SEXIS WRONG

marriage as subverting the American way of life. Why are requests
to put on sale safe medication to prevent conception
stonewalled? It’s hard to separate sincere conviction about
when life begins from the fact that Christian fundamentalists
are a powerful voting block.
As long as we equate sex with dirt, weakness, and guilt, a
powerful weapon exists for demagogues who not only flatter
supporters that they are disciplining their own erotic instincts
correctly, but also advertise the values they profess as essential
to living a good life. Political “architects” will exploit
these identity politics to make life a contest between us and
them, between “people of faith” (who don’t have to reveal
their own sexual desires) and “liberals” or “atheists,” whose
coarseness needs to be investigated and restrained. Phyllis
Schlafly has said that the chief problem for the country today
is whether “we as a people acknowledge that God exists.” 34
Those who do not are pro-abortion, like the state and federal
“secularist” judges who “hate religion” and the Healthy Marriage
initiative. Equally degenerate, according to this kind of
discourse, are the liberal Democrats who want to keep them
on the bench so they can keep abortion legal, prevent the
“Intelligent Design” doctrine from being taught, and help pornographers
keep the Internet unsafe for children to access.
Us vs. them. Similarly, patriotism is equated with fighting terrorists,
and wars of choice with removing tyrants. It’s infuriating,
but hey, it’s worked so far.
Endnotes
1. Rich, Frank. “My Hero Janet Jackson.” New York Times, 15 Feb 2004:
Arts Section. 2. Carr, David. “When a TV Talking Head Becomes a Talking
Body.” New York Times, 25 Nov 2004: E1, E5. 3. Tucker, Cynthia. “Now on
FOX: Immoral Values.” Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 2 Jan 2005. 4. Davis,
Richard H. [McCain’s campaign manager in 2000]. “The Anatomy of a
Smear Campaign.” Boston Globe, 21 Mar 2004; Kerry-Edwards 2004.
“Bush Waged Nasty Smear Campaign Against McCain in 2000.” Press
release, 21 Aug 2004; McGrory, Mary. “Dirty Bomb Politics.” Washington
Post, 20 Jun 2003: A23; Moore, James. “Smear Artist.” Salon.com, 28
Aug 2004; Moore, James, et al. Bush’s Brain. John Wiley & Sons, 2003;
Siddall, Eric. “How Karl Rove Uses Vietnam Against Kerry.” The Simon
[www.thesimon.com], 2 Aug 2004. 5. Folsom, Robert. “Porn and the
Bear Market.” Bearmarketcentral.com, 27 Sep 2004. 6. Rich, Frank.
“The Year of Living Indecently.” New York Times, 6 Feb 2005: sec 2, pp
1, 7; Chasnoff, Debra. “Bluster over TV’s ‘Buster’ Only Splits Us Further
Apart,” Houston Chronicle, 4 Feb 2005. 7. Eliot, Marc. Down 42 nd Street:
Sex, Money, Culture and Politics at the Center of the World. Warner Books,
2001: 254. 8. Alexander, H.M. Strip Tease: The Vanished Art of Burlesque.
Knight, 1938: 113; Senelick, Laurence. “Private Parts in Public Places.”
In William R. Taylor, ed. Inventing Times Square. Russell Sage Foundation
Publications, 1991: 335; Shteir, Rachel. Striptease: The Untold History of
the Girlie Show. Oxford University Press, 2004: 92-93,170-76. 9. “People
v. Moss – Undecided,” p. 7, File no. 391, Morris Ernst Papers, Humanities
Research Center, University of Texas at Austin; op cit., Senelick: 337;
Friedman, Andrea. Prurient Interests: Gender, Democracy, and Obscenity in
New York City, 1909-1945. Columbia University Press, 2000: 83-90. 10.
“Report on the Secondary Effects of the Adult Use Establishments in
the Times Square Area,” Times Square BID, 1994: 12-4, 37-9. 11. For
the responses of lawyers for the sex shops who appealed the zoning
regulations on First Amendment grounds, see Traub, James. The Devil’s
Playground: A Century of Pleasure and Profit in Times Square. Random
House, 2004: 194; “Lawyer for Sex Shops Predicts Failure of Mayor’s
Crackdown,” New York Times, 27 Mar 2001: 97; “Court KO’s Closing of
XXX Shop,” New York Daily News, 21 Dec 1999: 6. For a discussion of
the complex racial and ethnic groups making up the “community” of
late-twentieth-century Times Square, see Kornblum, William, and Terry
Williams. “Methodological Notes for a Times Square Field Station,” in
Robert McNamara, ed. Sex, Scams, and Street Life: The Sociology of New
York City’s Times Square. Prager, 1995. Volume I of the New York State
Urban Development Corporation’s “42 nd Street Development Project:
Final Environment Impact Statement,” Aug 1984, Section 10 contains
a large selection of pro and con comments to the 1984 Project by academics,
city planners, representatives of neighborhood associations,
and spokespeople for concerned businesses. 12. Op cit., Eliot: 245-7;
Sagalyn, Lynne B. Times Square Roulette: Remaking the City Icon. MIT
Press, 2001: 346-9. 13. Gilfoyle, Timothy. “Policing of Sexuality.” In
William R. Taylor, ed., Times Square: Commerce and Culture at the Center
of the World. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996: 317-28. 14. The best
book on what was lost—and why—by Disneyfication is by a frequent
customer of the movie theaters of the old Deuce: Delany, Samuel. Times
Square Red; Times Square Blue. New York University Press, 1999. 15.
