The Bible contains no injunctions against cannibalism.
That's not because Hebrews and early Christians thought it was morally
acceptable - it's because no one was doing it.
On the other hand, the Bible contains serious warnings against
adultery, incest, and same-gender sex. That's because there were people doing
these things.
A half-century ago, Alfred Kinsey asked 18,000 Americans what
they did sexually. He didn't get any cannibalism, but he did get plenty of adultery,
incest, and same-gender sex, along with oral sex, prostitution, and masturbation.
Like any good scientist, he categorized the behavior according to fundamental
demographic variables: by age, gender, race, religion, and so on. Simple.
Simple except for two things: Millions of frightened people
relaxed, and millions of frightened people got more frightened. The first
group flocked to his classes and made his books bestsellers, while the
second group tried to destroy his livelihood and freedom, and banish
his work.
The two groups' descendants are still
battling. His professional offspring struggle against government, Church,
and even academia to educate and heal Americans. Much of the public cherishes
scientific knowledge about their own bodies, and the freedom to use sexuality
as a form of self-expression.
The descendants of the second group are still trying
to destroy Kinsey fifty years after his death, with bizarre stories of
sadomasochistic, incestuous orgies of child abuse and bestiality. They
warn that Kinsey's work is responsible for America's
pornography, sex crimes, and abortions (as if there were none before 1948).
They even claim that Kinsey's disciples have infiltrated the Catholic Church,
and should be sued for giving bad advice about how to handle pedophile priests.
Yes, really.
It's in a country that spends $10 billion per year on porn
but which is not allowed to see an entertainer's nipple on TV that the
biographical film Kinsey arrived
last week. Good news: it's a wonderful film, intelligently written, beautifully
photographed, gracefully acted. The era from 1900-1950 is lovingly recreated.
There's a little bit of sex (quite gentle except for the Kinseys' wedding
night, which was awkward and painful for both) and some nice humor (also
quite gentle). The film isn't preachy about the storm of fear, hate, and
ignorance that desperately attempted to return America to
the closet whose door Kinsey opened with his naive faith in science and
human beings.
So for entertainment, go see the film. Or see it to support
the producer and distributors, who are being threatened with boycotts
from thousands of evangelical websites and pulpits around the country.
Or see it because it will put your own struggles for sexual identity
and self-validation into a comforting context. That, of course, is Kinsey's
ultimate legacy.
But enough about Kinsey the man, or Kinsey the
film. Let's talk about the people who hate both man and film, how the
media covers this hatred, and why we should care. Because that's what
today's electronic media are primarily about: sex and hate. Besides,
we're all post-modernists: we've learned that no thing is as real as
its broadcast image.
Frightened, angry people are using Kinsey to
make points--to their constituents, to the media, to their own repressed
eroticism. There's a whole industry keeping the national fear machine
going; not even control of the Presidency, Congress, and Supreme Court
soothes these folks.
They tell us that Satan literally walks among us, that
he will literally be seducing us until Judgment Day. With that siege
mentality, it's sensible to constantly scan the horizon for evil. And
if sexual impulses are inherently evil, well, we will never run out of
evil stuff to fear. Like the Aztecs who were waiting for God when Cortez
arrived, Alfred Kinsey is the latest devil for which the Christian Right
has been waiting.
The media's in bed with these Satan-worshippers, thrilled
to broadcast the latest chapter in America's
medieval science-versus-fear marathon. And so Fox, CNN, and the rest
have set up a bunch of verbal wrestling matches.
They aren't educational, because there's no attempt
to get at the facts. They aren't news because they involve the same old
organizations (Focus on the Family, Traditional Values Coalition, American
Family Association, BobJonesUniversity)
spewing the same old hate. They aren't fair or balanced, because non-scientists
are critiquing science. Actually, critiquing isn't the right word, as
that implies reasoned examination. It's non-scientists screeching about
not liking the results of science.
