America, we need to talk about the political sex scandal. A staple since the founding of the US government, politicians and their sexual “deviancies” have long informed our national attitudes towards sex and sexuality. From puritanical roots, we’ve morphed into a society that is equal parts judgmental and infatuated with all things sexual. Our attitudes towards sex and politics reinforce gender binaries and double-standards, fueled by a purity culture that promotes shame. This shame and sensationalization of sex, sexuality, and political scandal has been so pervasive that many of us don’t even notice it’s there, let alone think critically about how it colors our thoughts. From Stormy Daniels, to the infamous “stained blue dress” of the Clinton era, to the testimony of Anita Hill, tales of politicians and public figures indulging in sexual behavior have boosted television ratings and made captivating headlines. These stories spread like wildfire, and they carry loaded concepts of shame, sexism and morality along with them. At the end of a presidential election cycle unlike any other, it’s time to take a look at the intersection of shame, sex, and politics.
Shame and Sexuality
Sex and shame are deeply intertwined in mainstream American discourse. As Diane Glem, a Licensed Sex-positive Marriage and Family Therapist and Certified Sex Therapist, said in a piece for Psychology Today: “we are swimming in sexual shame, to the point where most of the time we are utterly oblivious to it.”
Shame and sex have become so linked in our society that most of us don’t even realize it. In fact, shame surrounding sex is so widespread that when sexuality does not evoke a shame reaction (for example, the growing sex-positive movement) these people and views tend to be judged through a lens of discomfort and anger.
This shame can take many different forms. Sometimes it presents with a fixation on genitals and bodies, which can present itself in conversations or thought patterns where we focus on certain parts of our bodies being “too big” or “too small.” Many folks also consider certain body parts and its secretions are “gross” or “undesirable.” This shame can extend further to influence our views around specific sex acts and positions. One of the most obvious examples of this is intercourse involving a penis and vagina is perceived as “normal” and “natural” because of the heteronormative implications. The same cannot be said for anal sex, which is often thought of as “deviant” or “dirty.”
Our puritanical roots run so deep that we can even feel shame around the sensation of sexual pleasure itself. If sex is purely for procreation, why should we feel pleasure? So the thinking goes. If we’re expected to feel shame around our pleasure, it doesn’t take a massive leap to transport that shame to our sexual desires, kinks, and fantasies. It shouldn’t come as any surprise that while an estimated 40% of Americans view themselves as kinky, a staggering 27% of those kinky adults report having a sexual desire that they haven’t shared with a partner.
Shame, especially as it pertains to sex, is reinforced by our concept of morality. As individuals, we base our moral code around thoughts and actions that are societally deemed “good” or “bad,” “right” or “wrong.” We absorb these social cues and norms from a litany of sources whether through media, religion or our own families.
While it’s easy to see when sexual shame is being promoted by a family member or religious leader, when it comes to politics and politicians these messages can be more covert. Taking a critical look at sex, sexuality and our politics requires moving past the headlines and past the sensationalism we’ve grown used to, and instead digging into the forces of shame, sexism and “purity” that inform our politics and our society at large.
Land of the Free, Home of the Scandal
While tales of affairs and “sexual deviancy” have long surrounded elected officials, mainstream media really began reporting on and amplifying these stories beginning in the mid-1970s, on the heels of Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal. Alongside the reports of his campaign’s wrongdoing against their political opposition, more sensational details regarding Nixon’s personal life made the news as well. The public ate up these stories with enthusiasm. Sex sells, and with a void left in the media following Nixon’s resignation, news outlets began looking for new ways to cash in. Since then, taboo tales of politicians getting up to “no good” have captivated the national psyche.
Take, for example, our sitting president, who allegedly orchestrated the payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels. Trump’s base is ironically composed significantly of evangelical Christians alongside a Vice President singing the praises of “purity culture.” He has long been deemed Teflon Don by the news media, due to his uncanny ability to deflect a huge number of scandals that could (and should) have threatened his presidency. Despite being caught on tape joking about grabbing genitals without consent during his 2016 campaign, as well as a staggering 26 women who have come forward alleging sexual misconduct by Trump, support among his base remained unchanged. In fact, more people cast votes for him in 2020 than in 2016.
Stormy Daniels and the 26 women who have come forward have not fared as well in the court of public opinion. Rudy Giulliani, former mayor of New York and one of Trump’s personal lawyers, said Daniels had “no reputation” to damage, by virtue of working as a porn star. His 26 accusers, without being given an equal chance to present their case, have been called “liars” by the president, with Trump even going so far as to say that none of his accusers were “attractive enough” for him to sexually assault them.
