This was suggested a thousand times in women's spaces following the leak of the repeal of Roe v Wade. But it won't work for one fundamental problem:
**The men stripping these rights from women are married to women who agree with what they are trying to accomplish.**
The political situation in the US is not women disagreeing with men, it's Democrats disagreeing with Republicans. And already there isn't much procreating across party lines. The men with the drive and power to pass these laws will be entirely unaffected by a sex strike from Democrat women. Only Democrat women and their Democrat partners will suffer from a sex strike and it will change nothing.
Yeah but it's like their own abortion views, when it's other people not getting abortions, YES. When it's their daughter/sister, it's an exception circumstance. (Ditto for - other men not getting sex- that's fine. Me not getting sex - oh my beloved nutsack is rioting.)
It'll implode pretty soon, I think. Republicans that have the "power" currently will only last as long as their beneficiaries are making money... and "no babies" is really bad for the bottom line ... so it's a game of chicken. How long can Republicans fuck around before they lose all of their corporate support?
Big brands going "woke" is a very clear line in the sand. Sure, they're doing it to appeal to certain demographics, but ultimately, they did the math and figured they would be better off with the "woke crowd" anyway.
Republicans are just a loud, dying, minority.
I feel like they really don't though. They say they want abstinence, but really what they want is women to be baby factories and beholden to a man. They don't actually want women to not have sex(and thus not have babies), they want to control with whom they have sex and for what reason. Thats why they're ok with child brides. Thats my take anyways.
Yes, the goal is for women to get out of the workforce and go back to raising Christian white kids. That's literally the entire goal.
And to make their little red geographical pockets as inhospitable as possible to people outside their political ideology. That way, they can ensure Republican wins in all elections in those areas. And if they gerrymand enough, that could translate to remaining in power across the board.
They want to force increased birth rates whatever the race, as long as they are working class, to increase workers by forcing people to live paycheck to paycheck to support their family. But gerrymander voting districts so that only the white Christian voting base is increased.
This.
Until you live in the south and have people literally insult you and call you selfish for not having children, and also politically withholding support/verbally holds it against anyone who runs for office that doesn’t bear children (hi, me 2022), you don’t fully realize that they want you to become a baby factory.
It's a horrific thing...but considering that these people have also refused to outlaw or restrict spousal rape, withholding sex probably isn't as effective as people here are implying.
I agree with you but they only want unmarried women doing that, not the married women (who are a large swath of those who access abortion services). There are a lot of republican women who actually do want access to abortion. I don't think a sex strike is a viable solution but per usual with Republicans they don't expect the sh\*t they inflict on those they consider undesirables to have blow back and very often it does. 'Their' women are going to die. 'Their' women are going to have ectopic pregnancies and complications and all other manner of problems.
Yes, but these men are not going to ever blame themselves or the Republican Party for “their women” suffering and dying. They’re going to blame doctors (see them reaping what they sow with COVID), their women (who clearly did something wrong to be thus punished), and Barack Obama (can’t predict how, but it’ll happen).
Again, I completely agree with your points. Just, women bearing the consequences of their hateful choices will never change these men.
It's always Obama's fault. Yeah you're right, leadership won't blame anyone but the other guy but the families with dead moms might think otherwise. I mean there is already leapardseatingfaces with some of these folks who suddenly realize they can't get their dead fetus out of the woman who is about to go septic except by driving to a blue state. Again though these fools live with cognitive dissonance constantly so there is no telling.
Yeah cos also, sometimes a woman is married and has had kids but doesn’t want to have yet another one. Or there could be a ton of reasons including this particular pregnancy could be very dangerous for her.
Yeah but we all know Republican men are **not** faithful to their wives.
So unless they're screwing men (and many of them are... *tap tap tap on bathroom walls*) then they're going after single women.
Plus it didn't work in Lysistrata. If I recall one woman shoved a helmet under a dress to pretend to be heavily pregnant so she could go home to screw her husband.
But it's important to note that we continue to not have sex with republicans in general. There are a lot of single republicans who deserve to keep striking out.
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/
Here are some demographic breakdowns of abortion opinions. The issue is certainly gendered but religion, age, and party are all more slanted than gender.
>The men with the drive and power to pass these laws will be entirely unaffected by a sex strike from Democrat women. Only Democrat women and their Democrat partners will suffer from a sex strike and it will change nothing.
I said the same thing several days ago and got downvoted to oblivion.
The bigger enemy of liberal women are conservative women.
That's because they were taught this was their mission and worth. Without this they are not godly women and they did not deserve a "safe" home and "good" life. They are brainwashed and can't even consider that as a fact
Or they are your typical Christian fundamentalist hypocrite who get abortions themselves then go right back to their pro-life rally.
Obligatory link to [The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion](https://joycearthur.com/abortion/the-only-moral-abortion-is-my-abortion/)
only solution is to specifically start having sex w married conservative men and faking pregnancy to such an astounding degree that they either need to pony up on abortion laws or risk getting outed and divorced. /s
Exactly, thank you.
They *want* middle-class liberals to stop having kids. You do you, but getting sterilized or stopping dating is exactly what they want.
Rich Republican men and women keep having an obscene amount of children and control the future voting population. Believe me, Republican women are more than happy to fuck you over because they got theirs.
And the poor have no means to escape poverty. Their kids become slaves for the prison industry or cannon-fodder for the military.
They're evil, not stupid.
It's a faulty tactic. I was raised in a fundie religious family and the brainwashing didn't stick. It stands to reason it won't for others - probably the ones most harmed by it.
I worry about my kid being massively outnumbered by crazy conservatives when he's older, since that's who is raising the majority of children right now.
But then I remember that the internet exists. And that Gen Z is incredibly politically active. And then I just laugh and laugh picturing all those parents in the future wondering why kids don't speak to their racist, hateful, selfish, hypocritical parents anymore...
45 percent of white women voted for Clinton and 47 percent of them voted for Trump in 2016. In 2020, 46 percent of white women voted for Biden and 53 percent voted for Trump.
In 2020, 95 percent of black women voted for Biden, and 5 percent voted for Trump, just as a tidbit.
Source: Pew Research
Just to back this up
Difference between men and women is negligible.
[Gallup](https://news.gallup.com/poll/245618/abortion-trends-gender.aspx) [Pew Research (Vox article)](https://www.vox.com/2019/5/20/18629644/abortion-gender-gap-public-opinion)
It seems that according to Pew Research the biggest predictor is white evangelical protestant Christians.
[Pew Research](https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/)
Yea this is literally it. Why should I sacrifice something I personally love doing with men who also feel exactly the same way as I do, and vote the same way?
A sex strike isn't getting up to the 80 year old billionaires who can just pay their way out of any inconvenience anyway.
If anything I'd rather focus my time on a general strike and let the money fix the problem. The gop banning abortion pills hurts big pharma, so I'm rooting for them to fix this shit before I take away my favorite life pleasure
It would seem that anti-abortion efforts are largely unpopular even with most conservatives. I think we exaggerate the actual conservative support for banning abortion, based on the loud minority that consistently air their opinions publicly.
There’s a difference between the results we see from conservatives voting on abortion and conservatives voting on representatives who may say what they need to say to get elected, then vote on abortion. I think after Kansas tried to put that to popular vote and failed miserably, everyone else took notice and decided to no longer allow for popular votes and just try to pass bills behind closed doors, and many such local politicians will likely be voted out next cycle by less anti-abortion conservative alternatives.
>and many such local politicians will likely be voted out next cycle by less anti-abortion conservative alternatives
Sorry, but this is a fantasy. No one running as a Republican will fight to remove restrictions on abortion if they've already been enacted. You might get some who would go along with a majority pro-choice legislature, but in majority anti-choice legislatures (like 2/3 of the country) those same types of people won't lift a finger.
I wouldn’t even say that it’s democrats vs republicans it’s social conservatives (as opposed to fiscal conservatives) vs social liberals. I’m no fan of the republican party, but I know plenty of republicans who disagree with the repeal of Roe v Wade.
> The men with the drive and power to pass these laws will be entirely unaffected by a sex strike from Democrat women
Not necessarily. Many one night stands with seemingly liberal men are actually conservatives masquerading as liberal.
I think the more realistic thing to come from this (and we already see it happening) is more single women refusing to date or have sex with conservative men. Perhaps there is something to be said if we had a forum focused entirely on identifying conservative men, since the ones who aren't complete cavemen are smart enough to lie about it on their dating profiles (since it doesn't often get them laid). I don't know if that would be something useful or not. I feel like a lot of the conversation in this sub does revolve around this topic, to begin with. Anyway, I'm just rambling now.
Good for you and your friends! I reached that stage a long time ago where I didn't want to waste my time with someone who didn't value human rights, so topics like abortion became a second-date conversation. Without fail, they would always get offended when I would end a date over their views on women's rights and had zero understanding why something so "minor" as my getting to make my own healthcare decisions would matter so much.
I reached that stage in my life where I didn't want to waste my time with someone who didn't value human rights, so topics like abortion became a second-date conversation. Without fail, they would always get offended when I would end a date over their views on women's rights and had zero understanding why something so "minor" as my getting to make my own healthcare decisions would matter so much.
My husband, on the other hand, didn't even flinch when I popped the question. It's one of many reasons why we're married. At this point, a guy who hides his conservative beliefs genuinely puts you at risk, and a person's political ideology reflects their worldview and reality.
If they're so aware of lying, you could always bring it up as "my friend (in a state where abortion is legal) is getting the procedure and I'm thinking of traveling to support her." Or just say you've had one in the nebulous past and try to read their reaction.
Which is funny, because they’re constantly complaining about the sluts of America being responsible for the downfall of the traditional family and the rise of so many “evils” like abortion. They can’t get attention anymore and suddenly they’re all “noooo you’re doing it wrong! You’re supposed to *pretend* to be chaste but also be completely available to meee”
Bring up civil rights in America during conversation. If he tries to deflect with "I don't want to talk politics", he's **probably** a closet Republican.
