Sexual Politics

Sexuality not only now dominates the culture, but demands for sexual freedom increasingly dominate the public political agenda. What Newsweek calls “the politics of sex” is much larger than just campaigns to recognize same-sex marriage, facilitate abortion, or admit women and homosexuals to military combat.  These debates form only part of a much larger trend, whose full dimensions we are only now beginning to understand.  Political scientist Stephen Baskerville argues that all this marks the emergence of a new political ideology – a radical agenda similar to socialism or nationalism but one that derives its claims to political power not from economic relations or ethnicity or race but from demands to control and change the terms of sexuality. Scholars and journalists have been very slow to analyze this new phenomenon in any depth or from a detached perspective and seem determined to avert their eyes.  Baskerville goes behind the slogans of both the left and right and examines the background and the trends that both the media and scholars ignore to offer a larger perspective on the significance of the new sexual radicalism.  He examines the impact not only on the family and other social institutions, but also on the machinery of government, the criminal justice system, and the global political environment.  Whatever the reader’s sympathies, the results are often surprising and sometimes disturbing.

Why is the American family in crisis? Some point to cultural forces such as pornography, popular culture, and secularization. Political scientist Stephen Baskerville argues that the most direct cause is the divorce regime: a government machinery that uses divorce and child custody to forcibly tear apart families, separate children from fit and loving parents, and turn ordinary law-abiding citizens into criminals in ways they are powerless to avoid.

Think you will never have to go through the horrors of divorce litigation because you don’t believe in it?  Think again.  Divorce is not necessarily something you agree to. Divorce can be forced upon you – entailing the loss of your children, expulsion from your home, confiscation of your property and earnings, and even jail without trial.  All this is now happening to law-abiding citizens who never agreed to a divorce or gave grounds for one – in ways completely beyond their control.

Nothing like this has ever before appeared in America. Driven by an extremist version of feminist ideology and highly bureaucratic in organization, the divorce machine now resembles the totalitarian regimes of the last century.  Yet its slow and subtle erosion of the private sphere of life is unprecedented.  Political correctness inhibits scholars and media pundits from confronting it, while clichés and euphemisms obfuscate the seriousness of government officials acquiring virtually absolute control over Americans’ private lives.

In this book, you will learn the shocking truth behind the clichés like "ugly divorce" and "nasty custody battle."  The family crisis originates in family law, a political underworld whose operations are shrouded in secrecy and jargon:

• What drives the rash of "parental kidnappings."
• Why the "deadbeat dad" is not only a myth but a hoax – the creation of government officials plundering parents whose children they first take away.
• What lies behind the hysteria over "domestic violence" and how this propaganda is destroying families, endangering children, and criminalizing innocent parents.
• The real causes of child abuse and how the child abuse industry distorts the truth.
• What allows family courts to operate as if the Bill of Rights simply did not exist.
• The "soft totalitarianism" being institutionalized in family law by organized feminism.

In this book, Dr. Baskerville exposes the greatest and most destructive civil rights abuse in America today. Throughout America and other Western democracies, family courts and Soviet-style bureaucracies ignore traditional protections for basic civil liberties, enter homes, take away children, and throw their parents in jail without trial.

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Öz: Sylvia Plath, yirminci yüzyıl gizdökümcü edebiyatının önde gelen isimlerinden biridir. Yaşamı ve yapıtları (özellikle Sırça Fanus adlı romanı ve Ariel şiirleri) farklı disiplinlerden pek çok araştırmacı tarafından incelenmiştir. Bu çalışmada bir nitel araştırma yöntemi olan doküman analizi aracılığıyla Plath'ın yapıtları arasında yalnızca güncelerine odaklanılmış ve bu güncelerdeki toplumsal cinsiyete ilişkin sorgulamalar çözümlenmiştir. Bu amaçla önce 1950'li yılların Amerikan toplumundaki ideal kadın tipi ele alınmış, ardından Plath'ın bu ideal kadın tipi gölgesinde yaptığı toplumsal cinsiyete ilişkin sorgulamalar irdelenmiştir. Yapılan incelemeler Soğuk Savaş dönemi Amerika'sında Plath'ın çatışan aşk tarzları, bakirelik/el değmemişlik tabuları, ikinci cins olma ve erkek yaşamına öykünme, kadının evlilik içindeki konumu, eş seçimi ve feminist ya da "kız kurusu" olarak anılma korkuları, cinsel politika, güzellik ve beden imgesi, evlilik ve kariyer çatışması, annelik ve çocuk sahibi olma ve aile içinde toplumsal cinsiyet rollerine dayalı iş bölümü konularında eleştirileri olduğunu ortaya koymuştur. Ayrıca Plath ailesinin hiyerarşik ve patriarkal yapısının yazarın toplumsal cinsiyete bakışı üzerinde kritik bir role sahip olduğu tespit edilmiştir.

