Making sex videos online is gross and low-class and we all know it, we can all admit it
Don't try and weasel your way out of this, you know it's true
Virginia Democrat Susanna Gibson this week was found to have “performed sex acts with her husband for a live online audience and encouraged viewers to pay them with ‘tips’ for specific requests.” This story has gone surprisingly mainstream—it was broken by the Washington Post and many lesser outlets have followed the Post’s lead and reported on it—which is a rare thing for a scandal that involves a Democrat. Most mainstream media outlets won’t report on a Democrat’s troubles for days after they break, if at all. If a Democrat murders someone the media will normally only report on it during the post-trial motions. So this is interesting.
The willingness of a major media outlet to report on this scandal really demonstrates just how uncomfortably tawdry and disgusting the whole thing is. Being a sex performer online is very gross and very low-class. And it’s the sort of behavior that can’t really be subject to a rehabilitative whitewashing on the part of ideologues. You know they’ve been trying to do that with prostitution for years. They’ve rebranded prostitutes as “sex workers,” and we are now expected to look upon prostitution and pornography as kind of legitimate and unremarkable professions rather than sad, depressing, rock-bottom life choices filled with violence, chaos, desperation, sexual infections and cruel exploitation. The mainstream media has sort of copped to that and has gamely tried to make it work. But they’re plainly not willing to do the same with this unfortunate Virginia politician’s creepy sex tape. Live sex streaming sort of lays bare the whole ugly conceit of our current sexual politics. If the Post reports on it, they’re signaling, however obliquely, that this sort of behavior is bizarre and gross and unseemly.
But not everyone is willing to admit it. At Politico, Jack Shafer asks: “So What if a Candidate Livestreamed Sex Acts with Her Husband?” Ha! So what?? It’s repulsive, that’s what! Jack Shafer knows this. At Slate, Christina Cauterucci claimed there was “nothing wrong with what she and her husband [did] to earn money and/or have fun.” Virginia State Rep. Louise Lucas claimed that Gibson’s opponents “[tried] to embarrass and humiliate her and they failed completely.” (Lucas also claimed, jeeringly, that Virginia Republicans were “going through porn websites” as part of their opposition recon, the implication apparently being that it’s perfectly fine to make pornography but not to consume it.)
Does anyone really believe this stuff? Here’s a litmus test: Suppose you had a daughter and she told you she wanted to make webcam videos of herself having sex online so that she could make “tips” from people watching her. Would you encourage her to pursue this vocation, or advise her not to do it? If your answer is the former, as it very well should be, congratulations: You’re a normal, healthy person who recognizes the shameful and degrading nature of prostitution. Don’t be ashamed of feeling that way, you’re in the right!
I think just about everyone feels this way. We see this sort of thing for what it is and it’s not good. And we can admit it. It’s okay. Don’t be afraid. “It’s a terrible look for anyone, let alone a politician, to be caught begging for money while having sex online” is a true statement and it’s not wrong to say it, to accept it, to promulgate it and try and convince others of it.
Whether or not this hurts Gibson’s chances at election remain to be seen. I don’t think this is the kind of thing that will induce even moderate Democrats to vote for a Republican, though it may be enough to cause them to stay home rather than vote for either one, handing the victory to the GOP anyway. Let’s fervently hope, if she loses, that this lady has a better career path in mind than the one that got her into this in mess the first place.