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Adam and Eve After the Pill: Paradoxes of the Sexual Revolution
Secular and religious thinkers agree: the sexual revolution is one of the most important milestones in human history. Perhaps nothing has changed life for so many, so fast, as the severing of sex and procreation. But what has been the result?
This ground-breaking book by noted essayist and author Mary Eberstadt contends that sexual freedom has paradoxically produced widespread discontent. Drawing on sociologists Pitirim Sorokin, Carle Zimmerman, and others; philosopher G.E.M. Anscombe and novelist Tom Wolfe; and a host of feminists, food writers, musicians, and other voices from across today's popular culture, Eberstadt makes her contrarian case with an impressive array of evidence. Her chapters range across academic disciplines and include supporting evidence from contemporary literature and music, women's studies, college memoirs, dietary guides, advertisements, television shows, and films.
Adam and Eve after the Pill examines as no book has before the seismic social changes caused by the sexual revolution. In examining human behavior in the post-liberation world, Eberstadt provocatively asks: Is food the new sex? Is pornography the new tobacco?
Adam and Eve after the Pill will change the way readers view the paradoxical impact of the sexual revolution on ideas, morals, and humanity itself.
This ground-breaking book by noted essayist and author Mary Eberstadt contends that sexual freedom has paradoxically produced widespread discontent. Drawing on sociologists Pitirim Sorokin, Carle Zimmerman, and others; philosopher G.E.M. Anscombe and novelist Tom Wolfe; and a host of feminists, food writers, musicians, and other voices from across today's popular culture, Eberstadt makes her contrarian case with an impressive array of evidence. Her chapters range across academic disciplines and include supporting evidence from contemporary literature and music, women's studies, college memoirs, dietary guides, advertisements, television shows, and films.
Adam and Eve after the Pill examines as no book has before the seismic social changes caused by the sexual revolution. In examining human behavior in the post-liberation world, Eberstadt provocatively asks: Is food the new sex? Is pornography the new tobacco?
Adam and Eve after the Pill will change the way readers view the paradoxical impact of the sexual revolution on ideas, morals, and humanity itself.
175 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2012
About the author
Mary Eberstadt
27 books87 followersMary Eberstadt is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, consulting editor to Policy Review, and contributing writer to First Things. Her articles have appeared in the Weekly Standard, the American Spectator, Commentary, the Los Angeles Times, the London Times, and the Wall Street Journal. Her previous books include The Loser Letters and Home-Alone America.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 76 reviews
October 2, 2013
Let me make one thing clear from the outset: I am extremely sympathetic to the idea that the sexual revolution has had some truly appalling consequences, and it is responsible for a lot of pain and suffering in the modern western world, especially among the weakest members of society. Furthermore, as a very devout Catholic I am fully committed to the ethical teachings of the Catholic Church on matters of sexual morality. So my fairly negative review below is coming from the point of view of a "fellow traveler" on these social and moral issues.
Without exaggerating too much I believe that the principle "argument" of this book can be summarized as follows:
1. Some time around 1960 easy and accessible effective birth control became widely accessible.
2. Today we have a lot of societal ills that are either sexual in nature or caused by various forms of sexual activity.
3. It is OBVIOUS that 1. has caused 2.
4. Therefore let me offer some of my own musings on this topic.
My biggest beef is with the point number 3, but both 2 and 4 have a lot of problems as well. First of all, if the causal connection between 1 and 2 was as exclusive and conclusive as the author implies, the obvious question would be why is this not more obvious to everyone. The author tries to address this issue by appealing to the analogy of the Cold War. During that period many intellectuals in the West (perhaps even a majority) were, if not quite communists themselves, then very sympathetic to the communist block. Aside from the issue of how accurate this analogy really is (I grew up under communism, have lived and worked in the American academia for the most of my professional life, and I am not entirely persuaded) the problem with this approach is that it's just an analogy. It helps illustrate the situation, but doesn't really explain it. I would really like to know HOW exactly does 1 cause 2. This is the bare minimum that I would expect from a book-length development of this "argument."
