Alas, a Blog | Feminist, anti-racist, pro-fat, plus whatever else we feel like talking about.

Marriage Equality, Marital Rape and No-Fault Divorce

Posted on October 28, 2005 by Ampersand

Belle, who favors same-sex marriage, nonetheless says that this is one of the most compelling anti-SSM arguments:

The change SSM advocates propose is a radical one, and we can’t be sure exactly what will happen. The last time a radical change to marriage was enacted on the grounds of maximizing individual liberty and happiness it turned out to be a disaster from a broader point of view, and especially for children.

Even if Belle is just playing devil’s advocate here, I think it’s worth responding.

First of all, it’s not clear that civil recognition of same-sex marriage is itself a radical change. I’ve argued in the past that SSM is just a relatively small side effect of two genuinely radical long-term trends. The first radical change is feminism’s defeat of “separate spheres” ideology: Now that it’s no longer true that women and men fulfill two strictly-bounded, separate roles, the rule that only women may marry men and vice-versa has lost its logical basis in our society.

The second radical change is the gay rights movement, which has made huge strides towards acceptance of the equal humanity and dignity of lesbian and gay relationships.

It is these two radical trends – which effect so much more than just marriage – which have made SSM a real possibility in our society. And although it’s certainly true that we “can’t be sure exactly what will happen” due to those two radical (and still ongoing) changes, it seems unlikely that either of these trends can be stopped just by opposing same-sex marriage.

Second, the most recent “radical change to marriage” wasn’t no-fault divorce; it was the near-total elimination of the marital exemption to rape laws. Although like all changes to marriage, this change was in the works for years before it led to a change in law, most of the actual modifications of the relevant laws took place in the 80s and 90s.

Is it possible for someone who takes the anti-SSM arguments seriously to justify the elimination of the marital rape exemption? I’m not sure it is. The Burkean hand-waving approach (short version: we can’t be sure that unintended effects of any change won’t be bad, so all change is bad) would clearly weigh against outlawing marital rape; making it illegal for husbands to rape their wives significantly changed the rules of every existing marriage, with who knew what results? And giving wives the right to refuse sex with their husbands strongly suggests that marriage is not only about procreation, but also includes concern for what’s good for adults – exactly the view of marriage that same-sex marriage opponents always say they oppose.

Finally, contrary to the conventional wisdom, no-fault divorce wasn’t an unmitigated disaster. To this day, social scientists argue about no-fault’s impact; many empirical studies have either found that no-fault divorce laws had no effect on long-term divorce rates, or had only a relatively small effect.

More importantly, no-fault divorce has literally been a lifesaver for some abused women. Even if we assume that no-fault divorce increased the divorce rate, its benefits may still outweigh its negatives.

Have Anti-SSM Folks Changed Their Tune?

Posted on October 28, 2005 by Ampersand

Almost two years ago, I pointed out that same-sex marriage opponents appear to be fitting their views of marriage around their opposition to SSM. SSM opponents often suggest that the only purpose for marriage that matters is marriage’s “generative” function. But as recently as 2000, SSM opponent David Blankenhorn’s think tank published a “statement of principles” – signed by many current SSM opponents, including Maggie Gallagher – which clearly took a much broader view of marriage’s purposes and benefits.

Yesterday Andrew Sullivan, who recently debated David Blankenhorn (audio file here), mentioned this seemingly shifting view of marriage among SSM opponents. David responded:

…Anyone who reads the statement, The Marriage Movement: A Statement of Principles, to which Andrew refers, will see quite clearly that the statement views marriage as a social institution as intrinsically linked to bearing and raising the next generation. My colleagues and I have been making this point with great emphasis for many years.

David has missed the point.

The question isn’t if SSM opponents have been saying that marriage is linked to bearing the next generation – of course it is, and people have been saying so for ages. (No one in the marriage equality movement denies that marriage involves children, and is important to children; that children raised by same-sex couples should be raised by married parents is one of the most important arguments for SSM).

But that’s not what SSM opponents have been saying, by and large. They’ve seen saying that the state’s only interest in regulating marriage is supporting heterosexual childbearing. And that’s simply not what David and other SSM opponents were saying five years ago.

The “Statement of Principles” David links to includes a section entitled “Is Marriage a Private Matter? The Public Costs of Divorce,” which argues that supporting marriage is a legitimate goal of government. (I agree with David about that). Here’s part of what it says:

Is strengthening marriage a legitimate public goal?