Abstract: Sylvia Plath was one of the prominent figures of the confessional literature of twentieth century. Her life and works (especially her novel titled The Bell Jar and Ariel poems) have been examined by many researchers from different disciplines. This study only focused upon her journals through document analysis, a form of qualitative research method and her questionings on gender were analyzed in the light of her journals. To do this, firstly, the ideal woman's type of 1950's American society was addressed, then, the gender questionings of Plath were examined in the shade of this ideal woman image. Analysis showed that Plath has a lot of criticism related topics such as conflicting love styles, taboos on virginity, second sex and jealousy of male life, the position of women in marriage, the choice of spouse and fears of being calling a feminist or a spinster, sexual politics, beauty and body image, conflicts between marriage and career, motherhood and childbearing, and traditional gender roles within the family in American society during the Cold War. In addition, it was found that the hierarchical and patriarchal structure of Plath's family had a critical role in her viewpoint on gender.

The reality of the meaning of the phrase “Elephant Front Legs-Hind Legs” in modern days is based on the logic that an elephant always walk with its forelegs first, which has led to an interpretation that the “front legs”, or men, are the leaders, and “hind legs”, or women, are the followers. This research has thus had an intention to present a number of certain observations derived from empirical evidence so as to challenge the set of facts abovementioned and present another actuality disclosing that elephants do not walk with forelegs first but with the hind legs. Hence, the cultural code in perspective of sexual politics like “Elephant Front Legs” does not always translate into leadership, nor does “hind legs” into followership, but a usage of language that reflects the power structure of Thai society in a compromising manner between the front legs in the front that step behind and the hind legs at the back that step ahead.

SE HACEN COMENTARIOS INTRODUCTORIOS A LA OBRA DE LOS PSCICÓLOGOS, PSICOANALISTAS Y EDUCADORES SEXUALES GALLEGOS A SU LIBRO "LA LUCHA SEXUAL DE LOS ADOLESCENTES EN LA HIPERMODERNIDAD", DESDE UNA PERSPECTIVA FREUDIANA Y REICHIANA ADAPTADA AL MOMENTO CONTEMPORÁNEO.

The article puts French scholarship regarding gay and lesbian political participation into international (US and European) perspective, with a focus on homosexual movements, mobilization processes, and electoral behavior. The article draws lessons from the available evidence and identifies several gaps: while homosexual movements have been well covered internationally and to a lesser extent in France, the "micro" level of gay and lesbian individuals has been largely neglected. Individual politicization and voting behavior of LGBT people have received little attention in the US and are absent of European and French political science, delineating a large research agenda. Early view : https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41253-021-00151-z?wt_mc=Internal.Event.1.SEM.ArticleAuthorOnlineFirst&utm_source=ArticleAuthorOnlineFirst&utm_medium=email&utm_content=AA_en_06082018&ArticleAuthorOnlineFirst_20210530

This thesis investigates fetishism as a sexual identity which forms as an emerging fusion of
biological dispositions, experiences and one’s own interpretation of desire (Wilkerson 2007). This text examines the desire of three fetishists and follows their lived experiences through the method of life histories. These intimate and personal narratives are then analysed from a queer- and sex-positive perspective and trace how fetishistic desire influences the lives of the three protagonists. As desire in itself cannot be explained by science (Stekel 2013[1930]:76, Kaplan 1977:4, Regan & Berscheid 1999:1, Wilkerson 2007:52) a deconstructionist approach is then applied to broaden knowledge about diverse sexualities that reaches beyond the dichotomy of natural and not natural,
such as in the hegemonic heteronormative discourse. It is finally argued that Sexual Diversity
Awareness as a concept holds the potential to educate everyone about the diversity of sexual
expressions and could increase visibility and reduce the stigma on fetishism and other non-
normative sexualities.

