Introducing the Schulman

[eredien]

I was tempted to backdate this post--turning back back time to an era when men were men immoral and uncontrollable, women were fragile flowers and queer people were all Oscar Wilde, undeserving of dignity or moral and physical integrity--but I didn't have to. Lucky for us, that time was as recently as August 6th!

That's when this opinion piece went up on the Christian Science Monitor, an opinion piece which is full of so much shit that I'm surprised that the type isn't brown.

Sam Schulman, before August 6th, the English language needed neither the concept of, or a word for, "the opposite of satirist Jonathan Swift." But you, Sam--once you recognized the glaring conceptual deficiency, you strove mightily to fill that void by penning the immortal lines below.

Alas, genius is fleeting: you did not fill the corresponding linguistic void. What can we do but name it in your honor?

Ladies, Gentlemen, and Genderqueer people of all ages--I am pleased to present the world's first "Schulman":

Marriage is not about couples or lovers – it’s about the physical and moral integrity of women. When a woman’s sexuality is involved, human communities must deal with a malign force that an individual woman and her family cannot control or protect.

Modern marriage is only the least worst version of marriage that has emerged from all this – but it is still necessary for women. What protects women, ultimately, is that marriage laws and customs confer upon her independence something extra – dignity, protection, sacredness – that others must respect. And if this quality can be bestowed upon anyone, even those not in intersexual relationships – it reduces, even dissolves its force.

Yes, you read it right: the central thesis of Schulman's piece is that women, not worth respecting on their own terms, will only become worthy of respect when society adds the little "something extra" of marriage. Once married, women must then become worthy of being respected by others, and will possess dignity and sacredness and physical and moral integrity.
It's good to know that no married women ever get raped, huh?
Oh, hey 13th century French inheritance law--what? You mean that there's a long history of women being considered legally married if they were taken by force? But that totally doesn't happen now! What, women of the Congo? Well, ok, it doesn't happen here. What's that you say, lady down the street? Oh. Oh, well. Um.

And unmarried women, well, um, they should get married and then--then they will be protected from A Malign Force that no individual woman or her family could control or protect. Whaddya mean, you don't want to get married, lady? Surely you want respect bestowed upon you, and physical and moral integrity, and marriage is the only way to get those.

...er, marriage is the only way for women to get those, I mean; you can't just have 'em already--that's kinda grabby, don't you think, ladies? But if you're a man, you already got dignity, protection, sacredness, physical and moral integrity, independence galore bestowed on you at birth. You are set. Golden. A-1. ...Dammit, last sentence in paragraph two! You say that bestowing those qualities on just anyone leaves women vulnerable, and that's messed everything up! Oh--oh, wait, it's cool, I've got it: Since marriage is the only way for women to gain all that extra independence and moral virtue that men are already rocking, there's no need to let men marry at all! They'll hardly notice it's gone!

Yup: one woman, no men, that's the way to....Wow, heterosexual-marriage-only crowd, you guys really take that idea of "marriage isn't about couples" to heart!

No, no...of course we can't go bestowing dignity, protection or sacredness on just anyone. Those things can only go to the people who didn't have enough of them in the first place, lest Malign Forces fail to respect their physical integrity, and all of those people just happen to be women...what? It's also possible for men to have their physical and moral integrity violated by Malign Forces? B-but how could that be, since men by definition already start out with so much more dignity and moral virtue than women that they don't even need marriage to protect their integrity? Such men can't exist. They...they do? But that means that they were lacking in dignity and sacredness in the first place, or else they wouldn't have had their integrity violated. The only people lacking in dignity and sacredness are unmarried women, though. So, that means that those men who have their bodily integrity violated because they are lacking dignity and sacredness...my god, they must be women! Or, no, wait, they're the Malign Forces! That's right, the Malign Forces are men who are really women! It was the queers, after all! God, I'm glad you got that straightened out for me, Sam; I was worried there for a second.

Geez, those Malign Forces--these weak feminine men lacking in innate dignity, bodily and moral integrity, and sacredness--must be really powerful, lacking all those things and yet causing all this uncontrollable strife for women. Those poor women, who who only want to uphold marriage law and custom so something extra may be conferred upon their independence! They never did anything to you, Malign Forces--why do you array yourself uncontrollably against human communities, individual women, and families? You're so powerful that I bet your moral and bodily integrity never get violated! But don't forget that you don't have dignity or sacredness and aren't worthy of protection. What? Why are you complaining, Malign Forces? You say that you don't have dignity and sacredness in the eyes of religion or society? You say your bodily and moral integrity is routinely violated?

