The (Disappointing) Sexual Politics of Liberal Bloggers

Friday August 10, 2007

I’m not sure why exactly I expect the sexual politics of liberal bloggers wouldn’t be disappointing. Where I live, social liberals are almost always worse news for sexual expression than social conservatives. And as far as bloggers go, think of what they could have done with sex during CNN’s E-lection Nite Blog Party during the last election. But, as a person who favors comprehensive sex education, basic sexual rights for all, and limited government power to censor, I probably consider them as my last hope.

If Marty Klein’s recent post about his experiences at the YearlyKOS Convention in Chicago is any indication, my last hope may be fading.

In case you haven't heard of him Marty Klein is a sex therapist, blogger, and most recently the author of the award winning book America's War on Sex. He is also one of our most fervent and outspoken activists for basic human sexual rights; passionate, articulate, and not at all concerned about pissing people off. While I don't know him well enough to describe his political leanings, I think it’s safe to assume he's a lefty.

Klein attended the conference to give a book talk, and described his dismay at lack of connection made between basic human rights and sexual rights at the conference. From his post:

…there was nothing about contraception, sex education, the unfairness (and complete failure) of sex offender registries, or mandatory internet filtering in public venues.
Everyone talked about how the government lied to get us into a destructive war 10,000 miles away. No one talked about how the government lies to keep us in a destructive war against a gigantic, demonic, phantom army of alleged sexual predators, porn addicts, and swingers.
Aside from the assumption that people shouldn’t be persecuted for loving someone of the same gender, no one talked about sexual justice as a justice issue, or sexual rights as human rights.

I think Klein is right on in arguing for these connections to be made. I don’t think it’s realistic to think that in our lifetime straight people are going to feel comfortable fighting for their sexual rights openly. Hopefully it will happen over time (if only we’d all read more Dan Savage, it might speed up the process a bit) but for now another important tactic is to incorporate sexual rights into the larger human rights agenda. Environmentalists have been doing it with sex toys, so why can’t activists do it with the political agenda?

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