(Experimenting with tumblr as a liveblog from sex::tech — I have ace supervision in the person of Regina Lynn of Wired.)
SexPanic: How New Technologies Focus Public Fears About Sex
- Internet was not the first technology to drive sexual development
- Young people as early adopters
- Society has always feared technology will get out of control
- Twin fears of the transformative power of new technologies & fear of sexual transformation challenges the status quo
Sex panics lead to bad public policies * Demonizes information * Substitutes fear for logic & reasons
The current sex panic especially bad. * Faith-based funding — and this is not going to change even if a Democrat gets into office next year * Use of tech to spread panic, especially new media — they have money and they have caught up to us.
Also: * Religions now a political power * Sex Panic hijacked onto national political stage * Scientific illiteracy of the public * Urgency of would-be censors * Internet gives technological “evidence” that tech is bad * Coalition of left and right wing to sustain panic * Well organized political war on sex * Increased privacy of both youth & would-be exploiters
Their Agenda * To contain sexual information (e.g., NetNanny’s algorithims are considered a trade secret; these are used as a public utility — at universities, libraries, etc. and so we have no information about what is being limited) * To end sexual rights for youth * Limit young people’s ownership of the own bodies * Maintain STD’s as price for premarital sex * Limit contraception * Censor mass media * Censor internet * Create/maintain sexual ignorance for youth
This creates a setting in which it can be legal for two seventeen year olds to have sex, but for them to create a photograph of the behavior is illegal. The question is, who owns these kids bodies? Who owns the picture? Who owns the activity conducted by those kids bodies?
What Are They Afraid Of * Youth will seize new technology and expand their sexual expression * Youth will become more vulnerable to sexual exploitation
This is not some bourgeois thing; these are not fears that will go away. Challenging these fears requires more strategy. These are fears in the real hearts of real people and an operational strategy for them.
We need to be talking about, what are the ways young people can participate in new media in smart ways? How do we increase our media literacy and our technological literacy? E.g., “it’s good for lonely gay teens in Kansas, but what about porn?” There’s a limit as to how facts address people’s fears and how those become public policies.
Disconnect Between Adults & Youth on Sex & Tech * It’s not that old people don’t know about new media; they actually feel left out of our fun. * Adults’ sense of exclusion leads them to feel that tech is an alien conduit for alien stuff. These people have power and money. * Fear/danger narrative has terrified even the most reasonable parents, and so they are more vulnerable to calls for control. They feel the pressure to do something and we have to talk about that in a way they understand, that’s as much about emotions as it is about electrons.
American Sexual Disaster Industry Being a sex therapist for twenty years = lots of erection problems. But there’s more sexual perversion in an hour of CSI than there is to be seen as a sex therapist for a month.
Increasing Legitimacy of Restricting Sexual Rights The increased amount of perceived sexual problems (more strip clubs, more sexual assault, more STI’s) -> the increased restriction of sexual rights = The socio-political commitment to restricting sexual rights has led to a War on Sex, based on a narrative of fear and danger.
The Sexual Disaster industry is overstating the amount of sexual violence and sexual danger in America, and creating the illusion of a threatening sexual “other” in our midst — most often, the “homosexual” and the “sexual predator.” (This just replaced Communism, really, and now we have terrorists. [snark])
People do not want to know they are safer than ever. They want to believe that it is rational to be afraid of sexual danger.
Today’s sexual narrative puts educators, clinicians, and technologists at a competitive disadvantage. We re trying to market positive sexuality without referencing these fears.
Re: the new “right” to not be made uncomfortable about sex “If we try to have a culture where no one is uncomfortable about sex, we’re either in a utopia or sex has been as vanilla as milk.”
Demonizing technology * Condoms * Emergency Contraception * Internet * Social networking sites * Anything that facilitates privacy, especially for young people
How To Deal with Today’s TechSexPanic * We should understand their motivation and goals and strategy * We should actively oppose it * We should increase the sexual literacy of young people * We should not assume all this will go away if we get a Republican out of the White House.