We've already gone over this in the last paragraph: if we went around bestowing dignity, protection, and sacredness on just anyone, there wouldn't be enough to go around to the women, who of course need it most. So sit down, and shut up: we're not letting you get married because you don't need to. And no sneaky business. Trying to convince me that you're really men who are women, and women need marriage, heh, whose idea was that? That argument won't fly with me.

...Yes, I'm aware it's my idea. No, my argument still holds in all other cases! It just--doesn't apply in this particular situation of you wanting marriage, that's all. That's it. The End.

You done now? Good, I'm glad you have no choice but to see it my way.
Ahem. Sorry for the interruption.

Powerful people: always trying to quash dissent, huh?

Since someone must be married or women won't be protected, and Sam's incisive arguments have clearly demonstrated that men and Malign Forces are not eligible for the unique women-sexuality-protecting benefits of marriage, the obvious strategy to protect marriage and keep Malign Forces at bay is: Mass Lesbian Weddings.

Yes, this is just a fantastic argument for gay marriage--you said that this is the argument for keeping marriage from queer couples?

Well, you said it, not me, Schulman.

Comments

[fiddledragon.livejournal.com]

That is a disgusting article, but a truly brilliant rebuttal.

[thomasyan.livejournal.com]

Oh good grief. I got to the paragraph below and decided to stop. What a maroon.

Marriage is not about couples or lovers – it’s about the physical and moral integrity of women. When a woman’s sexuality is involved, human communities must deal with a malign force that an individual woman and her family cannot control or protect.

[gaudior.livejournal.com]

Good gods, that article is amazing.

Am I right that he's saying "Marriage must remain heterosexual because otherwise women will get raped and abused, and these things never happen except from a male perpetrator to an unmarried female victim"?

...I've been spending a bunch of time trying to find logical arguments against same-sex marriage other than "I believe the flawed research which says that children are harmed by growing up without two biological opposite-sex parents" or "gays are icky" or "it's not really hurting gay people to not be able to get married, so why rock the boat?"

This, um, is different.

Good gods.

[eredien]

Yes. That is what he is saying, quite clearly:
Heterosexual relationships need marriage because of inferiority: the physical inferiority of sexual defenders to sexual attackers and the moral inferiority of male sexual attackers.

Marriage is a necessary defense of a woman’s sexuality and her human liberty from determined assault by men who would turn her into a slave, a concubine – something less than fully human.

[sovay]

Marriage is a necessary defense of a woman’s sexuality and her human liberty from determined assault by men who would turn her into a slave, a concubine – something less than fully human.

Holy blap.

[sovay]

Well, you said it, not me, Schulman.

You are brilliant.

[eredien]

Thanks! A few more thoughts below.

The way Schulman argues actually seems to disprove his points even as he makes them. For example, Schulman writes,

Modern marriage is only the least worst version of marriage that has emerged from all this.

That argument, "marriage is and has been used as a tool to damage a class of people and their sexuality," is the same argument that proponents of same-sex marriage make. Schulman will acknowledge the harm done to women, but he cannot acknowledge the harm done to queer people without arguing against his own point.

Schulman literally could not notice that he was attempting to use his opponent's argument to prove the opposite point, because of his pre-existing bias against gay marriage.

(I wonder if Schulman thinks that gay women are not really women, since he argues that lesbians are unworthy of the protections of legal marriage?)

[sovay]

(I wonder if Schulman thinks that gay women are not really women, since he argues that lesbians are unworthy of the protections of legal marriage?)

Presumably he thinks no lesbian has ever been threatened by a man.

[weirdquark]

Back in my preservation job I came across some medical textbooks from the very early 1900s talking about homosexuality which mentioned women who dressed like men and who were attracted to other women, but it also said that this never actually happened. Because you know, lesbians don't exist.

[circuit-four.livejournal.com]

This is a truly infuriating article, but you know, I actually came away from it feeling pretty sunny about about the whole thing, especially after reading the sidebar article about the GOP's lack of a response to the Prop 8 ruling.

The whole tone of Schulman's article strikes me as... timid for a cultural conservative. I hate to stereotype so badly, but in most of my arguments with archconservatives online, when they start taking the "now, now, let us sit and reason together" attitude -- instead of the fiery pulpit condemnation of you and everything you believe -- they're doing it because they're up against the ropes. It grants them more dignity than admitting your ideas were actually right all along.

