Earlier this year, Representative Anthony Weiner and New York City Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras stirred up controversy by demanding the sale and removal of a statue entitled Triumph of Civic Virtue. The statue is of a man stepping on the heads of two women, meant to demonstrate how society overcomes vice and corruption: by literally stomping on the heads of its enemy.
The depiction is actually a very traditionally sexist notion. Before women were portrayed as sexophobic virgins, they were the temptresses of mankind, whores who would corrupt and taint innocent manhood, opening a a gateway to satan. Eve caused Adam to lose his Eden, sirens lured Greek Sailors off their righteous paths of Greek imperialism, and commerce, and loose women and prostitutes lead innocent Christian men astray from their wives and families and to Satan's Den.
If you are a member of a minority group, it is likely that yours is a history of being, on one hand hypersexualized, or on the other, hyposexualized. Your race, ethnicity, religious group, or sexual orientation has likely been seen as a sexual threat on one hand, or sexually neutered on the other.
We are very familiar with the the sexual fetishization of African-American men. Most popularly, African-American men were portrayed as sexual predators of white women on the silver screen in The Birth of a Nation. That idea sent many innocent African-American men to their deaths at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan, and white vigilante groups like Haley Barbour's beloved White Citizens Councils, and more recently with the advent of DNA we've seen proof that many African-American men have been wrongly sent to prison for rape of white women. Too often white women have been able to (at least temporarily) pardon themselves of trouble by claiming they were victims of predatory African-American males, most notably, Susan Smith.
Where sexual conquest by a majority member is seen as something to celebrate, it is seen as a threat when perpetrated by a minority member. A man who has been promiscuous will be cheered and high-fived by friends, a female will be chided as loose and a whore if she has had multiple partners. A white man who has sex with a black woman will win acceptance. A black man who has sex with a white woman is "after all the white women."
I learned the last part in the most unfortunate way. When I was young and in the closet, I still described my sexual and romantic interests as women. So, when I had a sexual encounter with an African-American male, and discussed it with a friend, I said that "I had sex with a black woman," unsure of the reaction I would receive. The response made my stomach sick. I was told, "that's a good way to show a black woman her place." That was when I first became aware of how sexuality and oppression went hand in hand. I was twenty years old.
And the dominant group feels even more freedom to make gay rights about sexuality, or hypersexuality. After all, we are called "homosexuals." "See," I've been told a thousand times, "Gay is about sex!" Never mind that I am gay when I am cooking breakfast for my partner of 21 years. Never mind that I am gay while writing this diary. Never mind that I am gay when I am talking to my neighbor, or going to the movies, or on vacation to Mexico, Miami, Orlando, DC, or wherever. Employers who discriminate against me for being gay do so when I am NOT having sex. Nonetheless, we are often told that when we discuss gay rights, or fight against anti-gay bullying in the classroom, that we are "obsessed with sexuality." It's not polite to talk about my life or struggles because that often involves the difficulties of being gay in American society, and so we are told to keep silent because "now is not a good time to talk about sex."
And gay men are whores.
Gay men have a bunch of sex partners. Gay men will prey on your children. Gay men will hit on soldiers in the shower. Gay men are a sexual threat: to you, your children, your son, your husband. We threaten your civic virtue.
Sexuality is used as means of discrediting our opponents, whether they are political, social, work, or evil terrorists.
I saw it coming.
After the killing of Osama Bin Laden David Brooks penned a column for the New York Times. In it, he discussed Bin Laden's puritanism: how he would cover his eyes if an unveiled women walked into the room. True or not this is the sexual tactic of neutering your enemy. Show to the people that he is some kind of hyposexual freak who doesn't even want to peak at a woman. This works in the Western world. There's two types of enemies we have: the kind who has oppressive erections all day long, and the type that can't get it up. Bin Laden was the latter. But the latter doesn't have much resonance in the Muslim world, where it would be revered.
But I didn't think that was the end to it. Somehow I thought we'd hear more about Bin Laden and his sexual predilections. I feared we would get disinformation telling us that he was a closet homo (we still might). And so yesterday we find out that we not only "got Bin Laden" but we got his porn collection too. Is it true or is it disinformation? Now, mind you, I have no special liking of Bin Laden that I would want to spare his name any shame. But the killing of 3500 Americans was all I needed to hate the man. Just as I dread that we will soon get the "Bin Laden was a closet case" line soon, ostensibly making him a "homosexual terrorists" I hate what this part of the story does for porn lovers. Bin Laden is no longer a mass murdering thug, he's a porn perv. Now that might hurt his image in the Muslim world.
When all else fails the enemy is a whore. Whether the enemy are twin seductresses trying to drag down a virtuous male, an African-American male who dare look at a white woman, a gay man showering in the vicinity of a straight soldier, or the nation's arch enemy, the treatment is the same: there must be something sexually wrong here. What does it say about us that Women, Gays, African-Americans are worthy of no better treatment than the nation's preeminent foe?
It was said of the 9-11 attacks that they were an attack on civilization. That is what is depicted in the Triumph of Civic Virtue. That is what the artist was saying about women. It is what the Ku Klux Klan, and ardent segregationists said about African-Americans, and of attempts to integrate African-Americans into our society, and it is what is said about gays, and attempts to provide equality to gay people: this is a threat to civilization, it is a threat to our virtue.