|
only I get to call me a "whore", round II
I continue with more commentary following my 'only I get to call me a whore' column. I orginally tried posting this on No Treason, but it's suspiciously long in queue, so I guess either my ideas, manners, or verbosity proved unwelcome [correction, I was wrong; the post just went up! Carrying on...]. So, I'll just tack these theses to my own door. Partially, this is in response to a John Sabotta who commented on the previous blog, but most of the following is my response to a certain Stefan, who penned the following pearls of wizdom:
"It's interesting if that's the case, since in my view sex-work is far from the best kind of job to hold. If it was decriminalized it would pay even less than it does now. I realize that some values are subjective, but to me it's hard to believe that there are not better things one could do for oneself than essentially "renting" ones body for pleasure.
"I would also guess that some of the conservative opposition stems from the fact that the existence of sex-workers threatens the traditional family to some extent. Since I think families are a good thing, this makes me a little suspicious of encouraging women to go into sex-work. However, if Hoppe is right, then the question is moot since an ancap society will reinforce the traditional family and enforce social norms against "nature-worship and kin-centered lifestyles", which I think you could make the argument includes some kinds of sex-work."
Stefan is a serviteur of one Hans Hermann Hoppe, a professor at the University of Nevada believes that monarchy is superior to democracy on the grounds that a monarch will effectively manage a government, while a voting populace can be trusted only to loot their productive betters from the public treasury. He's also managed to have a few pretty little scandals, involving such things as mixing anti-homosexual smears in with his classroom lectures and giving an interview to a German magazine noted for its (ahem) right-wing nationalist proclivities. This would be nasty enough, but Hoppe (hereafter "H.H."), I am ashamed to say, presents his theories as a consequence of libertarian anarchism; a sort of getting punch-drunk on the right to property. As an anarcha-feminist answerable to the spirit of Liberty, I can only say: "Not In My Name!".
Much of what follows is an expression of my opinion of H.H.'s theories. I guess I could have saved myself some time and just said "Fuck You", but I usually use that word in more pleasant settings. And I wouldn't use it anywhere near H.H..
You can go read about him at his website, http://www.hanshoppe.com, and read an excellent take-down of the creep by a saner libertarian, Tom Palmer of the Cato Institute, at http://www.tomgpalmer.com/archives/022289.php.
* * * * *
John-
Replying to the comment you left on my blog, I do appreciate your clarifications, and a positive view of our business! Please understand I wasn't writing in personal anger so much as to point out the implications of harmlessly meant language for stigmatised groups. Please remember, we live in a culture in which the 'whore' is considered, not an archetype of sexual flowering, but a demonic projection of ultimate opportunistic evil. My intention wasn't to personally take you to task but to challenge our public discourse about sex work.
Now, on Stefan-
You're right, I shouldn't (and won't) confuse you with Stefan.
Oh dear, dear, dear. I must actually disagree that he is an idiot, believe it or not. But more on that later; I want to argue with him.
Stefan-
First of all,
I don't think of my work as 'renting my body for pleasure', any more than a shopkeeper thinks of her/himself as renting the hands that close the cash register drawer for customer satisfaction. Human cooperation inevitably involves one person using their body (we are embodied creatures, after all), to satisfy or please somebody else, and in market transactions this involves being paid for it. In one sense, all wage labour involves this sort of thing, and to no shame- whether that labour is babysitting or teaching or doctoring or bagging groceries. In another sense, sex work is precisely not 'renting', because sex work is (potentially) a *liberal* activity, meaning it is something enjoyed for one's own sake, developing an aspect of human flourishing (namely, the erotic)- it is not alienated labour done for another's benefit as is too much work under our current system. Sex work both appeals to and in practise is something which is valuable in itself. If one appreciates life on Earth, I can hardly think of something better to do with my time, and the few things that seem to me equally excellent as sex (such as friendship, spirituality, or the life of the mind) are quite compatible with the spirit of eroticism. Speaking somewhat above myself, <i>quite</i>.
Secondly,
Who the Abyss are you to tell me what a better job is? I gather you've
never had any experience in the business (if so, *do* tell), and you don't act like you've made any attempt to understand us with empathy, so you really don't know what you're talking about, do you? As for 'better', my notion of the good is that which promotes my happiness, which is found in the good life and the flourishing of human possibilities. If you reject this standard, please lay your cards on the table as to what you think human beings ought to do. Please either tell me I shouldn't pursue my own happiness or tell me the erotic isn't a dimension of human flourishing. If it's the latter, then you're either ignorant or disingenious, because the celebration of eroticism has been characteristic of humanistic cultures for millenia. If it's the former, then tell your deontologies for me, 'all debts are off this year'; I'm not interested in your commandments. Either way, unless you can give me an argument which shows I would enjoy life more if I followed some other path, I'm just going to continue doing my work and enjoying myself. Thank you.