This paper examines the diva as a site of conflict, a film image that represents a rupture in the status quo and that questions the boundaries of socially constructed identities. Taking as its inspiration film and art historian Angela Dalle Vacche’s interpretation of the modern, ‘anti-conformist’ Italian film diva (Dalle Vacche, 2008) rather than a model of classical Hollywood stardom and the diva as spectacle, the essay argues that the film diva can be said to represent the crisis and ambiguity at the heart of a global social modernisation. It also discusses various ways in which affect – the tension generated by the central character’s indeterminate identity and pathos – can be presented visually.
Matsumoto Toshio’s 1969 angura film Bara no soretsu, or Funeral Parade of Roses, presents Shinnosuke Ikehata, better known as Peter (ピーター Pītā) in the role of Eddie, a transvestite who performs as a drag queen in a notorious Shinjuku gay bar named ‘Genet’. Matsumoto’s film is a fusion of experimental avant-garde self-reflexivity and psychological drama that deliberately aims to produce a defamiliarising portrait of 1960s youth culture in Japan. Drawing on Matsumoto’s art historical writing and Anton Giulio Bragaglia’s 1911 manifesto on dynamism in the photographic image, the essay asks whether the subversive metamorphosis enacted in Funeral Parade of Roses can be understood better via recourse to aesthetic theories on affective or so-called indeterminate images.
After analysing the dynamic force of Eddie’s transformation against the upheaval of 1960s Japan, and Matsumoto’s attempts to ‘revitalise’ the production of the image in avant-garde filmmaking, the paper will conclude by summarising the subversive potential that the cinematic image of the diva presents for reinvention.

Welche Konsequenzen hat die (post-)koloniale Kritik für die westlich geprägten Gender Studies? Wie sieht eine (post-)koloniale Intervention aus, die weiße Frauen und queere Individuen als westliche, hegemoniale Subjekte sichtbar macht, jedoch nicht ihre Abgrenzungen gegenüber Heteronormativität und patriarchalen Strukturen verdeckt?
Dieser Band versammelt Beiträge aus unterschiedlichen disziplinären Feldern und gibt einen breit gefächerten Einblick in Ansätze transformativer Kritik, die Geschlecht und Sexualität als westliche Konzeptionen aufdecken und herausfordern.

Despite the many victories achieved by women during the past century, the resurgence of multiple forms of nationalism in Western countries has risen concern about the possibility of a regression in the matter of women's rights. On November 9 th , 2016, the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States of America opened a wound in the fight for gender equality and shocked a generation of young women who never had to question their freedom. In the wake of this radical change of direction in the American politics, on April 26 th , 2017, Hulu released the first season of The Handmaid's Tale, a tv series created by Bruce Miller and adapted from Margaret Atwood 1985's novel. Settled in a dystopian theocratic society, the series follows one of the handmaids, Offred, in her path from submission to full awareness and desire for freedom from the male-dominated system. Against the perspective of a Republican presidential mandate, "The Handmaid's Tale" arrives as a surprisingly strong wake-up call for women all over the world, raising the crucial question: is revolution still necessary? Through the exploration of the main characteristics of the series and with the support of some of the most relevant theories in feminist debate, this brief essay aims to highlight the important, while unexpected, role plays by Hulu's series in the awakening of a renovated necessity to feed the debate on female role in western democratic countries.

Eroticism and erotic literature have been, for most of history, legitimately considered of the male domain. Women are simultaneously barred from sexual agency and reduced to sexual objectification; but female writers enter this 'domain' with their own literary traditions of romance novels and slash fan fiction. When the patriarchal imagination places women and femininity at the feet of men, to be subjugated and used for sexual pleasure, and never to be pleased themselves; what can the female and queer imagination add to the re-imagination of sex scenes and erotica? How do the literary traditions of women attempt to negotiate with the sexual politics of objectification, consent, and representation?

