I have some doubts about the value of continuing this particular exchange with Kelley, and so I put off a reply for most of the day. But for better or worse, who goes.
It is symptomatic of Kelley's confusion about the relationship between the personal and the political, the public and the private, that she takes a criticism of a political position she expressed in a public forum -- the charge that her sermons on how morally wrong it is for two HIV+ gay men to have consensual intercourse without condoms constituted a form of sexual 'policing' -- as an attack on her personally. It is also symptomatic -- and so completely wrong-headed -- that she thinks a recitation of her polymorphously perverse sexual practices constitutes a defense against that criticism. The criticism was of moralizing sermons, and the criticism stands on its own, regardless of what the reverend does back in the vestry when the sermon is finished.
This is really no different than the case of Sullivan: his public positions on sexual politics are right or wrong based on the strength or weaknesses of his arguments, and nothing more. How could I be functioning discursively as the sexual police, Kelley asks, if I live the life of a Sadeian woman? Well how could Sullivan function as the sex cop if he is living the life of a Sadeian man? It is obvious that the one has little to do with the rest. For isn't that exactly what Kelley accuses Sullivan of -- a moralizing public pose with the actual life of a libertine? Kelley and Sullivan are a whole lot more alike than she wants to admit -- except that he does not share the penchant for the exhibitionist display of his private life.
There is a world of difference between frank and open public discussions of sex and sexuality per se, which are necessary and healthy, and the need to tell everyone all the details of one's sexual life. If insisting upon that difference makes me a prude in Kelley's book, I can live with that.
>you--like those you denounce--made my sexual practices, sexuality and
>sexual orientation an issue when you maintained that i ought to get out of
>the cop car and get down with the people. with very little evidence and a
>horrendous misreading of what little you had, you made a claim. i didn't
>have to answer your charge, just as sullivan didn't, but i see no reason
>not to, since i'm not ashamed and don't think it's a scandalous revelation
>(i teach courses on the sociology of love, sex, the family so, no, it's not
>big news). given that, i informed you that i was in the streets with "the
>people" and got down with them. (damn prepositions!)
>
>furthermore, mine wasn't a confession since i assume that quite a few
>people directly know from my theoretical and more personal writings on this
>topic elsewhere. so, it was kind of a joke i made--a wink at everyone who
>knew differently--just how absurd was your charge that i was the vanilla
>het sex police. oh, and of course, i do my damndest to please dd across
>the point--my greatest sexual trick yet!--by providing some prurient
>scandalous stuff to keep his uhhh interest up. it's is such a shame that
>you think it inappropriate material for this venue --especially given the
>reception you rec'd for your more formal writings on a similar topic, but
>hey, i cost you 140 clams, right? so whatever it takes, even if it requires
>temporary amnesia.
>
>did i engage in any fingering errr finger wagging about sullivan's love of
>bareback sex? not at sullivan. at the practice in general. yes, for the
>same reasons others did. like others here i agree that consensual
>barebacking between HIV+s is perfectly fine. i made that clear several
>times. like others, i don't happen to think that it is such a good idea to
>do so with people who aren't HIV+ -- altho i do agree with christian about
>realistic safer sex education rather than prohibition. but we were all
>finger wagging, even people who said, "whatever he wants to do as long as
>it's consensual" iow, as long as people tell their partners, then no big
>deal. like it or not, that's judging others' sexual behavior and everyone
>here did it, unless i missed out on someone saying that it would be
>perfectly ok for HIV+s to have sex with HIV-'s and not tell them about it.
>
>was i moralizing? you bet your sweet luscious bippy! so were they. so
>were you. so haven't we all. do i think proper moral behavior is the answer
>to social problems? no. i don't think anyone here does. sullivan, however,
>does.
>
>so, let's be clear:
>
>i do think that it's useful to point out that some gay men, sullivan in
>particular, engage in a hypermasculinized rhetoric about gay male identity
>and sexuality that is open to critique. i think lesbians have done similar
>things when _some_ have argued that women's sexuality is more warm fuzzy
>and loving than men's and than lesbian sex is an advance over hetsex. if
>that issue had come up, i would have piped up and critiqued the
>hyperfeminized notions that these lesbians have advanced. i think there's
>a problem with claiming that there is such a thing as a bi identity because
>it tends to privilege bi as primary, making hetsex AND homosex
>secondary. i'd critique that if it came up.
>
>i do think that HIV+'s shouldn't engage in unprotected sex with people who
>are not HIV+. were i HIV+ i wouldn't, even though i know about safer sex
>practices which don't require strict adherence to condoms 100% of the time.
>when i raised that issue, i raised in response to what appeared to me to be
>christian's uncritical assummption that as long as it was consensual, then
>i was ok. i'm not so sure about that, so i asked what was the scoop with
>that presumption. that said, i can't imagine any way nor do i even desire
>that anyone sit down and come up with a way to ensure that we can legislate
>behavior to prevent such. it's sort of like guns. i support the 2a and used
>to sell guns and hold a Federal Firearms License. but, there are a plenty
>of people out there that don't know how to handle them safely and don't
>care to practice safe gun usuage. so, i tend to make judgements on them.
>
>finally, in the end, you, like me, have finger wagged about public
>behavior. you started your tirade by complaining about my language. i
>complained about barebacking that involves HIV- men.
>
>the difference between me and you and andrew, however, is that neither of
>us are the pop media poster boys for a social movement. furthermore, i
>happen to think that andrew sullivan's finger wagging at gays who are
>supposedly promiscuous and pathological is a lot more damaging than your
>finger wagging at me about language or your revulsion of my frank
>discussion of my sexuality (and my persona here is part of an identity
>practice that i've purposefully cultivated) or me finger waggin at
>christian about what i thought was a cavalier attitude toward a sexual
>practice that was clearly not monogamous and not strictly between HIV+s.
>
>and yes, what you and nathan and rob miss is the fact that there really is
>some place between high abstract bodiless theorizing and titillating dish.
>it can move back and forth between them as mills said it was important to
>connect biography to history. sullivan does it all the time, except he
>sucks at social analysis.
>
>michael pollack once engaged in a very moving example of this re: why he's
>sexually attracted to younger women. dennis thought it appropriate re porno
>flix. rob schaap has frequently discussed his sexuality in an effort to
>think through gender debates. if you saw gossip here, then please point it
>out. noting that sullivan's ad suggests a desire for barebacking with HIV-
>and HIV+s is about the closest you'll get. but that was engendered by
>sullivan's own contradictory whine. yes, his whine was engendered by the
>expose which i've said fromthe beginning was wrong and i wish signorile
>would knock it off. why do you think i said from the get go that i don't
>like signorile either!!
>
>there are some really good freeware learn to read programs out there, i
>hope you'll download two or ten.
>
>kelley
Leo Casey United Federation of Teachers 260 Park Avenue South New York, New York 10010-7272 (212-598-6869)
Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has, and it never will. If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its waters. -- Frederick Douglass --
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