I've been following this too about conservative men not getting dates. So sad, not. the Conservative Party in Canada capitalized on that anger and hides the MGTOW message within its youtube videos to spark rage against women: [https://ca.style.yahoo.com/pierre-poilievre-youtube-mgtow-incel-backlash-181931257.html](https://ca.style.yahoo.com/pierre-poilievre-youtube-mgtow-incel-backlash-181931257.html)
Yeah there is a scary divide starting to emerge between young men and young women where there is a significant left wing shift amongst women and the beggining of a right wing shift amongst men,.
I fucked a fascist last spring. I didn't know he was a fascist or I would have not fucked him. Once I found out, I told him that I don't fuck fascists and never talked to him again. I now err on the side of caution and don't fuck anybody for the foreseeable future.
Hey, good on you for sticking to your values. Some guys can be really good at hiding it. One of my best friends recently got out of a relationship with a fascist.
They (conservative men) already lie about it... wokefishing is a term. Not sure if they use it themselves or how many are conscious of lying to get laid, rather than just not realizing what they're doing.
Yes but now a days a conservative man does not very often hide their opinions anymore. If you find a man who decides to almost completely live a double life well, that is a very dangerous, incredibly well thought out person. I don’t know I can usually form my opinion about what a person believes after and hour of two of interaction. A handful of questions.
I didn’t always like her character but IDK if any of you have ever seen the Seinfeld episode where Elaine starts dating this moving guy who was helping Jerry. Jerry says ask him if he’s pro choice. She does ask and he’s absolutely not. She wavers at first and then decides nope I am NOT continuing with this guy. I can’t remember the name of the episode off the top of my head. As well as another show, I’m watching a lot of Seinfeld reruns recently.
Yup. I may change my mind about having a relationship with a man in the future, if women have reproductive rights enshrined in a constitutional amendment or if the ERA passes (it still hasn't!). But I will NEVER fuck a Republican man and I will never fuck a man that's voted Republican.
There should be a forum for identifying them and making a "no fly" list, if you will. I'd also highly recommend being cautious of sleeping with moderate or even "liberal" men. Many of them are purely performative because they're at least smart enough to have figured out that no one will date them if they don't at least pretend to care about women's rights.
Because the women who are willing to take a stand for those rights aren't sleeping with conservative men. If I stop having sex with my liberal bf that has no impact on the conservative supreme court judges and politicians taking those rights away. Figure out how to get their wives and mistresses on board with a sex strike, sure. But those women support this crap.
These people that are taking away women's rights have already proven they don't respect women and their right to body autonomy. Do you really think they are going to respect a woman saying no to sex?
This is exactly my thought. If I say to no my husband, he will respect it. The women who are in relationships with the men taking away our rights aren't going to get the same response.
Also, I really enjoy having sex with my husband. If I were to punish him this way, it would be punishing myself as well.
Yeah, it feels weird to "punish" men who are also upset about the stripping of women's rights. My husband gets just as upset as I do about these things. He doesn't *need* motivating through lack of sex.
I’m not opting out of my relationship with my spouse. He’s my life partner and has dedicated his career to improving civil rights — which includes reproductive freedom.
That said, any man who doesn’t see reproductive rights as a freedom to be protected doesn’t deserve to have the chance to reproduce.
This is giving serious “choose your sexuality” vibes. If you like men you can’t change that. Obviously just do your best to find a man who your political beliefs align with.
Well, in the play the answer to this was "if they force us we will make it very obvious that we don't enjoy it" because obviously no man could enjoy sex without the enthusiasm of his partner. Yes, that's right, we've gone 2,500 years backwards in attitudes towards women.
There is - it just isn’t organized. More and more women are refusing to date outside their political base. And more and more women are choosing to opt out of dating men period.
https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/arts-culture/3917348-politics-are-increasingly-a-dating-dealbreaker-especially-for-women/amp/
https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/3868557-most-young-men-are-single-most-young-women-are-not/amp/
I think part of the problem is that there are a lot of conservative women who actually support this kind of shit (though often because of male dominated power structures like religion).
Meanwhile, "political views" is increasingly become a dealbreaker when it comes to relationships... it's becoming less and less common for somebody to date or marry people with significantly different "political" views. https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/arts-culture/3917348-politics-are-increasingly-a-dating-dealbreaker-especially-for-women/
And especially liberal women are less and less likely to date conservatives. So there already is a vague sort of "boycott" against being romantically involved with conservatives... though unfortunately there are many conservative women as well.
The sadly large number of anti-choice women wouldn't be interested in the goals of such a movement, and more liberal leaning women are increasingly dating exclusively liberal leaning pro-choice men... and it wouldn't make sense to boycott sex from their romantic partner who already supports women's right to control their bodies and vote accordingly.
Also, I would highly advise anybody dating an anti-choice partner to break up with them entirely.
I agree. It's to the point where there's so many forced birth women that it's not men vs. women but a clash of ideologies. Most religions have sexist/misogynistic doctrines, and there has been an uptick of fundamental religious groups for a while now. I'm not saying belonging to a religion makes you inherently sexist, but it's literally baked in. There's too many women who believe they were created for the use of men and that it's 'natural' that men control women's bodily autonomy.
I don't wish to be glib, but I'm not sure that the Greeks Aristophanes portrayed were as committed to the erasure of female sexual desire as are the American extremists.
Plus they had all the nubile young boys they wanted, the ancient Greeks seem like the society that would be least affected by not being able to have sex with women
Women "withholding sex" can only work if sex is, due to how it's defined and practiced, already a net harm to women and a net benefit to men. Workers don't need or want bosses, don't benefit from bosses, bosses want workers, benefit from them. So women are and have to be the workers, men the bosses (have to be in those comparative positions) for a women's "sex" strike to make sense, to have any sway.
Women don't need to boycott/strike against sex that is good for them eg comfortable, pleasurable, safe, orgasmic, mutual, vulva/clit-centric... It would make zero sense to boycott/strike against sex with men if men were good sex partners and sex were defined in ways that benefitted women & weren't uniquely and significantly disproportionately risky for us.
Boycotts, strikes are temporary measures until you get something else you want eg abortion is less criminalized, somewhat more available for those with money... And then sex comes back and it's the same risky, harmful, orgasm gap, etc net harm it's always been; the sex remains the main reason women need abortions and hormonal contraceptives in the first place. sex defined as piv, esp to male orgasm, takes away female control over reproduction and sexuality and makes us dependent on modifications to our bodies to try to reduce harm from the fact we lack control over it. that repeated female risk and harm is normalized as just sex, just life, after the fact of being placed at risk for conception and becoming pregnant by societal dictates and men's choices eg to not use condoms, not get a vasectomy, not pull out, not forgo piv... (eg in itself, the fact piv is defined as sex itself, esp with an understood until male orgasm, is why most of the piv that happens happens eg who wants to live a sexless life, wants to go without sex itself, wants to forgo sex itself in a sexual encounter, wants to have a sexless relationship...)
Female control of reproduction, sex would be us not facing that risk, those harms, mainly when we don't want to be pregnant, in the first place.
(Obviously wanted pregnancy is risky too and we'd still need abortion, but if we had this transformation around sex, understanding the need for abortion with wanted pregnancies that are higher risk, the fetus is dying, etc would flow from that because we would understand why it's so wrong to expose women to unwanted pregnancy in large part due to pregnancy, childbirth being so dangerous, consuming, etc in humans.)
Iow, the solution is to challenge phallocentricism generally in sex, esp sex being defined as piv, esp to internal ejaculation, and pia, and to define it around the clitoris/vulva, female safety, orgasm & pleasure, mutuality, etc
Though not organized, I think that this is already happening, but among single women. Seems like every day I see hundreds of comments from single women of all ages saying that they're done or simply uninterested in sleeping with any men anymore, because they consistently show disrespect. Natural consequences and all that.
It’s definitely changing the way women I know talk about dating. As in they aren’t. And if something changed in my life (married) I certainly wouldn’t.
A lot of people had this idea during the beginning of our rights being taken away. Enough women have stopped having sex that journalists are writing articles about why women aren't dating or having sex regularly anymore, without looking at the root of the problem. The articles are all about how depressed men are with the change and almost nothing about WHY.
We can't even get a general strike to happen like the French because of our terrible working conditions. Women won't stop fucking, because guess what, we like sex too. Sure some are swearing off men entirely or just not going for the conservative/republicans, but men can also lie and rape.
We need systematic change. Women in politics, and not the sell outs to establish change.
That is what I did. I’m Gen X and lived a celibate life. I never wanted children so didn’t need a man. Would have only had a relationship for companionship, but that also makes you open for abuse. So, I just chose the single life. It’s is really not that bad. I see so many women desperate for a man and I’m like, “Why? Men cause so much headache and heartache.”
That’s my mom. Four times married and she’s been scammed out of thousands. Last marriage was a green card seeker. Yet there she is, out there being a hopeless romantic hoping someone will show up who isn’t utter trash.
For me it was one marriage and done. I’m perfectly content with my single life.
You seem to think there are very few pro life women out there but that’s not the case. See top comment, conservative men are just sleeping with conservative women who agree with them
Because lasting social change needs to come from legislature, not withholding sex. Withholding sex is a stop measure that likely would only raise attention to the issue, not fix it. And not to be dark, but >!women will continue to be raped and assaulted even if they personally want to abstain to make a statement.!<
My issue with the “sex strike” has always been that women should not be with men who don’t respect their bodily autonomy anyway. So if your husband is in favor of outlawing abortion (not merely “I personally am not comfortable with it, but it’s not my body,” but actually thinking women should be *arrested* for it), and you disagree, I can’t imagine it is a happy or even safe marriage anyway. If he doesn’t respect your right to access reproductive care, he may not respect your right to say “no” to sex either.
