“The Only Safe Guide is Love”: Models of Engaging Luther's Ethical Hermeneutic for Theological Responses to the Affirmation of Same‐Sex Sexuality

Lutheran theological discussions over the morality of same‐sex sexuality not only raise “ethical” questions, but point to deeper interpretive tensions that arise when resources of the tradition are interpreted in new contexts. Responding to these debates, in this article I propose that Luther's application of the law to challenging ethical situations provides a historically situated hermeneutic that can redirect theological discussions on same‐sex sexuality. Drawing upon feminist Lutheran and queer theological work, I consider how we may reengage with Luther in a way that is both faithful to his commitments, and also takes queer people seriously as moral subjects.     

Asé and Amen,Sister!

At times, the academy seems devoid of justice because it emphasizes the cultivation of knowledge often denied to marginalized individuals and communities. As black queer feminist scholars doing praxis‐driven theorizing from separate fields on the subject of black queer families and communities, we employ research methods that resist the dynamics of power and privilege that exist within normative researcher‐participant exchanges. In this essay, we explore and highlight the ethical, justice‐oriented, and dialogical relationship between researcher‐scholars and research participants. Through story and theory, we illustrate and argue that autoethnographies and narrative interviews can act as epistemological excavation tools for both researchers and participants, as they become sites of individual and collective consciousness. Our work resists capitalist models of research and instead promotes a justice‐oriented and community‐derived building of knowledge.     

Queer Patients and the Health Care Professional—Regulatory Arrangements Matter

This paper discusses a number of critical ethical problems that arise in interactions between queer patients and health care professionals attending them. Using real-world examples, we discuss the very practical problems queer patients often face in the clinic. Health care professionals face conflicts in societies that criminalise same sex relationships. We also analyse the question of what ought to be done to confront health care professionals who propagate falsehoods about homosexuality in the public domain. These health care professionals are more often than not motivated by strong religious convictions that conflict with mainstream medical opinion on homosexuality. We argue that they ought to be held accountable for their conduct by their professional statutory bodies, given that they abuse their professional standing to propagate sectarian views not representative of their profession. Lastly, we propose that medical schools have special responsibilities in training future health care professionals that will enable them to respond professionally to queer patients seeking health care.     

iObjectify: Self‐ and other‐objectification on Grindr,a geosocial networking application designed for men who have sex with men

Grindr is a smartphone application for men who have sex with men (MSM). Despite its reputation as a ‘hook‐up app’, little is known about its users' self‐presentation strategies and how this relates to objectification. This article explores objectification on Grindr. The results of Study 1 showed that Grindr users objectified other men more than non‐Grindr users. A content analysis of 1400 Grindr profiles in Study 2 showed that profile pictures with objectifying content were related to searching for sexual encounters. Finally, a survey of Grindr users in Study 3 revealed that objectification processes and sexualized profile pictures were related to some objectification‐relevant online behaviors (e.g., increased use of Grindr, discussion of HIV status). Interestingly, the presence of body focused profile content was more related to sexual orientation disclosure (not being ‘out’) than to objectification. This article presents evidence that Grindr usage and online presentation are related to objectification processes.     

Sexual Priming, Gender Stereotyping, and Likelihood to Sexually Harass: Examining the Cognitive Effects of Playing a Sexually-Explicit Video Game

The present study examines the short-term cognitive effects of playing a sexually explicit video game with female “objectification” content on male players. Seventy-four male students from a university in California, U.S. participated in a laboratory experiment. They were randomly assigned to play either a sexually-explicit game or one of two control games. Participants’ cognitive accessibility to sexual and sexually objectifying thoughts was measured in a lexical decision task. A likelihood-to-sexually-harass scale was also administered. Results show that playing a video game with the theme of female “objectification” may prime thoughts related to sex, encourage men to view women as sex objects, and lead to self-reported tendencies to behave inappropriately towards women in social situations.     

Good Ol’ Country Boys Playin’ on the Farm: Online Articulations of Rural Masculinity by Men Who Have Sex with Men

This study seeks to fill existing gaps in the literature about the lives of rurally-situated men who have sex with men (MSM). Much work in this field grapples with identity construction and the unique contexts faced by queer, gay, or MSM in rural areas. This study explores the ways in which this population utilizes Craigslist as a means to articulate and perform rural masculinity. Findings suggest that MSM located within rural topographies often deploy culturally contingent masculine traits specific to rural cultural and geographic locations. The relationship that rural MSM have with the Internet is complex and dialectical in nature. The present study leads the author to conceptualize rural MSM’s relationship to both rurality and same-sex sexual behavior in two primary ways: (1) to queer or fetishize the rural, and similarly, (2) to ‘ruralize’ the queer.     