More accurately, the entertainer formerly known as Marky Mark, now
the fine actor Mark Wahlberg. 16. Op cit., Sagalin: 343-4. 17. Op cit., Rich,
“Year”: 7. For Seduction of the Innocent and the public response to it,
see Gilbert, James. A Cycle of Outrage: America’s Reaction to the Juvenile
Delinquent in the 1950s. Oxford University Press, 1986: 91-108. 18. Report
of the New York State Joint Legislative Committee to Study the Publication
of Comics. Williams Press, 1955: 22. 19. US Senate, Committee on the
Judiciary, Subcommittee to Investigate Juvenile Delinquency. Hearings
on Juvenile Delinquency (Comic Books), 83 rd Cong., 2 nd Sess., S. Res. 190
(Washington, DC: GPO, 1954). See Gilbert: 143-61. 20. Sabin, Roger. Adult
Comics: An Introduction. London: Routledge, 1993: 157-70, 251-4. 21. Ibid.:
166. 22. Rolfe, Dick, “Wal‐Mart Sells ‘Sanitized’ Music, Film‐Censorship
or Customer Service.” The Dove Foundation, Dec 1996; Hoffman,
Hank. “Wal-Mart Blues.” Sonoma County Independent, 9 Jan 1997. 23.
de Grazia, Edward. Girls Lean Back Everywhere: The Law of Obscenity and
the Assault on Genius. Vintage, 1993: 502-12. 24. Rich, Frank. “Hollywood
Bets on Chris Rock’s ‘Indecency,’” New York Times, 27 Feb 2005. 25. The
Senators are Sam Brownback (R‐KS), Joe Lieberman (D‐CT), and John
McCain (R‐AZ); the Representatives are Tom Delay (R‐TX) and Fred
Upton (R‐MI). See Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
“Addicted to Porn: Members of Congress Accept Contributions from
Porn Purveyors.” www.citizensforethics.org, 10 Mar 2005. 26. In The
Flynt Report, 4.1 (1999). 27. The Archives of the City of New York District
Attorney’s records have a large file on the case: ACCN#93-39, shelf collection
130218. There were numerous newspaper and magazine articles
on the case. Some relevant ones are “Decision Reserved on Jelke Press
Ban.” New York Times, 20 Feb 1953: 14; “Bail Denied Jailed Jelke.” New
York Times, 3 Mar 1953: 22; “Jelke Gets 3-6 Years on Vice Conviction.”
New York Times, 28 March 1953: 1, 243. Jelke was Minot Jelke, heir to
a family oleomargarine fortune, but not old enough to receive money
from it when he was involved in the pimping. The chief witness, Pat
Ward, subsequently attempted a career in show business but failed.
The other agent to be convicted, and sentenced to one year in prison,
was Ray Daviani. No callgirls were sentenced. 28. Paynter, Susan.
“We’ve Waited Long Enough for the ‘Morning after Pill’,” Seattle Post-
Intelligencer, 13 Apr 2005; Schultz, Connie. “Hard to Swallow Objections
to Pill,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, 18 Dec 2003. 29. Ahrens, Frank. “FCC Head
Downplays Regulation,” Washington Post, 6 Apr 2005. 30. “Know Your
Enemies,” Mass Mic: Preserving Free Expression in Music [www.massmic.com].
31. “Prepared Statement of Senator Joe Lieberman Media
Research Forum....” Digital Kids [www.digital‐kids.net]. 32. Brooks,
David. “Public Hedonism and Private Restraint.” New York Times, 17 Apr
2005: 14 (Op-Ed section). 33. Op cit., de Grazia: 612-6. 34. Ridgeway,
James, “Mondo Washington: Stalin to the Rescue.” Village Voice, 13-19
April 2005: 24; Milbank, Dana. “And the Verdict on Justice Kennedy Is:
Guilty.” Washington Post, 9 Apr 2005: A3.
THERE HAS BEEN NO SEXUAL REVOLUTION 315