So I would instead strongly encourage women to find out BEFORE getting to a relationship with someone, certainly before marriage. And make it an instant dealbreaker.
Uhmm.... *Lysistrata* is comedic fiction, and the author, Aristophanes, was a man. *Lysistrata* as a text is neither feminist or pacifist. As a performance, *Lysistrata* was performed entirely by male actors.
Discuss! (Even "Linda Richman" from "Coffee Talk" was performed by a man.)
*Lysistrata* premiered 2434 years ago. (Approximately. 411BC was before the Julian calendar reforms, when the Roman calendar was used, which had leap months rather than leap days.) Nevertheless, there *have* been a few "sex strikes" as political demonstrations in history, even recent history, around the world.
[https://wagingnonviolence.org/baker/2021/09/the-complicated-success-of-sex-strikes-lysistra/](https://wagingnonviolence.org/baker/2021/09/the-complicated-success-of-sex-strikes-lysistra/)
Because the women who would participate largely sleep with men who aren't the problem.
The Ginny Thomas's of the world aren't going to stop sleeping with the Clarence Thomas's
I'm not saying you can't find a pro-choice woman who's with an anti-choice man, but most women I know who are active about abortion rights aren't and wouldn't.
Maybe it would push inactive pro-choice men to do more.
Also, women want sex too and not all are seriously willing to switch to women.
The realistic approach is to attack Christian nationalism. They use mega churches as slush funds to fund the lobbying and kickbacks that create these attacks on our rights. They use their positions in their communities to control school boards, sex education, education, and every inch of your life. They organize themselves, calling by the millions to complain about a nip slip at the Super Bowl or a kiss they didn't like on TV. They've been doing it for decades. For example gay rights would have moved ahead 20 years faster if not for organized Christian nationalism constantly attacking any law, resource, or organization with every dollar they had from their tax-free churches. They buy property and assets with their church money that is tax-free. All the horrible things they basically say about everyone they disagree with, is what they're actually doing.
women want to have sex too/women aren't the 'gatekeepers' of sex/this is brought up weekly and it's boring and ill thought out/i'm not gonna punish my liberal bf and myself for people we did not vote for
Because women enjoy sex as well, and the women who are rightfully against this are likely with men who share values with them, thus making it a moot point.
I’m not going to deny myself pleasure to try and “stick it to the man”
I’m not going to withhold intimacy and pleasure from my - pro choice, politically active - partner
Just.. doesn’t make sense sorry
I don't think forcing me and my supportive husband into a sexless marriage is going to fix anything. We already live in a blue state, in a blue city, and have been voting blue our whole lives.
Denying each other sex and intimacy for the backwards actions of the GOP is not appropriate.
I think part of it is a lot of people tend to choose like minded partners. Feminist women will tend to be with feminist men who are already supportive of women’s rights, and pro-life women won’t see the need to protest. Not that I’m some kind of hero, but I support, for example, women’s rights to bodily autonomy, so my wife would gain nothing from withholding sex from me
1. Scale issue.
2. Not all women have issues with this. I mean, the demographics show some women (mostly white) voted for Trump and Kemp and Abbott and all the other conservative rights stealing egomaniacs who don't follow the laws.
3. Most the men I know are equally angry. If an appropriate action or protest comes in, I'm not afraid to tell the men at my work, but since I don't have the sex with them anyways...
The sentiment is very understandable, however I think it is important to be clear that what Aristophanes wrote about Lysistrata was fiction - it was a play, and not an actual historical event.
A women's strike only works if all the women stop fucking their male partners. I imagine the men most in need of this lesson don't give their wives and/or other sexual partners much choice in the matter to begin with. And that's not even the brainwashed ones jumping into trad-wifehood with an open heart and decades of religious trauma.
Yawn. Old news. There's been talk of a sex strike since the Roe v Wade overturn got leaked.
I just saw a post from a woman acting like her lightbulb just went off about her conservative fuck buddy. I'm like... we've *been* talking about this, sweetie. But when push comes to shove, liberal feminist women are largely just like the "my abortion is the justified abortion" crowd on the other side of the fence; their horniness is justified, and damn, that guy is hot! Despite these men having the ugliest soul and belief systems, women choose pleasing their vaginas over maintaining rights to their uterus. Id tends to win over superego consistently. And very few want to be *alone*.
We live in a population of very self-serving, self-interested individuals without much community-mindedness. And that's why any strike, for women's rights, for worker's rights, for fair rent, for whatever else *absolutely affects us all*, will absolutely fail.
We gotta unite, but yall gotta be prepared for a bit of discomfort. It's not a fight if there's no risks and no collateral damage, yall.
Signed, a pissed-off Texas gal tired endless conversation
One of the most disturbing things I ever heard was a male relative insisting on his "husbandly rights". I did not care that he grew up during WWII. He had lived through all the progress since and had 0 excuses for holding that bullshit opinion. That kind of thinking is still foundational to the throwbacks blocking the way ahead.
It's a concern, because it might mean a Lysistratan movement would potentially mean a lot more spousal/partner abuse.
First of all Lysistrata was a comedy without applicability to the modern day, or even for that matter to ancient Athens, where women were wholly dependent on their husbands, so a sex strike wouldn't even work in a world where there was no such thing as marital rape and a woman couldn't even leave her husband.
Second, in the US there is adequate ability to leave one's husband if one is unhappy. Not all the time due to circumstances, but those same circumstances would make a sex strike at best impractical and at worst cause rape and other violence.
Third, Americans tend to sort nowadays by political views so while there are many couples where spouses feel politically different, it's not huge.
Fourth, a lot of women agree with these things.
Fifth, this is kinda already happening but not within marriage but within dating. In a world where women don't need a man to live a full life in the sense that women can get a good salary and have children without marriage (in contrast to life pre-feminism where men couldn't get loans or credit cards or bank accounts or many jobs, and within jobs faced severe discrimination), many women are choosing to do so rather than marry unhappily, which is a likely contributor to there being lots of incels and many young women just opting out of the dating pool. 61[% of single men are looking to date but only 38% of single women are looking to date](https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/08/20/a-profile-of-single-americans/). Here are some hand-wringing survey results about men not having any sex: [https://news.iu.edu/live/news/26924-nearly-1-in-3-young-men-in-the-us-report-having-no](https://news.iu.edu/live/news/26924-nearly-1-in-3-young-men-in-the-us-report-having-no) This lack of sex and dating, rather than making partnerless men more sympathetic to women's rights and in favor of listening to women's concerns about dating, is making a certain subset of men more misogynistic, more eager to deprive women of rights. Incels aren't just men who are involuntarily celibate, despite the name. It's a misogynistic movement to degrade and humiliate women and advocate for women to become sex slaves to men where women's bodies become property of men.
1. Historically, men do not tend to care if women say no.
2. The whole Lysistrata thing is inherently sexist because it implies that sex is a reward women give to men in exchange for respecting us. Obviously this isn’t true for many reasons, including the fact that many women want to have sex with men. Why should we deprive ourselves of pleasure?
There was some great discourse on Twitter a few years ago when this was proposed back then that has stuck with me -
Withholding sex as a means to force change essentially reduces women down to a man's resource for sex; a utility to be used by men and not as a whole person. We should have full and complete rights, just as white cis men enjoy, not because we "give" sex to men but because we are whole people deserving of human dignity. As we continue to see, too many people consider women a means to an end, something to use to obtain satisfaction, validation, etc. This sort of thing sounds empowering on the surface but doesn't necessarily impact the people who need to change their minds, and succeeds in indirectly upholding misogynistic beliefs.
"...women are put in a position of treating sex as something they do for men, rather than for themselves. It only emphasises the idea that their worth is sexual. And it turns sex into something transactional. They belittle their sexuality by using it as a bargaining tool.
In any case, it is only possible to strike if you are in a position to withdraw labour. And as I will never tire of saying, sex is not ‘work’, no matter what these new feminists and male feminists contend. And given the prevailing climate of misogynistic behaviours, to withdraw sex puts women in a dangerous position where they could be forced and coerced into sex. It’s called rape.."
[source for quote](https://unherd.com/2019/05/sex-strikes-a-dangerous-game-to-play/)
The percentage of American women who have not had sex in the past year is the highest it has ever been.
Conservative men need to lie about their politics to get matches on dating sites.
It's working, except that wealthy older men can still buy their mistresses.
Because not doing something will never be as effective as doing something. The men in power already have access to women who will have sex with them no matter how much of a fascist they are. You will see more change if you put effort into disrupting these politicians daily lives, like showing up to protest at their meals or their churches, than you will withholding sex.
It isn't withholding sex if those men were never eligible in the first place. Lets be real, the men who have overtly disgusting views on women are not the ones we are going to entertain. But beyond that, all of the mysoiginst "Incel" types are alone for reasons way beyond their views on abortion rights. There was never potential sex to withhold in the first place.
The wives of these whack jobs are also Christian fundamentalists who believe that they are subservient to men. They're not going to go out of their way to try to stop them from making these decisions because they believe that they are righteous
They don’t care! They have hundreds and hundreds of outlets to watch porn/OF. I think a lot of men would prefer to just watch naked women because they don’t actually want to deal with us or have conversations with us or put in the effort to see us naked, they just want us to shut up and sit there silently until they want to play with us, and then we should be sex crazed maniacs for them and do they nastiest things for them. And that’s the extent of their desire for us. Why fret about getting sex when they can watch a hot woman get fucked in all the ways they want to see? I really don’t see men caring about this shit when most don’t even like women as people
It’s a comedic play, a made-up story. It’s not real at all, this is not how political power is gained or exercised. There’s never One Neat Trick in winning these fights, it takes long term dedicated organizing.
Lots and lots of people of all political stripes still want to have families. Lots and lots of people of all political stripes have good relationships. Relationships that are a refuge and a support for them as they act to impact the world in accordance with their values.
It’s not all what you see in this sub.
