinking of women opting to participate in the process at all except as a facet of the Patriarchy’s endlessly insiduous influence, had they not held an equally damaged and lacking view of the men involved that sees them as otherwise helpless masturbators that only feminism can save, or their utter indifference to the implications for the men involved within the process then perhaps the similarity not be so striking.

As it is, one has to wonder whether the fixation radical feminism holds for pornography (note that RATManchine has made no less than nine essays on the matter, each of considerable length, and shows no sign of ceasing to churn) is truly based upon their wrath at women performing sex acts while observed by cameras on an entirely upon their disdain for the Patriarchy or whether it is more closely tied to long standing expectations of appropriate womanly conduct.

Not that this argument is anything new, this one has been raging for a very long time. But, as far as I am concerned, the irony lacing the prospect of women imagining themselves to be the fiercest critics of Patriarchal structures while in fact behaving as inadvertant, unaware throw-backs to the time when the Patriarchy still existed remains quite delightful.

Annoyingly his comments on homosexuality have allowed Benedict’s main thrust here to be disregarded. I know that the implications for gays are significant and doubtless some of the thinner skinned might find his words offensive, but it’s hardly the main jist. This follows a long-standing and much noted upon pattern: the Pope says something foolish which has implications for near enough everyone and only the elements related to a minority are picked up upon.

This is why you see gay Catholics as somehow seen as having some additional burden which heterosexuals are free from. In reality the straight Romans are permitted only the outlet of sex within a marriage where they intend to procreate, with everyone who spills a drop of sperm outside of those precise conditions a sinner. This should make it fairly obvious to all but the clinically naive that Catholicism is incompatible with virtually all strains of sexuality. Homosexuals who live other than chaste existences are only as defiant as their legion brethren who have disregarded the absurdly restrictive laws applied to them to.

So now Benedict assails gender theory (next up: mind) and much the same occurs: an edict which applies to the totality of humanity is presented as something which is worth discussing only with regards to humanity. This is clearly a foolish approach. When Benedict speaks of a matter such as this he speaks of everyone, there can be nobody excluded.

What makes it so frustrating that this was that his reason is so shoddy. Indeed he states “The Church speaks of human nature as ‘man’ or ‘woman’ and asks that this order is respected” without so much as a jot of evidence. Apparently the importance of this dichotomy and its inherency can be deduced by “Listening to the language creation”, although Ratzinger fails to elaborate, instead declaring that disregarding this mysterious linguistical muttering would mean “self-destruction”.

But on one thing, at least, we can agree:

The human being wants to make himself on his own and to decide always and exclusively by himself about what concerns him.

Precisely. And so, to content them, we should not assume their nature through minor physiological details.

Culture 11, the conservative website that honoured no sect and cherished no party, has effectively ended. In its place stands Censor 11, an altogether more shoddy replacement.

Joe Carter explains his paltry excuse for reasoning here, the offending post in question is rather bizarrely stored here. Apparently so foul & heinous that Joe doesn’t mind it posted under his name. The strongest response yet (besides Will Wilkinson’s, in comments) is here. To that I have only to add that this part of the reasoning was by far the most telling:

I myself have been scarred by the behavior that Ms. Gray defends [therefore] the defense of it is not something I can condone on Culture11.

Note the assumption that simply because dear Joe’s experiences with “hook-up” have been poor, the same will be true of everyone. It is impossible to have encounters which lead to outcomes distinct from his own, and from his annecdote we can extrapolate the outcome for every human that would attempt acts of such great “moral stupidity”.

All patricians see themselves as physicians, though, and Carter is no exception. He knows sickness when he sees it and if he needs to quarantine a post or two to stop it spreading then that’s what he’s willing to do. Disregarding patient consent he springs into action and starts purging.

Why is it that so few conservatives can come up with a non-deranged position on sex?

Edit: It would seem that David Kuo has sprang into action. Too late? Perhaps not. Then I’d have to start arguing with feminists and liberals again…

…this time in Northern Ireland. There, the “Family Education Trust” wants the state to withold a vaccine against STDs and cervical cancer from teenage girls on the grounds that it’ll encourage early sex, and that parents should emphasise abstainence.

