jgtaylor

* Updated * Here, Bob Herbert tells us about the ills of a society that is still full of misogyny. Of course, it’s true – we are a misogynistic people, relegating women to second class positions with second class compensation, etc…. That’s all true.
But I must take umbrage at his characterizations of misogyny. Namely his attack on prostitution. It smacks of the same reasoning that kept the woman at home and out of the gamey and unsightly institutions of the workplace. He calls the prospective customer’s selection process a “humiliating inspection”. Surely no more than having your underwear checked by your Drill Instructor when you join the military. Surely no more than having to send a resume out to 50 firms in the hopes that one of them calls you. Surely no more than having to get as dressed up as you can (dust off the ol’ interview suit) for a humiliating inspection process to make sure you are what the new firm wants. Surely no more humiliating than the same thing every human being goes through just to get by in this society.
These attacks on Pornography and Prostitution are thinly veiled vestiges of the Puritan heritage in America. To suggest that sexual desire is somehow off limits to commercialism is patently stupid. To say it’s simple-minded is simple-minded. In reality, it’s the same kind of Misogyny that he is arguing against. The world we live in requires that we sell what we posses that is in the highest demand. In the case of a technology worker, it’s their knowledge of technology that they sell. In the case of a writer, it’s his creative genius that they sell. In the case of a sex worker, it’s their sex that is sold.

Read moreOh the Misogynist Feminist