Mary Eberstadt is really fond of analogies. She dedicates two full chapters of the book (one on food and another one on tobacco) on the analogies with our treatment of these substances and the way we treated porn in the past. Again I am not entirely persuaded about the analogies. The moralistic obsession with food is still VERY restricted to certain elite circles - most of Americans struggle with being overweight and eat pretty much whatever they want. But with the food analogy my reaction is one of "So what?" How does that help me understand the moral hazards of sexual permissiveness and, even more importantly, what to do about it? In the case of tobacco the purpose of analogy is clearer. Eberstadt advocates the introduction of policies and restrictions on pornography that were similar to those that were imposed on Big Tobacco. This is something worth considering, but the nature of the difference between the two products (physical goods vs. digital files nowadays) makes the difficulty of this approach obvious to anyone who is familiar with the history of futility of trying to regulate anything online. (If even the NSA can't keep their files secret, good luck trying to regulate porn.)
Another big issue that I have with this book is that it overwhelmingly relies on popular articles and essays for its main source of information - both positive and negative. Furthermore, instead of analysis more often than not we are offered little more than an opinion. It is reasonably well-informed opinion for the most part, but Eberstadt has a tendency of becoming preachy where probing would be much more called for. This book might have been intended as a form of preaching to the choir, but even the choir needs some rigorous analysis every once in a while.
I had high hopes for this book, but it turned out to be a big disappointment. It is very poorly argued, and it doesn't offer any substantially new insights. For a more incisive book on the failure of the social norms in the US I would recommend Charles Murray's "Coming Apart," and for a look at the impact of the sexual revolution on the falling birth rates I suggest "What to Expect When No One's Expecting."
Without exaggerating too much I believe that the principle "argument" of this book can be summarized as follows:
1. Some time around 1960 easy and accessible effective birth control became widely accessible.
2. Today we have a lot of societal ills that are either sexual in nature or caused by various forms of sexual activity.
3. It is OBVIOUS that 1. has caused 2.
4. Therefore let me offer some of my own musings on this topic.
My biggest beef is with the point number 3, but both 2 and 4 have a lot of problems as well. First of all, if the causal connection between 1 and 2 was as exclusive and conclusive as the author implies, the obvious question would be why is this not more obvious to everyone. The author tries to address this issue by appealing to the analogy of the Cold War. During that period many intellectuals in the West (perhaps even a majority) were, if not quite communists themselves, then very sympathetic to the communist block. Aside from the issue of how accurate this analogy really is (I grew up under communism, have lived and worked in the American academia for the most of my professional life, and I am not entirely persuaded) the problem with this approach is that it's just an analogy. It helps illustrate the situation, but doesn't really explain it. I would really like to know HOW exactly does 1 cause 2. This is the bare minimum that I would expect from a book-length development of this "argument."
Mary Eberstadt is really fond of analogies. She dedicates two full chapters of the book (one on food and another one on tobacco) on the analogies with our treatment of these substances and the way we treated porn in the past. Again I am not entirely persuaded about the analogies. The moralistic obsession with food is still VERY restricted to certain elite circles - most of Americans struggle with being overweight and eat pretty much whatever they want. But with the food analogy my reaction is one of "So what?" How does that help me understand the moral hazards of sexual permissiveness and, even more importantly, what to do about it? In the case of tobacco the purpose of analogy is clearer. Eberstadt advocates the introduction of policies and restrictions on pornography that were similar to those that were imposed on Big Tobacco. This is something worth considering, but the nature of the difference between the two products (physical goods vs. digital files nowadays) makes the difficulty of this approach obvious to anyone who is familiar with the history of futility of trying to regulate anything online. (If even the NSA can't keep their files secret, good luck trying to regulate porn.)
