The Mcdonaldization Of Sex 2 (Sex And Christianity 11)

There were many signs predicting the McDonaldization of Sex. The first came generations ago. A 1931 editorial in the Washington Post , commenting on the Lambeth Conference of the Episcopal Church, which led to the acceptance of contraception among U.S. Protestants, predicted the social change that would come: Carried to its logical conclusion, the committee's report if carried into effect would sound the death-knell of marriage as a holy institution, by establishing degrading practices which would encourage indiscriminate immorality. The suggestion that the use of legalized contraceptives would be "careful and restrained" is preposterous. Though its language is quaint, that editorial was prescient. Today we are faced with a number of paradoxes in the contraceptive age: There has been a nineteen-fold increase in the number of out-of-wedlock births in the United States between 1940 and 2007, according to the Centers for Disease Control. And while there is greater tolerance and support for single parenthood, still, according to the CDC, "Nonmarital births are at higher risk of having adverse birth outcomes such as low birthweight, preterm birth, and infant mortality than are children born to married women. Children born to single mothers typically have more limited social and financial resources." Of course, the social burden of these truths falls most heavily on poor women. The prevalence of sexually transmitted infections has dramatically increased in the contraceptive era. Prevalence of HIV in the United States increased from roughly 200,000 cases in 1980 to over a million in 2003. While rates of gonorrhea declined, rates of chlamydia and syphilis continued to increase (by 24% and 36% respectively) from 2006 to 2010. Other types of STIs have shown similarly dramatic increases over recent decades. Those hardest hit are women, particularly women of color. The impact is particularly strong on young people: a CDC report showed that nearly half of the 19 million new STDs each year are among young people aged 15-24 years. But the epidemic has hit older adults as well: a UK study showed a doubling of the rates of STI's among older adults (over 45) from 1996 to 2003, a study which the authors said revealed more sexual risk-taking—and this among a population which is more likely to make sexual decisions with greater forethought than teenagers. Even in an age when sex is putatively more available because of reduced fears about pregnancy and infection, sex trafficking is a reality, however little understood. The divorce rate in the U.S. has remained relatively steady at about half of all marriages over the past three decades, but the rate of those attempting marriage has declined over that same period. It seems that fewer people believe a lifelong sexual friendship in marriage is possible or even worth attempting. Americans are more lonely than ever. Even with more widespread access to sex, our ability to relate to one another appears to be deteriorating. Second, we have colluded in making women's bodies an enemy to be overcome rather than a gift to be cherished. An early ad for the first birth control pill expressed this negative attitude toward a woman's body in striking terms: From the beginning woman has been a vassal to the temporal demands... of the cyclic mechanism of her reproductive system. Now to a degree heretofore unknown, she is permitted normalization... of cyclic function. This new method [of] control is symbolized in an illustration borrowed from ancient Greek mythology—Andromeda freed from her chains (cited in Lara V. Marks, Sexual Chemistry: A History of the Contraceptive Pill [Yale University Press, 2001], p. 132). Early proponents of birth control like Margaret Sanger were eugenicists , whose theories of population were based in the (frequently challenged) Neo-Malthusian fear of uncontrolled growth. The woman's body was seen as an enemy of economic prosperity, and so it had to be subdued at all costs. Here again we see remarkable paradoxes. Most obviously, in the contraceptive age population has continued to expand. But more importantly, what the Malthusian model assumes is uncontrolled growth as a result of economic laws about fertility. But that assumption has been criticized by many, including the economists Gary Becker (a Nobel Prize winner) and H. Gregg Lewis, who argue for a more rational model of childbearing , rooted in a correlation between quantity and quality of children. As populations are lifted out of poverty and women enter the workforce, the cost of childcare rises and so the fertility rate will naturally decline. In contrast, McDonaldized sex that results from easy contraception fosters a rise in risky sexual behavior, leading to greater rates of fertility. Further, contraception is one of the hallmarks of the modern feminist movement, and yet support for contraception rests on shaky assumptions of what promotes the flourishing of women. The most common form of contraception, sterilization, involves the disabling of a healthy biological process through surgery. Oral contraceptives, containing artificial estrogen and progesterone, carry significant health risks such as increased likelihood of cervical cancer, liver cancer, and breast cancer, even though they may reduce the likelihood of cervical cancer. And with serious medical questions raised about even recent contraceptives like Yaz , there is reason for concern about what new science will reveal about introducing chemicals to interfere with a healthy biological process in a woman's body. Further, users of the Pill may be disrupting the normal biological processes that govern attraction and mating (more evidence here ). Use of barrier methods increases the risk of vaginal infection, urinary tract infection, and toxic shock syndrome. The Depo-Provera shot may trigger weight gain. Failed contraception affects women more profoundly than men, due to the possibility of pregnancy and a greater susceptibility to certain sexually transmitted infections. Third, we have "corporatized" sex by developing an unhealthy dependence on technology. There are implications of this dependence. The introduction of estrogen into the ecosystem has shown to have negative effects on fish species. There may be greater effects that have yet to be studied. According to the World Health Organization, in 2005, 10.4 billion condoms were used worldwide. With a significant number of those condoms being made of polyurethane, a non-biodegradable substance, there is an impact on landfill and the wider environment. No corporate product is free from the perennial problems of corruption and greed. The reality of condom recall suggests that hanging an entire public health program on a corporate product is unwise and dangerous. Corporate sales are driven by the manipulation of human desire. Condom manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies that produce contraceptive pills have a financial interest in promoting risky sexual behavior. Further, there are myriad industries that benefit from manipulating sexual desire to sell products, from beer to shampoo to cars to cosmetics. Corporations benefit from unhealthy sexual attitudes because those attitudes play on consumer anxiety. Fourth, we have developed an imperialistic, colonial mentality about public health in the developing world , rooted in modern Western assumptions about sex. We assume that modern, technologized cultures will have more sex as they follow the pattern of secularization that has characterized Western modernity. We do not question whether secularization is necessary or even good. Nor do we challenge the assumption that women (or men) will benefit from the de-sacralization of sex. Fifth, we've made sexual transactions cheap precisely because they are so abundant, and the losers are women. Analysis of demographic data from 117 countries has shown that when men outnumber women, women have the upper hand: Marriage rates rise and fewer children are born outside marriage. An oversupply of women, however, tends to lead to a more sexually permissive culture. ( Source: Mark Regnerus ) The bottom line is that when cultures empower women to control access to sex and move men towards marriage, the whole society benefits.

The McDonaldization of Sex 2 (Sex and Christianity 11)