I know I've slagged off the Fry here on more than one occasion, BUT I hope the following probably-ridiculous post will demonstrate a number of things including:
a) however they sounded, my 'attacks' weren't made entirely in an ad hominem spirit, were not about the Fry being, but about him doing
b) I'm quite capable of sticking in the knife regarding someone I actually quite like (is this reassuring, I wonder?)
c) unlike Thatcher, I am sometimes for turning, though, actually, since I still basically haven't changed my mind about the things I said previously, perhaps I'm not about to demonstrate this at all
Apparently, Stephen Fry has somehow managed to cause an outrage by making the entirely unremarkable statement that women don't like sex as much as men. Read this article for details, or Google it yourself. From the article:
Late last year, writer Jan Moir published an op-ed piece in British newspaper The Daily Mail on the death of gay Irish pop star Stephen Gately. She linked Gately's death at age 33 to his "homosexual" lifestyle of clubbing, doing drugs, and picking up strangers for sexual encounters. The article sparked outrage, and many gay British celebrities called Moir homophobic. Indeed, Stephen Fry himself wrote, "I gather a repulsive nobody writing in a paper no one of any decency would be seen dead with has written something loathesome and inhumane." Burchill views Moir's article as "a woman passing a comment on gay male sexuality," – basically, she says, doing the same thing Stephen Fry did when he made his comment about women's sex drives – and she's frustrated that Moir was pilloried, while Stephen Fry can seemingly make such judgments without receiving the same level of criticism Moir did.
One obvious difference here is that Fry has not said, "Women don't like sex as much as men do, and this frigid lifestyle will lead to a well-deserved death", which was at least what many felt the implication of the Moir article was. Saying that men like sports and women like flowers (as David Byrne does in a song whose title I've forgotten, for instance), may be a generalisation, and may, after a scientific survey is held of every man and woman on the planet, startlingly turn out to be false, for all we know. But people are at least allowed to make such observations, or should be.
I find it a little disturbing how easy it is becoming to outrage people merely by making observations. In this case I'm reminded of the Monty Python lumberjack sketch:
At the end of the sketch, Outraged of Sussex (or somewhere else in the Home Counties) writes a letter of complaint about the sketch because, "some of my best friends are lumberjacks and only a few of them are transvestites". Sometimes, in Monty Python, huge flashing letters appear saying "SATIRE", and they should do at this point. If I remember correctly – I may be imagining it – we then cut to a shot of the person dictating a letter – a brigadier in uniform with a tutu on his lower half. EVERY SINGLE PERSON CURRENTLY COMPLAINING ABOUT FRY'S COMMENT IS A BRIGADIER IN UNIFORM WITH A TUTU ON THEIR LOWER HALF.
Such people are one or all of the following:
a) illiterate
b) hypocrites
c) humourless
Illiterate, because no one who actually reads books complains about people expressing their views. People get outraged about films and song lyrics – and this is telling – but people who enjoy books, for instance, tend to understand that views are not written in stone and expression is not absolute and not always literal either. It's not as if these views of the Fry are a revelation. He made exactly the same point as this – almost word for word – in his novel The Hippopotamus, which came out in the early nineties or before. People who read already knew that Stephen Fry thought this, and they didn't have a problem with it.
Hypocrites – I'll come to this.
Humourless – well, this relates to being illiterate, too. This is a quote from Oscar Wilde: "A man can be happy with any woman as long as he does not love her." Imagine Wilde saying this in the kind of company who complained about Fry. Immediately there come the barked uptight replies, "What, are you saying that heterosexuality has to be insincere to work? How would you like it if we started saying that about gays?" Etc. Wilde (muttering under breath): "Fer fucks sake, I was only trying to be witty and quotable, but you've spoilt it now."
Or how about this, also from Wilde: "America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilisation in between."
Come the cries: "How dare you bash America like that! To criticise an entire country in this way is unacceptable!"
Etc.
As I say, humourless and illiterate.
If there are women who are outraged by Fry's observation, why don't they prove him wrong?
I'm sure people will immediately think I'm making a 'tacky' suggestion here, but if they do think that, that fact in itself already betrays that there is something in what Fry says.
Besides which, I wouldn't be making the 'tacky' suggestion they think I am. No. Here's a simple way to prove Fry wrong. If women seriously want to refute his statement then they should refrain from stigmatising men for liking sex. That is how they would prove him wrong. Once women stop talking about men's one-track minds, etc., then the disparity will cease. Until then there is a disparity to be commented on. You can see where the hypocrisy thing comes in now, I imagine. Is it an insult to say that men have high sex drives? (Apparently it is, this being one of the many ways in which 'all men are bastards'.) How is it then an insult to say that women have low sex drives? If the game is being played straight and fair here, there should be nothing to complain about.
