by Eurydice (c) 1999

In Defense of Free Sex

     In America, we fear the fact that we are bodies.  We are either-or: either slut or frigid, either overtly sexual or indifferent to all physical exchanges. We're either unaware of our sexuality or too self-conscious. We live in a state of constant contradiction, in time-consuming self-abusive frustration. We mostly abstain from aimlessly flirting-at-large, from the exchange of meaningful glances, gestures, remarks etc. that is a major form of human communication. Or at best we only flirt in designated areas-bars, clubs, parties-and at designated times-after dark. We conceive our physicality in terms of health, exercise, self-defense, anatomy, autonomy, relaxation, and identity. We do not allow our bodies to smoke, to joke, to smell, to eat, to express themselves naturally and abundantly. We fear what goes into our bodies-food or genitals-and we quantify, qualify, analyze, dissect everything erotic or gastronomic. We organize our civic life in a rigid series of correct respectful rules and punishments of our natural behavior. As a result, the entire aesthetic interactive dimension of our bodies is sadly missing.
     I do miss here the stares, whistles and muttered remarks of men in European streets. Unsolicited male approval is satisfying, whatever our personal politics. Without the countless occasions where the body feels alive and noticed, in libraries, restaurants, banks, elevators, cabs, anywhere public, American women have nothing to judge themselves by but prefab images of photographically idealized elongated supermodels, and when they fall short of that hyperreal unnatural standard they seek refuge in some disorder that can disqualify them from the nerve-rending competition-or they literally "die" trying to catch up. American beauty standards are far too limited and boring, but that is another topic of neopuritanical repression.
     As a feminist intellectual, I protest the naive pretense that our minds don't live in our bodies, that we respond to each other's minds independently of each other's bodies, and that, on the other extreme, what we sexually desire in each other is the body alone; that professors (including priests) can teach and students can learn without their bodies ever being present in the classroom, that bosses and employees and colleagues can interact professionally without their bodies ever being present in the office or factory; and that, miraculously, those bodies can suddenly turn sexual in private bedrooms at the end of the day with the right consenting adult, after they've been utterly repressed and sublimated and forgotten all day. 
     I resent the assumption that every woman is in a position of weakness and must be protected by courts and other authorities. I resent the assumption made by our molestation-or-harassment laws that sex is evil, destructive, hurtful. All sexual coercion is repulsive, and I'm glad we have laws guarding us against it.  But coercion shouldn't just be assumed from the nature of an encounter and its apparent power dynamics.  Not all sexual relationships are or should be "equal."  Not all sexual desires are or should be "healthy." Not all power plays or sexual desires are black-and-white and simple to read. Sometimes we even want what we hate. Sometimes we tame and conquer our own demons through the partners we choose, and sometimes we choose as partners demons we hope to conquer and  tame. The great democracy of the body is that sex renders equal (and vulnerable) people of the most diverse levels and backgrounds. By trying to prevent all possible coercion, we risk losing a vast dimension of human existence, namely the language of our bodies-the thousand voices of bodies, which vary exquisitely from culture to culture and class to class and milieu to milieu, through which, endlessly, women and men ask and answer questions about each other, suggest, confess, touch, light up, and manifest wonder, admiration, tenderness, arousal, defiance, delight, life. And loss of sex in workplace and school and family may have tremendous ramifications in the 21st century, rendering our sex lives into desensitized, sterile, plebeian duties-nothing more. 
     Even though I was once raped under physical threat, I unequivocally feel capable of policing myself.  I can't conceive of resorting to lawsuit in response to a mating call. I also refuse to put a monetary value on a personal trauma-that would both trivialize it and exaggerate it beyond any 'real' proportion.  Sex is not pampering. That may be a movie version. Sex is our most important evolutionary task. I don't want to live in a world where life at school, on the job, in the neighbourhood, in the cafeteria, on the subway, on a daily basis, is robbed of spontaneous sensuality, and in return breeds secret aberration or compulsion. Loss is a central part of life. The unexpected is the beauty of life. Those are central lessons to be learned. There are no rules of moral conduct more important than mutual generosity and pleasure. And those we learn-and improve on-only by trial and error.