I’ve Never Quibbled, If It Was Ribald

by Attila on September 29, 2004

Via Christophe comes this rather alarming piece in the Baltimore Sun, which suggests that the Bush Administration is going to be cracking down on smut. Now I would love it if they were planning on tackling smut spam, which is a different issue entirely: I despise the thought that my college-age neice and my grandmother in her 90s are to be subjected to disgusting mailings that promote kinds of sex that they don’t even know exists . . . and all couched in such a way as to make sex appear really dirty, and to imply that eroticism degrades women in a way it doesn’t men. Women being, I suppose, broken by their desires at the same time men are lifted up by same to become almost godlike. If the spammers are right, the best way for married boy-girl couples to resolve arguments is to simply have sex. This way the man wins, because the woman has betrayed the fact that she has a libido. At the same time, he’s proven himself to Have! A! Libido! The man wins, and the woman loses.

That’s not quite how it works in my household, oddly enough.

Anyway, my point is that the sex spammers must be crushed, because no one should be subjected to words and images in their in boxes that suggest they, their bodies, their urges—and all women—are ugly. Not unless they seek it out, in which case they should have a good time.

We need to remember prohibition, and the contempt for law that came about when laws were passed and enforced that ran against people’s philosophies and expectations.

For the most part, this is a terrible use of precious resources. I see that it’s a genuine crusade for Ashcroft, but I hope Bush keeps him on a leash. And I pray that it’s only window dressing, like the ill-fated constitutional amendment that was supposed to protect marriage from change—but really protected the President against the charge that he wasn’t fighting the culture wars he has little or no interest in.

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