There has been much brouhaha made over a recent article by right-wing columnist and blowhard Dennis Prager titled, "When a Woman Isn't in the Mood: Part I".
This morning bonedad got up on the rec list with a hard punching title (and diary), "Dennis Prager Endorses Marital Rape"; followed this afternoon with Yoseph 52's objection to bonedad's use of the "R" word in, "No, Prager is NOT Advocating Marital Rape"
I think it fair to say that both diarists think Dennis Prager to be a right-wing asshat, and I find myself in agreement. However, reading through the comments, I noticed that one interesting piece of analysis wasn't really made: Prager is Jewish, and in a strange way he's advocating for sexual equality! Unfortunately, this irony will be lost on what can be presumed to be his overwhelmingly conservative Christian audience. Indeed, in reading the actual text of the article, I doubt Prager himself wrote it with the intention of attempting to shatter thousands of years of traditions.
Confused? So am I a little, but after the jump I'll do my best to explain.
Dennis Prager is one of those asshats we all love to hate. Liberal, Observant Jews like myself, or liberal Jews in general, detest him and his ilk for gaining fame by pandering to the religious right. He and his are the types who write and speak to an audience who only "love Israel" because it will be the supposed site for the mass-conversion of the Jewish people to the "truth" of Christ, followed by the rapture and other fun events detailed in the Book of Revelation. I wonder how an Orthodox Jew, as Prager claims to be, can stomach doing this. The only thing I've been able to come up with is that he is playing a "long con" against the Rapturist Right, stringing them along to support Israel with the knowledge that what they REALLY hope for will never happen.
With this in mind, it's time to explain what I mean when I said "sexual equality."
You see, what is little known among non-Jews (and even among a good deal of Jews) is how Judaism views human sexuality. Many people take the notion of "Judeo-Christian values" to think that Orthodox Judaism is the same or similar to the Victorian and/or misogynistic notions of the Religious Right; i.e. that the wife's "duty" to the husband is sexual gratification and that in order to honor her holy vows she must submit her body to him at his each and every request. You may be interested to know that this is nearly opposite to Orthodox Jewish thought on the subject.
In Talmudic tradition, there are 3 "rights" that a woman has when she is married that her husband must provide to her: Food, Shelter, and Sex. That's right, Jewish tradition obligates the husband to please his wife sexually as part of the marriage contract. It also must be pointed out that the husband does not have the same right. To be fair, a wife withholding sex, or using it to manipulate her husband, is still a big no no and grounds for divorce, but the woman has less of a burden of proof should she want to divorce her husband on the grounds of a bad sex life. There's lots of other fun facts in Jewish traditions of marital sex, like a husband returning from a business trip being obligated to please his wife before she is obligated to prepare a meal for him, but I digress.
So Prager, in saying that a wife should have sex with her husband at his asking when she is otherwise inclined (but not forced) to, is also saying, "Hey! This thing in Orthodox Judaism that says I should put out for my wife? It should go both ways!" However, I don't think that Prager is consciously claiming this as his message. It would be one thing if this was published in an Orthodox Jewish journal of Talmudic discussion, albeit with less obvious misogyny and a little bit more gender-inclusive narrative.
Its obviously not, though. Politically conservative Jews number less than 1/4 of 1% of Americans, based on my wholly unscientific guesstimate (John McCain received only 22% of the Jewish vote). This leads me to believe that, statically, Prager's audience are comprised of the types of Right Wing Christians who need "Judeo" validation of their "Judeo-Christian" misogyny. One can only conclude that Prager, while not advocating rape, is not advocating marital bliss to his target audience, either.