The Ethics of Sexual Objectification: Autonomy and Consent

It is now a platitude that sexual objectification is wrong. As is often pointed out, however, some objectification seems morally permissible and even quite appealing—as when lovers are so inflamed by passion that they temporarily fail to attend to the complexity and humanity of their partners. Some, such as Nussbaum, have argued that what renders objectification benign is the right sort of relationship between the participants; symmetry, mutuality, and intimacy render objectification less troubling. On this line of thought, pornography, prostitution, and some kinds of casual sex are inherently morally suspect. I argue against this view: what matters is simply respect for autonomy, and whether the objectification is consensual. Intimacy, I explain, can make objectification more morally worrisome rather than less, and symmetry and mutuality are not relevant. The proper political and social context, however, is crucial, since only in its presence can consent be genuine. I defend the consent account against the objection that there is something paradoxical in consenting to objectification, and I conclude that given the right background conditions, there is nothing wrong with anonymous, one‐sided, or just‐for‐pleasure kinds of sexual objectification.     

Ekstasis as (Beyond?) Jouissance: Sex,Queerness, and Apophaticism in the Eastern Orthodox Tradition

Ekstasis (ecstasy) is central to Eastern Orthodox theology, an encounter that sets the self on the way towards knowledge of and union with God. Ekstasis is fundamentally apophatic — achieved through the eschewal of cognitive knowledge, and experiential — precipitated by practices that foster self-renunciation and transcendence. This article examines how this notion of ecstasy, as narrated in the Orthodox theology of Staniloae and Lossky, can aid, and be aided by, queer theoretical claims regarding sex. Through examining Lacan's notion of jouissance and Bersani's utilization of it, as well as Williams's analysis of sex as “the body's grace,” this article explores how sex, particularly orgasm, can function as a spiritual resource, as a site of and practice towards ecstasy. This article concludes with a brief examination of the ethical implications of this frame.     

Racial and Sexual Objectification of Asian American Women: Associations with Trauma Symptomatology,Body Image Concerns,and Disordered Eating

ABSTRACT

Sexism and racism often imbue Asian American women’s socialization experiences. Operating from an objectification theory framework, the present article (a) examines the conceptual relevance of racial and sexual objectification in describing Asian American women’s oppressive experiences, (b) reviews empirical studies linking racial and sexual objectification with Asian American women’s mental health issues, specifically in the areas of trauma symptomatology, body image concerns, and disordered eating, (c) offers critiques of existing research and points to directions for future research, and (d) discusses clinical implications for therapy work with Asian American women based on available literature. In essence, the present review highlights how Asian American women may experience body image concerns, disordered eating, and trauma symptomatology through processes ethnoculturally and socioculturally distinct to them via experiences of racial and sexual objectification. This review calls for a more nuanced and precise understanding of Asian American women’s racial and sexual objectification experiences and associated mental health difficulties. This understanding can only occur through increased empirical research and clinical practice, as informed by feminist scholarship situated in a culturally expanded objectification framework.     

Husserl and queer theory

In spite of a history wherein queer theory has openly rejected phenomenology, phenomenology has gained increasing interest amongst queer theorists. However, Husserl’s phenomenology is often marginalized in attempts to integrate queer theory with phenomenology, and when Husserl is addressed specifically, his work is often treated superficially or even misrepresented. Given this, my first goal is to demonstrate how Husserl’s work is already open to positions considered fundamental to queer theory, and that Husserl is often explicitly arguing for these positions himself. In doing so, I wish to show that Husserl’s phenomenology is well fitted for complementary engagement with queer theory. My second goal is to work through some ways in which Husserl’s phenomenology and queer theory can work together in detail to accomplish shared theoretical goals. Although this will not be a full-blown analysis—which would exceed the parameters of this article—my hope is to provide a certain amount of in depth work that can then assist further analyses that combine these methods.     

Home and hiddenness: queer theology,domestication and institutions

ABSTRACT

This essay examines tropes of hiddenness and domestication in queer theology, particularly in light of the increasing mainstreaming of queer theologies in institutional (e.g. university, seminary, church) settings, and the inclusion of queer theologies by straight academics and teachers on their syllabi. Drawing on James C. Scott’s work on revolution as a luxury of the elite (by way of the Arab Spring, the UK riots of 2011, and the US demonstrations in 2014), and Judith Halberstam’s construction of “failure” as a strategy of queer resistance, I ask whether there will continue to be a role for “shadow queernesses” which reject institutional acceptability. However, I also suggest that the increased visibility of queer theology within mainstream institutions does not inevitably imply compromise or “toothlessness,” but may in fact testify to the pre-existing presence of queer diversity in multiple contexts and the inhabitation by queer scholars of various “homes.”     

