POWER PLAY
Carla: “I think Weinstein, Spacey, et al have fundamentally destroyed those ideas.”
Carlos: “You can't say that.”
Carla: “I just did. 'Sexual assault is about power' is a pretty flimsy idea. I know how we got there but, even without knowing the history of the idea, it seems like a steaming pile of bull tweed.”
Carlos: “What do you mean?”
Carla: “I'm sorry, the most powerful and wealthiest men alive, and subsequently the most visible and exposed and obviously have the most to lose, too – and who are taller, larger, heavier, and very likely stronger than their victims – are not convincing themselves or anyone else of their power by jerking off in front of others or putting their hands down someone's pants, as is claimed. No.”
Carlos: “But why not? Clearly they're demonstrating their fearlessness and that they can get away with anything they like.”
Carla: “Sorry, I'm not buying it. Their celebrity means they're uncommonly vulnerable. Doesn't it? It's just plain to see that these actors and comedians and public figures rely upon public and co-worker approval for their livelihood, and to a degree that few others do. Compare Jian Ghomeshi or Louis CK with a software engineer, truck driver, or investment banker, an auto mechanic or dentist. These guys have every incentive to behave themselves and also have no reasonable expectation of hiding from or brushing off accusations. They're almost uniquely placed under an unusual and near-constant level of scrutiny; and, when they do something terrible, it would actually be very likely impossible to disappear as you or I might. There's also no reason to think they can start over anew in another industry, town, or country. None of this is true of my barista, accountant, or Uber driver.”
Carlos: “But they have all the resources, legal and public relations and fan support to deflect criticism.”
Carla: “Maybe. Doesn't seem to have worked for Bill Cosby or Harvey Weinsein – the most wealthy and influential of the lot. But we'll see I suppose.”
Carlos: “We will.”
Carla: “I just think, ultimately, all these explanations seem like such difficult, convoluted, pseudo-psychological sense-making where simple biological and chemical explanations exist.”
Carlos: “I don't know about that.”
Carla: “Just look at the origins of the idea that sexual assault is not about sex came from. Susan Brownmiller gifted this to the world in her book Against Our Will. It's just a tiny side note to the book. She says she got the idea from a Marxist professor of hers – who always framed absolutely everything in terms of power. That alone should raise eyebrows. It's an untested hypothesis posed as fact. This wasn't observed nor was it reasoned into being. It's just a feeling pressed out of a blind, pre-cut ideological mould. And it doesn't hold up against the slightest scrutiny.”
Carlos: “Well. I don't know. I think it makes sense. And I think it's a pretty standard belief among your peers.”
Carla: “Yes, the idea spread like wildfire. And it did because folks, most ridiculously, fear that if the motive for sexual assault is sexual desire then it may be argued, by the very confused, that it's natural or normal, or some such thing, or that it's therefore good – as though the naturalistic fallacy hasn't existed for eons, isn't obvious, or obviously wrong.”
Carlos: “That does seem like a legit fear though. You're not going to try and argue that people are rational or reasonable are you?”
Carla: “But you'd never say that because sexual assault is bad and should be eliminated it cannot have arisen through normal or natural means. It's not a supernatural phenomena. Is it?”
Carlos: “Of course not.”
Carla: “But this is how atrocious people's thinking is. Sexual assault is horrific, no matter the motive or origins, and we know we can reduce the incidence, because we have, and so we should do more of that. Period.
Carlos: “I agree”
Carla: “But lying to ourselves about it doesn't get us to where we want to be, personally or as a civilization. And repeating Susan Brownmiller's ideas only makes things worse. I get that it sounds good and is super useful as a tool.”
Carlos: “It is that.”
Carla: “Just to drive this home, and kill the idea in your head for good, we know that this Brownmiller chick chose to reinforce her terrible argument by claiming that sexual assault didn't happen in the animal kingdom. And therefore isn't 'natural.' And as a result must be bad. Uh... Like... What?!”
Carlos: “Well, that makes no sense.”
Carla: “Right. This is nonsense on all fronts. Sexual assault, by any definition you like, happens all over the animal kingdom, and was even widely observed and described (within and between different species) when Brownmiller formulated the idea and then penned it for the world. She just didn't go looking or ask anyone. Lame. And her use of the 'naturalistic fallacy', that 'if it's natural it's inherently good', is, well, childish. It should have destroyed her career; instead, she's the progenitor of one of the most pervasive ideas in the Western world.”
Carlos: “Perhaps.”
Carla: “Given its origins I can't understand why we repeat this nonsense. And the fact that it doesn't make sense on its face makes its persistence all the more nauseating.”
Carlos: “But surely sexual assault could be, in some instances, about power? We know it's used as a weapon and tool of war, for instance.”
Carla: “Right. I'm only arguing that sex and sexual violence isn't always or even often about power – where some folks seem to want to suggest that all manifestations of sex can only ever be.”
