By: PAIGE FOSTER
Staff Writer
The question stared imposingly from the board: How has the concept of sexuality changed since the time of Medea?
Medea is the main character of a Greek tragedy and the possessor of incredible feminine rage – which was especially unflattering in the context of her culture. This week, Mrs. Jolly’s AP Lit students were prompted to consider Medea’s complaints in the light of modern-day and examine the extent to which these complaints – such as lack of autonomy and double standards – persist.
When responding to this question, I was struck by how deeply issues of gender equality are rooted in sex culture. In Medea’s ancient Greece, for example, the ideal woman was perceived as quiet, submissive, and aware of her own inferior standing. Similarly, the sex culture of the time idealized women as delicate servile vessels, allegedly devoid of any desire of their own and endowed with value according to their virginity. By sharp contrast, the ideal Greek man was socially confident and authoritative. Men were also taught to see sex drive as an affirmation of masculinity and were never expected to deny their lust – even at the expense of its subject. Thus the society’s perception of men and women’s social roles heavily influenced and was influenced by sexual norms of the time.
Luckily, the gap between men’s and women’s perceived intrinsic value is significantly less than it was in ancient Greece. After all, women can vote, own property, live alone, and remain childless without major legal or social backlash. In many ways, this collective relaxation benefits society by promoting equality in employment, education, and politics. So how do sex culture and progression towards gender equality interact in the modern age? Considering our strides towards equality, do they interact to any significant degree?
Some people might argue that the present attitudes towards sex have led to social liberation and taken a weight of shame off of women who once believed their virginity to be their chief virtue. While it is true that the antiquated perspective on women and sex enslaves women to guilt, the new perspectives enslave women to promiscuity disguised as freedom. Frankly, neither are preferable options.
Take a moment to picture the perfect misogynistic man of the past. He views women as objects inferior to himself. He indulges his every lustful whim without regard for morality or monogamy. He utilizes his own rights to perpetuate the voicelessness of those without rights like his. No one likes this guy. Now let me present to you a plausible modern woman. She is in her twenties, and after a tough break-up in college, she has developed a pattern of one-night stands whom she meets on an online dating platform. She can only hold interest in a man for about a month. If she were to get pregnant, she has decided she would abort the pregnancy. Just like the utterly despised misogynistic man, this woman also uses people as sexual objects, places herself above concern for others’ feelings, and utilizes her political rights to ensure that those without the same rights will never be given the chance to fight back. All of this to say, the social and legislative changes which have served to grant women greater equality have not solved every problem in the bedroom but created new ones. Chiefly, greed, lust, selfishness, and apathy. Women today exhibit the very same attitudes as the men from past generations who were criticized for being womanizers and cowards. It is apparent that, while the world as a whole has largely elevated women to the same social standing as men, our equality has not come by raising the standard for men’s behavior. It has come by lowering the standard for our own.
Besides this collective failure, it is also evident that modern sex culture is, at its core, not so different from the reviled culture of earlier centuries. Tradition says that a woman’s value is sex, so she is worth no more to a man than her virginity. Modern sex culture says that a woman’s value is sex, so she is worth no more to a man than her willingness to share herself generously. Note that both of these attitudes start with the assumption that a woman’s value is sex. This is incredibly, outrageously noticeable in terms of present-day marketing, as well as in entertainment media like TV shows, movies, and music. The excessively sexual representation of people is especially glaring in regards to women. If you need proof, open two separate tabs and search “school girl” on one and “schoolboy” on the other. On the first tab, you’ll get pictures of grown women in short skirts, knee-high socks, and half-buttoned blouses meant to be some sort of sexy Halloween costume. On the other tab, you’ll get pictures of elementary school-aged boys toting large backpacks or spinning globes.
C.S. Lewis, a late Christian theologian, and author, aptly noted “You can get a large audience together…to watch a girl undress on a stage. Now suppose you came to a country where you could fill a theater by simply bringing a covered plate onto the stage and then slowly lifting the cover so as to let everyone see…that it contained a mutton chop or a bit of bacon, would you not think that in that country something had gone wrong with the appetite for food?” Considering the prevalence of sex and sex-related content in today’s world, it is a reasonable bet that something has gone incredibly awry with society’s sexual appetite.
Certainly, a hefty part of the issue is that we have cheapened sex to such a degree that it is mere mutual masturbation. We have so corroded the bonding tie of physical intimacy that young people can talk about having sex with a stranger as though it were an event no more personal than getting a pedicure. Perhaps the solution to the sex and gender crisis is not idolizing sex as the purest form of self-actualization as Western society as a whole has supposed. Perhaps sexual restraint is not about denying one’s self out of excessive and restrictive puritanical zeal, but rather is a practice conducive to the health of one’s relationships with others and with the God who created the human body. Perhaps reserving sex for the context of marriage is pragmatic, thoughtful, and rewarding instead of prudish, withholding, and guilt-based. Perhaps we can preserve the modern lack of judgment towards others’ sexual decisions without minimizing the importance of those decisions. Perhaps it is time to elevate societal standards instead of lowering them to suit appetites that are so clearly convoluted.