Mara Gay, the New York Times columnist, recently penned a perceptive article regarding the Dobbs decision that ended a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion. Underneath the headline “The Republican War on Sex,” she wrote, “One day I hope to become a mother. But for now, I have sex just because I like it. Sex is fun.” She pointed out that many religious fundamentalists who oppose abortion “are animated by an insatiable desire to punish women who have sex on our own terms and enjoy it.”
This is a core element of the battle over reproductive rights that we do not discuss enough: sex. In fact, though our culture and popular media are full of sex, we rarely talk about sex in straightforward terms. It’s fun (for many, if not most, people), and most Americans engage in sex more than once a month, according to one recent study. But it’s usually not part of the public discourse. (Do government officials ever promise voters more and better sex?) One obvious reason the protection of reproductive rights is so important is that people want to have sex for recreation, not procreation. Yet some Americans cannot stand this idea. They may have a theological objection. The Catholic Church insists sex should only occur with the intent to breed. The same holds true for evangelical Christians. Others might just find sex icky. A big chunk of the social turmoil of the 1960s involved sex. Though it seemed the so-called “sexual revolution” was ultimately won by advocates of sexual freedom, the anti-sex crowd never went away. And it is back and not just focused on abortion, as Justice Clarence Thomas showed in his concurring decision in Dobbs. These tyrannical puritans want to allow states once again to enact anti-sodomy laws and to restrict your right to obtain contraception. This is not just about assigning personhood to zygotes; this is about control.
The anti-sexers have been able to wage their war because sex remains taboo-ish. Can you think of a political candidate who has declared, “These fundamentalists want to stop you from having a good time enjoying sex, but I’m fighting to preserve your right to have sex without worrying about creating a kid”? No, the good-time sex that Mara Gay refers to is generally not addressed in our policy debates. Instead, we focus on—and fight over—rights and values. That’s certainly important, but this allows us to elide what these rights protect. It’s my hunch that folks who oppose recreational sex—and who want to deny others the freedom to seek this pleasure—are aided by the societal reticence to discuss sex openly.
Some time ago, I learned directly that the fear of sex was part of the motivation of fundamentalists. In the 1990s, I was one of the revolving guest hosts on the daily syndicated radio show of Patrick Buchanan, the pugnacious conservative commentator. The three-hour-long offering was structured similarly to CNN’s Crossfire, which Buchanan then co-hosted. Each hour had its own topic and a conservative-leaning guest and a liberal-ish one. Buchanan would grill the lefty, and I would debate the right-winger, and then the two of us would have some back-and-forth. It was exhausting to do this for three hours—with breaks for the news, weather, and commercials, we probably produced only 35 minutes or so of programming per hour—and though I found Buchanan’s tribalistic and demagogic politics despicable, he was an enjoyable sparring partner, and I had free rein to assail the dangerous and hateful notions of the right.
One day, the topic for an hour was the demand of an Irish American gay group to march in Boston’s St. Patrick’s Day parade. This was causing a ruckus in Beantown, with the parade organizers adamantly opposing the group’s participation. The conservative guest for this segment was the Reverend Lou Sheldon, an ardent antigay crusader who headed a religious right group called the Traditional Values Coalition. Sheldon frequently appeared on cable news and radio shows, expounding on the threat homosexuality supposedly posed to the United States and claiming gay and lesbian people were plotting to destroy the American family.
After the predictable to-and-fro on the particulars regarding the St. Patrick’s Day parade, I switched gears and asked him a simple question: “Why do you care so much about what gay people do?” He stammered and said something about how they engage in wrongful conduct. “I don’t understand,” I said, pushing the point: “Why do you care about this more than a zoning issue in your town?” Again, he said something like, “What they’re doing is wrong.” Wrong? “What is it they’re doing that is wrong?” I said. I could sense Sheldon was becoming flustered. “It’s just wrong and unnatural,” he repeated. I kept pressing, “What is it that’s wrong?” We went around on this point, with an increasingly agitated Sheldon reiterating “it’s wrong” and me demanding to know what was “wrong.” Finally, an exasperated Sheldon exclaimed, “They take their ———— and put it in the ———— of other men.” The quick-in-her-seat producer managed to bleep out the words that might have caused a problem with the FCC.
I don’t remember my reply. I might not have said anything. The point was made. Sheldon was horrified at (or obsessed with) a particular sex act, and that seemed to be what was propelling his hatred of gay men. It was about the sex. Quite literally. Afterward, he told the show’s producer he would never appear on the program again if I were in the co-host chair. That was no big loss for me or the audience. (Eventually, a court order compelled the St. Patrick’s Day parade organizers to accept the group; the LGBT outfit marched and was met by smoke bombs, jeers, and thrown beer cans; and the organizers canceled a subsequent parade rather than allow the gay group to march again.)
Whenever there is a clash over gay rights, abortion, pornography, sexual education, same-sex marriage, or contraception, I always remember my special moment with Sheldon. Yes, it’s just one data point—but a revealing one. The fights over these subjects are fights over sex, why you have sex, and who (if anyone) gets to say what sex you can have and who you can have it with. Of course, with abortion, the direct target is women. But the war on sex extends beyond that. As Gay noted, American men must “recognize that their way of life is also under attack. Men also have sex for pleasure. This is not just a women’s issue.” Indeed, sex is a multi-gender issue. For many people, it’s part of the pursuit of happiness, and, once again, it must be fought for.