The base idiocy of this position is well established. Abstinence only sex-education doesn’t work, and simply encourages the spread of disease through ignorance. The desire for sex is a perfectly natural instinct, and one that won’t be quashed because a collection of pompous prigs stand in front of a class and say that it’s naughty. Teenage experimentation will happen; I speak as a teenager who has experimented, and would’ve done so in most conceivable circumstances.* But, because these teenagers have only been told to abstain, they might not know to wear a condom, or about how syphilis/chlamydia/AIDs/etc are spread; so they don’t take precautions. And then teenage pregnancy and STD infection rates go up.

The case for the vaccine is still more simple. The state exists to preserve and extend the freedom of its citizens; one such freedom is from infectious disease, and from dangerous ignorance. A lack of knowledge of how infectious diseases such as this cervical cancer because you’ve only ever been told to avoid sex counts as dangerous ignorace. Therefore, the state must offer full and detailed sexual education, for the sake of the individual and public health. And if a vaccine exists which can prevent the spread of potentially deadly diseases, that needs to be available too; if they vaccinate against meninghitis in schools, why not cervical cancer?

Ah, but doesn’t all this infringe a parent’s right to raise their child as they wish, you ask? Not so. A child does not exist as an extension of their parent’s will; it exists as an entity in its own right. If a parent plans to put that child at risk of infectious disease for the sake of the parent’s beliefs, then someone else must look to the child’s rights and future. It’s in the teenager’s every interest, both in the present and the future, to be safe from disease and ignorance. If they themselves objected on strong grounds, religious or otherwise (and I note this is an offer of a vaccine), then there’d be grounds to withold its provision. But not otherwise. A child is an individual in its own right, and one that exists in a community as well as a family. If it serves that individual’s interests more, then that community must also play a part in raising them.

So, frankly, the “Family Education Trust” can fuck off (preferably wearing condoms, of course.) There are no legitimate grounds to withold a vaccine against a potentially deadly disease from teenagers; especially when it’s an offer rather than a compulsion. Individual and public health must comes before parental sensitivity - and this is no exception.

*Could there be a more unfortunate sentence?

Sophie Platt, writing for The F Word, has an irritating but valuable article here.

Irritating because it is filled with typical vindictive puerility:

I would love for them to turn the tables round one night and end a sexual encounter before their partners had come. A friend of mine tried this once, and reported that the incensed rage and sulking that followed could only be likened to that of a three-year-old who has been told Christmas had been cancelled.

Also due to the prejudiced, sourceless bigotry that somehow imagines that an Austen reference that was long ago faded through overuse constitutes a valid substitute for anything beyond the most meagre of anecdotal evidence:

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that teenage boys on the whole are more concerned with their own satisfaction than that of their partners

Let’s see if I can give this a go: It is a truth universally acknowledged that Afro-Caribbean men care more about stealing car stereos than raising their bastard children. Does that sound in any way acceptable to everyone? No matter, I shall just generate a false consensus in lieu of an adequete proof and make pretence that my view is that of the entirity of universe denizens. Does this not make a refreshing change from the mainstream press and its ceaseless distortions?

Furthermore her phallus obsession is seemingly total, as well as less than benign:

It’s just that so many are made to look like a penis, some disturbingly realistic, that they seem rather sinister as a tool for us to become better acquainted with our own bodies.

Where to begin with this? Is she stating that she finds real phalluses realistic? Or is it the prospect of women using items which resemble the organ used for the act that they are stimulating with it that unsettles her? Is it really appropriate and wise to label the sexual predilections of others “sinister” in such an article? Or any article? Is it in pointing out her failure to mention the rise of the “Fleshlight” devices for men that are now plastered all over the internet?