We believe that the answer is yes, for at least four reasons:

1. Marriage protects the well-being of children;

2. Divorce and unwed parenting generate large taxpayer costs;

3. Marriage is a unique generator of social and human capital, as important as education in building the wealth of individuals and communities; and

4. Only marriage creates a reasonable hope of permanence.

Does this involve children? Yes, of course it does.

Does this support the view that the generative capacity of fertile heterosexual couples is the government’s only interest in marriage? Obviously not; the “Statement of Principles” makes it clear that the government has multiple interests in supporting marriage. The argument that heterosexual childrearing is the one and only reason for government to have an interest in marriage – so popular among SSM opponents today – contradicts what the marriage movement was saying just five years ago.

Posted in Same-Sex Marriage | 22 Comments

Lies Told By Republican Fundraisers

Posted on October 28, 2005 by Ampersand

From a fundraising letter sent me last month by the “College Republican National Committee”:

These [anti-war] protests are being led by liberal professors leftover from the 1960’s… the same professors who fail students for simply expressing their support of President Bush and our troops!

Not that I think that Republicans leaders are liars, but does anyone know if there is any credible evidence to support the claim that there is a pattern of many leftist professors acting in this manner?

Posted in Conservative zaniness, right-wingers, etc. | 10 Comments

Silly links for silly people

Posted on October 27, 2005 by Ampersand

Even His Groceries Are Racist
Frequent “Alas” token right-winger Robert goes shopping.

Old Glory Insurance
Boy, is Sam Watterson a sell-out. (Quicktime required).

Stop Looking At Me!
Ann Althouse provides a scary photo of a cell phone.

Infamous Page 7
Kevin gets in trouble lending his six-year-old Katie a comic that reveals the unrevealable.

Objectivity and Subjectivity Switched Meanings
Really, they did. But that was hundreds of years ago, so none of us noticed.

Quite Impressive Optical Illusion.
I probably came across this via Boing Boing.

Control Humans Via Remote Control

I felt a mysterious, irresistible urge to start walking to the right whenever the researcher turned the switch to the right. I was convinced — mistakenly — that this was the only way to maintain my balance.

The phenomenon is painless but dramatic. Your feet start to move before you know it. I could even remote-control myself by taking the switch into my own hands.

Posted in Link farms | 19 Comments

The Lancet Study of Iraqi Deaths

Posted on October 27, 2005 by Ampersand

This topic has come up in P-A’s UNFPA thread: rather than derail that discussion further, I’ve put up a new post, and transfered comments about the Lancet study from that post to this one.

It’s been almost a year since the British medical journal The Lancet published a study (pdf version here) showing that deaths among ordinary Iraqis have increased as a result of the American invasion and occupation.

This study is important because the invasion of Iraq, after the collapse of the WMD rationalization, is currently rationalized post hoc as justified by the good our invasion has done the Iraqi people. While it’s certainly true that getting rid of Saddam is wonderful – I mean that seriously – things on the other side of the scale – such as a massive increase in needless, violent deaths – need to be considered as well, if we’re going to take the “invade to help the people” argument seriously.

Unfortunately, neither the American media nor the pro-Iraq-invasion folks on either side of the partisan divide have seriously dealt with the Lancet study or its implications; instead, they’ve argued that the study is bad science. They’re wrong.

From the abstract of the study:

Background

In March, 2003, military forces, mainly from the USA and the UK, invaded Iraq. We did a survey to compare mortality during the period of 14.6 months before the invasion with the 17.8 months after it.

Methods

A cluster sample survey was undertaken throughout Iraq during September, 2004. 33 clusters of 30 households each were interviewed about household composition, births, and deaths since January, 2002. In those households reporting deaths, the date, cause, and circumstances of violent deaths were recorded. We assessed the relative risk of death associated with the 2003 invasion and occupation by comparing mortality in the 17.8 months after the invasion with the 14.6-month period preceding it.

Findings

The risk of death was estimated to be 2.5-fold (95% CI 1.6–4.2) higher after the invasion when compared with the preinvasion period. Two-thirds of all violent deaths were reported in one cluster in the city of Falluja. If we exclude the Falluja data, the risk of death is 1.5-fold (1.1–2.3) higher after the invasion. We estimate that 98 000 more deaths than expected (8000–194 000) happened after the invasion outside of Falluja and far more if the outlier Falluja cluster is included. The major causes of death before the invasion were myocardial infarction, cerebrovascular accidents, and other chronic disorders whereas after the invasion violence was the primary cause of death. Violent deaths were widespread, reported in 15 of 33 clusters, and were mainly attributed to coalition forces. Most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children. The risk of death from violence in the period after the invasion was 58 times higher (95% CI 8.1–419) than in the period before the war.