Another big issue that I have with this book is that it overwhelmingly relies on popular articles and essays for its main source of information - both positive and negative. Furthermore, instead of analysis more often than not we are offered little more than an opinion. It is reasonably well-informed opinion for the most part, but Eberstadt has a tendency of becoming preachy where probing would be much more called for. This book might have been intended as a form of preaching to the choir, but even the choir needs some rigorous analysis every once in a while.
I had high hopes for this book, but it turned out to be a big disappointment. It is very poorly argued, and it doesn't offer any substantially new insights. For a more incisive book on the failure of the social norms in the US I would recommend Charles Murray's "Coming Apart," and for a look at the impact of the sexual revolution on the falling birth rates I suggest "What to Expect When No One's Expecting."
August 10, 2019
Wow, I fell in love with the first chapter and how it laid out what was to come: showing the connection between the sexual revolution and how it led to misery. I most excited to read in depth of how gender roles are complementary, how the revolution led to broken families and households, as well as how broken households affect children. At the end of the first chapter, I knew that this was going to be one of my favorite books, until I dropped down to a star by the time I reached the other cover.
Eberstadt led me to thinking that she would go in depth on each chapter, for example, the 3 chapters listing the many areas that the sexual revolution has hurt men, women, and children. Instead, she would make some weird claim and not provide any scientific evidence to back it up, or even provide her explanation that brings the reader to her conclusion. Instead, she expects everyone to have the entire opinion palette of the archetypal boomer, and is dumbfounded if you don`t reach the same conclusions on your own.
I wanted this book to challenge me, to show me how sex and pornography are harmful, leaving me with a new outlook on how I can live a healthier life and encourage my friends to do the same. Eberstadt instead decides to substitute sound, supported arguments for weak parallels, including one that was a weird rant on vegetarianism, and people that want to eat organic food without GMO`s.
Like I said, I loved the first couple dozen pages. I learned that wives whose husbands are the breadwinners are happier than most women, and that married people score better on all measurements of well-being than not, which Eberstadt neglected to break the Earth and go into any detail about at all. Just take what you can from the start of the book and then get the hell out. As for me, I`m gonna go engage in coitus and watch porn, because why not.
Eberstadt led me to thinking that she would go in depth on each chapter, for example, the 3 chapters listing the many areas that the sexual revolution has hurt men, women, and children. Instead, she would make some weird claim and not provide any scientific evidence to back it up, or even provide her explanation that brings the reader to her conclusion. Instead, she expects everyone to have the entire opinion palette of the archetypal boomer, and is dumbfounded if you don`t reach the same conclusions on your own.
I wanted this book to challenge me, to show me how sex and pornography are harmful, leaving me with a new outlook on how I can live a healthier life and encourage my friends to do the same. Eberstadt instead decides to substitute sound, supported arguments for weak parallels, including one that was a weird rant on vegetarianism, and people that want to eat organic food without GMO`s.
Like I said, I loved the first couple dozen pages. I learned that wives whose husbands are the breadwinners are happier than most women, and that married people score better on all measurements of well-being than not, which Eberstadt neglected to break the Earth and go into any detail about at all. Just take what you can from the start of the book and then get the hell out. As for me, I`m gonna go engage in coitus and watch porn, because why not.
March 12, 2012
Having greatly enjoyed The Loser Letters by Mary Eberstadt I looked forward to her new book Adam and Eve After the Pill: Paradoxes of the Sexual Revolution. Talk about a timely subject considering the HHS mandate.
This book does not just cover the effects of contraception on the culture, but also related problems such as pornography and what she calls Toxic U. She draws out many very interesting paradoxes concerning the so-called sexual revolution. The sexual revolution is a real revolution in that it revolved around a individualistic and selfish view of self and maximizing pleasure. While some of those paradoxes are ones that have been noted before she also brings out some new insights and some rather surprising one. The chapter on how sex and food were once regarded and their switch places attitude-wise is very interesting especially how the moral weight of what food you eat has increased while the moral weight of casual sex has decreased.