More harmfully still she has made a deep error in her analysis of “Raunch Culture”. Platt attempts to stage a forced division, of sorts, between the elements she truly disapproves of (lap-dancing legality, pole-dancing lessons, girls wearing mini-skirts and so on) from those she can not help but muster begrudging respect for (the popularity of a programme revolving around the sex lives of a set of vapid egoist females, the mass marketing and cultural strength of an item designed purely to bring women vast amounts of pleasure, vibrators on sale at Boots).

Such a dichotomy quite simply does not exist.

Both sets of phenomenon are part of a cultural motion away from the moralistic confines of the past and towards a state of personal liberty to pursue physical pleasure via carnal means. They are not divisible and any efforts to consider them along some form of “Pro” and “Anti” patriarchy lines is bound for failure, as are all other strictly partisan assessments. Women pleasuring themselves and feeling no shame and men resorting to bandwidth over charm and discussing without generating horror their nights at lap-dancing clubs are not in the slightest phenomenon which can be held apart. Their origins are precisely the same: formerly residual Christian morality dominated Britain’s views of carnal union, but since this is rapidly disintegrating people are beginning to act far more as they please and are in acceptance of far less restraints or restrictive mores. To divide this tendency into two separate paragraphs and imagine that it can somehow be split apart is the height of foolishness: they are simply differing manifestations within near identical circumstances. But Platt becomes wound up in her tiresomely hackneyed depiction of Raunch Culture:

it has become about appearing to be sexual available simply to please men and not to fulfil their own desires or fantasies.

The rise of so-called ‘raunch culture’ means that for many girls, merely looking ‘pretty’ has taken a back seat for looking ‘sexy’: supermarkets stock pole dancing kits as children’s toys, glamour modelling is in the top five career choices for pre-teen girls and hundreds of girls all over the country are counting the days until they are 18 and are legally allowed breast enhancements. Girls are being sexualised at an increasingly younger age, and it seems to be more about self-esteem than sexual satisfaction. The pleasure that comes from sexual experiences at this age is often the feeling of being thought attractive and being desired by a male than actually getting off.

Has she no conception of the positive effects of banishing shame in exposing more flesh than our present 1950s hang-over hegemony permits? Is she unaware that the frequency of exibitionism has always matched voyeurism? Obviously not: it is required that all shifts be made somehow in favour of the Patriarchy. Thus pole dancing kits suddenly are related to skimpier outfits for young women and are entirely unrelated to alterations that increase women’s pleasure.

As flawed a view as this unquestionably is this article is valauble because Platt has hit the nub of this issue: it is simply not expected of girls that they will entertain themselves, while with boys only (fittingly paired) certain fundamentalist Christians and some extremist feminists would argue otherwise. This is a strange and harmful double standard, in that it denies half of the population the assumption that it is correct to pursue their personal pleasure. The consequences are young (and occasionally even elderly) women who have never experienced an orgasm, a highly unfortunate state of affairs that leaves the men in a strong lead.

It would seem that Platt, then, is excellent at identifying the problem before us but fails in terms of solution. She, for instance, disparrages the shift that has eradicated the near total silence on matters of female pleasuring that reigned previously, through her offensive against the surgingly popular sex toys, now sold by a variety of mainstream stores and chains. For how can something remain a taboo when it is upon the evening news? Having the act she fears girls are not expected to participate in directly alluded to on chemists shelves is surely going to break the culture which she outlines.

The silence is thus effectively already breached.

Witness the triumph of western value importation.

Do I detect more than a litte hypocrisy on the part of a certain registrar? You’d think that someone whose religion was demonstratedly hostile to them might pause before directing religious hostility at others.

We’ve been rather behind on this one. Originally, I’d ignored the whole fuss as another tabloid celebrity sales-orgy - until this excellent post by Jim Jepps. So, time to rectify my silence, I think.

It’s not a matter of free speech, as the News of the World claims. Very few claim that the paper shouldn’t be allowed to publish the story - if it’s true. What’s at stake here is privacy; which, as usual, the paper has very little respect for. To infiltrate someone’s house (or £35,000 dungeon, as the case may be…) and film them without permission represents a blatant invasion of that individual’s private space.

