Sexual Puritanism and Empire: Sex, Shame, and Military Might

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.alternet.org/sex/151284/sexual_puritanism_and_empire%3A_sex%2C_shame%2C_and_military_might/


At present, the air is plagued with the scandalous tweets of a congressman’s undergarments and the predictable howling from the hectoring ghosts of U.S. Puritanism, conjured from their graves by the contrived spectacle and its promise of anonymous arousal intermingled with the blood sport of public shaming.

By finger-wagging and sneering, carnal desires can be lived out vicariously in the Puritan/Calvinist imagination. In this way, petty moralists can ogle what they claim to condemn.

To Puritans, all the problems of life can be traced to the genitals … true, but only their own problems.

How many times do the prigs, ninnies, and scolds of the U.S. have to repeat this sort of inanity before they grow up and realize that human beings have strong libidos? Libido propels both creativity and contretemps, and it is wise to aver that “the issue of character” should best be evoked and debated, as a general rule, when the situation involves hypocrisy.

More at the link --

[Uncle Joe]

1. That was a good essay.

Thanks for the thread, Donna.

[fascisthunter]

2. Orwellian Nation

[CanSocDem]

3. This line....

" — their insatiable craving to revel in the tawdry — but remain engaged in the delusional worship of their own toxic innocence."

...sums up nicely, Americas' current distraction.

.

[riderinthestorm]

4. I couldn't get past the para where the author says anyone who hasn't been embroiled in a sex scandal

is either lying about it or a prig. Sorry but that's bullshit. Phil Rockstroh doesn't get to decide what part of my life is the most seductive, or that the only greatest seduction in life is sex. That's an excuse for Weiner's actions that's a stretch too far imho.

"Yet, if, in fact, their lives have been absent such misfortune, then one should withhold the scorn reserved for hypocrites, and, instead, grant these poor souls pity, for they have been afflicted with the awful circumstance of having passed through their lives without ever being seduced by life."

Clearly Mr. Rockstroh has never galloped a horse across the countryside, or swum with the dolphins, or participated in a medical miracle (or even a religious miracle if you believe that way), or held his own newborn babe, or whatever other overwhelming (dare I say seductive) lifetime experience really rocks your socks. There are so many incredible moments in life that actually even TRANSCEND sex shockingly enough.

The issue isn't puritanical prigs vs. wild fucking. And the author in the OP is being disingenuous in trying to paint the issue so (dare I say it? !prig alert!) shamefully simplistically.

Maybe the rest of the article is good but I couldn't get past that particular scold myself. Unrec.

[seabeyond]

5. my alcoholic, narcissistic brother says the same thing. i haven't lived life because

i haven't used and abused it with its very highs and terrible lows.

ok. i dont live for destruction. works for me.

lol

[riderinthestorm]

6. Yes, we're to be "pitied" according to the OP because we've "escaped" such "misfortunes".

Snort. Our lives are empty of such drama obviously. I'm guessing that deep thrum in your soul when they placed your son into your arms for the first time has no comparison to a sex scandal in our lives....

Only scandal and sex are life's "true" seductions.