Intercourse, by: Andrea Dworkin - Feminish

eal hierarchy that nature or God created putting man on top.Society makes laws that say who will put what where when;and though folks keep getting it wrong, law helps nature out bypunishing those who are not natural enough and want to putthe wrong thing in the wrong place.The small, intimate society created for intercourse, onetime or many, the social unit that is the fuck in action, must beone that protects male dominance. Every man is vulnerable torebellion, pain, metaphoric castration and real physical anguish,at the point of entry. There is a sudden democracy ofvulnerability. Vulnerable means “ capable of being wounded, ”“defenseless against injury” 1The penis needs the protectionof the law, of awe, of power. Rebellion here, in intercourse, isthe death of a system of gender hierarchy premised on a sexualvictory over the vagina. The triumphant fuck is virtuallysynonymous with masculinity. The legitimacy of a man’s civildominance depends on the authenticity of his masculinity,which is articulated when he fucks. Masculinity itself meansbeing as differentiated from women as it is possible to be; andso the laws regulating intercourse in general forbid those sexacts that break down gender barriers and license those sex actsand conditions that heighten gender polarity and antagonism.The laws that say who to fuck, when, how, and anatomicallywhere keep the man differentiated in a way that seems absolute.Having power, one can break the law for pleasure; butthe law itself is the mechanism for creating and maintainingpower.Laws create male dominance, and maintain it, as a social environment.Male dominance is the environment we know, inwhich we must live. It is our air, water, earth. Laws shape ourperceptions and knowledge of what male dominance is, of how