Monday, January 10, 2011

Choosy Mothers Choose Lesbianism

I've been poleaxed by a lingering bug, and feeling unusually susceptible to depression, so I'm not up to reading right-bloggers' offensive defense of theodolite crosshairs and high capacity magazines, or watching mainstream media personalities distributing blame like they were passing out medals at the Special Olympics.  Fortunately, both Roy and the Hoosier Sage have already performed all the heavy flensing...

...so that leaves me to wander around in a bleary-eyed stupor and do a little desultory roadside rag-picking, like John Carradine in Satan's Cheerleaders.

Let's check in with mensnewsdaily, where non-man Denise Noe provides some timely un-news by exposing the connection between abortion and homo nups (spoiler alert: it turns out that same-sex marriage is actually just Plan B for otherwise straight men and women who can't figure out how to work a diaphragm.  Or, for that matter, Plan B™).
Gay Marriage and Abortion: The Surprising Link
Without question, the two most divisive social issues today are gay marriage and abortion. At first glance, they may seem disconnected since a gay relationship can’t lead to a pregnancy and subsequent abortion.
it can, however, (spoiler alert!) lead to the 1972 film Cabaret.
I suggest that this is precisely the link – and the reason most of those opposed to legal abortion also oppose gay marriage while legal abortion supporters often support gay marriage.
So let me get this straight...you're suggesting that people who believe women have the right to control their own bodies, also believe that gays and lesbians are entitled to the same civil rights as other Americans?  No offense, Denise, but I'd like to see the Venn Diagram.
Heterosexuality has a unique relationship with life creation, as gay marriage opponents invariably point out. However, they usually omit the corresponding truth that a unique relationship with life creation also means unique risks and even horrors.
I guess, but you might want to consider the possibility that you're doing it wrong.
No woman has ever shoved a knitting needle up herself as a result of a lesbian embrace. No woman has ever had a doctor rip a fetus out of her body because of lesbianism. No woman has ever made the wrenching decision to give up a baby that has grown in her body for nine months up for adoption due to a lesbian liaison.
I think lesbians should really emphasize the safety aspects of their orientation, with a series of OSHA-approved workplace posters.  For example...

Lesbianism:  It's Like a Hardhat For Your Uterus.
This is not to suggest that lesbian relationships are risk free. Like any romantic or sexual relationships, they are prone to conflict, jealousy and even abuse, violence and murder.
I don't know who Denise is dating right now, but whoever it is, I urge them not to be stingy when buying her Valentine's Day gift.
However, they don’t have the special, biologically based costs for women that heterosexuality does.
Heterosexual intercourse is like the Russian Roulette scene in The Deer Hunter -- and not just because of all the sweating and cursing.
The fact that lesbianism cannot lead directly to abortion might seem to indicate that those wanting to reduce abortion should applaud it. Usually they oppose it. Why is that?
Oh, wait -- I know this one!  Because opposition to reproductive rights is less about  reducing the absolute number of abortions, and more about an overall icky attitude toward sex and girl parts?
The more brutal the consequences for women are of an unplanned pregnancy, the more attractive lesbianism might be to them –
You could take a trip to the contraceptive aisle at CVS, but it's more convenient to just find another gal and settle down in a Boston Marriage.
and the greater the societal fear that they will choose sexual partners that will not lead them to replenish the species and the culture.
And yet the Catholic Church would rather women turn to lesbianism than the Pill.  Either the Vatican hierarchy doesn't care about the brutal consequences of unplanned pregnancies, or the most frequently Tivo'd show in the Lateran Palace is The L Word.
Thus, it may appear important to put in cultural incentives for women to choose the more dangerous heterosexuality because the same form of sex that leads to reproductive horrors also leads to the reproduction necessary for species and cultural survival.
Nowadays a "cultural incentive" most often means "a chance to appear on reality TV," so perhaps the few, proud women who agree to brave the dangers and horrors of heterosexuality could be rewarded with a spot on one of those Discovery Channel shows like Dirty Jobs, or Deadliest Catch.  In fact, Sarah Palin's Alaska probably would have lasted longer if it had featured the former governor giving birth in the wilderness, severing the umbilical cord with her teeth, and eating the placenta before it attracted wolves.
It is no coincidence that the stigma toward lesbianism declined during the era of the Pill, legal abortion, and the demise of the home for unwed mothers. As the consequences of heterosexuality became less devastating, the fear that women would turn to each other rather than risk sex with men automatically diminished.
And yet, you look around, and there seems to be more lesbians than ever!  Someone really needs to tell Ellen about the Pill.
While lesbianism has been stigmatized, it has not usually been as persecuted as male homosexuality. I would suggest that the reason for this is also linked to reproduction. For much of human history, overpopulation was not a concern. The concern, as noted, was with the continuation of the species. Male sperm released in homosexuality is “lost” to its reproductive mission.
Yeah, that's undoubtedly the motivation for gay-bashing: squandered sperm.
By contrast, a woman who has engaged in lesbianism is no less likely to be impregnated than a woman who has not — if she also engages in heterosexuality. Male homosexuality per se appears a threat while lesbianism becomes a threat only if it is exclusive.
So lesbians aren't exclusively attracted to women, they're just fooling around with their girlfriends until the Pizza Delivery Guy shows up to impregnate them.