Carlos: “But then how do you feel about sex addiction? Aren't you then kind of making an argument against sex addiction?”
Carla: “Well–”
Carlos: “–I mean, what do you think about the possibility of too much sex?”
Carla: “Well, I don't see why you couldn't overdose on sex, have it seriously interfere with your life; but I think that would be an extraordinarily rare occurrence and not the kind of commonality it has become.”
Carlos: “Interesting.”
Carla: “Actually, if you look at the data, men diagnosed with sex addiction almost always have identity issues of some kind. Far too often to possibly be insignificant, those seeking help for sex addiction are gay men from religiously conservative families who've had trouble shaking either their guilt about their sexuality or even just their liking sex. At this point there's more psychology professionals who think the idea is bunk than support its diagnosis and treatment. I think a big part of the problem is that we've created this series of fictions regarding male and female sexes and sexuality.”
Carlos: “Like what? 'Rape is about power' etcetera?”
Carla: “Yeah. And there's also this weird, vague idea that when we got the birth control pill it made us somehow indistinguishable from men. Or, in some iterations, that males and females are blank slates, identical at bottom. It's actually pretty gross if you think about it. It's part of this distorted, and disturbingly common, anti-feminist ethos that places men as the ideal and seeks to erase women and womanhood by making us all aim to match all males in their skills, habits, obsessions. And it never goes the other way, suggesting that women are fine as they are and males could use to be more like us. Why is that? Regardless, rather than looking at what we know is going on, we create a fiction and then act confused about what's happening and why, and, as a result, how to deal with it. The reproductive success piece, and the sexual selection of women – those oldest elements of biological software we have running – has a lot to do with male sexual desire and aggression and does a lot to explain the anti-social behaviour we see. Why would you seek to complicate that? And on top of all the biology we have all this great contemporary social data. We have billions of data points over years and across the globe from online dating sites showing that women consider something like 80% of men to be below average attractiveness and not worthy of their time. And the data also shows that on these sites a man of average attractiveness, the norm, has their profile 'liked' by less than 1% of women.”
Carlos: “What? Where's this data?”
Carla: “Look it up. It's amazing.”
Carlos: “Oh, I will.”
Carla: “As you probably assume, most women receive a great deal of male attention; but what's crazy is that males rank much more accurately female attractiveness. Attractiveness fits on a bell curve and men put most women somewhere in the middle and a few at either end of the spectrum. And, not only that, they will also interact with women along the entire spectrum. It's a stark contrast to what women are up to and really jumps out in the data.”
Carlos: “Yeah. Curious.”
Carla: “Not really though. That our species has changed little in a hundred thousand years seems obvious in light of these numbers.”
Carlos: “Makes us look like apes!”
Carla: “Yeah, exactly. This behaviour looks less unique and more like the rest of the animal kingdom. Human females hide their fertility and are also, as a result, the ones choosing a mate. In thousands of years, tremendous social changes, and even with the invention of the pill we're still playing this primal game. And today, as ever, we ladies are largely calling the shots, creating culture, and sculpting the species.”
Carlos: “Of course none of these facts represent social or biological mechanisms for tempering overactive adrenal glands, testosterone, and male sexual violence; but, they do probably do a tonne of work explaining how these things arose and why they persist.”
Carla: “Exactly. But if the root cause and explanation is power we've failed to encapsulate virtually everything I've personally seen, heard, and experienced. And virtually everything we know about biology.”
Carlos: “I don't know. It's all pretty interesting though.”
Carla: “And it all gets more interesting when you bring in the experience of trans people. It's actually an obvious place to look, I think, for evidence of the biological and chemical basis for sex, sexuality, and sexual aggression and sexual violence. And from what I've found all that is best articulated in a This American Life episode on testosterone. In it a self-described former 'feminist butch dyke', Griffin Hansbury, articulates his experience of a mid-life hormone-induced transition to manhood. Surely this approximates the best we're likely to get in terms of an honest understanding of the experiential differences between genders. It's amazing.”
Carlos: “Super interesting.”
Carla: “Griffin contrasts previous feelings of attraction and experiences interacting with women 'BT', before testosterone, and after. It's really something to hear, his having thoughts and feelings that, as a former woman and feminist, he would have assumed were impossible, as well as actions that, though fully conscious and embarrassed of, he found himself unable to control.”
Carlos: “What?”
Carla: “He even describes someone, unaware he'd spent thirty years as a woman, describe him as a misogynist. It's amazing.”
Carlos: “Haha.”
Carla: “Yeah, it's so ridiculous and full of crazy stereotypes that he even describes a weird new fascination with and understanding of physics that, before testosterone, as a woman, he did not have. It really offers an amazing window into the biochemical basis of gender.”
Carlos: “Wild.”
Carla: “There's that, but there's also the Radiolab episode about 'the first female gondolier.' That's just as amazing.”
Carlos: “'Gondolier', as in Venice?”
Carla: “Exactly. It takes some fairly provocative twists and turns.”
