Gayle Rubin begins “Thinking Sex” by answering the question of why we should think about sex. To most people, Rubin acknowledges, sex is a trivial matter, not rising to the seriousness of war, poverty, and other social issues. But Rubin argues that sex often absorbs the anxieties of these other issues. Faced with problems we can’t fix, like systemic poverty, we start to police other people’s sexuality. Moreover, this policing can produce forms of oppression that are on the order of other social ills, like racism and sexism. It therefore deserves special, not marginal, attention. Rubin also notes how sex is policed in the name of patriotism or nationalism. During the Cold War, conservative commentators linked sex outside marriage to communism. Homosexuality was cast as a threat to national strength. If homosexual behaviour were permitted, some argued, the United States would not be strong enough to fight the Soviets.
This essay expands one’s viewpoint about the role sexuality plays in society. It is no longer a private entity because it has been transformed and exploited as a public agent, in order to repress certain groups of people. To make this essay stronger, I would suggest Rubin to have gotten quotes from the individuals who are doing the repressing, whether it be policemen, clergy, anyone from the other side. This would prevent any counterarguments and show that she researched outside of her own sphere. Otherwise, this essay connects with the class beautifully in that it takes the morals learned from the readings and puts them into a real world context. How sexuality is actually seen in Western culture, and not in an abstract sense, but with evidence showing it being abused for other purposes.
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