Alfred Kinsey: Liberator or Pervert?

The New York Times ^ | 10/3/04 | CALEB CRAIN

[MarlboroRed]

Why always must the views of the weirdo, discontent and psycopath (not just Kinsey, but Marx, Sanger and the rest) be accepted today as normal? Johnson's hilarious (and frightening) biographies of these so-called leading figures of the "enlightenment" makes it clear that these people should be at best ignored and at worst secluded in quiet places.

[JB_90]

Pervert.

[RightWingAtheist]

"Sloppy statistician" will suffice for me.

[MarlboroRed]

Of course, the creep is and always has been a pervert. The interesting point, however, is how the hell can such a pervert gain mainstream traction, why anyone in their right might (let alone, most of the opinion makers of the West) consider this guy as a liberator?

[Logophile]

"The most profound damage Kinsey did was to kids," he says. "To this day his cold dead hand is on the throttle of sexual liberation, and the kids are still lying there on the tracks, right in front of that train."

Well said.

[Logophile]

Of course, the creep is and always has been a pervert. The interesting point, however, is how the hell can such a pervert gain mainstream traction, why anyone in their right might (let alone, most of the opinion makers of the West) consider this guy as a liberator?

He told people what they wanted to hear.

[MarlboroRed]

The mainstream in the 50s and 60s wanted to hear that it was normal to share your wife with another man, that homosexuality was simply another normal sexual choice, that children were sexual beings?

I don't think so. It took decades of constant pummeling the media and Hollywood to drag the mainstream in line with their perversions, but they've succeeded.

[Restorer]

He told the elite what they wanted to hear.

They then spent the next 50 years dragging most of society down to their level.

We will either climb back out of this swamp of perversion, or we will drown in it.

Stuff like this is why I on bad days I sometimes feel like the Islamists have a point. Our society is remarkably corrupt and decadent.

On good days I feel like we can still turn this ship around.

[nothingnew]

He told people what they wanted to hear.

I almost want to say that your statement is profound...but basically, it's just the TRUTH. TRUTH should not be considered profound. It should be considered what it is: TRUTH.

Thanks for reaffirming what I've always known.

FMCDH(BITS)

[MarlboroRed]

The TRUTH is that we want to have multiple sexual partners, sexually share our spouces with others, homosexuality is a normal life choice, children (even infants) are sexual beings?

[jocon307]

"I sometimes feel like the Islamists have a point."

They are just as bad as Kinsey if in an opposite way. I think their culture is quite perverse esp. in its treatment of women. They may be correct on a couple of instances but inevitably they corrupt things. For example, I too think homosexuality is a sin, but I also think it is a sin to kill homosexuals.

[blanknoone]

the "enlightenment"

Please don't confuse the issue with the enlightenment. The leading figures of the enlightenment were Locke, Jefferson, Washington etc...NOT sexual deviants.

[buffyt]

TOTAL 100% Pervert!

[buffyt]

GREAT tagline! (KERRY: "If at first you don't deceive, lie, lie again!")

[MarlboroRed]

Nonsense. Whether we call them rationalists or children of the enlightenment, they're all fools who ignore reality, and the fundamental stability of our Judeo-Christian ethic.

I have very little patience for Descartes and Kant and the lesser fools like Locke.

As for our founding fathers, their act was as anti-conservative as you can get--they were lucky that the mass of the American public at the time was more than capable of self-government and self-sufficiency. Revolutions like ours never worked anywhere else in the Americas or anywhere else in the world, for that matter. Revolutions have resulted in despotism and misery. Let's not romanticize.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

The TRUTH is that we want to have multiple sexual partners, sexually share our spouces with others, homosexuality is a normal life choice, children (even infants) are sexual beings?

Actually we want to think all the nasty little desires we have are normal so that we may, with societies blessing, indulge them rather then stomp on them and stuff them back in the dark hole they crawled out of.

Example: I see a cute guy that I am attracted to I check out the left hand for a wedding band. If he is not married I am free to indulge my desire by flirting. If he is married I stomp on that desire, in other words I do not indulge that desire or allow it to grow.

According to Kinsey I am repressing my desires. He is right. However he also sees (or rather saw) that as a bad thing. It isn't. Not every desire is healthy or moral.

As I weed my garden so do I weed my desires, I allow the good, healthy and moral ones to grow into habits. The bad ones I must pull and toss away.

[blanknoone]

Seeing things as 'Judeo-Christian' and non-Judeo Christian is just as foolish as seeing things as 'religious' and non-religious (note that that lumps Christians with Islamonazis). There are huge differences between Locke and Kant and Kinsey.

You're right that our founding fathers were not conservative...they were radicals. But it is their radical accomplishments that conservatives should wish to conserve.

[F16Fighter]

The mental nutcase Kinsey's essential claim to fame is the "discovery" or "revelation" that NO sex is taboo.

Thanks to both he and the equally nutty Freud, gerbil orgies are "normal".

[MarlboroRed]

Your exactly right. We have tons of thoughts and desires that exist, but the fact they exist doesn't make them right and certainly is not grounds for action.

It's our ability to distinguish between the thoughts and desires that we can act on and those that we ignore that makes us moral beings.

Kinsey would have act on any impulse because nothing for him is wrong.