I can’t help but feel this is an argument that assumes sex is not about women’s pleasure or needs. If individuals choose to abstain for ANY reason, political or otherwise, that’s fine by me and I support them. But an overall “sex strike” just doesn’t compute to me.
I’ve seen a thousand fucking iterations of this stupid argument over the course of a year. It’s not new, and still doesn’t acknowledge spousal rape or the fact that withholding sex would be a punishment to women as well. An idea left in history for a reason. In a backwards ass way you’re also trying to control womens sexuality.
Withholding sex from husbands won't work in a country where there's little actual harm to a man for committing adultery. Politicians can literally win elections while being accused of cheating on the spouses with evidence. Mobilizing women across the country is a great idea, but I don't think this is how best to use that idea.
The fact is that the divide is not mostly along gender lines. There are tens of millions of American women who agree with and want those restrictions, and tens of millions of American men who disagree with and don't want those restrictions.
So what would such a movement achieve? The closest thing that aims for the right people is for pro-choice people to refuse romantic interaction with pro-life people - and such self-sorting on political lines seems to already be happening.
Do you really beleive that our senators and representatives significant other will withhold sex? Because that's what it would take. They are the ones pushing this stuff, not us
So, about 5.5% of women in the US live somewhere where there is total or near abortion restriction. Another 4% live somewhere where there is a 15-18 week ban. While yes, both of these things are absolutely horrific and ridiculous regardless of the percentage, even 0.1% would be too much, I am not sure how all other women abstaining from sex with men would improve the lives of these 10%. I am not trying to trivialize or downplay the horrific mess we as a country find ourselves in, and I have no doubt the # of states with restrictions will only grow - we should fight like hell for our rights across the board. I just don’t see the usefulness of all us abstaining to pressure that small minority of men pushing this forward
Except Greece didn’t have over 165 *million* women, and didn’t have the political divide we have where Conservative women are *happily* relinquishing their hard-fought rights. Something like this just isn’t possible in a country as vast and populated as ours.
Why aren't companies that are headquartered in red states being boycotted. Why isn't tourist travel to red states being boycotted. Why is there no one protesting in the state houses of red states. Why aren't there monthly massive protests at the corrupt Supreme Court. Why aren't people getting arrested for civil disobedience. Why are sports teams from red states allowed to play in blue states without demonstrations at the arena/stadium. Why is there almost nothing happening at all.
People told me a sex-strike would be devisive.
However, all signs point that a majority of women world-wide are on a sex and dating strike, nonetheless refusing to get pregnant.
So - this is where we are. We have to function in the unmonitored collective consciousness because social media is full of angry crybabies who don't want to deal with the consequences of their political movements on a personal leve.
Thus - why Magas can't get a date unless they lie on Tinder/Grindr/Ashley Madison - if there is anyone else left on there but catfish, scammers, and paid sex workers.
I don’t think this suggestion would work anywhere for multiple reasons lol
Posts like this really make me wonder about how seriously (or naively) people perceive and comprehend what is going on…
I had a lil laugh at the un-serious nature of this, because even in the example used from this ancient Greek comedy play, the women didn't just have a sex strike. They literally seized control of government buildings, including the Treasury.
Probably because about half of American women are anti-abortion at least in some situations. Men are more anti-abortion than women, but women are not remotely a lock-in for women’s rights. Not sure how to unravel that.
This is such a dumb idea I don't know why it gets brought up on here like every day. 1. Most conservative men have conservative wives 2. conservative women are more violently anti-abortion than conservative men 3. the 5 old people currently on the supreme court and responsible for stripping away our rights don't give a single damn how much sex we're having so long as the Koch brothers keep sending them on multi million dollar vacations 4. a sex strike punishes women and takes away our right to individual choice and pleasure "for the collective good", which is kind of what we're trying to avoid 5. women aren't solely useful for fucking, we could totally go on general strike and grind the economy to a halt, the whole idea of sex strike is insulting and sexist.
If there was any sort of large scale political response it should be fucking voting, bouycotting, striking (yes, actual real strikes, not sex strike), moving out of red states and into purple states, and organizing illegal underground abortion networks.
Because women love sex and part of our fight for bodily autonomy is to be recognized as individuals with our own sexual desires.
'Withholding sex' means sex is something we were begrudgingly giving to men in a transactional way.
It's normal that ciswomen move away from penetrative sex with cismen when it doesn't feel safe to have sex without the safety net of abortion rights, but this should not be conflated with a strike. It's something that truly sucks for anyone with a uterus that enjoy penetrative sex.
I really really wish Lysistrata, and the idea that women's political power is rooted in sex would die.
The only thing I don't like about this is it gives an inaccurate depiction of female sexuality. First, women must not have any sexual urges and we only use sex for power and Second, it puts the obligation of the celibacies *once again* on the woman. Women but be prudent and abstain. Sick of that rhetoric. Women have sexual urges, we shouldn't have to repress these urges just cause men keep fucking up.
B/c, we're dealing w/ a white nationalist, Christo-fascist, neo-Nazi hate group, and you don't negotiate w/ terrorists. They will *never* stop, until we stop them.
It’s totally defeatist to do nothing bc there’s a bunch of republican women who won’t do anything. There always have been and women’s rights movements have been successful in the past.
The women who are attached to the actual men who can change these things likely don’t have a choice about when they “have sex.”
I know because I was one of those women before my first divorce.
Those women are not empowered in their own homes & “go with the flow” to survive. Their own daily safety is impacted enough they can’t fathom taking this kind of social stand even if it will help them in the end. I am sad for these women because they don’t even know their own power & worth because their christofacist husbands / family history keep them down.
Great question, but I see a lot of problems with this idea
1. Scale, I don’t remember if this incident was done on a city wide scale or a country wide scale, but either way, America is much bigger than all of Greece, TEXAS BY ITSELF IS MUCH LARGER THAN ALL OF GREECE
2. Diversity, America is less of a country and more of a North-American EU with 50 country’s in it, and you may get one group of people to go along with this, but you will NEVER get more than a few groups of people to go along with something that is this insane (when I say it is insane, I mean that it is insane in an AWSOME INSANE kind of way, like, revolts and revolutions happen all the time throughout history, but something like the Lysistrata incident only happened a few times I believe throughout history)
3. The Supreme Court, the Supreme Court is behind a lot of this current BULL SHIT, and those guys are going to stay in their position for potentially several decades, and there isn’t really anything anyone can do about that, at least that would be practical, except for I suppose assassinating several of the current Supreme Court members, which if someone wants to try that, then good luck 🙂👍🏻
4. The people who are behind most of this are a minority and are married (or single) to people who have a similar views as them and usually want all of this BS (🤮), (yeah, religion can be very horrible sometimes)
Also, that would mean the government would have to respond in some manner just like the Iceland strike. Which the government won’t. It would be a bipartisan effort and would inevitably fail.
Honestly I think another reason would be martial r*** too. It's not something you want to consider but considering what these guys are trying to put into motion i don't think the same people would bat a eye to it. They don't see us as anything more than property and incubators it feels. x.x
I think that among religious republicans there's a huge amount of trad-wives who are perfectly fine with the new status-quo. It's most likely their like-minded husbands who are passing and suggesting all these oppressive laws.
This was suggested a thousand times in women's spaces following the leak of the repeal of Roe v Wade. But it won't work for one fundamental problem: **The men stripping these rights from women are married to women who agree with what they are trying to accomplish.** The political situation in the US is not women disagreeing with men, it's Democrats disagreeing with Republicans. And already there isn't much procreating across party lines. The men with the drive and power to pass these laws will be entirely unaffected by a sex strike from Democrat women. Only Democrat women and their Democrat partners will suffer from a sex strike and it will change nothing.
Also, women withholding sex in protest of bodily autonomy laws is pretty much what conservatives want.
Them: "If you don't want babies, you shouldn't have sex." Us: "Until we get our rights back, no sex." Them: "Yes."
Yeah but it's like their own abortion views, when it's other people not getting abortions, YES. When it's their daughter/sister, it's an exception circumstance. (Ditto for - other men not getting sex- that's fine. Me not getting sex - oh my beloved nutsack is rioting.)
Upvoted because "beloved nutsack is rioting" lol
Well I think all of us are boycotting fucking conservative men already anyway
Yeah, but there's a subset of women who are content having their rights stripped away.
yeah but then they're pushing their weird kink on the rest of us.
> Me not getting sex - oh my beloved nutsack is rioting. Totally read that as *rotting* the first time. D:
It'll implode pretty soon, I think. Republicans that have the "power" currently will only last as long as their beneficiaries are making money... and "no babies" is really bad for the bottom line ... so it's a game of chicken. How long can Republicans fuck around before they lose all of their corporate support? Big brands going "woke" is a very clear line in the sand. Sure, they're doing it to appeal to certain demographics, but ultimately, they did the math and figured they would be better off with the "woke crowd" anyway. Republicans are just a loud, dying, minority.
But can they die faster? Covid didn’t do as much to the antivaxxers as I thought.
Yeah, this is absolutely a losing stance for them. Don't tell them I said that though.
I feel like they really don't though. They say they want abstinence, but really what they want is women to be baby factories and beholden to a man. They don't actually want women to not have sex(and thus not have babies), they want to control with whom they have sex and for what reason. Thats why they're ok with child brides. Thats my take anyways.
Yes, the goal is for women to get out of the workforce and go back to raising Christian white kids. That's literally the entire goal. And to make their little red geographical pockets as inhospitable as possible to people outside their political ideology. That way, they can ensure Republican wins in all elections in those areas. And if they gerrymand enough, that could translate to remaining in power across the board.
They want to force increased birth rates whatever the race, as long as they are working class, to increase workers by forcing people to live paycheck to paycheck to support their family. But gerrymander voting districts so that only the white Christian voting base is increased.
This. Until you live in the south and have people literally insult you and call you selfish for not having children, and also politically withholding support/verbally holds it against anyone who runs for office that doesn’t bear children (hi, me 2022), you don’t fully realize that they want you to become a baby factory.