Trump’s ability to weather this sea of scandal is a mixed bag. In some ways, our standards for how politicians should conduct themselves have loosened in the Trump era. Indeed, President Clinton eventually faced impeachment as a result of his extramarital affair with Monica Lewinsky. While Trump himself faced less political fallout for his behavior than Clinton, Daniels, Lewinsky, and the president’s 26 accusers share a common bond of shame and, in some circles, outright revulsion in the eyes of the American public.
Lewinsky, for her part, remains a public figure and has used her platform to push for a change in our national attitude. In a TED Talk she gave, “The Price of Shame,” Lewinsky shares the emotional impact being at the center of a political sex scandal had. “But the attention and judgment that I received — not the story, but that I personally received — was unprecedented,” Lewinsky said. “I was branded as a tramp, tart, slut, whore, bimbo, and, of course, ‘that woman.’ I was seen by many, but actually known by few. And I get it: it was easy to forget that that woman was dimensional, had a soul and was once unbroken.”
It’s a painful perspective that I’ll bet not many of us have stopped to think about after sharing our opinions of Lewinsky in the 90s. This is why it’s all the more important that we hear it now. Power and age dynamics notwithstanding, Lewinsky did something that most humans do: engaged in a sexual act. But while our culture promotes privacy and shame around sex, Lewinsky was unable to hide. Her shame was made public, forever etched onto the history of our nation. History will continue to repeat itself unless we make the effort to disrupt the cycle with new empathetic and sex-positive attitudes.x
Towards a Sex-Positive Future
Though still far from mainstream, sex-positivity and sex-positive discourse has become increasingly common in the US. he sex-positive movement seeks to uncouple shame, guilt, and humiliation from concepts of sex, love, and pleasure. The movement and dialogue focused on creating a society which respects and values everyone’s unique sexual identity and tastes, promotes enthusiastic consent, and brings an end to both slut-shaming and kink-shaming.
Lewinsky, who describes herself as “patient zero” for internet bullying, put the issue of public shaming in a stark light when she said that “as far as our culture of humiliation goes, what we need is a cultural revolution. Public shaming as a blood sport has to stop, and it’s time for an intervention on the internet and in our culture.” While she may not have been speaking specifically about sex-positivity, her words are a poignant indictment on a culture of shame surrounding sex which seeks to brand people (especially women and queer folks) as sluts, deviants and all around bad people.
In an opinion piece for the Guardian Dave Madden writes that “sex can be a political tool, but our culture of shame is helping to prop up capitalism and the patriarchy.” In a telling anecdote, Madden recalls the presidential primaries when then-candidate Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay presidential candidate in American history, cancelled a fundraiser at a gay bar when the bar’s owner refused to remove a dance pole on premises. Groundbreaking as Buttigieg’s candidacy was, the campaign’s decision spoke volumes about the antiquated views our nation still holds towards queer people and queer sex. To retain viability, Buttigieg had to go to great lengths to make sure public knowledge of his sexual orientation was not associated with sex itself. To many queer Americans and sex-positive folks at large, this moment signified a slap in the face.
In many ways, queer folks and other sexual minorities have always been at the vanguards of the national discourse on sex-positivity. Not too long ago, same-sex attraction in America was a one-way ticket to electroshock therapy, prison, and in some cases, death at the hands of a mob. It was under these inhospitable conditions, over generations, that queer people learned the revolutionary power of sex and sex-positivity. For many queer folks, it was sexual encounters in alleyways, parks and underground bathrooms that brought the community together. While frowned upon by society at large, these spaces reminded queer people that they were not alone.
With the changing of the times, these encounters evolved into connections at bars and bathhouses, to a widespread movement to “come out of the closet and into the streets,” to a world where LGBTQIA+ folks are, increasingly, holding elected office and, in Buttigieg’s case, running for the highest office in the land. It’s progress, sure, but we still have a long road ahead of us. Queer sex has always been, and will continue to be, a revolutionary act that brings people from all walks of life together. It doesn’t get more political than that.
So here we are, in 2020. It’s only a matter of time before the next sensational political sex scandal dominates the news cycle and captivates the nation. Each and every one of us will be presented with a choice: do we repeat our old cycles, further spreading sensations of shame, guilt and embarrassment, or do we instead push back on the prevailing narrative and work to create a more sex-positive future? The power is in your hands, it’s in my hands, it’s in all of our hands.
