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Further Reading
Sex Panic's 'Declaration of Sexual Rights'
The lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender movement, feminism, and AIDS activism all include long histories...
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And are the folks who think there is smart enough to fight it?
By
Liz Highleyman
Are we in the midst of a sex panic, a new moral crusade and intensified crackdown on gay sex? A number of queer activists think so. But is the current anti-sex harassment part of a distinct new panic, or simply more of
the same old erotophobic routine? And if a sex panic does indeed exist, who are its real targets?
On November 13, activists, theorists, and organizers from around the US gathered to discuss these issues at a Sex Panic Summit in San Diego, held in conjunction with the National Gay and Lesbian
Task Force's Creating Change conference.
Historian Allan Bérubé opened the summit with a chronicle of 20th-century sex panics. Sexual repression comes in four varieties, he suggested: sex panics, repressive law reform, crackdowns, and routine
anti-sex policing. Anti-sex repression is motivated by a fear of "moral monsters," and often follows successful activism by marginalized groups. The media whips up anti-sex frenzies by tapping into archetypal images--
"rapacious black men, lesbian mothers, welfare queens, 'Patient Zeros,' promiscuous gay men, traitorous prostitutes, and SM practitioners." The power of these stereotypes in turn sets in motion the wheels of government control.
The impetus for the weekend's events came from a recent upsurge in closures of gay men's sex venues and crackdowns on public sex spaces. Much of this activity has taken place in New York City,
where Mayor Rudolph Guliani initiated a campaign to shutter sex establishments-- both gay and straight-- to make way for the Disneyfication of Times Square and the gentrification of the city as a whole.
But such anti-sex harassment is not confined to New York. San Francisco has experienced heightened enforcement of sex-club regulations, and there's been a brouhaha over sexually explicit store
window displays in the Castro. Boston, San Diego, and Columbus, Ohio, have all seen increased police crackdowns of sex in parks. And the list goes on.
Ducking the tough issues?
But the Sex Panic conferees glossed over the most egregious recent affronts to civil liberties motivated by sexual hysteria: the laws passed over the course of the last year that mandate registration and allow
for the indefinite confinement of sex offenders who have served their sentences. In some cases, the wide net cast by these laws has swept up older gay men who were arrested for consensual adult sex in the era of strict
sodomy law enforcement. But the most stringent control has been reserved for those involved in intergenerational sex.
It's nothing new that sex panics reach their peak when children are involved. The most classic example of a sex panic in our era is the daycare satanic abuse travesty of the early 1980s. It is also no surprise
that queers are loathe to address the issue of intergenerational sex, given that the bogeyman of pedophilia has so often been used to further the oppression of gays and lesbians. Dan Tsang, of the University of California,
Irvine, addressed the issue of sex-offender registration, and a manifesto prepared by summit attendees called for recognition of "the right of youth to sexual freedom and self determination." But otherwise the issue received
minimal attention.
Censorship of sexual expression was another area that received little attention, though there was discussion of the recent outcry over a women's sexuality conference at the State University of New York at
New Paltz-- which prompted demands for the school president's resignation. Still, queer activists have largely remained silent about censorship that is not specifically directed at gays and lesbians, including attempts to close
sexual entertainment venues in New York, banning adult newspapers from street vending boxes in California, and ongoing campaigns to censor sexually explicit material on the Internet. Despite attempts to broaden its focus, the
"sex panic movement," such as it is, seems to be heavily focused on identity politics, and less able to act on issues outside this framework.
There was, however, discussion both at the summit and "Creating Change" about how sex panics affect groups other than gay men. "Public sexual culture is not just gay men sucking each other off
in bathrooms," said Eva Pendleton, of Sex Panic in New York. When cops crack down on sex, venues where people of color gather are disproportionately singled out, she noted. Poor women are coming under fire for
their "irresponsible" sexual behavior, transgendered people are targeted, and sex workers of all genders and orientations are ripe for harassment and violence. Several current and former sex workers spoke at the summit, and
the Sex Panic manifesto called for an end to harassment of sex workers and legal sanctions against paid sex.