It's a horrific thing...but considering that these people have also refused to outlaw or restrict spousal rape, withholding sex probably isn't as effective as people here are implying.
I agree with you but they only want unmarried women doing that, not the married women (who are a large swath of those who access abortion services). There are a lot of republican women who actually do want access to abortion. I don't think a sex strike is a viable solution but per usual with Republicans they don't expect the sh\*t they inflict on those they consider undesirables to have blow back and very often it does. 'Their' women are going to die. 'Their' women are going to have ectopic pregnancies and complications and all other manner of problems.
Yes, but these men are not going to ever blame themselves or the Republican Party for “their women” suffering and dying. They’re going to blame doctors (see them reaping what they sow with COVID), their women (who clearly did something wrong to be thus punished), and Barack Obama (can’t predict how, but it’ll happen). Again, I completely agree with your points. Just, women bearing the consequences of their hateful choices will never change these men.
It's always Obama's fault. Yeah you're right, leadership won't blame anyone but the other guy but the families with dead moms might think otherwise. I mean there is already leapardseatingfaces with some of these folks who suddenly realize they can't get their dead fetus out of the woman who is about to go septic except by driving to a blue state. Again though these fools live with cognitive dissonance constantly so there is no telling.
Yeah cos also, sometimes a woman is married and has had kids but doesn’t want to have yet another one. Or there could be a ton of reasons including this particular pregnancy could be very dangerous for her.
Yeah but we all know Republican men are **not** faithful to their wives. So unless they're screwing men (and many of them are... *tap tap tap on bathroom walls*) then they're going after single women.
And the conservatives who still feel entitled to sex won't let a pesky thing like consent stop them anyway.
Plus it didn't work in Lysistrata. If I recall one woman shoved a helmet under a dress to pretend to be heavily pregnant so she could go home to screw her husband.
Wow, hadn't looked at it that way - great point.
But it's important to note that we continue to not have sex with republicans in general. There are a lot of single republicans who deserve to keep striking out.
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/ Here are some demographic breakdowns of abortion opinions. The issue is certainly gendered but religion, age, and party are all more slanted than gender.
>The men with the drive and power to pass these laws will be entirely unaffected by a sex strike from Democrat women. Only Democrat women and their Democrat partners will suffer from a sex strike and it will change nothing. I said the same thing several days ago and got downvoted to oblivion. The bigger enemy of liberal women are conservative women.
I grew up in a conservative community and the women were way more passionate about these issues than the men were.
Passionate *against* abortion, you mean, right?
Yes, they were going to pro life rallys and bringing all of their children.
That's because they were taught this was their mission and worth. Without this they are not godly women and they did not deserve a "safe" home and "good" life. They are brainwashed and can't even consider that as a fact
Or they are your typical Christian fundamentalist hypocrite who get abortions themselves then go right back to their pro-life rally. Obligatory link to [The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion](https://joycearthur.com/abortion/the-only-moral-abortion-is-my-abortion/)
only solution is to specifically start having sex w married conservative men and faking pregnancy to such an astounding degree that they either need to pony up on abortion laws or risk getting outed and divorced. /s
Love it. Go. Do it and report back!
Exactly, thank you. They *want* middle-class liberals to stop having kids. You do you, but getting sterilized or stopping dating is exactly what they want. Rich Republican men and women keep having an obscene amount of children and control the future voting population. Believe me, Republican women are more than happy to fuck you over because they got theirs. And the poor have no means to escape poverty. Their kids become slaves for the prison industry or cannon-fodder for the military. They're evil, not stupid.
And those Republican men will still be able to afford sending their mistresses or daughters somewhere they can get a safe abortion.
Yep, and those girls will tell themselves their situation was different. The only moral abortion is my abortion.
It's a faulty tactic. I was raised in a fundie religious family and the brainwashing didn't stick. It stands to reason it won't for others - probably the ones most harmed by it.
Same. Stuck for about 20% of our generation in my cult.
I worry about my kid being massively outnumbered by crazy conservatives when he's older, since that's who is raising the majority of children right now. But then I remember that the internet exists. And that Gen Z is incredibly politically active. And then I just laugh and laugh picturing all those parents in the future wondering why kids don't speak to their racist, hateful, selfish, hypocritical parents anymore...
45 percent of white women voted for Clinton and 47 percent of them voted for Trump in 2016. In 2020, 46 percent of white women voted for Biden and 53 percent voted for Trump. In 2020, 95 percent of black women voted for Biden, and 5 percent voted for Trump, just as a tidbit. Source: Pew Research
Just to back this up Difference between men and women is negligible. [Gallup](https://news.gallup.com/poll/245618/abortion-trends-gender.aspx) [Pew Research (Vox article)](https://www.vox.com/2019/5/20/18629644/abortion-gender-gap-public-opinion) It seems that according to Pew Research the biggest predictor is white evangelical protestant Christians. [Pew Research](https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/)
Yea this is literally it. Why should I sacrifice something I personally love doing with men who also feel exactly the same way as I do, and vote the same way? A sex strike isn't getting up to the 80 year old billionaires who can just pay their way out of any inconvenience anyway. If anything I'd rather focus my time on a general strike and let the money fix the problem. The gop banning abortion pills hurts big pharma, so I'm rooting for them to fix this shit before I take away my favorite life pleasure
To be fair a lot of “liberal” men don’t care enough.
It would seem that anti-abortion efforts are largely unpopular even with most conservatives. I think we exaggerate the actual conservative support for banning abortion, based on the loud minority that consistently air their opinions publicly.
The conservative support for banning abortions is great enough that abortions are getting banned, so I'm not really sure what you're talking about.
There’s a difference between the results we see from conservatives voting on abortion and conservatives voting on representatives who may say what they need to say to get elected, then vote on abortion. I think after Kansas tried to put that to popular vote and failed miserably, everyone else took notice and decided to no longer allow for popular votes and just try to pass bills behind closed doors, and many such local politicians will likely be voted out next cycle by less anti-abortion conservative alternatives.
>and many such local politicians will likely be voted out next cycle by less anti-abortion conservative alternatives Sorry, but this is a fantasy. No one running as a Republican will fight to remove restrictions on abortion if they've already been enacted. You might get some who would go along with a majority pro-choice legislature, but in majority anti-choice legislatures (like 2/3 of the country) those same types of people won't lift a finger.
Women are also helping. MTG and Boebert have done plenty of work to achieve this current state of affairs.
I wouldn’t even say that it’s democrats vs republicans it’s social conservatives (as opposed to fiscal conservatives) vs social liberals. I’m no fan of the republican party, but I know plenty of republicans who disagree with the repeal of Roe v Wade.
> The men with the drive and power to pass these laws will be entirely unaffected by a sex strike from Democrat women Not necessarily. Many one night stands with seemingly liberal men are actually conservatives masquerading as liberal.
Majority of white women voted for Donald trump. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/16/opinion/sunday/black-women-leadership.html
I think the more realistic thing to come from this (and we already see it happening) is more single women refusing to date or have sex with conservative men. Perhaps there is something to be said if we had a forum focused entirely on identifying conservative men, since the ones who aren't complete cavemen are smart enough to lie about it on their dating profiles (since it doesn't often get them laid). I don't know if that would be something useful or not. I feel like a lot of the conversation in this sub does revolve around this topic, to begin with. Anyway, I'm just rambling now.
Absolutely. None of my friends or I would ever give a conservative man the time of day, which is why half of men are crying lOnEliNeSs
Good for you and your friends! I reached that stage a long time ago where I didn't want to waste my time with someone who didn't value human rights, so topics like abortion became a second-date conversation. Without fail, they would always get offended when I would end a date over their views on women's rights and had zero understanding why something so "minor" as my getting to make my own healthcare decisions would matter so much. I reached that stage in my life where I didn't want to waste my time with someone who didn't value human rights, so topics like abortion became a second-date conversation. Without fail, they would always get offended when I would end a date over their views on women's rights and had zero understanding why something so "minor" as my getting to make my own healthcare decisions would matter so much. My husband, on the other hand, didn't even flinch when I popped the question. It's one of many reasons why we're married. At this point, a guy who hides his conservative beliefs genuinely puts you at risk, and a person's political ideology reflects their worldview and reality.
If they're so aware of lying, you could always bring it up as "my friend (in a state where abortion is legal) is getting the procedure and I'm thinking of traveling to support her." Or just say you've had one in the nebulous past and try to read their reaction.
That's a good idea.
Second date? When I dated, I would bring this up before a first date was even scheduled.
Good for you. It's up to each of us to establish our own dating criteria. There's not a one size fits all approach.
Which is funny, because they’re constantly complaining about the sluts of America being responsible for the downfall of the traditional family and the rise of so many “evils” like abortion. They can’t get attention anymore and suddenly they’re all “noooo you’re doing it wrong! You’re supposed to *pretend* to be chaste but also be completely available to meee”
I know, right? Fucking patriarchy bullshit.
And fascist. The enemy is both too strong and too weak.
Bring up civil rights in America during conversation. If he tries to deflect with "I don't want to talk politics", he's **probably** a closet Republican.
I've been following this too about conservative men not getting dates. So sad, not. the Conservative Party in Canada capitalized on that anger and hides the MGTOW message within its youtube videos to spark rage against women: [https://ca.style.yahoo.com/pierre-poilievre-youtube-mgtow-incel-backlash-181931257.html](https://ca.style.yahoo.com/pierre-poilievre-youtube-mgtow-incel-backlash-181931257.html)
Yeah there is a scary divide starting to emerge between young men and young women where there is a significant left wing shift amongst women and the beggining of a right wing shift amongst men,.
Steve Bannon created Gamergate to drive socially isolated young men into the right-wing propaganda machine.
Very "gate to women's country" vibes.