But aren't men who've engaged in gay sex no less likely to impregnate a woman, or are we pretending that no one's dad was ever in the Navy?
The stigmatization of same-sex relations in both genders occurs because there is a sense that, to the extent that such relationships may be the result of choice, that choice is all-too-attractive from the individual’s viewpoint while threatening the ability of society to perpetuate itself.
Gay people:  Please help us prevent human extinction by making the less attractive choice.
In discussing the issues of gay marriage and legal abortion, it is important to realize their connections in fears about reproduction.
So anyway...Lesbianism.  It Does A Body Good.

15 comments:

D. Sidhe said...

Wow. I haven't had straight sex in a while, but it wasn't *that* long ago, and I know I enjoyed it. Did you people change the rules or something? Now it has to involve HORROR?

Anyway, the joke's on her. The only reason I'm bi is so I can have the occasional abortion and abortion shower. I can't resist the party games. Pin the Vacuum on the Fetus, Mangled Baby Part Match, Diaper Money Spending Spree. And the food? To die for.

You know, for a straight woman, Denise seems kind of fucked up about heterosexuality. I suggest therapy or soul searching or both.

Nowadays a "cultural incentive" most often means "a chance to appear on reality TV,"

As per tradition, I hate you, Scott.

Unknown said...

Wow, just..wow. It is truly astonishing how phucked up some peoples thinking gets! With your brutal description of Sarah Palin giving birth to add to the mix I'm totally going to have to head off for a Unicorn chaser.
As always Scott, a masterful dissection.

77south said...

Well, I'm sold. How do I become a lesbian?

Bogie said...

There's also the toaster premium, which didn't exist in olden days.

heydave said...

OK... Wow^3 (that's "Wow" cubed for you non-nerds)

I strongly suspected that your average, everyday woman just might not be up to "risking" sex with me, as evidenced by, well, the evidence, but I hadn't realized that the mere potential of a thrill ride at Dave Land would be viewed as so devastating.

Sorry ladies; I will try to tone things down and eliminate more of the danger from now on.

James Briggs Stratton "Doghouse" Riley said...

Okay, so it's a little rough; at least someone has finally begun to unravel the puzzling connection between the desire to control other people's sexual behavior and the desire to control other people's reproductive systems. I'd always heard there was some mysterious collection of Bronze Age fables, selectively quoted, involved, but I guess that now, like Laplace, I have no need of that hypothesis.

Not to say the task remaining before us is not daunting, but perhaps one day, in the lives of our own children, someone will discover some connection (which we at our present state of understanding cannot even imagine) linking opposition to gay marriage and fear of lesbians with obsessive firearms display, leading to our first theoretical understanding of Dr. Mike Adams, and perhaps--it's only a dream--the first steps toward a Grand Unified Theory of Dirty-Icky-Peepee-Mommy-Jesus-Reagan.

D. Sidhe said...

Man, Bogie, I know. In the olden days you had to wait till she moved in with you on the second date to get the toaster, and if you ever broke up, she could take it back. On the plus side, it was generally a four slicer.

Anon said...

While lesbianism has been stigmatized, it has not usually been as persecuted as male homosexuality. I would suggest that the reason for this is also linked to reproduction.

OTOH, you could also reasonably suggest that the reason for this is linked to the grinding oppression of sexism throughout most of history and around the world to this day, such that most women HADDA/HAFTA get with da menz for economic and social survival, regardless of our personal preferences to the contrary.

These people keep revealing so much about themselves without even realizing it -- Denise here plainly thinks of het sex as a duty at best, and a horror at worst. Wake up and smell the liberation, Denise!

Angry Geometer said...

There's no "I" in uterus.

heydave said...

There's no "team" in uterus, either, although I would sign on if they were accepting new members (hehe).

sorry, I'll behave now.

Bogie said...

While Octomom was just short of a baseball team in her uterus, she did have a basketball team with 3 subs. Michelle Duggar, however, has had two baseball teams and an umpire in her uterus (as of this morning).

Bill S said...

At this point, she could probably squeeze a Buick outta the thing.

papa zita said...

There's no "I" in uterus.

But there is in uteri.

David in NYC said...

Male homosexuality per se appears a threat while lesbianism becomes a threat only if it is exclusive.

Huh?

So, let me get this straight (no pun intended): male homosexuality is a threat, whether or not it is exclusive, but lesbianism not so much? In other words, bi women can perpetuate the species, but not bi men?

I think I must have been absent the day this was covered. Is it going to be on the test?

WV: hestiva. The Hebrew version of Festivus.

Li'l Innocent said...

You guys are wonderfully funny. But I'm not so much (too tired from shoveling white crystalline matter, in quantity), so I'll just observe that this screed of Miz Noe's is an interesting contribution to the Mystery of Why Conservatives Think People Really Want to Go Gay. This mystery puzzled me for a long time - their insistence, for instance, that legalizing samesex marriage is, ipso facto, a threat to hetero marriage. How come, I wondered. But then I grasped that they view (particularly) male homosexuality as being an endless parade of orgasms with NO PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY involved at all. Or to put it another way, no woman to support, no kids to look after. Denise's views of both lesbianism and the woman's experience of straight sex is the female side of that coin. It's wonderfully consistent, really. There's no desire, no romance, no sweetness, no equal sharing in their view of the heterosexual relationship. Even, or especially, for married couples, there's just oppressive responsibility for The Breadwinner, alleviated only by the respect he must be accorded as Paterfamilias, and gynecological risk and pain for the Little Woman, alleviated, presumably, by being Protected and Supported.

No wonder they think everyone would, deep down, choose endless orgasms.

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