Re: [Marxism] Re: Rather's facts on Bush were true, documents not provenforgeries

["Alan Bickley" <avb34@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

For what it's worth Fred Feldman's understanding of what constituted "having
sex" in his youth exactly matches the understanding of it held by people who
grew up in late 1940s and early 1950s Oklahoma, or, at least, in that part
in which I grew up. I checked memories on this score at my most recent high
school reunion. Pulling up short of the finish line was not "having sex."


----- Original Message -----
From: "Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, March 14, 2005 1:34 PM
Subject: [Marxism] Re: Rather's facts on Bush were true,documents not
provenforgeries


> Oh please. He *did* inhale. And oral sex is sex.
>
> Carlos
>
> Carlos! How in heaven's name do you know that he inhaled?  Has any one
> who was there ever said that he did?
>
> I will tell you why I knew that it was POSSIBLE that he didn't.
> Because, for what reason I don't know, I have never been able to inhale
> smoke.  Never.
>
> I tried to start smoking when I was a teenager, but I kept doubling up
> in agony. Friends tried to show me how to safely inhale but to no avail.
>
> Finally, I gave up smoking.  And this no doubt helped the US SWP's
> antidrug policy to pretty much become second nature without much
> internal conflict.
>
> Well, it happens to now be an established fact that Clinton, for medical
> reasons, COULD NOT INHALE. Its true that he tried to describe it in
> terms that suggested some kind of moral choice, which is idiotic.
>
> I don't want to start one of those grisly list discussions on sexual
> mores, that go on forever.
> But when I was young, there was absolutely no doubt in my generation
> that "having sex" was "going all the way" or the reproductive act, with
> or without birth control devices.  Any thing else was making out --
> light, medium or heavy.  So if you were challenged by your parents, one
> could reply "I did not have sex with that woman!" and do so with iron
> moral conviction.
>
> I would also add that this is still the standard by which women are held
> to be and, for the most part, consider themselves to be virgins.
>
> Of course, a lot of things have changed but I think a lot of basically
> heterosexual youth still use variants of this stance.  It's a good
> defensive posture, but also one that was effective because it was
> believed.  By the way, of course, most of us also, I admit, did not
> believe that gays and lesbians were really "having sex." This also gave
> some leeway for some to wander from the straight and narrow and
> experiment.  You were still just "making out," not changing your basic
> sexuality.
>
> Okay, a lot of things have changed. The legitimizing of gay sex changed
> the standards in one way. And the sickening witch-hunt of the Starr gang
> also contributed to changing them in the same direction, in an uglier
> way.
>
> But I am convinced that Clinton (who sometimes seems a bit adolescent in
> his outlook to me) believed what he said, when he responded, "I did not
> have sex with that woman." I think he would have passed a lie-detector
> test at that moment. And millions of young people agreed with him -- and
> they did not learn it from him as right wing morality mongers claim.  It
> was already a fundamental part of their belief system.
>
> To get Clinton to admit he had had sex, the Starr inquisitors had to
> come up with a definition of having sex which embraces a quite gigantic
> scope of human contact.
>
> For heterosexual youth, at least but not exclusively, everything but
> "having sex is "making out" or whatever the term is today.
>
> The acceptance of these as the famous "Clinton lies," and Whitewater as
> a high point of government corruption (well, at least that coverup was
> partly defeated), was part of the reactionary role of the right-wing
> Starr witch-hunt.
> Fred Feldman
>
>
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