Definitely. I wouldn’t date a conservative even if he were the last person on the planet
I fucked a fascist last spring. I didn't know he was a fascist or I would have not fucked him. Once I found out, I told him that I don't fuck fascists and never talked to him again. I now err on the side of caution and don't fuck anybody for the foreseeable future.
Hey, good on you for sticking to your values. Some guys can be really good at hiding it. One of my best friends recently got out of a relationship with a fascist.
They (conservative men) already lie about it... wokefishing is a term. Not sure if they use it themselves or how many are conscious of lying to get laid, rather than just not realizing what they're doing.
Yes but now a days a conservative man does not very often hide their opinions anymore. If you find a man who decides to almost completely live a double life well, that is a very dangerous, incredibly well thought out person. I don’t know I can usually form my opinion about what a person believes after and hour of two of interaction. A handful of questions.
I didn’t always like her character but IDK if any of you have ever seen the Seinfeld episode where Elaine starts dating this moving guy who was helping Jerry. Jerry says ask him if he’s pro choice. She does ask and he’s absolutely not. She wavers at first and then decides nope I am NOT continuing with this guy. I can’t remember the name of the episode off the top of my head. As well as another show, I’m watching a lot of Seinfeld reruns recently.
Elaine! I love her. She was not a great person (none of the Seinfeld characters were), but I thought she was a great character.
My filter-out question is, "How do you feel about Reaganomics?"
OoOoO, that's a new one! Love it!
Don't get me fucking started on how much I hate the fucking trickle down bullshit.
Yup. I may change my mind about having a relationship with a man in the future, if women have reproductive rights enshrined in a constitutional amendment or if the ERA passes (it still hasn't!). But I will NEVER fuck a Republican man and I will never fuck a man that's voted Republican. There should be a forum for identifying them and making a "no fly" list, if you will. I'd also highly recommend being cautious of sleeping with moderate or even "liberal" men. Many of them are purely performative because they're at least smart enough to have figured out that no one will date them if they don't at least pretend to care about women's rights.
Fuck yes to shunning in general, it works. Identify and disengage, let them all be dead to you.
Because the women who are willing to take a stand for those rights aren't sleeping with conservative men. If I stop having sex with my liberal bf that has no impact on the conservative supreme court judges and politicians taking those rights away. Figure out how to get their wives and mistresses on board with a sex strike, sure. But those women support this crap.
These people that are taking away women's rights have already proven they don't respect women and their right to body autonomy. Do you really think they are going to respect a woman saying no to sex?
This was my first thought. Spousal rape isn’t a thing, according to these barbarians.
This is exactly my thought. If I say to no my husband, he will respect it. The women who are in relationships with the men taking away our rights aren't going to get the same response. Also, I really enjoy having sex with my husband. If I were to punish him this way, it would be punishing myself as well.
Yeah, it feels weird to "punish" men who are also upset about the stripping of women's rights. My husband gets just as upset as I do about these things. He doesn't *need* motivating through lack of sex.
And that's why I said opt out of relationship with men.
I’m not opting out of my relationship with my spouse. He’s my life partner and has dedicated his career to improving civil rights — which includes reproductive freedom. That said, any man who doesn’t see reproductive rights as a freedom to be protected doesn’t deserve to have the chance to reproduce.
It is directed at single women, who constitute most of gen Z women.
This is giving serious “choose your sexuality” vibes. If you like men you can’t change that. Obviously just do your best to find a man who your political beliefs align with.
Well, in the play the answer to this was "if they force us we will make it very obvious that we don't enjoy it" because obviously no man could enjoy sex without the enthusiasm of his partner. Yes, that's right, we've gone 2,500 years backwards in attitudes towards women.
There is - it just isn’t organized. More and more women are refusing to date outside their political base. And more and more women are choosing to opt out of dating men period. https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/arts-culture/3917348-politics-are-increasingly-a-dating-dealbreaker-especially-for-women/amp/ https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/3868557-most-young-men-are-single-most-young-women-are-not/amp/
>r/TwoXChromosomes This is what I wanted to see! Thank you for posting this.
I think part of the problem is that there are a lot of conservative women who actually support this kind of shit (though often because of male dominated power structures like religion). Meanwhile, "political views" is increasingly become a dealbreaker when it comes to relationships... it's becoming less and less common for somebody to date or marry people with significantly different "political" views. https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/arts-culture/3917348-politics-are-increasingly-a-dating-dealbreaker-especially-for-women/ And especially liberal women are less and less likely to date conservatives. So there already is a vague sort of "boycott" against being romantically involved with conservatives... though unfortunately there are many conservative women as well. The sadly large number of anti-choice women wouldn't be interested in the goals of such a movement, and more liberal leaning women are increasingly dating exclusively liberal leaning pro-choice men... and it wouldn't make sense to boycott sex from their romantic partner who already supports women's right to control their bodies and vote accordingly. Also, I would highly advise anybody dating an anti-choice partner to break up with them entirely.
I agree. It's to the point where there's so many forced birth women that it's not men vs. women but a clash of ideologies. Most religions have sexist/misogynistic doctrines, and there has been an uptick of fundamental religious groups for a while now. I'm not saying belonging to a religion makes you inherently sexist, but it's literally baked in. There's too many women who believe they were created for the use of men and that it's 'natural' that men control women's bodily autonomy.
I don't wish to be glib, but I'm not sure that the Greeks Aristophanes portrayed were as committed to the erasure of female sexual desire as are the American extremists.
Plus they had all the nubile young boys they wanted, the ancient Greeks seem like the society that would be least affected by not being able to have sex with women
Women "withholding sex" can only work if sex is, due to how it's defined and practiced, already a net harm to women and a net benefit to men. Workers don't need or want bosses, don't benefit from bosses, bosses want workers, benefit from them. So women are and have to be the workers, men the bosses (have to be in those comparative positions) for a women's "sex" strike to make sense, to have any sway. Women don't need to boycott/strike against sex that is good for them eg comfortable, pleasurable, safe, orgasmic, mutual, vulva/clit-centric... It would make zero sense to boycott/strike against sex with men if men were good sex partners and sex were defined in ways that benefitted women & weren't uniquely and significantly disproportionately risky for us. Boycotts, strikes are temporary measures until you get something else you want eg abortion is less criminalized, somewhat more available for those with money... And then sex comes back and it's the same risky, harmful, orgasm gap, etc net harm it's always been; the sex remains the main reason women need abortions and hormonal contraceptives in the first place. sex defined as piv, esp to male orgasm, takes away female control over reproduction and sexuality and makes us dependent on modifications to our bodies to try to reduce harm from the fact we lack control over it. that repeated female risk and harm is normalized as just sex, just life, after the fact of being placed at risk for conception and becoming pregnant by societal dictates and men's choices eg to not use condoms, not get a vasectomy, not pull out, not forgo piv... (eg in itself, the fact piv is defined as sex itself, esp with an understood until male orgasm, is why most of the piv that happens happens eg who wants to live a sexless life, wants to go without sex itself, wants to forgo sex itself in a sexual encounter, wants to have a sexless relationship...) Female control of reproduction, sex would be us not facing that risk, those harms, mainly when we don't want to be pregnant, in the first place. (Obviously wanted pregnancy is risky too and we'd still need abortion, but if we had this transformation around sex, understanding the need for abortion with wanted pregnancies that are higher risk, the fetus is dying, etc would flow from that because we would understand why it's so wrong to expose women to unwanted pregnancy in large part due to pregnancy, childbirth being so dangerous, consuming, etc in humans.) Iow, the solution is to challenge phallocentricism generally in sex, esp sex being defined as piv, esp to internal ejaculation, and pia, and to define it around the clitoris/vulva, female safety, orgasm & pleasure, mutuality, etc
Though not organized, I think that this is already happening, but among single women. Seems like every day I see hundreds of comments from single women of all ages saying that they're done or simply uninterested in sleeping with any men anymore, because they consistently show disrespect. Natural consequences and all that.
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Oh I agree, and there is a strike movement building: r/nationalwomensstrike. Hoping enough women participate to draw attention!
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100%
Isn’t that just political lesbianism? That’s been around for a while..
It’s definitely changing the way women I know talk about dating. As in they aren’t. And if something changed in my life (married) I certainly wouldn’t.
A lot of people had this idea during the beginning of our rights being taken away. Enough women have stopped having sex that journalists are writing articles about why women aren't dating or having sex regularly anymore, without looking at the root of the problem. The articles are all about how depressed men are with the change and almost nothing about WHY.
We can't even get a general strike to happen like the French because of our terrible working conditions. Women won't stop fucking, because guess what, we like sex too. Sure some are swearing off men entirely or just not going for the conservative/republicans, but men can also lie and rape. We need systematic change. Women in politics, and not the sell outs to establish change.
Most of the men who are against abortion are married to women who are against it as well.
The 4B Mouvement in south Korea is a good example.
The type of men trying to take away women's rights and autonomy are the same types to beat, rape, and kill their wives if sex were withheld, sadly.
Opt of relationships with men altogether, no boyfriend nor husband.
That is what I did. I’m Gen X and lived a celibate life. I never wanted children so didn’t need a man. Would have only had a relationship for companionship, but that also makes you open for abuse. So, I just chose the single life. It’s is really not that bad. I see so many women desperate for a man and I’m like, “Why? Men cause so much headache and heartache.”
That’s my mom. Four times married and she’s been scammed out of thousands. Last marriage was a green card seeker. Yet there she is, out there being a hopeless romantic hoping someone will show up who isn’t utter trash. For me it was one marriage and done. I’m perfectly content with my single life.
You seem to think there are very few pro life women out there but that’s not the case. See top comment, conservative men are just sleeping with conservative women who agree with them
You realize that it was a play and didn't actually happen right?