Just keep it in your pants?
One feature distinguishes the current sex debates: this time queers are active on both sides. Widely-read gay authors such as Michelangelo Signorile, Gabriel Rotello, and Larry Kramer have called for
a moderation of gay male promiscuity and a turn toward monogamous long-term relationships as a means of reducing the transmission of HIV. Activist Scott Tucker derided the non-gay left for giving these writers a forum,
but noted that it was not surprising, because "they are saying what straight progressives want to hear."
Some of these gay writers have put forth the same type of anti-sex rhetoric that was formerly the exclusive purview of straight muckrakers. In a column in New York's
Newsday, Rotello called sex clubs "bustling hives of contagion."
"Twenty years ago we heard Anita Bryant and Paul Cameron insisting that gay male sex is diseased and suicidal," writer Eric Rofes told Sex Panic conferees. "These days we hear gay men saying the
exact same thing." Rofes lambasted gay people who go beyond disagreement and "cross the line" into helping the state to crack down on gay sex, as some have done in New York City.
The current sex panic debate has the potential to cause deep rifts within the queer community. These rifts are already becoming apparent among gay men, and may open up between gay men and lesbians.
This was most evident during a discussion of bareback sex-- at Friday's town hall meeting.
Tony Valenzuela, a writer and sex worker who sero-converted while working as an HIV educator, decried what he called "safe sex absolutism." "Sex lite-- sex that tastes like styrofoam-- eventually leads
to bingeing," Valenzuela said. Alex Garner, a San Diego writer and activist, said that young gay men who came of age in the era of AIDS construct their sexuality differently than older men. He criticized the "lie of hot safe
sex," contending that "stroking a feather or rubbing a potato masher on someone's arm does not equal the thrill of unprotected anal sex."
But Robin Tyler, a lesbian activist, was not impressed. "It upsets me to see gay men still getting sick," she declared. Characterizing lesbians as the "wife" of the gay movement, Tyler went on, "Do what
you want, but I'm not going to clean up after you this time." Garner countered that "Consenting adults have the right to make a decision to have unsafe sex and to become infected. We have to allow this if people have control
over their own bodies."
Sex wars revisited
Judith Halberstam, a University of California, San Diego, literature professor, drew parallels between the current debates within the gay community and the "sex wars" of the 1970s and 1980s, in
which feminists split over issues such as pornography, butch/femme, and SM. Then as now, some in the community allied with conservative forces in the government to crack down on sexual practices they did not approve of-- in
the 80s, pornography was the primary target, today it is gay male public sex.
During the town hall meeting, a member of the audience challenged national gay organizations to take a stand against sexual repression. NGLTF Executive Director Kerry Lobel said she was well aware
of crackdowns going on across the country, but that work needs to be done at a local level. Lobel said that "People in our community do not care that people are being arrested, because they don't want to be associated with
those who are arrested."
Although the current situation regarding gay male public sex may not be appropriately characterized as a full- blown sex panic, the intensified crackdown on sex offenders may fit the bill. According to
Rofes, "What we are witnessing in 1997 are several powerful social shifts which could easily and swiftly fall into place, causing a full-scale sex panic to break out nationwide at any time."
"We have been condescendingly characterized as immature children who haven't grown up," Rofes continued, "and who need to get with the times, put our pricks back in our pants, and apply our energies to
the real challenges facing our communities, like gays in the military or gay marriage. But even a cursory look at the histories of our movement will show that sexual liberation has been inextricably bound together with
gay liberation, the women's movement, and the emancipation of youth. Among the most effective ways of oppressing a people is through the colonization of their bodies, the stigmatizing of their desires, and the repression of
their erotic energies." Rofes emphasized that the queer movement must "refuse to cast off any section of our community in order to gain privileges and social acceptance. Resist scapegoating subcultures you don't know and
you don't understand." Will principled activists find ways to apply this maxim to all groups who are stigmatized on the basis of their sexual identities and practices?
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