Anonymous writes:Let us just refrain from reading the Daily Mail or, better yet, any form of print newspaper.I have always disliked newspapers for some reason; I think it’s because there’s always some political or social slant to the reporting no matter what one you turn to. That combined with a sort of ever present invisible boast about being the ”Custodians of the Public’s Right to Know” (and by extension being the one’s with the right to decide how to tell them.)Also why must we actively champion generalized sexuality just for it’s own sakes. To me it just seems like populist culture has turned pre 1950s ”sexuality is automatically bad unless it falls into very narrow categories and we must harry anyone who thinks otherwise” into ”sexuality is automatically good unless it falls into categories and we must vilify anyone who thinks otherwise”. I don’t think the latter is really that much better than the former really just far more commercially viable: with something so personal it should depend on the people involved. (Rant over)
oscar wilde’s pronouncements were like arrows which go around trees to strike a bullseye. i agree with both of these quotes. the best wit seems to enlighten at the same time as amuse.personally, i am disappointed at the retrogression regarding our collective understanding about sex. it’s just a powerful driver of human action. yes, it’s animal. so what? as long as you are not hurting anyone or taking advantage of the innocent, do whatever you can get away with. sex is not sinning per se. if i could wave my magic wand over all of humanity and change one thing, it would be, ‘stop blaming people when they do what you yourself wanted to do but were afraid or unable to do.’
Originally posted by anonymous:Let us just refrain from reading the Daily Mail or, better yet, any form of print newspaper.I have always disliked newspapers for some reason; I think it’s because there’s always some political or social slant to the reporting no matter what one you turn to.I’m not really fond of newspapers myself, in fact, for the reasons you state.Originally posted by I_ArtMan:if i could wave my magic wand over all of humanity and change one thing, it would be, ‘stop blaming people when they do what you yourself wanted to do but were afraid or unable to do.’I think it must have been Wilde again who said something like, “Most people have done worse things in private than those they pretend to be shocked at in public.”
ahhh so apropo. and the essense of hypocrisy. let he who is without sin etc..i might add, if we could be prosecuted for our thoughts, we would all be behind bars. so lighten up world…
Owlster writes:I like Stephen Fry, but I think his response was knee-jerk based on being gay, just as the outraged woman’s response is knee-jerk based on being a woman (hypocrisy?)I can prove him wrong: women like sex as much as men, but they generally like sex with one person because of the heightened emotion, which heightens the stimulation. Men like having sex with many people (probably for a lot of good reasons that I won’t conjecture about). When a man loses interest in one woman and moves on, she is still interested in him and still wants to enjoy sex, but loses the drive because the emotional connection is gone. This is general. There are “one-woman” men and “multi-partner” women. But the lesson holds: nature is cruel for making sex drives so incompatible.Anyway, I didn’t read the “implications” of the article the way Fry did, and I generally sympathize with him. I think the point is that any lifestyle saturated with drugs and insomnia and yeah, even too much f-ing, can lead to tragedy, whether you’re gay or straight.(I am a girl by the way.)
Owlster writes:But then a boring lifestyle can lead to tragedy too, so who cares. Life is always a damn tragedy, so why don’t people live accordingly? (Also, I only mentioned I’m a girl if it makes a difference to anyone. ie, women or men who will be outraged for whatever stupid reason by what I just wrote.)
Originally posted by I_ArtMan:if we could be prosecuted for our thoughts, we would all be behind bars. so lighten up world…Rowan Atkinson, of all people, pointed out that it might not be too long before this happens, as we could have the technology soon to have a thought-reading device implanted in everyone’s brains. Then, indeed, we shall all end up in prison, and there’ll be no one left to act as warders.Originally posted by anonymous:But the lesson holds: nature is cruel for making sex drives so incompatible.I think this is the point. As the interview in which Fry was speaking was in Attitude magazine, which is sometimes described as a gay magazine, but also holds appeal for bisexuals, the bi-curious and many other shades in the spectrum, it is hardly surprising that he spoke about sexuality and gender. In a sense his comments were meant to do two things – contrast the attitudes of men and women, and contrast the lot of heterosexuals and homosexuals. The incompatibility of sex drives is something that is conspicuously less of an issue in the gay world.It has occurred to me that this is nature’s way of keeping the population down – to make it oddly difficult for men and women to get together. If so, it’s a strategy that hasn’t worked terribly well, but I suppose things would be worse, population-wise, without it.In any case, some words from Dorothy Parker:http://oldpoetry.com/opoem/14894-Dorothy-Parker-General-Review-Of-The-Sex-SituationMy point is not that Fry is right and his current detractors are wrong, but that the “How dare you!” attitude displayed towards his comments is ridiculous.I could give plenty of examples where I and others have been perfectly tolerant of the opposite views being expressed, but perhaps that would be boring. I’ll give one, maybe. In Personal Services, Julie Walters plays a character based on the famous madam Cynthia Payne:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_ServicesShe makes a number of observations about men throughout the film, as her occupation gives her ample opportunity to do so, but I believe that it’s towards the end she says something like, “Men don’t actually like sex. They want it, but they don’t actually like it.”I can’t remember exactly how she elaborates on this, if she does, but I thought it was an interesting insight, and possibly true.Originally posted by anonymous:Life is always a damn tragedy, so why don’t people live accordingly?I do.
Anonymous writes:I hope someday someone writes a defense of me and spells it the British way… :PAlso, Quentin, these words I have to type in order to post a comment are getting bitchy. “Varmist” what is that? And “Hairun?” 😛
unarex writes:Oops, I’m the one who posted the last comment.