Symposium: Women Speaking for Themselves

This article is in response to “Has the Sexual Revolution Been Good for Women?” by Mary Eberstadt and is part of the symposium, “Sex and the Polis: Perspectives on Marriage, Family, and Sexual Ethics.”

I always feel a great deal of hesitation to comment on contraception and the so-called “war on women.” C.S. Lewis rightly declared that any single man who takes up the subject can be nothing better than an armchair critic. It is something of an irony that I came to work for a female Catholic law professor who mostly writes on women’s issues. This Anglican bachelor has come to learn more about Catholic social teaching on women than he ever expected, and I have truly been blessed for it.

While I, and many men like me, hold the conservative position on the matter may remain hesitant to engage the issue directly, I’m afraid the other side has no such sense of manners. They may deride the Catholic Church and Conservative Right as an outdated patriarchy telling women what to do with their bodies, but they have no problem with men from their own side declaring an equally adamant dogma about what women should be doing with their bodies.

It seems completely lost on most people that the sexual revolution has done more to degrade women into mere objects of utility who are now often at the disposal of either the soulless corporations or heartless serial philanderers, or much worse, both. The lie of the sexual revolution is that you can seek out your own pleasure and desires. The truth is that in seeking, in breaking free, you only make yourself available to subjection by those who do not give a whit what becomes of you.

To expose this great lie we are lucky to have great women like Mary Eberstadt, Helen Alvaré, and Kim Daniels on our side who are capable of speaking up for the real needs of women everywhere. Say a prayer for them and all that they do. Their courage in the public square is unmatched.