Desde la cuadrilla de cazadores que conduce potentes coches y acaricia sus armas, hasta la comida familiar en la que la cantidad de carne servida es el baremo utilizado para determinar la calidad de la misma, las conexiones entre los valores patriarcales y la relación que tenemos con los demás animales aparecen, como mínimo, de forma intuitiva. La política sexual de la carne explora esas relaciones entretejiendo puntos de vista del feminismo, el vegetarianismo, la defensa animal y la crítica literaria. En ese recorrido nos muestra el concepto del referente ausente, el ciclo de objetificación, fragmentación y consumo y la superposición de imágenes culturales, y hace una aproximación histórica a las alianzas entre feminismo y vegetarianismo.

The article explores the impact of Kerouac’s instrumental use of rambling, direct and indirect styles in Tristessa (1960) on the literary project of the novella.
After an examination of the characteristics of the narrator’s voice – underpinned by an aesthetics of spontaneous prose – the analysis focuses on the occurrences of Tristessa herself, a character widely fantasised about throughout the narrative but who is also largely speechless. The article pinpoints the discrepancy in speech occurrences between Duluoz as the white male-subject and Tristessa as the exoticised female-object with regards to issues of race and gender. These stylistic choices allow a reinterpretation of the nature of Kerouac’s narrative project in Tristessa through a reformulation of its economy of desire.

Liquid Foundations—Debt, Default and the Limits of Epistemology e critique of epistemology has assumed an unusually prominent role in academic reection on the recent nancial crisis. As the consequences of the subprime debacle continue to unfold in scal crises of the state, austerity measures, currency wars, and mass unemployment, attention has turned to the role played by nancial models in predicting (and failing to predict) the economic risk inherent in complex nancial instruments such as mortgage-backed securities [MBSs], col-lateralized debt obligations [CDOs] and credit default swaps [CDSs]. Retrospective analyses have focused, in particular, on the failure of economic models to predict failure-the mass delinquency, that is, of subprime borrowers whose unantici-pated levels of default set o the chain of events that led to a full-blown liquidity crisis in the summer of. Since the AAA ratings assigned to CDOs had been based on sophisticated mathematical models of credit risk, it is inferred that critical reection on the nancial crisis must be concerned with economic knowledge, its limits, and the possibility of its reform Without a doubt, it was the assumptions of neoclassical nance and the ecient market hypothesis that underwrote the overwhelming certitude of economic knowledge during this period. For economists within this tradition, the liquidity of transactions is ensured by the fact that in perfectly competitive markets, full and complete information would allow each market participant to price and trade products at their correct value. Within this perspective, liquidity requires a certain standardization of knowledge about the future-the ability, that is, to oer an objective, mathematical evaluation of future risks.

This article examines the current state strategy of political homophobia used by the Russian government to create a sense of national identity by scapegoating Russian homosexuals as "foreign agents," reinforcing the power of the governing elite, and distracting people's attention from government misconduct.

Early medieval priestly campaigns against contraceptive magic and medicine, in theology and penitential books. "Diabolical drinks" and ligatura (magical knotting) for contraception, and also, the magic of male impotence.  The imperative to punish  "simulated virgins" while ignoring endemic rape of bondmaids  by masters.

This chapter studies Cypriot LGBTIQs’ intersectional politics amidst the socio-political environment within which these are articulated, marked by strong nationalistic discourses as well as tensions with European identity and belonging. Specifically, it examines the ways in which local and EU discourses about nationhood, gender, and sexuality shape dynamics of intersectionality. It does so by analysing how gender and sexual identities are formed and by questioning how these formations inform LGBTIQ movement politics in contentious contexts. The chapter employs a qualitative research design and thematically analyses empirical ethnographic data that includes interviews with Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot LGBTIQ participants. It marks intra-ethnic and inter-ethnic dynamics of in-group exclusions. The research argues that these exclusions are reinforced by local notions about ‘Europe,’ expressed through the ‘Europe/West-versus-the-Rest’ dichotomy. Nonetheless, it also finds that the successes of the Cypriot LGBTIQ movement have been based on opportunities afforded by ‘Europe’ and Europeanisation. Therefore, this chapter builds a theoretical and empirical framework for understanding the implications of understandings of nationhood, gender, and sexuality on LGBTIQ politics when the ‘Rest’ meets the ‘West/Europe.’