Nor does the story fall in the category of public interest usually used to justify such invasions. What an individual does behind closed doors, in private, is just that - a private activity. If that private activity happens to involve whips, chains and dangling pricks, then who else can judge? There’s little evidence to suggest that Mosley’s particular private predeliction affected his performance in public. And so, little evidence to suggest either the public or his employers had a desperate need to know of it.

Indeed, the fact Mosley can afford his £35,000 private spanking parlour perhaps suggests he’s doing perfectly well in his job, thankyouverymuch. (And, of course, that income tax isn’t progressive enough yet…)

So it’s not a matter of free speech or public interest - which is what’s concerning. The direction of media coverage throughout the case has been a tad depressing. As Hari asks - hadn’t we got over this sort of thing? Most people manage a, “none-of-my-business” shrug for an increasing number of sexual preferences. Why not BDSM? And, likewise, the very possible (and probably more relevant) discussion that could be had on prostitution has been conspicuously absent.

A very interesting discussion (which, unfortunately, I don’t have time to engage in tonight. Should do at some point though…) could be had on the ethics of power exchange in sex. I imagine the very phrase would have as a divisive an effect on a crowd of feminists as pornography. Is it a simple projection of patriarchal power structures, or a matter of sexual freedom? Or, indeed, possibly both at different times, in different circumstances…

But, of course, the real world finds itself stuck with a tabloid induced celebrity sales-orgy. Could there be an apter demonstration of the internet’s superiority that the contrast between the wood-pulp mush and Jim’s post?

Excuse me while I gibber in bafflement for a moment. A homophobe doesn’t want to perform civil partnerships for gay couples on religious grounds - and an employment tribunal says that’s okay. Why? The whole point of civil partnerships is that they’re secular; religion doesn’t come into it.

But, apparently, it does now. The tribunal sets a dangerous precedent with their decision. It’s okay for the religious to discriminate against gays on the grounds of their sexuality, it says - even in secular situations. And it’s not okay to ensure secular functions are carried out if the religious functionary due to carry them out isn’t comfortable. Note that sexuality isn’t often considered a conscious choice. Religion very definitely is.

And, guess what? That’s how the fundies read it too. Quoth Lillian Ladele, the bigot concerned:

“I am delighted at this decision.

“It is a victory for religious liberty, not just for myself but for others in a similar position to mine.

“Gay rights should not be used as an excuse to bully and harass people over their religious beliefs.”

And, of course, selective, homophobic readings of an ancient text should be used as an excuse to bully and harrass people over their sexuality. Ladele claims to have won a victory for liberty; she hasn’t. She’s set a precedent where public servants - who exist to serve the whole public equally, on the basis of need - may discriminate against that public on the grounds of their own irrational prejudices. A victory, in short, for discrimination.

Hadn’t we got past all this?

It’s a few days old - but if you haven’t seen Johann Hari’s piece on Section 28, it’s well worth the read. It must be some of his best writing in a while:

Let’s end with the story of one boy – one of many – who paid the price for Section 28’s stalling. Jonathan Reynolds was a 15 year-old from Bridgend, South Wales, who came out to some of his closest friends in 2006. They blabbed – and he was bullied and harassed and threatened as a “faggot” and a “poof” until he couldn’t take it any more. His school had no policy in place to protect gay children; any move to develop one had been squashed by the vast legal block of Section 28, and hadn’t recovered in time for him. So one day, after he sat a GCSE exam where he earned a starred A grade, he lay down on the train tracks near his home. He texted his sister Sam: “Tell everyone that this is for anybody who eva said anything bad about me, see I do have feelings too. Blame the people who were horrible and injust 2 me. This is because of them, I am human just like them. None of you blame yourself, mum, dad, Sam and the rest of the family. This is not because of you.” Then a train sliced his body apart.

Jonathan Reynolds’ final text message – his last cry of “I am human” – should serve as the obituary for the late, un-great Section 28.

Ignore the occasionally poor sub-editting, and it’s an excellent summary of just how vile that law was.