Interpretation

Making conservative assumptions, we think that about 100 000 excess deaths, or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Violence accounted for most of the excess deaths and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths. We have shown that collection of public-health information is possible even during periods of extreme violence. Our results need further verification and should lead to changes to reduce noncombatant deaths from air strikes.

Posted in Iraq | 62 Comments

Withdrawn

Posted on October 27, 2005 by Pseudo-Adrienne

The White House has withdrawn its SCOTUS nominee, Harriet Miers. Hm. Guess she won’t make it on the highest bench after all.

UPDATE: NARAL Pro-Choice America’s response to the withdrawal.

Posted in Conservative zaniness, right-wingers, etc., Supreme Court Issues | 5 Comments

How to eliminate extreme poverty according to the UNFPA

Posted on October 26, 2005 by Pseudo-Adrienne

Via Planned Parenthood, the UNFPA has recently released its 2005 State of the World Population report. Which in my opinion states the obvious. That the elimination of extreme poverty cannot be achieved without ensuring gender equality and making reproductive healthcare readily available to all women, especially those living in ‘developing nations’.

[…]The report focuses on the fact that the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), eight goals aimed at eliminating extreme poverty worldwide, cannot be achieved without significant investments in furthering gender equality and reproductive health.

Gender inequities can take the hardest toll on women living in poverty. Gender discrimination in education and employment can lead to poverty. Today, nearly twice as many woman as men are illiterate, and women continue to face discrimination in employment and lower pay in the workplace.[…]

And we are living in a world where millions of women have no access to reproductive health care, because they cannot afford services, because their husbands or parents won’t allow them to get services, or simply because there is no provider available.

The lack of access to care is compounded by harmful traditional practices like female cutting/female genital mutilation, early marriage, and transactional sex, which increase women’s risk of HIV/AIDS and leave many women unable to negotiate sex or condom use.

The Results?

Every minute of every day, a woman dies of a pregnancy-related cause. In sub-Saharan Africa, one in 16 women is likely to die as a result of pregnancy. In some of the poorest parts of this region, as many as one in six women face these odds. (To compare, this risk is one in 2,800 women in industrialized nations.)[…]

A severe lack of access to family planning leads to 76 million unintended pregnancies each year in the developing world alone.

When women cannot decide freely when and whether to have a child (or even when or whether to have sex) they are left with multiple unintended pregnancies, which prevent them from working outside the home, trapping them in poverty.

Too often, to make ends meet, parents decide to pull their daughters out of school so they can earn money or marry their daughters off to have fewer mouths to feed.

Giving women the right to education, the right to control their bodies, and the right to equal treatment in the workforce can help break the cycle of poverty.[…]

But we cannot achieve these goals unless governments commit to gender equality and reproductive rights.

Guess one of the nations that’s not entirely committed to this effort.

Though UNFPA is the only multilateral agency devoted to providing adults and adolescents with family planning and reproductive health care services, the Bush administration has withheld congressionally approved funding to UNFPA for the past four years.[…]

And with Bush nominating people like Ellen Sauerbrey to be Assistant Secretary of State on the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, there’s no doubt of how “committed” the administration is to this effort of eliminating poverty, via gender equality and reproductive rights.

[…]Sauerbrey, the current U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, is not well prepared to take the job, having little experience working with refugees and a long record of opposing reproductive rights.[…]

However, Sauerbrey’s record on reproductive health and family planning raises more than a few red flags:

—She has not only repeatedly stated her opposition to the right to choose abortion but has also declared that abortion is not a legitimate element of reproductive health assistance.

—She approves of President Bush’s withholding of funding to UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, charging that the money is “being used for coercive abortions in China,” despite numerous findings to the contrary.

—Sauerbrey has also denied that adolescents have any right to exercise autonomous control over their reproductive health and has called abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education the healthiest and most responsible method of HIV prevention suitable for adolescents.

Along with opposing reproductive health and rights, Sauerbrey has taken extremist positions on other women’s rights issues in the context of the United Nations.