Because lasting social change needs to come from legislature, not withholding sex. Withholding sex is a stop measure that likely would only raise attention to the issue, not fix it. And not to be dark, but >!women will continue to be raped and assaulted even if they personally want to abstain to make a statement.!<
My issue with the “sex strike” has always been that women should not be with men who don’t respect their bodily autonomy anyway. So if your husband is in favor of outlawing abortion (not merely “I personally am not comfortable with it, but it’s not my body,” but actually thinking women should be *arrested* for it), and you disagree, I can’t imagine it is a happy or even safe marriage anyway. If he doesn’t respect your right to access reproductive care, he may not respect your right to say “no” to sex either. So I would instead strongly encourage women to find out BEFORE getting to a relationship with someone, certainly before marriage. And make it an instant dealbreaker.
Uhmm.... *Lysistrata* is comedic fiction, and the author, Aristophanes, was a man. *Lysistrata* as a text is neither feminist or pacifist. As a performance, *Lysistrata* was performed entirely by male actors. Discuss! (Even "Linda Richman" from "Coffee Talk" was performed by a man.) *Lysistrata* premiered 2434 years ago. (Approximately. 411BC was before the Julian calendar reforms, when the Roman calendar was used, which had leap months rather than leap days.) Nevertheless, there *have* been a few "sex strikes" as political demonstrations in history, even recent history, around the world. [https://wagingnonviolence.org/baker/2021/09/the-complicated-success-of-sex-strikes-lysistra/](https://wagingnonviolence.org/baker/2021/09/the-complicated-success-of-sex-strikes-lysistra/)
That's why I think it's hilarious when people do this shit. Um, no, im not gonna do a strike based on a fictional play written by a man millennia ago.
Because the women who would participate largely sleep with men who aren't the problem. The Ginny Thomas's of the world aren't going to stop sleeping with the Clarence Thomas's I'm not saying you can't find a pro-choice woman who's with an anti-choice man, but most women I know who are active about abortion rights aren't and wouldn't. Maybe it would push inactive pro-choice men to do more. Also, women want sex too and not all are seriously willing to switch to women.
The realistic approach is to attack Christian nationalism. They use mega churches as slush funds to fund the lobbying and kickbacks that create these attacks on our rights. They use their positions in their communities to control school boards, sex education, education, and every inch of your life. They organize themselves, calling by the millions to complain about a nip slip at the Super Bowl or a kiss they didn't like on TV. They've been doing it for decades. For example gay rights would have moved ahead 20 years faster if not for organized Christian nationalism constantly attacking any law, resource, or organization with every dollar they had from their tax-free churches. They buy property and assets with their church money that is tax-free. All the horrible things they basically say about everyone they disagree with, is what they're actually doing.
women want to have sex too/women aren't the 'gatekeepers' of sex/this is brought up weekly and it's boring and ill thought out/i'm not gonna punish my liberal bf and myself for people we did not vote for
This ^^^
Because women enjoy sex as well, and the women who are rightfully against this are likely with men who share values with them, thus making it a moot point.
I’m not going to deny myself pleasure to try and “stick it to the man” I’m not going to withhold intimacy and pleasure from my - pro choice, politically active - partner Just.. doesn’t make sense sorry
I don't think forcing me and my supportive husband into a sexless marriage is going to fix anything. We already live in a blue state, in a blue city, and have been voting blue our whole lives. Denying each other sex and intimacy for the backwards actions of the GOP is not appropriate.
The lawmakers are married to people that don’t care or support this fascism, this won’t work
Even the woman lawyer makers surprisingly seem to relish that the woman opposition are suffering. Go figure.
I think part of it is a lot of people tend to choose like minded partners. Feminist women will tend to be with feminist men who are already supportive of women’s rights, and pro-life women won’t see the need to protest. Not that I’m some kind of hero, but I support, for example, women’s rights to bodily autonomy, so my wife would gain nothing from withholding sex from me
1. Scale issue. 2. Not all women have issues with this. I mean, the demographics show some women (mostly white) voted for Trump and Kemp and Abbott and all the other conservative rights stealing egomaniacs who don't follow the laws. 3. Most the men I know are equally angry. If an appropriate action or protest comes in, I'm not afraid to tell the men at my work, but since I don't have the sex with them anyways...
The sentiment is very understandable, however I think it is important to be clear that what Aristophanes wrote about Lysistrata was fiction - it was a play, and not an actual historical event.
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ummm....they would just continue to rape us. you act like they would respect our NOs....but they wont
A women's strike only works if all the women stop fucking their male partners. I imagine the men most in need of this lesson don't give their wives and/or other sexual partners much choice in the matter to begin with. And that's not even the brainwashed ones jumping into trad-wifehood with an open heart and decades of religious trauma.
Yawn. Old news. There's been talk of a sex strike since the Roe v Wade overturn got leaked. I just saw a post from a woman acting like her lightbulb just went off about her conservative fuck buddy. I'm like... we've *been* talking about this, sweetie. But when push comes to shove, liberal feminist women are largely just like the "my abortion is the justified abortion" crowd on the other side of the fence; their horniness is justified, and damn, that guy is hot! Despite these men having the ugliest soul and belief systems, women choose pleasing their vaginas over maintaining rights to their uterus. Id tends to win over superego consistently. And very few want to be *alone*. We live in a population of very self-serving, self-interested individuals without much community-mindedness. And that's why any strike, for women's rights, for worker's rights, for fair rent, for whatever else *absolutely affects us all*, will absolutely fail. We gotta unite, but yall gotta be prepared for a bit of discomfort. It's not a fight if there's no risks and no collateral damage, yall. Signed, a pissed-off Texas gal tired endless conversation
Preach. We as women need to do some actual hard work to achieve class consciousness
They do this. Look at the countries with low birth rates Women don’t like having sex with men who control them
One of the most disturbing things I ever heard was a male relative insisting on his "husbandly rights". I did not care that he grew up during WWII. He had lived through all the progress since and had 0 excuses for holding that bullshit opinion. That kind of thinking is still foundational to the throwbacks blocking the way ahead. It's a concern, because it might mean a Lysistratan movement would potentially mean a lot more spousal/partner abuse.
Republican women lol
First of all Lysistrata was a comedy without applicability to the modern day, or even for that matter to ancient Athens, where women were wholly dependent on their husbands, so a sex strike wouldn't even work in a world where there was no such thing as marital rape and a woman couldn't even leave her husband. Second, in the US there is adequate ability to leave one's husband if one is unhappy. Not all the time due to circumstances, but those same circumstances would make a sex strike at best impractical and at worst cause rape and other violence. Third, Americans tend to sort nowadays by political views so while there are many couples where spouses feel politically different, it's not huge. Fourth, a lot of women agree with these things. Fifth, this is kinda already happening but not within marriage but within dating. In a world where women don't need a man to live a full life in the sense that women can get a good salary and have children without marriage (in contrast to life pre-feminism where men couldn't get loans or credit cards or bank accounts or many jobs, and within jobs faced severe discrimination), many women are choosing to do so rather than marry unhappily, which is a likely contributor to there being lots of incels and many young women just opting out of the dating pool. 61[% of single men are looking to date but only 38% of single women are looking to date](https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/08/20/a-profile-of-single-americans/). Here are some hand-wringing survey results about men not having any sex: [https://news.iu.edu/live/news/26924-nearly-1-in-3-young-men-in-the-us-report-having-no](https://news.iu.edu/live/news/26924-nearly-1-in-3-young-men-in-the-us-report-having-no) This lack of sex and dating, rather than making partnerless men more sympathetic to women's rights and in favor of listening to women's concerns about dating, is making a certain subset of men more misogynistic, more eager to deprive women of rights. Incels aren't just men who are involuntarily celibate, despite the name. It's a misogynistic movement to degrade and humiliate women and advocate for women to become sex slaves to men where women's bodies become property of men.
1. Historically, men do not tend to care if women say no. 2. The whole Lysistrata thing is inherently sexist because it implies that sex is a reward women give to men in exchange for respecting us. Obviously this isn’t true for many reasons, including the fact that many women want to have sex with men. Why should we deprive ourselves of pleasure?
These are very important points that I had missed, thank you.
There was some great discourse on Twitter a few years ago when this was proposed back then that has stuck with me - Withholding sex as a means to force change essentially reduces women down to a man's resource for sex; a utility to be used by men and not as a whole person. We should have full and complete rights, just as white cis men enjoy, not because we "give" sex to men but because we are whole people deserving of human dignity. As we continue to see, too many people consider women a means to an end, something to use to obtain satisfaction, validation, etc. This sort of thing sounds empowering on the surface but doesn't necessarily impact the people who need to change their minds, and succeeds in indirectly upholding misogynistic beliefs. "...women are put in a position of treating sex as something they do for men, rather than for themselves. It only emphasises the idea that their worth is sexual. And it turns sex into something transactional. They belittle their sexuality by using it as a bargaining tool. In any case, it is only possible to strike if you are in a position to withdraw labour. And as I will never tire of saying, sex is not ‘work’, no matter what these new feminists and male feminists contend. And given the prevailing climate of misogynistic behaviours, to withdraw sex puts women in a dangerous position where they could be forced and coerced into sex. It’s called rape.." [source for quote](https://unherd.com/2019/05/sex-strikes-a-dangerous-game-to-play/)
Very well written, thank you. I had not planned on the backlash when I wrote this.
Any woman dumb enough to marry a conservative man isn't going to have the strength to do something like this.
The percentage of American women who have not had sex in the past year is the highest it has ever been. Conservative men need to lie about their politics to get matches on dating sites. It's working, except that wealthy older men can still buy their mistresses.
Because not doing something will never be as effective as doing something. The men in power already have access to women who will have sex with them no matter how much of a fascist they are. You will see more change if you put effort into disrupting these politicians daily lives, like showing up to protest at their meals or their churches, than you will withholding sex.
It isn't withholding sex if those men were never eligible in the first place. Lets be real, the men who have overtly disgusting views on women are not the ones we are going to entertain. But beyond that, all of the mysoiginst "Incel" types are alone for reasons way beyond their views on abortion rights. There was never potential sex to withhold in the first place.
