Sexual Politics of Sarah Palin: Sex Sells, Even with Anti-Sex Authoritarians

Sexual Politics of Sarah Palin: Sex Sells, Even with Anti-Sex Authoritarians

_{Image © Austin Cline}

Would it be sexist to discuss Sarah Palin's sexual politics — not so much her sexual positions (er, I mean positions on sexual issues), or at least not directly, but how Sarah Palin's sexuality is being implicitly used to counterbalance her position on sexual issues? To what extent is the anti-sex party selling their anti-sex policies by using sexy women like Sarah Palin to deliver the sex-is-bad medicine with a wink and a nod? And just how many times will I need to use the words "sex" and "Sarah Palin" before this post hits Google's front page for what must be a very popular search right now?

Perhaps it is a bit sexist because we probably wouldn't be discussing the sexuality of a Steve Palin, but then again, I didn't pick Sarah Palin, did I? There would be something wrong if I couldn't point out the barely-repressed sexual tension surrounding a right-wing authoritarian candidate who keeps telling people to "just say no" to sex. This is, in fact, where a good part of the tension lies: a stern old man lecturing us about evils of sex would just be boring, but a pretty woman who knows when to wink can attract a lot more positive attention, though not necessarily for the right reasons.

Sex sells, and apparently it can even be used to sell anti-sex ideology — at least to a point. Conservative evangelicals have eaten from the Tree of the Knowledge of Modern Culture more than they realize. They use modern marketing techniques rather than the gospel to promote their churches. They organize mega-churches instead of small community churches, much as big box stores have supplanted corner shops. The employ every bit of modern technology they think they can use even as they decry the science behind it. And, finally, they employ the prettiest faces and the sexiest spokespeople to make their anti-sex ideology a little more palatable.

When looking around for ideas about how to best structure and phrase these thoughts, I found I wasn't the first to have them — no surprise there, though my reaction is a little conflicted. It's nice to have an original idea occasionally, but the fact that others are talking about it at least reassures that I'm probably on to something legitimate. Tom Perrotta calls this phenomenon the Sexy Puritan, and since I can't come up with anything more clever or descriptive (though it does sound like the title of a soft core film for Cinemax, which might be appropriate after all) I'm happy to follow suit. Perrotta writes:

Sexy Puritans engage in the culture war on two levels—not simply by advocating conservative positions on hot-button social issues but by embodying nonthreatening mainstream standards of female beauty and behavior at the same time. The net result is a paradox, a bit of cognitive dissonance very useful to the cultural right: You get a little thrill along with your traditional values, a wink along with the wagging finger. Somehow, you don't feel quite as much like a prig as you expected to.

Conservatives don't choose representatives like Sarah Palin by accident. They know what they are doing, and it's not simply the knowledge that putting a pleasant face on a product helps make the product more attractive. John McCain and his campaign revealed that they knew what they were doing when they registered the domain name "VoteForTheMILF.org" and directed to the Sarah Palin page on McCain's campaign site (until they were caught, that is). Her campaign theme song had been at one point Shania Twain’s “She’s Not Just a Pretty Face," but seems to have been changed to Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely? At least they don't go so far as to drape her in revealing clothing, but that's not necessary.

Pundits and voters like Rich Lowry are clearly getting the message when they imagine that Sarah Palin is winking at them personally. Even if they aren't actually masturbating to images of Sarah Palin, sexual fantasies are being tied to sexual repression in a manner that must make the authoritarian repression of sex seem sexually attractive in itself. This creates fantasies that are easy for outsiders to buy into. No one is going to make (INCOMING MESSAGE FROM THE INTERNET: WARNING! TURN AWAY NOW OR WE'RE ALL DOOMED!) a John McCain sex doll or a videos about masturbating to John McCain (TOO LATE, YOU READ IT! RULE 34 INVOKED! OH, THE HORROR...), but they sure are doing it with Sarah Palin.

How do you undermine something like that? You can mock people who demand respect and thereby undermine their perceived authority. You can sexualize prudery and thereby undermine the attempts to shut out sex. When it comes to prudery that comes wrapped in a tacitly sexualized package, though, all the bases seem to be covered. De-sexualizing it (like portraying Sarah Palin in a burqa, the theological end of such faith-based anti-sex ideology) may jut be giving in to the prudery. Over-sexualizing it (like with Sarah Palin sex dolls) makes the sexualized packaging seem even more normal and thereby further blinds people to the truth of what's inside.

Sex is being separated from Sexiness, which shouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. Being sexy isn't an invitation to sex and sex can be enjoyed without conforming to society's standards of sexiness. This separation isn't being done, though, to free people from impossible standards of sexiness but is rather exploiting and reinforcing those standards for ideological goals. This separation isn't being done to protect women's choices about sex, but rather to limit their choices even further.

The question before us, then, is how to properly challenge this without on the one hand reinforcing the tactic in ways that might make the anti-sex brigades' job easier or, on the other hand reinforcing some of society's notions about sex and sexiness which should be reformed anyway. Indeed, I can't even be sure if I'm not inadvertently making this worse in this sermon, but we need to have a discussion about this even if it means fumbling about with it at first.

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