In diesem Artikel wird der Zusammenhang zwischen Nation, Geschlecht und Sexualität in Polen diskutiert und der Frage nachgegangen, warum dieser Zusammenhang gerade in polnischen rechten Diskursen so präsent ist. Wie auch in anderen Kontexten, gibt es in Polen unterschiedliche Spielarten des Nationalismus, die miteinander konkurrieren oder sich gegenseitig beeinflussen. In dieser Analyse rechter Geschlechterpolitik widme ich mich speziell dem durch Katholizismus beeinflussten primordialen Ethnonationalismus (vgl. Meyer Resende 2015). Der Katholische Nationalismus, der mit einer konservativen, durch katholische Moralvorstellungen geprägten, Geschlechterpolitik einhergeht, ist die derzeit (2019) hegemoniale Form des Nationalismus in Polen. Im Zentrum dieser Variante des Nationalismus steht eine familistisch (vgl. Notz 2015) geprägte Weltanschauung. In der Verbindung mit Nationalismus bezieht sich der Familismus keineswegs nur auf die heterosexuelle Kernfamilie, sondern auf rassistische Ideen über den Ursprung von Völkern (vgl. McClintock 44ff.). Die spezifisch familistische Prägung polnischer Nationalismen zeigt sich exemplarisch an der Geschlechterpolitik nach der Machtübernahme durch die Partei Recht und Gerechtigkeit (PiS ) im Jahr 2015. Der durch PiS nach der Machtübernahme durch die Partei Recht und Gerechtigkeit (PiS) im Jahr 2015. Der durch PiS eingeleitete politische Umstrukturierungsprozess, der u.a. zur Aufrufung des Artikels 7 der EU führte, umfasst nicht nur die Nationalisierung und Zentralisierung staatlicher Verwaltungsstrukturen, Institutionen und Medien (vgl. Sutkowski 2017), sondern perspektivisch auch die Bevölkerung des Staates selbst. Durch diverse staatliche Programme und Maßnahmen werden konservative und nationalkatholisch geprägte Wertevorstellungen und Lebensformen privilegiert sowie materiell gefördert.


Ramme, Jennifer: „O Mutter Polin, warne deinen Knaben!“ Zusammenhänge von Nation und Geschlecht am Beispiel rechter Sexualpolitik in Polen, in: Carina Book, Nikolai Huke, Norma Tiedemann und Olaf Tietje (hrsg.): Autoritärer Populismus, Verlag westfälisches Dampfboot, 2020, S. 108-123.

This dissertation takes-off from the empirical observation about the gross anomaly between the burden of HIV/AIDS epidemic and the amount of resources directed to tackle the problem both globally, and in India. Globally, HIV/AIDS with a 5 percent disease burden as measured by disability adjusted life-years consumed more than 25 percent of all health aid in 2007; and in India, with 0.3 percent prevalence rate, consumed about 18 percent of total health allocations in 2010. This dissertation explores the question, why the Indian state behaved in this particular way to contain the HIV/AIDS epidemic, whereas endemic diseases like diarrhea, dengue, infant and maternal deaths causing more mortality, and a collapsing health system received little or no attention of the state? Using social constructivist theories of the study of international relations, I argue that the Indian state’s behavior was shaped by a process of “norm socialization,” in which the state’s interest, preference, and behavior were reshaped by internalizing the principled ideas, and norms of powerful HIV/AIDS regimes. I argue that the interests and preferences of the Indian state were reconstituted from three directions: “from above,” “from within,” and “from below.” This dissertation identifies important actors at various levels and maps out the processes through which the Indian state’s preferences and behaviors were reconstituted to reflect the norms of the AIDS-regimes at the domestic level.

At the second level, this dissertation explores how norm socialization has affected two most important communities vulnerable to HIV/AIDS epidemic –– sex workers and gay men. In the first case, I examine collectivization of hitherto marginalized groups of prostitutes and their legal and political struggle of redefining prostitution as “sex work,” or “any other work,” and the overall implication of such a radical proposal on the Indian society in general. In the second case, I examine India’s queer rights mobilization and the struggle for civil and  political rights of sexually minority groups towards decriminalizing a 150-year-old statute on same-sex sexual relations. In conclusion I note that the international HIV/AIDS regimes and their norms were highly effective in reconstituting India’s national health priorities, and reshaping India’s domestic polity/ policy leaving some paradoxical effects on public health and creating contestation between state and civil society groups.

