In the space of a generation, sexual behaviour once considered immoral and beyond the pale is now endemic and considered normal.
Long gone are the days when the statue of David displayed in Melbourne’s Myers emporium had to be covered with a fig leaf and where nudity in the musical Hair caused moral outrage.
The cultural revolution of the late 60s and early 70s heralded a sexual revolution epitomised by the slogan ‘make love, not war’. This was a time when the birth control pill radically changed sexual mores, the gay/lesbian pride movement became active and the traditional family was seen as inflexible and outdated.
We now live in a world where pornography of every description is available in a virtual world 24/7, where marriage no longer involves a man and a woman, where children are taught boys can be girls and girls can be boys and where explicit sex scenes on TV and in movies is commonplace.
“To overthrow capitalism and what he describes as “repressive morality” Reich, instead of focusing on the class struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, champions complete sexual empowerment and freedom.”
While many see this age of sexual liberation and empowerment as beneficial and beyond reproach, the Italian philosopher and cultural critic Augusto Del Noce, in his essay ‘The Ascendance of Eroticism’ published in 1970, describes what he terms eroticism as a dangerous and malignant disease infecting Western societies.
Del Noce traces today’s sexual revolution to the publication in 1930 of Wilhelm Reich’s The Sexual Revolution.
To overthrow capitalism and what he describes as “repressive morality” Reich, instead of focusing on the class struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, champions complete sexual empowerment and freedom.
Central to Reich’s thesis, Del Noce writes, is the belief “the core element of life will be sexual happiness” and “the achievement of sexual happiness would lead to the extinction of the authoritarian spirit and to a form of internationalism free from all compromises”.
Reich argues religious teachings about the sanctity of marriage and the importance of monogamy reinforce capitalist domination.
As a result, Del Noce warns “the idea of indissoluble marriage and other ideas related to it (modesty, purity, continence)” no longer apply. Proving how prescient he was, Del Noce also notes, given the impact of Reich’s book and the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s,
“It is clear that what today is called the left fights less and less in terms of class warfare, and more and more in terms of ‘warfare against repression’”.
The lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender, intersex, queer, plus rainbow alliance (LGBTIQ+) best illustrates how successful the neo-Marxist inspired cultural-left has been in its fight against what is condemned as the repressive morality associated with Western civilisation and Christianity.
“The Canadian gender activist Cristian Scarlett Milloy argues ‘With infant gender assignment, in a single moment your baby’s life is instantly and brutally reduced from such infinite potentials down to one concrete set of expectations and stereotypes …’”
The so-called Safe Schools gender fluidity program, funded by Liberal and Labor governments, tells students there is nothing preferable or beneficial about the love between a woman and a man. Such a relationship is condemned as hetero-normative and guilty of cis-genderism.
While the overwhelming majority of babies are either female or male with XX or XY chromosomes respectively, hospitals are now ‘assigning’ a gender on the basis that babies must not be stigmatised by labelling them as boys or girls.
The Canadian gender activist Cristian Scarlett Milloy argues “With infant gender assignment, in a single moment your baby’s life is instantly and brutally reduced from such infinite potentials down to one concrete set of expectations and stereotypes, and any behavioural deviation from that will be severely punished …”
In Tasmania, it is now possible to change one’s birth certificate to identify as non-binary, indeterminate or other (including but not restricted to transgender, transsexual, bigender or agender).
In a recent article in The Age newspaper, the journalist Madonna King praises schools and students for championing LGBTIQ+ rights.
Examples include wearing non-binary ‘they’ badges, setting up a non-binary ‘safe space’, not telling parents their child wants to transition and girls wearing pants so as not to be seen as female.
A second article in the same paper by Farrah Tomazin praises a boy who transitions to being a girl and his role in changing the law to make it easier for teenagers to take puberty blockers. The author also praises the Victorian government for banning gay conversion therapy.
“As argued by Del Noce, radical, neo-Marxist inspired eroticism and gender ideology represents an attempt to destroy human sexuality and the family.”
Not surprisingly, in the UK, America and Australia programs like Safe Schools and the campaign to normalise LGBTIQ+ ideology, there has been an upsurge in gender dysphoria, especially among girls, with clinics recording ever-increasing numbers.
As argued by Del Noce, radical, neo-Marxist inspired eroticism and gender ideology represent an attempt to destroy human sexuality and the family. Ignored, as argued by Pope Francis, is radical gender ideology, especially transgenderism, which is against the natural order and God’s plan.
Francis argues: “when the freedom to be creative becomes the freedom to create oneself, then necessarily the Maker himself is denied and ultimately man too is stripped of his dignity as a creature of God”.
- Dr Kevin Donnelly is a Senior Research Fellow at the Australian Catholic University and the author of The Culture of Freedom.
- First published in Catholic Weekly. Republished with permission