Loose Women, Lecherous Men (18 page)

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Authors: Linda Lemoncheck

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stigmatization and marginalization of sexual deviance. According to sex radicals, sexual minorities need to reclaim their sexual freedom to pursue what is erotically pleasurable for them. Therefore, a sex radical feminist claims that feminism should actively promote the kind of sexual agency and self-definition for women that will maximize women's sexual pleasure and satisfaction, especially when women's sexuality deviates from the acceptable norm. It is contended that radical feminism is properly placed to challenge socially respectable categories of sexuality as a means of transforming the repressive sexual climate of patriarchy. This is one reason that some sex radicals describe themselves as "sex positive" feminists and regard feminists suspicious of women's sexual exploration as "sex negative" feminists who would ironically join more conservative moralists in condemning all but the most narrow band of sexual behavior. From a sex radical perspective, feminists should demand that fully consenting partners whose sex is neither exploitative nor abusive have the opportunity to practice whatever gives them sexual satisfaction. From this view, women's liberation is liberation toward a plurality of sexual pleasure, exploration, and agency, limited by the requirements of mutual desire within the relationship and of respect for the sexual preferences of others.
11
Many feminists have avoided using expressions such as "sex positive" to refer to feminists debating women's sexual liberation, since cultural feminists would regard themselves as "sex positive" feminists in virtue of their insistence that women's sexuality not be infused with the oppressive power dynamics of patriarchy. Chris Straayer reminds us that the sex radical's "sex positivity" was built on a (sex positive) feminist platform shared by cultural feminists, a platform of sexual agency and self-definition for all women. Thus, Straayer contends that ''the current ['sex positive'] sexual rebellion . . . is a
feminist
sexual rebellion of benefit to and properly credited to 'both sides'" (Straayer's italics).
12
Indeed, both cultural and sex radical feminists would agree that behavioral norms in patriarchal society serve to reinforce the male power and privilege of the status quo. Feminists of both groups would also contend that since such privilege is in large part determined by men's sexual access to women, any deviation from the sexual norms specified by a patriarchal ideology will be particularly threatening to the stability of social institutions dependent on women's sexual compliance. The relevant questions for a feminist philosophy of sex that explores issues of sexual deviance can be summarized as follows: is sexual deviance yet another instance of the physical and psychic corruption of an oppressive patriarchy? Or does conceiving of sexual deviance as patriarchal victimization itself constitute the persecution of an oppressed minority, no less repressive than the patriarchy from which feminists would liberate ourselves? Is power so male-identified as the "power-over" of dominance and submission that its manifestation in sex always constitutes an abuse of women? Or can power in sexual relations be a positive and pleasurable "power-with" sexuality that can liberate eroticism for both women and men under patriarchy?
This chapter pursues the strategy begun in chapter 2, a strategy in which I use the dialectical and contextual perspective of the "view from somewhere different" to negotiate the tensions between conflicting feminist perspectives. In what follows, I offer a conceptual analysis of the expression "sexual perversion" by contrasting the "normal" with the "perverse" in a variety of contexts. This variety suggests that the
 
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expression "sexual perversion" is heavily weighted with negative normative content, such that questions of whether and how to value sexual perversion become moot. Such questions are essential, however, if we are to take seriously the sex radical's claims that at least certain forms of cross-generational and sadomasochistic sex are not only aesthetically pleasurable but also morally unobjectionable and profeminist. Instead of attempting to define necessary and sufficient conditions for sexual perversion, an approach found in much of the contemporary philosophical literature on the subject, I propose to replace expressions such as "sexual perversion" and "sexual norm" with the less evaluatively charged expression of "sexual difference,'' consistent with the perspective of the "view from somewhere different" in chapter 1; we can then "world"-travel to both a cultural feminist's and a sex radical feminist's social location without the bias of superiority or the assumption of absolute truth, in order to investigate their claims about the pursuit of sexual pleasure.
Proceeding from this analysis, I describe and evaluate the debate over three types of sexual difference of particular concern to both cultural feminists and sex radical feminists: man/boy love, butch/femme sexual role-playing, and lesbian sadomasochism. This exploration reveals some fascinating similarities between the two feminisms concerning the goals of a feminist sexuality. I also contend that their ideological differences can be used to expand our understanding of the complexity of women's sexuality only if we dispense with the oppositional character of the debates in favor of reading them in terms of the dialectical relation between gender and sexuality described in the previous chapters. The discussion then expands on the feminist sexual ethic of care respect introduced in chapter 2, an ethic that can accommodate both cultural and sex radical feminists' concerns about sexual difference in women's lives and that reflects the advantages of regarding a feminist philosophy of sex from the "view from somewhere different." This feminist sexual ethic can then be used throughout the remainder of the book to identify and explore further controversial issues in women's sexuality.
Deviance, Difference, and Otherness
The typical conceptual analysis of sexual perversion in the contemporary philosophical literature defines perversion as that which sexual desire or sexual relations are
not
: if sexual desire is the desire for interpersonal or reciprocal sex, perverse sex is
truncated
or
incomplete
sex. If sexual desire is the desire for successful communication, perverse sex is a
breakdown
of such communication. If sexual relations are reproductive relations, then perverse sex is a
failure
of reproduction.
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Philosophers tend to justify and distinguish such analyses by what they capture about sexual perversion that alternative definitions do not. I shall argue, however, that each such analysis tends to repeat the error of its rivals by delineating some set of necessary and sufficient conditions for sexual perversion that inevitably fail to capture the variety of its uses. Furthermore, making perverse sexual desire the
contradiction
of sexual desire (complete/incomplete, successful communication/unsuccessful communication, reproductive/not reproductive, p/not p) only makes sense if perversion is opposed to the
norm
or the
natural
in sex, as in normal sex/not normal sexotherwise
perverse
sexual desire is simply
not
sexual desire.
 