When Humanae Vitae was released it was roundly mocked and ignored. The same year The Population Bomb was released and it sold millions of copies. One made many predictions which all turned out to be false and the other projected four things that all came to pass. It was Pope Paul VI who was able to project into the future what would happen with the use of widespread contraception and like most prophets he was ignored. This book explains exactly how he got it right demonstrates the consequences that flowed. This is backed up by plenty of research and the book contains a plethora of references at the end.
One of the parallels she uses is the comparison between those who were actively denying the evil effects of Communism and those that deny the evil effects of the sexual revolution. She references an article by ardent anti-Communist Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, “The Will to Disbelieve” on the subject. There certainly is a will to disbelieve to ignore or simply laugh at the toxic effects the sexual revolution has had. This is an “Emperor’s New Clothes” of the first order where everybody seems to pretend that what they can see with their own eyes is mistaken. The talk of effects on women and children is often brought up by liberals, but strangely never in regard to the massive damage that has occurred especially in the last fifty years. When the pill was being pushed it was promised as a panacea to cure social ills and to create stronger marriages and families. Even the pills strongest defenders don’t really push that line anymore. But just as how the facts of life in Communist countries was largely ignored, the facts of the sexual revolution are also inconvenient.
The topic of pornography is another one of those areas that gets so soft-pedaled. Talk about strange-bedfellows with radical feminism. The ideas concerning pornography have largely fallen into a libertarian attitude and when referenced it is usually with a wink-wink attitude. The destructive nature of pornography on families and specifically with men in families has a lot of growing evidence and it is just another area that the culture has turned it’s back on. I know first hand (not an intentional masturbation pun) the danger of pornography and it was sheer grace that turned me totally away from it.
Mary Eberstadt takes all of these subjects and just writes brilliantly on them. Her uses of explaining these paradoxes by backed-up examples illustrates the points in an entertaining manner.
This book does not just cover the effects of contraception on the culture, but also related problems such as pornography and what she calls Toxic U. She draws out many very interesting paradoxes concerning the so-called sexual revolution. The sexual revolution is a real revolution in that it revolved around a individualistic and selfish view of self and maximizing pleasure. While some of those paradoxes are ones that have been noted before she also brings out some new insights and some rather surprising one. The chapter on how sex and food were once regarded and their switch places attitude-wise is very interesting especially how the moral weight of what food you eat has increased while the moral weight of casual sex has decreased.
When Humanae Vitae was released it was roundly mocked and ignored. The same year The Population Bomb was released and it sold millions of copies. One made many predictions which all turned out to be false and the other projected four things that all came to pass. It was Pope Paul VI who was able to project into the future what would happen with the use of widespread contraception and like most prophets he was ignored. This book explains exactly how he got it right demonstrates the consequences that flowed. This is backed up by plenty of research and the book contains a plethora of references at the end.
One of the parallels she uses is the comparison between those who were actively denying the evil effects of Communism and those that deny the evil effects of the sexual revolution. She references an article by ardent anti-Communist Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, “The Will to Disbelieve” on the subject. There certainly is a will to disbelieve to ignore or simply laugh at the toxic effects the sexual revolution has had. This is an “Emperor’s New Clothes” of the first order where everybody seems to pretend that what they can see with their own eyes is mistaken. The talk of effects on women and children is often brought up by liberals, but strangely never in regard to the massive damage that has occurred especially in the last fifty years. When the pill was being pushed it was promised as a panacea to cure social ills and to create stronger marriages and families. Even the pills strongest defenders don’t really push that line anymore. But just as how the facts of life in Communist countries was largely ignored, the facts of the sexual revolution are also inconvenient.
The topic of pornography is another one of those areas that gets so soft-pedaled. Talk about strange-bedfellows with radical feminism. The ideas concerning pornography have largely fallen into a libertarian attitude and when referenced it is usually with a wink-wink attitude. The destructive nature of pornography on families and specifically with men in families has a lot of growing evidence and it is just another area that the culture has turned it’s back on. I know first hand (not an intentional masturbation pun) the danger of pornography and it was sheer grace that turned me totally away from it.