Thirdly,
It is true that state prohibition of sex work inflates prices. Of course, it also makes our work more dangerous, prevents us from honestly advertising, makes it difficult for us to communicate the best we have to offer, and generally degrades the quality of our lives. How about you let us worry about it? I know in Thailand, where prostitution is only very technically illegal and prostitution is a hugely visible industry, sex work is still a relatively well paying job. I could argue a lot of things here, but perhaps I might start by suggesting perhaps some of us value liberty more than scrambling to accumulate property? I want an independent life, not profiteering off some sexual crony capitalism.
Fourthly,
"I would also guess that some of the conservative opposition stems from the fact that the existence of sex-workers threatens the traditional family to some extent. Since I think families are a good thing, this makes me a little suspicious of encouraging women to go into sex-work."
Oh, you're quite right- this is the primary reason conservatives hate sex work, and the same reason your master Hoppe is against the *existence* of plenty of people, including sex workers (does having trouble with the *existence* of people sound familiar to any of our gentle readers?). Of course, Hoppe also favours an interpretation of anarcho-capitalism which grants 'extraterritoriality' to families in which a paterfamilias has absolute power over a household sacred against interference from outsiders (wouldn't one nifty consequence of this be that husbands could rape their wives without recourse), and hopes that market discipline will force everyone with a different social model to be ground out or perish. Hoppe is one of the most socially intolerant persons I have ever read and his presence among libertarians should be an embrassment to the true heirs of John Stuart Mill's "On Liberty".
In my eyes H.H. is a travesty of libertarianism, his struggle a replacement of political coercion with social suthoritarianism which opposes statism only because statism doesn't promote illiberalism enough. If his views were true, they would validate statist liberal claims that lassiez faire promotes injustice and evil- but I hesitate to say this as forcing a choice between his way and socialism is part of Hoppe's strategy.
That said, I don't think his views are true. In my mind Hoppe is nothing more than a European reactionary of the de Maistre variety with a flair for the terminology of Austrian economics. What he wants is clearly a restoration of the feudal order and the supremacy of the patriarch. Hoppe is a semi-monarchist who exalts throne and altar, hopes the market will eliminate social dissidents from society, and is known to associate pretty freely with types who'd also like to see people like me eliminated from society but who aren't so delicate about portraying the market as their means. I'm sorry, but some of us have standards on whom we get in bed with. You grok, mein herr?
I had a dream of an Enlightenment peace treaty, where public neutrality towards conceptions of the good could provide a space where different kinds of life could live in peace. Now I don't think that's quite adequate- as a left-libertarian I think dismantling structures of power in civil society (like racism and sexism) is just as neccesary as dismantling state structures of coercion if we're all to have a real chance to follow our own muses. But I still haven't quite given up on that dream, and I still have some hope it might be applied, as it ought to be, to sex workers, to gays and lesbians, and to those God-damned nature-worshippers with nonlinear senses of kinship (dangerous blighters, I'm sure).
And that's not just a policy, that's a principle. I'm a market anarchist of the Tucker variety myself, but political technicalities are less important to me than the social reality of an open society. I've no love for those, like Hoppe, who want to eliminate the government in the hopes of an end-run around the separation of church and state. Maybe that's because in the social system Hoppe really wants, I and most of the people I love would die. You want to drive away support for liberty? Why not join Hoppe and tell social nonconformists that liberty will mean practical exclusion and ostracism? And if that doesn't make you pause, the only reason is because you want to see us driven out of town more than you really want to promote liberty. And that's, well, evil.
Why don't you at least try letting us live in peace? Of course, if you actively believe that your family values can't coexist with the existence of sex work, then what you are fearing is that the presence of out-of-the-closet, sex positive women will lure people away from family values. Although I haven't and wouldn't 'encourage[] women to get into sex work' (I think it is a decision that people must come to exclusively in one's own solitude), you sound like you fear someone doing so might be persuasive. Why? You don't think you can attract people to your society if they have several viable options? Are saying yur social order depends on, if not force, *intolerance* and *ignorance*. Well, if that's what you want, then you are calling for a closed society- and I don't care if you hope to enforce it by guns, stakes, shunning, or starvation. You are also saying it's open social war between us and you. It which case, don't be surprised if we go around carrying swords on our backs. If your kind of family does
have to destroy us to survive, then we don't have much choice than to be in a state of hot or cold war against the patriarchal family. This kind of thing's been going on for quite awhile, and I assure you we didn't start the fire.