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My claim is that while philosophers have argued that norms can be merely statistical and that what is natural is not necessarily what is good, the concept of perversion is, to use Mortimer Kadish's phrase, "invincibly pejorative."
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For this reason its use is charged with negativity despite attempts either to remove its normative content altogether or to enhance its value over the normal. The former strategy is reminiscent of the "view from nowhere," in which conceptual analysis is blind to the bias of social location, while the latter reflects the "view from somewhere better," which replaces one oppressive normative framework with another. I shall argue that those philosophers who contend that they do not equate the natural with the good in their conceptual analyses of perversion either fail to provide a substantive account of sexual perversion or fail to undermine the notion that natural or normal sex is in some way better than perverse sex. I claim instead that the concept of perversion understood from the "view from somewhere different" is a socially situated concept designed to stigmatize and marginalize those who do not practice the sex deemed normal by the status quo. As such, perversion constitutes a devalued form of sexuality produced, according to such writers as Michel Foucault, by the power of those who define the norms of sexual behavior for the institutional regulation and social control of sexuality.
15
However, rather than redefining what counts as normal sex by replacing one power structure with another, I would replace the notions of sexual normality and perversity altogether with a notion more consistent with a dialectical and contextual relationship between gender and sexuality, since this relationship, I have argued, better represents the sexual complexity and diversity in women's lives. This reading will allow me to develop a concept of sexual difference that incorporates both so-called normal and perverse sexuality into a larger schema for valuing the diversity of human sexuality.
By suggesting that the concept of sexual perversion is weighted with negative normative content, I am not suggesting that perverse sex is in fact bad sex. Such a suggestion would limit any discussion of sexual perversion to the perspective of the "view from somewhere better," whose perception of superior location makes all others inferior, or to the "view from nowhere," whose truths are unequivocal and universal. My point is that if we want to investigate the normative value of sexual perversion from the "view from somewhere different," we cannot beg the question of
whether
sexual perversion is negative by being required to assume that such sex
is
somehow negative. Yet in a patriarchal culture whose sexual norms are designed to reinforce a heterosexist status quo, the concept of sexual perversion is necessarily Other to man's Self: not merely different but
deviant
, not merely an alternative but an
aberration
. How, then, are we to understand the claims of a sex radical feminist that certain so-called sexual perversionsman/boy love, butch/femme sexual role-playing, and consensual lesbian sadomasochismare not only pleasurable for those who choose to engage in them but are consistent with, even promote, feminist values? My solution is to jettison the notion of perversion in favor of a notion of sexual difference that respects the bias of social location without assuming the superiority of the normal.
My strategy in this section is threefold: first, I will contrast linguistic uses of the term "normal" with that of the term "perverse" to reveal the variety of its uses in the language. This variety will help us name some of the sexual preferences or lifestyles commonly referred to as perverse and suggest a way of thinking about sexual per-
 
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version that explains its derogatory use in the language. Second, I will show how several philosophers' normatively negative definitions of sexual perversion are troublesome because they presume too much about how to evaluate sexual perversion; or when philosophers offer normatively neutral definitions, I will show how their definitions fail to distinguish particular forms of sexual perversion from normal sex. Third, I will replace the expressions "sexual perversion" and "sexual normality" with the expression "sexual difference"; this replacement is consistent with the "view from somewhere different," which eschews the normative superiority of the "view from somewhere better'' as well as the normative universality of the "view from nowhere" in favor of a dialectical and contextual understanding of sexual preference. This understanding is one that appreciates both the oppressive and liberating ways that women may explore their sexuality; and it promotes an empathic reading of the particular social locations of persons from whose sexual preferences uniquely located but equally partial observers may differ. From this perspective, we can then explore some of the feminist debates over ways of practicing sexual difference.
What Does "Normal" Mean?
Consider the following uses of the term "normal":
1. Normal teenagers like rock 'n' roll.
2. It is normal for a married couple to value each other's companionship even after their sexual intimacy wanes.
3. Children have a normal curiosity about their bodies.
4. The bearded lady at the circus always draws a large crowd because everyone seems to be curious about people who are not normal.
5. I am back to normal after three days of fever.
Sentence 1 describes typical, average, or representative teenagers. This sense of "normal" is in contrast to the deviant, aberrant, odd, queer, weird, peculiar, eccentric, strange, or kinky. ("My fourteen-year-old brother only listens to classical music stations. He's
weird
!") Sentence 2 refers to an acceptable, unobjectionable, or tolerable marriage. Contrasted with this sense of "normal" is the unacceptable, objectionable, intolerable, abhorrent, disgusting, revolting, repugnant, or taboo. ("It would be intolerable for my husband to demand more sex than I wanted to give him.") Sentence 3 refers to pure, innocent, or untainted children. Such normality is in stark contrast to the corrupt, vile, degenerate, dirty, depraved, or defiled. Such depravity is often associated, again, with the abhorrence, disgust, and repugnance of the objectionable. ("Children who are victims of incest sometimes regard their own sexuality as dirty or defiled.") Sentence 4 describes an absence of the natural, the biological, or that which is definitive of the species. The bearded woman might be called "freakish," "monstrous," "grotesque," "twisted," "subversive," "unspeakable," or "unnatural." ("This circus spectacle is nothing but a freak show.") Similar reactions of horror and disgust that accompany the defiled also accompany the unnatural, inviting speculation that what persons regard as monstrous is also that which they regard as in some way tainted or corrupt. Sentence 5 refers to that which is in good health, physically well, psychologically stable, or sane. Such notions are contrasted with the sick, unhealthy, mentally ill, unstable, disordered, or pathological.

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