Objectification Theory Predicts College Women’s Attitudes Toward Cosmetic Surgery

This study investigated cosmetic surgery attitudes within the framework of objectification theory. One hundred predominantly White, British undergraduate women completed self-report measures of impression management, global self-esteem, interpersonal sexual objectification, self-surveillance, body shame, and three components of cosmetic surgery attitudes. As expected, each of the objectification theory variables predicted greater consideration of having cosmetic surgery in the future. Also, as expected, sexual objectification and body shame uniquely predicted social motives for cosmetic surgery, whereas self-surveillance uniquely predicted intrapersonal motives for cosmetic surgery. These findings suggest that women’s acceptance of cosmetic surgery as a way to manipulate physical appearance can be partially explained by the degree to which they view themselves through the lenses of sexual and self-objectification.     

Queering the Fertility Clinic

A sociologist examines contemporary engagements of queer bodies and identities with fertility biomedicine. Drawing on social science, media culture, and the author’s own empirical research, three questions frame the analysis: 1. In what ways have queers on the gendered margins moved into the center and become implicated or central users of biomedicine’s fertility offerings? 2. In what ways is Fertility Inc. transformed by its own incorporation of various gendered and queered bodies and identities? And 3. What are the biosocial and bioethical implications of expanded queer engagements and possibilities with Fertility Inc.? The author argues that “patient” activism through web 2.0 coupled with a largely unregulated free-market of assisted reproduction has included various queer identities as “parents-in-waiting.” Such inclusions raise a set of ethical tensions regarding how to be accountable to the many people implicated in this supply and demand industry.     

Is it Really Just About Being More Like a Fag? Confronting the Gay Male Model Mantra

Although the debate between feminism and queer is by now a fairly old and some might argue, trite and overwrought one, in this paper I direct my attention to a specific feminist assessment of queer that I find to be especially unhelpful and pernicious: the automatic linkage of queer with the exaltation of a gay male subjectivity. This article is informed by my own ethnographic research on lesbian/queer public sexual cultures; specifically, two Canadian lesbian/queer bathhouses, where public sex and sexual exploration are encouraged. I argue that this contention, that lesbians who espouse queer are aping (gay) male sexuality and subjectivity—due to the privileging of non-normative sexual practices found within the gay male community—does two things: (re)essentializes genders and sexualities, and, more importantly, robs non-gay male subjects (e.g., women, lesbians, butches, trans identified individuals) of their own agency. In sum, I believe that this linkage to a supposed gay male imitation, and concomitantly, viewing lesbian/queer sexual cultures, behaviors, configurations, and signifying sexual economies as mere derivatives of gay male culture, reinforces lesbian/queer invisibility and (re)centers the heterosexual matrix. For the sake of lesbian/queer subjects’ own viability, lesbian/queer sexualities must thus be pulled out of this discursive trap.     

Towards a queer dharmology of sex

Lay practitioners of Buddhism, especially lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender/queer persons, are given little guidance by the traditional Dharmology (Buddhist theology) of sex. The most extensive discussions are the detailed prohibitions in the monastic rule, which focus on the mechanics of sex rather than on love and relationships. What advice there is on sex for lay persons is either vague or over‐determined by its cultural context. Christianity, despite being homophobic and mistrustful of sex, has developed a positive attitude towards sex within heterosexual marriage. An investigation of this suggests a Dharmology of sex as relationship, based on central Buddhist doctrines such as interdependent arising. This Dharmology can be strengthened by queering it with reference to Harry Hay's notion that gay subject–subject consciousness is more compatible with Buddhist non‐duality than the hetero subject–object consciousness. It can be claimed, therefore, that Buddha Nature, and Buddhism itself, is queer.     

Gay,Lesbian, and Queer Theologies: Origins,Contributions, and Challenges

Abstract : Theologians and biblical scholars have been writing about Christianity and homosexuality for over three decades, but lesbian/gay and queer theologies are still unfamiliar. Since questions about lesbian, gay, and queer Christians are confronting many denominations, it is important to study these proposals. This essay argues that lesbian/gay theologies trace their histories to theologies of liberation, while queer theology is indebted to postmodern and queer theories. Recent Christological and anthropological proposals are presented, and the essay concludes by exploring the distinct political implications of these theological proposals.     

The Waiting Room: Ontological Homelessness, Sexual Synecdoche, and Queer Becoming

An autobiographical reflection on the experience of being diagnosed as intersex, this essay considers the waiting room an apt metaphor for lives shaped by medical understandings of queer corporealities. Drawing upon the work of Gayle Salamon, Malatino develops the concept of sexual synecdoche as a useful analytic tool for considering the operations of medical pathologization in the realm of non-normative gender. She concludes with a discussion of queer becoming as an alternative ontology of gendered being that offers a resistant, coalitional way beyond contemporary, problematic institutionalized understandings of intersex subjectivities.