Mary Eberstadt takes all of these subjects and just writes brilliantly on them. Her uses of explaining these paradoxes by backed-up examples illustrates the points in an entertaining manner.
September 24, 2019
Excellent analysis. I was constantly reminded of the verse "he who saves his life shall lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake shall find it." Two quotes that illustrate this, both from the last chapter:
In the face of all the wreckage from this Revolution, may we have the courage to stand for what is true, and good, and beautiful.
Consider just what we have been told by endless books on the topic over the years. If feminists married and had children, they lamented it. If they failed to marry or have children, they lamented that, too. If they worked outside the home and also tended their children, they complained about how hard that was. If they worked outside the home and didn't tend their children, they excoriated anyone who thought they should. And running through all this literature is a more or less constant invective about the unreliability and disrespect of men.
The signature metaphors of feminism say everything we need to know about how happy liberation has been making these women: the suburban home as concentration camp, men as rapists, children as intolerable burdens, fetuses as parasites, and so on. These are the sounds of liberation? Even the vaunted right to abortion, both claimed and exercised at extraordinary rates, did not seem to mitigate the misery of millions of these women after the sexual revolution.
By giving benediction in 1930 to its married heterosexual members purposely seeking sterile sex, the Anglican church lost, bit by bit, any authority to tell its other members - married or unmarried, homosexual or heterosexual - not to do the same. To put the point another way, once heterosexuals start claiming the right to act as homosexuals, it would not be long before homosexuals started claiming the rights of heterosexuals.
In the face of all the wreckage from this Revolution, may we have the courage to stand for what is true, and good, and beautiful.
July 25, 2017
An excellent book that covers the consequences of the sexual revolution and in particular the connection to birth control and pornography. She explains how the sexual revolution has harmed women, men, and society as a whole. As another friend commented, her chapter on food and sex was eye opening chapter. She writes about how we now treat food like we used to treat sex and sex how we used to treat food. She is surprisingly optimistic about the ability to combat the sexual revolution. She believes that as studies continue to accumulate the sexual revolution will start to die, though the consequences have been and will continue to be heartbreaking.
The chapter on pedophilia feels dated even though the book is only 5 years old. She notes that prior to the priest-pedophilia scandal, sex with children was gaining steam. The scandal slowed that train considerably. But now, here in 2017, the objections to sex with children continue to erode.
One does not need to condemn birth control in all circumstances to see that easy, cheap contraceptives have dramatically altered our sex lives, including most importantly our approach to marriage and children, and not for the better. Thus we have a culture where the basic building block of society, a biological man and woman married and having children, is not the norm. She noted the upsurge of Protestant evangelicals who are questioning the rampant use of birth control. Since 2012 I have noticed an increase in pastors and leaders having 5, 6, 7 children and in writing more on birth control. This is encouraging and I hope it continues.
All in all, a book I would recommend though those who are conversant with more recent literature will have heard much of this before.
The chapter on pedophilia feels dated even though the book is only 5 years old. She notes that prior to the priest-pedophilia scandal, sex with children was gaining steam. The scandal slowed that train considerably. But now, here in 2017, the objections to sex with children continue to erode.
One does not need to condemn birth control in all circumstances to see that easy, cheap contraceptives have dramatically altered our sex lives, including most importantly our approach to marriage and children, and not for the better. Thus we have a culture where the basic building block of society, a biological man and woman married and having children, is not the norm. She noted the upsurge of Protestant evangelicals who are questioning the rampant use of birth control. Since 2012 I have noticed an increase in pastors and leaders having 5, 6, 7 children and in writing more on birth control. This is encouraging and I hope it continues.
All in all, a book I would recommend though those who are conversant with more recent literature will have heard much of this before.
