The War On Fucking
by tristero
In today's Times, Lauren Winner writes:If we are truly to help our teenagers adopt the countercultural sexual ethic of abstinence until marriage...
Wha? As the father of a soon-to-be ten year old daughter, why on earth would I want my future teener not to have sex until she got a state license?
Of course, I don't want her to get pregnant until she and her partner-to-be are emotionally ready and prepared to raise a child in a loving environment. And certainly, I don't want her to get sick or make others sick. But "help" her to refrain from enjoying the pleasures of intimacy? I don't get it - why would I want to help with something so psychologically and morally crippling?
And what's this "we" shit? Also, check out that "countercultural" - wow. Who knew that not fucking was the new LSD?
To change the tone of my post, please note the rhetorical devices here, in particular the intense barrage of baseless assertions - the "we" assuming everyone agrees that so-called "premarital" sex is a bad thing (and notice how she witholds the specific qualifier, "Christians," until long after the "we" has worked its magic); the weird assumption that abstinence is a sensible thing to inflict on a kid, a strange assumption even if you do think that teen sex is not necessarily a good idea; and the bizarre delusion that not having sex until officially licensed flies in the face of official values (see Virgin, The Forty-Year Old, and the hundreds upon hundreds of slasher films where the teen couple that just had sex inevitably gets dismembered in all sorts of gruesome ways ).
This is all of a piece with modern rightwing propaganda style, to pack as much loopy nonsense as possible into every sentence. This makes it exceedingly difficult to confront and rebut, but not because there's a solid argument to "engage." Firstly, the sheer amount of garbage that needs to be cleared away all but requires, as it does here, a response longer than the original winger passage. Secondly, the whackiness of many of the secondary assertions makes it extremely easy to get distracted onto tangents - for example, into a debate on exactly what is meant by "countercultural." Thirdly, the effect is literally paralyzing and intimidating. To read the word "we" in this context stops us (heh heh) dead in our tracks - huh? - and then "we" wonder what's wrong with us that "we" aren't focused on helping us make our kids' teen years as miserable as they possibly can be ("and no, little Ethel, no masturbation, either, that's a sin, and I really don't like you smooching little Lucy, either. You're too old now.").
This packing tactic was, if not pioneered by him, surely brought to a new level of obnoxiousness by Robert Novak many, many years ago, when he would ask a Democrat a trick question filled with screwy righty assumptions that simply would have to be dealt with before the question even could be addressed, thus enabling Novak to accuse the hapless Dem of wimpiness and evasion.
Finally, notice the appropriation and inversion of liberal/lefty rhetoric. We wish to help our teenager. We are the counterculture, sticking it to The Man. This is very common and very old. The early pro-coathanger activists would adapt Beatles songs and old 60's protest chants ("All we are saying, is give life (sic) a chance") and Lauren Winner is steeped in that tactic. And what are "we" gonna do in retaliation? It's not as if there are that many compelling rightwing songs around to rip off ("The Ballad of the Brie Ballet," maybe? Nah...).
Lauren Winner's op-ed is full of it - rightwing rhetoric, that is. Rhetoric that comes so naturally even to mediocrities like the inaptly named Winner they just speak it as a matter of course. Liberals and Dems have nothing comparable and they need to develop it. That's why those of us who've been shouting about rhetoric and framing long before Lakoff got famous insist that yes, ideas but also yes, you gotta talk real good, too. Liberals have many great ideas, but they matter nought if they're tongue-tied.