In her role at the U.N. she has opposed ratification of the Convention for the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), a United Nations treaty agreed to by more than 180 countries (excluding the United States), and has also objected to language in U.N. documents that requires countries to “condemn violence against women and refrain from invoking any custom, tradition or religious consideration to avoid their obligations with respect to its elimination as set out in the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women.”[…]

So does allowing governments to invoke certain religious customs in the form of the law, no matter how misogynist they can be, take precedent over ending violence against women–because it’s “religious?” And does ideology take precedent over helping efforts such as the UNFPA’s to eliminate extreme povery, by supporting gender equality and reproductive rights? Perhaps for people like Sauerbrey and this administration it does.

Posted in Abortion & reproductive rights, Anti-feminists and their pals, Conservative zaniness, right-wingers, etc., Feminism, sexism, etc, Gender and the Economy, International issues, UNFPA | 77 Comments

Are Homophobes Really Repressing Homosexuality?

Posted on October 26, 2005 by Ampersand

There’s a famous study, which many liberals are fond of, which involves putting a special cuff around the penises of homophobic young men. This cuff measures even tiny changes in the penile circumference. The homophobes are then shown homoerotic films; the cuff shows that their penises get bigger as they watch hot gay men doing what hot gay men do in such films. In contrast, a control group of non-homophobic men with cuffs around their dicks didn’t show any reaction to the hot gay men. The authors conclude that “Homophobia is apparently associated with homosexual arousal that the homophobic individual is either unaware of or denies.”

I most often see this study brought up by liberals and lefties when they’re arguing with a right-winger about some queer rights issue; the point is that homophobes are homophobic because they’re repressing secret gay desires. I don’t like the way it’s brought up in argument, because it’s usually used as a sort of neener-neener “you only say that because you’re a closet case” ad hom attack.

But I’m also bothered by the study’s methodology and interpretation. First of all, measuring sexuality by strapping a cuff around Mr. Happy – while ignoring what the subjects say about their subjective state of arousal – is a reductive and simplistic way of defining male sexuality.

Second of all, sexual excitement isn’t the only thing that can alter a penis’ circumference. The study authors themselves, towards the end of their study, acknowledge that their data could be explained by homophobes feeling anxious and threatened, rather than by secret gay desires:

Another explanation of these data is found in Barlow, Sakheim, and Beck’s (1983) theory of the role of anxiety and attention in sexual responding. It is possible that viewing homosexual stimuli causes negative emotions such as anxiety in homophobic men but not in nonhomophobic men. Because anxiety has been shown to enhance arousal and erection, this theory would predict increases in erection in homophobic men. Furthermore, it would indicate that a response to homosexual stimuli is a function of the threat condition rather than sexual arousal per se.

To me, that seems more likely than the theory that homophobes are mostly closet cases – even though the closet case theory is, I admit, more fun.

Posted in Homophobic zaniness/more LGBTQ issues | 51 Comments

Should I be worried?

Posted on October 25, 2005 by Ampersand

Anyone know what’s going on with Half Changed World and Democracy Arsenal? Two of my favorite blogs which haven’t had new posts in nearly two weeks…. (UPDATE: I have no idea why my browser wasn’t refreshing – there are plenty of new posts at both DA and HCW. Oy.).

Anyhow, if you haven’t been reading these blogs, go over and check out their archives – it’ll be worth your while. Half Changed World deals with social policy and social science, from a feminist mom perspective, and Democracy Arsenal covers foreign policy from a progressive perspective (Susanne Nossel’s posts are especially good).

And A Couple of New Blogs

Another good blog – one that’s new to me – is Capitalism Bad; Tree Pretty by occasional “Alas” contributor Reddecca. She has a recent post about abortion and Down syndrome, galvanized by the recent discussion, which “Alas” readers may want to check out. There’s also a lot of interesting posts about the lives of the woman profiled each day in the “feminist of the day” segment, and a refreshing lack of partisan loyalty – Reddecca doesn’t hesitate to criticize sexism on the left.

And, finally, Salon‘s new blog focused on women and women’s issues, Broadsheet, seems pretty good to me – the stories they’re covering are worth reading about, and it’s better-written than most blogs, although I’d prefer it to be a tad less slick/professional and a tad more of an individual voice. Still, so far it looks like a good moderate-liberal blog with a real concern for women; why so many of Salon‘s readers consider that a horrible thing is a mystery.

Posted in Link farms | 1 Comment