Of course, that kind of morality has to make a constant war on human nature, evidenced by the fact that the moralistic kind of family values never really works (or there wouldn't be anyone to employ us, would there)? Of course, patriarchs take this to show we have to tighten even harder on the social screws, until people finally learn to sit down, shut up, and do everthing 'right'. We take it to show there's something wrong with the whole authoritarian conception of the good, that beauty comes when we can enjoy ourselves, express ourselves, and relax, and that the good comes naturally to us and develops uniquely in each individual. To my mind, the essence of authoritarianism is the fear that all Hell will break loose the moment one fails to keep control. That surely defines Hoppe, even if he wants control
to be accomplished by the invisible fist he makes out of the market. Some of us think this is both a vicious end and an insult to the market, whose hand we find a bit more gentle.
No, I really don't like H.H. Hoppe. Oh yes, Herr Doktor Time Preference; the man who thinks a good society is one is which anyone who enjoys life in the present is put to the economic wall! Personally, I doubt that is even good economics- I think we're more able to deal with the vicissitudes of Fortune is we aren't made rigid by terrified fear of life's consequences, which is the real effect of these Protestant ethics. It's a horrible way of living, even without the sundry bigotry that Hoppe attaches to the concept. Personally, I'm not willing to sacrifice the beauty of life to gain control of myself and troublesome others. If you are, do it to yourself.
I think human history shows that it's periods of freedom, or openness, of 'decadence' that give rise to the sites of intellectual and artistic
creativity (e.g., resonances of the names Babylon, Athens, Corinth, Alexandria, Venice, Paris, Kyoto, Shanghai, New York, San Francisco), whereas Spartan ages which know and do their duty are aesthetically and spiritually barren. That's really the basic issue here, with you and Hoppe- is civilisation the cultivation of human talents in liberty, thus a fulfillment of human possibility, or it is the discipline which breaks recalcitrant human matter into doing the right? I say the former.
The question in this house is: what does Promethean individualism say? Allow me a moment of ungaurded hope that libertarianism is a humanism!
Fifthly and lastly,
"However, if Hoppe is right, then the question is moot since an ancap society will reinforce the traditional family and enforce social norms
against "nature-worship and kin-centered lifestyles", which I think you could make the argument includes some kinds of sex-work."
What a *fascinating* choice of H.H. quotes, meus amicus! Y'know, for someone who claims to characterise sex-work as soulless body-renting, 'tis interesting that you also make the counterintuitive (to Americans, at least) association of sex-work with 'nature worship' and 'kin-oriented lifestyles'. Now, where'd you get the idea sex work had something to do with nature worship? You're talking about religion, while associating religion you don't like with a practise you believe embodies a lack of spirit. My father, an Episcopalian, would have just called this 'worshipping a false god'.
That's interesting- especially because you just coincidentally happen to be right, sex work does have a very long history of association with something very close to 'nature worship', this does have something to do with 'kin-centered lifestyles' (meaning, a nonpatriarchal family system, which is relevant because the patriarchal marginalisation of prostitution as a respected social practise has a lot to do with the enforcement of the social norms that prop up a patrilinearity which is at the heart of H.H.'s vision of social order). You are correct: many sex workers, myself included, practise what could be called either a special case of nature worship or a closely related religion of a similar pattern. The relationship's even closer, if you think of 'nature' in a pre-modern or Hellenic sense of 'cosmos', including humanity as part of a natural universe (the spiritualisation of sex work is a triumph of humanism). Well, I'm flattered if you're paying attention! People do tend to forget these sort of things nowadays.
I'll leave off the thealogy, but I think it's clear your problem with sex work has a lot to do with religion- not that it's eactly news that the stigmatisation of sex and sex work in Western society is a matter of religious attitude problems at root. It's *religious intolerance* that's clearly here at least partially driving your problem with us persons of the professional persuasion. Congratulations, you're a bigot! Let's repeal the Enlightenment and restart the wars of religion! Or more precisely here, let's start up the Holy Inquisition- this time by the market, by making sure everyone is ostracised who doesn't belong to the traditional morality church. Let's make employment contracts and housing covenants come built-in with sumptuary laws.
Why don't you stand and say, clearly, like your master, that 'naturev worshipping and kin centered lifestyles' are a danger to society and public order, who include some kinds of sex workers- and such people need to be excluded from society? Because there is rather a name and a history to all this. Don't you agree?
Methinks the gentleman philosophises with a hammer.
Lady Aster Francesca
{)(*)(}
 
|
