I had to steal this from Isaac Schrödinger's blog when I saw the post. It's the abstract from a comprehensive sociologial examination of how women, not men, are the driving force behind the suppression of female sexuality:
Four theories about cultural suppression of female sexuality are evaluated. Data are reviewed on cross-cultural differences in power and sex ratios, reactions to the sexual revolution, direct restraining influences on adolescent and adult female sexuality, double standard patterns of sexual morality, female genital surgery, legal and religious restrictions on sex, prostitution and pornography, and sexual deception. The view that men suppress female sexuality received hardly any support and is flatly contradicted by some findings. Instead, the evidence favors the view that women have worked to stifle each other's sexuality because sex is a limited resource that women use to negotiate with men, and scarcity gives women an advantage.
Sex is the only weapon that women, as a gender, have against men, as a gender. What a promiscuous woman does is analogous to beating her sword into a plowshare in the middle of "the fight" and making peace with "the enemy." An active minority of promiscuous women can have a devastating impact on the object value of the sexuality of the majority of women if left unchecked by the majority, and women know that on a subconscious level. Even steps as radical as female circumcision are typically initiated and controlled by the older women of the community in the regions where they are practiced as a means of controlling female sexuality.
One of the areas where feminists go completely wrong here is assuming that this is a function of patriarchy. It may be more pronounced in some respects in a patriarchy, but it would still be a serious issue in a matriarchy as well. In fact, in a matriarchy, it would probably manifest itself in a more virulent manner as promiscuous women be in a position to directly turn their sexuality into means of increasing their social standing and power among men. No matter which way you look at it, female promiscuity poses a direct threat to male loyalty, and subconsciously, women will go to great lengths to prevent that.
This is pure gold, MikeT. As the first commentor on "The Sorry Sisterhood" said, "In retrospect, this should have been obvious", but having some relevant data never hurts. I think they want about $15 for a hard-copy, but it'd be worth the read, I think.
I'm still laughing.
Very interesting. A related phenomenea: Wives of soldiers are suspicious of female soldiers as "total sluts". Even the ones who used to be female soldiers themselves.
Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't there actually a lot of truth to that accusation about your average female soldier? A friend of mine who went into the army a few years ago was disgusted by how outright whorish the average girl in his unit was (or at least bragged about being).
I want to echo Feral here. This is great stuff. A couple thoughts, tho:
"Sex is the only weapon that women, as a gender, have against men, as a gender."
Not the only weapon, as feminists have co-opted government to do their bidding against men. The coercive power of government is arguably much more powerful of a weapon against men than the primeval weapon of sex. A man can protect himself, even exploit, a woman's sex weapon. Good luck doing that wrt City Hall.
"In fact, in a matriarchy, it would probably manifest itself in a more virulent manner as promiscuous women be in a position to directly turn their sexuality into means of increasing their social standing and power among men."
I have a hard time seeing how this would be the case in a matriarchy, 'cuz a matriarchy by definition deprives the majority of men of any meaningful power or influence. In a matriarchy, a female who beds many men does little to advance herself politically or to acquire more power or resources.
Sex is still the only weapon that women have by virtue of being women. It's the only carrot they have to offer men that men cannot get from each other. If sex were simply not a factor in any respect, few men would want much to do with women.
Men would still have to form the bulk of the military and other branches that require the physical capabilities and aggression of men. I'm not talking about a matriarchy in which males are physically weaker, among other biological changes, than women.