Abstract
This article focuses on the debate that culminated in the enactment of the law on  civil marriage for same-sex couples in Argentina, in 2010, centering on the religious pluralism that enabled religious actors to play as political forces favorable to sexual diversity and legal recognition. Facing a majority of studies on the influence of conservative religious and sexual politics, here we consider those religious positions of both evangelicals and Roman Catholics in favor with civil marriage for same-sex couples. The study is based on the systematization and analysis of secondary sources.

Resumen
El artículo se focaliza en el debate que culminó con la sanción de la ley de matrimonio civil para parejas del mismo sexo en Argentina en 2010, profundizando en qué consiste el pluralismo religioso que posibilitó que actores religiosos actuasen como fuerzas políticas favorables a la diversidad sexual y su reconocimiento legal. Ante una mayoría de estudios sobre lo religioso como influencia conservadora sobre la política sexual, aquí nos concentramos en las posiciones religiosas favorables al matrimonio civil de parejas del mismo sexo de evangélicos y católicos romanos en Argentina, en base a la sistematización y análisis de fuentes secundarias.

Resumo
O artigo centra-se no debate que culminou com a promulgação da lei do casamento civil entre pessoas do mesmo sexo na Argentina em 2010, aprofundando no que consiste o pluralismo religioso que possibilitou que representantes religiosos agissem como forças favoráveis à diversidade sexual e seu reconhecimento legal. Frente a muitos estudos referentes ao religioso como influência conservadora sobre a política sexual, aqui nos concentramos nas posições religiosas favoráveis ao casamento civil entre pessoas do mesmo sexo quer evangélicas, quer católicas romanas na Argentina, com base na sistematização e análise de fontes secundárias.

This article discusses the debate on sexism that flared up again as a consequence of the moral panic after the sexual assaults by young migrants and refugees during the New Year's Eve celebrations 2015/2016. I introduce the concept of ethnosexism in order to approach an existing yet currently aggravated conceptualization of migration as a 'sexual problem'. This adds an intersectional dimension to the concept of sexism. I then consider the 'sexually dangerous muslim refugee' as a figure of defense against migration and analyze its function in feminist and liberal attitudes for narratives of western superiority.

Dr Camilla Power (26th March, 2013) - Lunarchy: The original human economics of time. The Ecology, Cosmos and Consciousness Salon, The Institute of Ecotechnics, October Gallery, Bloomsbury, London. (Host and compère)

Scientific discourse rarely allows mention of the moon. The enlightenment’s rational tradition drawing from its Christian heritage in male-only theological colleges had problems with two things: 1) women; 2) the moon. Apparent from 'lunatics', 'moonshine', and 'looney' figures as regular patriarchal putdowns. Yet the question of what made us human cannot be solved without a focus on women, the moon and menstruation. African hunter-gatherer cosmology takes the lunar cycle as the crucial timeframe for ritual, sex and economic activities. The shared sources of this cosmology carry us back to earliest human symbolic culture, the very origins of art and ritual itself, over 100,000 years ago. These hunter-gatherer societies are among the most gender egalitarian on earth. But how does such egalitarianism work? Women especially assert power through their bodies collectively to resist any threat of male exploitation. As the moon waxes and wanes, the dynamic of power switches in more or less playful battles between the sexes. No one rules but the moon. Could lunarchy offer us a way to transform our lives and reclaim our revolutionary heritage as humans?

Sexual science has often been mobilized to advance progressive sexual rights agendas against conservative, religiously-driven political agendas. This chapter explores a different dynamic, where religious-conservative activists used sexual science to advance their ‘anti-homosexual’ campaign. We focus on the attacks on Kinsey in the US. While the historiography on religious conservatism has highlighted the centrality of religious/moralistic discourses, our analysis of textual sources (from archives of evangelical-political organizations and recently declassified FBI documents) shows that evangelical activists often foregrounded scientific arguments. Women activists played a particularly important role in this discursive battleground, as our political history of the attacks on Kinsey demonstrates.