Maybe I'm being too cynical, but the fact he's even conceding Judge Walker's basic decency as a human being, much less any merit to his ruling, means only that he knows the American right wing has lost this one -- and it's time to start preparing to play the Poor Oppressed Underdog Voice Of Reason instead of the Screaming Paragon of Inflexible Justice.

He's still a patronizing, sexist jackass and the historical record totally demolishes his argument IMHO, but it's really good to know his side has to resort to (or fake) basic civility and restraint towards us. I think we're gonna win this one good and hard, and people like Schulman are simply editing their weak rationales so they can still exist in a queer-friendly world without looking like total reactionaries.

They'll fail, of course, for exactly the reasons you outlined above -- they really don't have the faintest comprehension of women's issues, to name just one. And it's sort of fun to see them squirm and try to stay relevant.

[eredien]

He's still a patronizing, sexist jackass and the historical record totally demolishes his argument IMHO.

I wanted to say a little more about that.

Shulman writes: As a species, we need to protect female sexuality in order to assure ourselves of a future.

Schulman points out that both the historical and current records show that the human race has been pretty bad at protecting female sexuality (both in general, and in terms of that sexuality as it exists and has existed within the institution of heterosexual marriage).

But notice how he doesn't go on to say that humanity hasn't stopped procreating yet, despite the abysmal track record of respecting womens' rights via marriage? I thought it was strange that he wouldn't comment on that, especially given his overall tone of "we've come so far in respecting women, since the past."

And then it hit me: I realized that anyone who talks about reserving marriage for heterosexual couples for the continuation of the species never talks about how the species continued itself just fine before marriage existed, because they don't want you to think about how people existed and had sex before heterosexual marriage was instituted. Instead, I see a lot of "in the future." "If gay marriage existed, in the future heterosexual people will have fewer children. If gay marriage existed, in the future there would be fewer heterosexual couples and therefore fewer children."

What does "heterosexual couples will have fewer children" mean, really? I see that it could mean one of two things: a decrease in heterosexual desire for children, or a decrease in heterosexual reproductive capacity.

Will heterosexuals desire to have fewer children? If so, it's not desire that produces babies. People don't need desire to make a baby; in fact, one can create a baby in the midst of actively desiring not to have one! Likewise, desiring a baby will not spontaneously generate children.

People don't even need sex to make a baby anymore, (even though heterosexual sex is still the most common way of doing it).

All you need is fertilization, whether in vitro or utero.

Heterosexual sex is the most common of the currently available technologies for fertilization, and since heterosexual people are probably not going to give up on desiring sex anytime soon, fertilization will likely occur at the normal rate, so there will probably continue to be babies.

So, that problem seems to be a red herring. Next.

Will heterosexuals be physically able to have fewer children? I find it hard to believe that anyone thinks that heterosexual couples' physical ability to bear children, whether individually or in the aggregate, could truly be affected by the emotional capacity, sexual preferences, and desire for commitment of people they will never meet.

So that's a red herring. Next.

If there were fewer straight couples and more queer couples, fewer straight couples overall might bear children, but more queer couples would likely bear children. I am guessing that "I find queer couples raising children unacceptable and scary" is actually what people mean when they raise the specter of "fewer straight people would have children if gay people could marry," but if that's what they mean then they should just say it, instead of making the false claim that human reproduction will end, and the human race with it. If they were really worried about human reproduction ending, you'd think all people would be encouraged to have as many children as possible to preserve the species.

Straight people may fail to manage their own sexual desire and reproductive decisions to ensure the survival of the species, but gay people aren't sitting there in the bedroom of straight couples, making them desire children or have sex or fertilize or not fertilize eggs.

Queer persons do not have a responsibility to manage straight couples' sexual desire and reproductive decisions! That truly sounds dystopian for all concerned.

[sovay]

Likewise, desiring a baby will not spontaneously generate children.

No, but it would make a hilarious satirical cartoon.

[blushingflower.livejournal.com]

oh, it's always fun to see a man who is clearly terrified of female sexuality and the power it holds over him

[eredien]

No kidding!

[darthbitsy.livejournal.com]

To ignore everything else that people here have eloquently talked about, in what world does "women's sexuality" mean "men desire to have sex with women"?

Oh, this one http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2010/07/27/guys-on-immodesty-lust-and-the-violence-of-womens-bodies/ (via http://nablacdotu.livejournal.com/101655.html ).

[krinndnz.livejournal.com]

Heck of a takedown, and makes awesome reading. It continues to astonish me how anti-feminists tend to be a lot more willing to believe that men, as a whole, are Evil, than feminists are, despite reputations to the contrary.