By Dr. Marty Klein
Iceland, the world’s oldest democracy, is now heading in exactly the opposite direction. And they’re doing it in a familiar way—by eliminating choices regarding sex.
Iceland has now criminalized all strip clubs. And forget even something as quaint as a topless bar; the repression of the 1950s is looking positively progressive, as the law even makes it illegal for a business to profit from the nudity of employees.
What makes this law particularly repulsive is the crowing of self-proclaimed “feminists” and “women’s advocates,” who seem unable to grasp the simple idea of adult choice. Member of Parliament Kolbrún Halldórsdóttir says, “It is not acceptable that women or people in general are a product to be sold.”
By that, I assume she also plans to shut down all theaters and soccer matches too, well-known sites where “women or people” are a product to be sold. You say that that’s where the public purchases performances by women and men? Explain that to the strippers who are now out of jobs because Parliament disapproves of their performances.
The legislation, of course, comes bundled with claims about forced prostitution, rape, and trafficking, legitimate issues that are trotted out on cue whenever someone wants to justify restrictions on any consensual sexual expression. They are the sexual equivalent of flag-waving and mom-&-apple-pie.
Iceland’s prime minister Johanna Sigurdardottirs is not only a woman, but an open lesbian. As Americans already know, female politicians are no more willing to guarantee sexual rights to women than the most misogynist male. Apparently, lesbian politicians are just as willing to curtail others’ rights as straight politicians. No surprise there, either—as we’ve been saying for decades, gay people are just people who happen to be gay. Some of them are against sexual expression and sexual rights.
Plenty of dictatorships and women-hating countries in our world officially ban stripping—either for “moral” or “religious” reasons. Iceland has the distinction of being the first country in the world to ban stripping and lap-dancing for allegedly feminist reasons. They think this is a good thing. To an adult woman prevented from doing what she wants by a government who doesn’t trust her to make her own decisions, it’s a pathetic distinction.
Guðrún Jónsdóttir of Stígamót, an Icelandic organization fighting sexual violence, supports the ban because sex “is not a commodity.” That’s the same sophomoric nonsense that Pope Benedict XVI uses to deprive women of their right to contraception and abortion. Is he a closet feminist, too?
This piece originally appeared on Marty Klein’s Sexual Intelligence Blog, here. (reprinted with permission)