Kinsey described sexual reality in America,
results that are consistent with later surveys by everyone from the University of Chicago's NationalOpinionResearchCenter to
Modern Maturity Magazine. Some people hate and fear that reality. And
so they're attempting to kill the messenger. The media is complicit in
this manslaughter: they're pretending there are two sides to this, and
they're giving each "side" time.
(They're actually giving the anti-Kinsey people way more time because
their bile is more mediagenic than most scientists' straightforward explanations.)
The two "sides" being presented are 1) scientists and
educators and 2) moralists and "concerned citizens." What exactly are
the latter's credentials to critique science? To draw conclusions about
the effects of science? To predict how things would be different with
different science? How many moralists know the difference between a cluster
sample, snowball sample, and a random sample--the key methodological
question about the Kinsey data they so confidently disparage?
The anti-Kinsey "side" says:
Kinsey used pedophiles to
abuse kids to get data.
This is FALSE.
Kinsey himself had sex with kids.
This is FALSE.
Kinsey said that all sex is OK.
This is FALSE.
By neutrally collecting information, Kinsey endorsed
everything he heard.
This is FALSE.
By neutrally describing various sexual behaviors, he
endorsed them.
This is FALSE.
Because his sample wasn't random, Kinsey's data is
skewed toward perversion.
This is FALSE.
These facts are not matters of opinion - they
are matters of public record. There aren't two sides to these questions;
there's only one side - the truth. But in giving viewers the meta-message
that there are two sides to this "controversy," the
media not only obscures the truth, it undermines the idea that there
IS truth about this. Thus, nothing is required from the audience - no
thought, no evaluation, no growth. In fact, people can watch the conflict
without actually listening to what's said, because they know which protagonist
they believe based on which "side" they're
on.
With all the talk shows purporting to "explore" the
Kinsey "controversy," there
hasn't been one that has challenged the assumptions
of those who damn him:
Information is dangerous
People weren't already doing "those things" before
Kinsey reported them
Sexual ignorance has no personal or social costs
Sexual problems
didn't exist before Kinsey did his work
Science should not challenge
society's status quo
Kinsey accurately noted that Americans enjoyed oral
sex, masturbation, and premarital sex. Today, virtually everyone accepts
this as factual, and organizations from the American Medical Association
to the UnitarianChurch accept
these behaviors as healthy when done honestly and respectfully. But many
people are uncomfortable with, and disown, their own behavior. Our President,
for example, who had plenty of premarital sex, insists we spend hundreds
of millions of dollars teaching kids not to.
Kinsey and his interviewers asked about both attitudes
and behavior, but he felt that behavior spoke more eloquently. "Often," he
said, "the
expressed attitudes are in striking contradiction to the actual behavior,
and then they are significant because they indicate the existence of
psychic conflict."
Kinsey: still telling the truth after all these years.
Dr. Marty Klein has been a Licensed Marriage & Family Counselor
and Sex Therapist for 24 years. He has aimed his entire career toward
a single set of goals: telling the truth about sexuality, helping people
feel sexually adequate & powerful,
and supporting the healthy sexual expression and exploration of women
and men. See
more of Marty's work at www.SexualIntelligence.org.
Kinsey Film DVD's for sale through Amazon.com
Kinsey
Academy Award-winning Bill Condon (GODS & MONSTERS, CHICAGO)
explores the life of the pioneer of human sexuality research,
Alfred Kinsey (Liam Neeson). Spanning six decades from his childhood
in the early 1900s to his death in 1956, the film turns the microscope
on the man whose landmark studies on the sexual behaviors of
the common man rocked a nation.
Two-Disc Special Edition Extra
Features • Commentary with writer/director Bill Condon
• The Kinsey Report: Sex on Film
• 20 deleted scenes plus alternative ending with optional commentary by
Bill Condon
• Gag reel
• Sex Ed at the Kinsey Institute
• Interactive Sex Questionnaire
Kinsey: American Experience (2004)
PBS documentary assesses Kinsey's achievements,
while examining how his personal life shaped his career, through
interviews with his research assistants, his children, his
biographers, and historians.
Address
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