By Angomcha Bimol Akoijam
Yes, sex does sell. But when one says that we must also know that the sex in question is primarily, if not exclusively, that of women.
Sex is omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscience. It’s everywhere, in its raw or derivative forms. One doesn’t need to blame ‘father’ Freud for this ‘pansexualism’. All of us, without exception of the theological kind, have got our life through sex. Believe me, I am a man and I do not believe that women were made from the ribs of men. Humanly speaking, that’s counter factual. For, almost all of us, perhaps with the exception of those who were not that ‘fortunate’ enough to go through the ‘natural’ way and needed the intervention of doctors with their ‘CS’ (caesarean section), have come through the vagina.
This being the case, one must think hundreds and thousands of times before one decides to aim a camera at the bare back of a girl with her bra straps and flashed the picture on the media with a report (or read) detailing on how a girl was ‘caught’ without fanek etc with a boy in a shady cabin of a makeshift eatery.
Yes, sex does sell. But when one says that we must also know that the sex in question is primarily, if not exclusively, that of women. And that selling power of sex is founded upon, both in its crass and subtle forms, the sexual ethos that subjugates women. Again, I am a man and still I tend to believe that, as some feminists insist, mother of all suppression is the suppression of female sexuality by men. Indeed, there are enough arguments and indications to show that much of ‘sexual morality’ and manner in which institutions such as ‘marriage’ and ‘family’ are designed are by product of seeking to ‘regulate’ sexuality wherein subjugation of female sexuality gets implicated. Acts of ‘moral policing’ often brings out this aspect insofar as it brings out the figure of the girl/woman and her sexuality as a central concern, both as a premise for forming moral judgment and titillation.
Just as one doesn’t need to blindly blame Freud for reminding the centrality of sexuality in our lives, after all primary institutions such as ‘marriage’ and ‘family’ are nothing but a way to regulate human sexuality, one doesn’t need to reject ‘uncle’ Marx for his takes on the centrality of ‘labour’, including the ‘labour’ of the female kind, in our existence.
To think of it, didn’t he once said,
“Anyone who knows history knows that…
