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Read other letters about this article
Just kidding.
Actually the stripper pole conversation touches on what I think to be the major difficulty in the so-called pro-sex/anti-sex debate. At the same time people have to be responsible for their own decisions, they can never fully "own" those decisions. Sex is never "just" sex, as my local Hustler Hollywood boutique asserts. There is a massive complex of motivations and desires--not to mention a heteronomous logic, language and currency--in play in every social exchange.
On the one hand, we want to say that pole dancing is just a good way to get some excercise.
On the other hand, we have to admit we're not really talking about boys signing up, because it's sort of understood that pole dancing is tied into the sexualization specifically of girls. Moreover, we worry over how much the sexuality girls learn from places like pole dancing class blurs the boundaries of objectification.
Then we're a little disturbed by the ages of some of the girls in the class, because we're clued into the destabilizing effect fully sexualized preteens might have on society, and at some point we'd rather have clear and unquestioned boundaries for our kids, simply because they're not yet old enough to know better.
Finally, we might find ourselves anxiously wondering if our enlightened attitudes about sex haven't trickled down too far so that our 14 year old daughters and sons really get turned on stripping on a webcam for 50 year old pedophiles.
Liberals and libertarians can be a little hamstrung as parents by their assaults on paternalism.