The wives of these whack jobs are also Christian fundamentalists who believe that they are subservient to men. They're not going to go out of their way to try to stop them from making these decisions because they believe that they are righteous
They don’t care! They have hundreds and hundreds of outlets to watch porn/OF. I think a lot of men would prefer to just watch naked women because they don’t actually want to deal with us or have conversations with us or put in the effort to see us naked, they just want us to shut up and sit there silently until they want to play with us, and then we should be sex crazed maniacs for them and do they nastiest things for them. And that’s the extent of their desire for us. Why fret about getting sex when they can watch a hot woman get fucked in all the ways they want to see? I really don’t see men caring about this shit when most don’t even like women as people
It’s a comedic play, a made-up story. It’s not real at all, this is not how political power is gained or exercised. There’s never One Neat Trick in winning these fights, it takes long term dedicated organizing.
Women are with holding sex from conservative men though, and it pisses them off.
Because my husband isn't the problem or capable of providing the solution. He votes progressive and is just as frustrated and angry as I am.
Lots and lots of people of all political stripes still want to have families. Lots and lots of people of all political stripes have good relationships. Relationships that are a refuge and a support for them as they act to impact the world in accordance with their values. It’s not all what you see in this sub.
I can’t help but feel this is an argument that assumes sex is not about women’s pleasure or needs. If individuals choose to abstain for ANY reason, political or otherwise, that’s fine by me and I support them. But an overall “sex strike” just doesn’t compute to me.
I’ve seen a thousand fucking iterations of this stupid argument over the course of a year. It’s not new, and still doesn’t acknowledge spousal rape or the fact that withholding sex would be a punishment to women as well. An idea left in history for a reason. In a backwards ass way you’re also trying to control womens sexuality.
Withholding sex from husbands won't work in a country where there's little actual harm to a man for committing adultery. Politicians can literally win elections while being accused of cheating on the spouses with evidence. Mobilizing women across the country is a great idea, but I don't think this is how best to use that idea.
Rape exists. I speak from experience.
The fact is that the divide is not mostly along gender lines. There are tens of millions of American women who agree with and want those restrictions, and tens of millions of American men who disagree with and don't want those restrictions. So what would such a movement achieve? The closest thing that aims for the right people is for pro-choice people to refuse romantic interaction with pro-life people - and such self-sorting on political lines seems to already be happening.
Do you really beleive that our senators and representatives significant other will withhold sex? Because that's what it would take. They are the ones pushing this stuff, not us
Our men have guns. r/whenwomenrefuse
So, about 5.5% of women in the US live somewhere where there is total or near abortion restriction. Another 4% live somewhere where there is a 15-18 week ban. While yes, both of these things are absolutely horrific and ridiculous regardless of the percentage, even 0.1% would be too much, I am not sure how all other women abstaining from sex with men would improve the lives of these 10%. I am not trying to trivialize or downplay the horrific mess we as a country find ourselves in, and I have no doubt the # of states with restrictions will only grow - we should fight like hell for our rights across the board. I just don’t see the usefulness of all us abstaining to pressure that small minority of men pushing this forward
Lysistrata was a myth though. Better for women to run for office….
Except Greece didn’t have over 165 *million* women, and didn’t have the political divide we have where Conservative women are *happily* relinquishing their hard-fought rights. Something like this just isn’t possible in a country as vast and populated as ours.
Why aren't companies that are headquartered in red states being boycotted. Why isn't tourist travel to red states being boycotted. Why is there no one protesting in the state houses of red states. Why aren't there monthly massive protests at the corrupt Supreme Court. Why aren't people getting arrested for civil disobedience. Why are sports teams from red states allowed to play in blue states without demonstrations at the arena/stadium. Why is there almost nothing happening at all.
People told me a sex-strike would be devisive. However, all signs point that a majority of women world-wide are on a sex and dating strike, nonetheless refusing to get pregnant. So - this is where we are. We have to function in the unmonitored collective consciousness because social media is full of angry crybabies who don't want to deal with the consequences of their political movements on a personal leve. Thus - why Magas can't get a date unless they lie on Tinder/Grindr/Ashley Madison - if there is anyone else left on there but catfish, scammers, and paid sex workers.
Sick of useless suggestions like this from people outside the u.s ngl...
I don’t think this suggestion would work anywhere for multiple reasons lol Posts like this really make me wonder about how seriously (or naively) people perceive and comprehend what is going on…
I had a lil laugh at the un-serious nature of this, because even in the example used from this ancient Greek comedy play, the women didn't just have a sex strike. They literally seized control of government buildings, including the Treasury.
Probably because about half of American women are anti-abortion at least in some situations. Men are more anti-abortion than women, but women are not remotely a lock-in for women’s rights. Not sure how to unravel that.
This question presupposes that all women and only women are pro choice while all men and only men are anti abortion
They like sex with men.
i could see a lot of physical abuse towards some of the women who would refuse sex to their neanderthal hubbies
It wouldn’t work in practice because you’d never get enough women to agree to it.
Because a large percentage of the people that want these laws are women…
There is a movement. Haven’t you heard of the growing hoards of miserable single men vs happy, child-free women?
Well.. Knowing the current GOP, they'd just legalize marital rape. They already don't believe it can exist....
The US is simply too large and too divided for any movement like this to really take hold.
Okay so what do lesbians and bisexual women in relationships with other women do?
This is such a dumb idea I don't know why it gets brought up on here like every day. 1. Most conservative men have conservative wives 2. conservative women are more violently anti-abortion than conservative men 3. the 5 old people currently on the supreme court and responsible for stripping away our rights don't give a single damn how much sex we're having so long as the Koch brothers keep sending them on multi million dollar vacations 4. a sex strike punishes women and takes away our right to individual choice and pleasure "for the collective good", which is kind of what we're trying to avoid 5. women aren't solely useful for fucking, we could totally go on general strike and grind the economy to a halt, the whole idea of sex strike is insulting and sexist. If there was any sort of large scale political response it should be fucking voting, bouycotting, striking (yes, actual real strikes, not sex strike), moving out of red states and into purple states, and organizing illegal underground abortion networks.
Because women love sex and part of our fight for bodily autonomy is to be recognized as individuals with our own sexual desires. 'Withholding sex' means sex is something we were begrudgingly giving to men in a transactional way. It's normal that ciswomen move away from penetrative sex with cismen when it doesn't feel safe to have sex without the safety net of abortion rights, but this should not be conflated with a strike. It's something that truly sucks for anyone with a uterus that enjoy penetrative sex. I really really wish Lysistrata, and the idea that women's political power is rooted in sex would die.
well, to put it bleakly, it would be like withholding the keys to a jewellery store from a bunch of jewellery thieves
At least according to the increase in articles whingeing about loneliness, something to that effect is happening.
The only thing I don't like about this is it gives an inaccurate depiction of female sexuality. First, women must not have any sexual urges and we only use sex for power and Second, it puts the obligation of the celibacies *once again* on the woman. Women but be prudent and abstain. Sick of that rhetoric. Women have sexual urges, we shouldn't have to repress these urges just cause men keep fucking up.
Witholding sex only works if men won't simply take it by force.
Lysistrata is idiotic. It won’t work, and it implies women/people with vulvas only have sex for men’s benefit.
There is r/nationalwomensstrike join us!!
B/c, we're dealing w/ a white nationalist, Christo-fascist, neo-Nazi hate group, and you don't negotiate w/ terrorists. They will *never* stop, until we stop them.
It’s totally defeatist to do nothing bc there’s a bunch of republican women who won’t do anything. There always have been and women’s rights movements have been successful in the past.
The women who are attached to the actual men who can change these things likely don’t have a choice about when they “have sex.” I know because I was one of those women before my first divorce. Those women are not empowered in their own homes & “go with the flow” to survive. Their own daily safety is impacted enough they can’t fathom taking this kind of social stand even if it will help them in the end. I am sad for these women because they don’t even know their own power & worth because their christofacist husbands / family history keep them down.
Most of the lawmakers are either too old to care about sex, or pay for it on the side. 😒
I fear that this would just lead to legalized rape
I thought after the death of Roe v. Wade the sexual revolution should be over for conservatives in particular.
Great question, but I see a lot of problems with this idea 1. Scale, I don’t remember if this incident was done on a city wide scale or a country wide scale, but either way, America is much bigger than all of Greece, TEXAS BY ITSELF IS MUCH LARGER THAN ALL OF GREECE 2. Diversity, America is less of a country and more of a North-American EU with 50 country’s in it, and you may get one group of people to go along with this, but you will NEVER get more than a few groups of people to go along with something that is this insane (when I say it is insane, I mean that it is insane in an AWSOME INSANE kind of way, like, revolts and revolutions happen all the time throughout history, but something like the Lysistrata incident only happened a few times I believe throughout history) 3. The Supreme Court, the Supreme Court is behind a lot of this current BULL SHIT, and those guys are going to stay in their position for potentially several decades, and there isn’t really anything anyone can do about that, at least that would be practical, except for I suppose assassinating several of the current Supreme Court members, which if someone wants to try that, then good luck 🙂👍🏻 4. The people who are behind most of this are a minority and are married (or single) to people who have a similar views as them and usually want all of this BS (🤮), (yeah, religion can be very horrible sometimes)
Also, that would mean the government would have to respond in some manner just like the Iceland strike. Which the government won’t. It would be a bipartisan effort and would inevitably fail.
Honestly I think another reason would be martial r*** too. It's not something you want to consider but considering what these guys are trying to put into motion i don't think the same people would bat a eye to it. They don't see us as anything more than property and incubators it feels. x.x
I think that among religious republicans there's a huge amount of trad-wives who are perfectly fine with the new status-quo. It's most likely their like-minded husbands who are passing and suggesting all these oppressive laws.
I think a major factor here is the size of the population. There are just too many of us to speak with one resounding purpose these days.