September 17, 2012
This was a very interesting read, but I didn't find it as "bulletproof" as many people have seemed to indicate. It's billed as a book that lays out the case against the sexual revolution with reason and research, and it does, but there are big gaps that the author fills with sweeping statements that won't convince anyone who's not already on board. To her credit, there are definitely some good, telling facts referenced, and she has incorporated detailed footnotes as well, so those who are interested can easily see the source material.
January 15, 2013
Eberstadt boldly begins her book by asserting that the results of the sexual revolution are plainly and painfully horrendous, yet most people stubbornly refuse to accept the facts. She compiles an impressive list of studies from numerous sources most of which are more liberal leaning that nonetheless conclude that the sexual revolution has been detrimental to men and even more so to woman and children. Most interestingly she cites several studies that show that women since the Revolution report being less happy about romance, relationships, sex and life in general.
The book includes several comparisons that are enlightening. One chapter asks, “Is food the new sex?” Here the author highlights how American moral ideas concerning food and sex have reversed over the last sixty years. In the 1950’s the average American had few morals connected to food and saw most choices as personal taste, but most people had firm convictions about sexual morality. Today many people see sexual conduct as primarily personal choice but may have many qualms about the sources and consumption of food. Another chapter asks, “Is pornography the new tobacco?” again showing, as the author states it, a translation of values between the two products.
Eberstadt has done an excellent job of pointing out the elephant in the room in regards to the ill effects of the sexual revolution including divorce, sexual exploitation, neglected children and more. Can anyone honestly deny that many of today’s worst problems such as violence, crime, suicide, depression and poverty have their roots in broken families? For Eberstadt, the main root of the problem is the widespread availability and acceptance of contraception which she believes has led to the massive changes in our behavior and the resulting problems in society. As a Catholic she vigorously defends the Church’s teachings on contraception. She blames abandoning (in the case of Protestants) and ignoring those teachings as the cause not only of society’s problems but of the decline of Protestant churches and the priest sex scandal.
The question is “What is the sexual revolution?” Was the revolution the introduction of cheap, available, effective contraception or is it a change in our morals concerning sex? Did contraception bring about the change in morals or did the introduction of contraception coincide with the change in morality and enable the resulting behavior? In the Epilogue Eberstadt states, “after all, if such unprecedented sexual freedom weren’t just what most of the customers ordered, the Pill and its companions would have stayed in their boxes.”
I agree with Eberstadt that the rejection of church teaching is the cause of the problem, but it is not the teaching on contraception. Marriage is valuable, leads to happiness and benefits society even if it contains inherent difficulties, which Eberstadt wonderfully champions. The heart of the sexual revolution is the idea that sex should be enjoyed any time and in any way and that marriage and children are not that important. Eberstadt does not ask this question, but the answer to who won the battle of the sexes is clear. Men did. They received what they always wanted: sex with no consequences or commitment. They even convinced women to pay for the contraception!
Many churches are in decline because, like society, they are abandoning the teachings of God’s Word. The Bible teaches that marriage is good and children are a blessing from God. This fundamental outlook on life as well as the Bible’s guidelines on how marriage and family should work has been abandoned leading to the disaster we see today. Even though the ideals of the Bible’s teachings cannot always be achieved in an imperfect world (no divorce for instance), affirming the correctness of those teachings and striving to achieve them lead to a happier and healthier society. Scientific studies and our common experience confirm this.
The book includes several comparisons that are enlightening. One chapter asks, “Is food the new sex?” Here the author highlights how American moral ideas concerning food and sex have reversed over the last sixty years. In the 1950’s the average American had few morals connected to food and saw most choices as personal taste, but most people had firm convictions about sexual morality. Today many people see sexual conduct as primarily personal choice but may have many qualms about the sources and consumption of food. Another chapter asks, “Is pornography the new tobacco?” again showing, as the author states it, a translation of values between the two products.
Eberstadt has done an excellent job of pointing out the elephant in the room in regards to the ill effects of the sexual revolution including divorce, sexual exploitation, neglected children and more. Can anyone honestly deny that many of today’s worst problems such as violence, crime, suicide, depression and poverty have their roots in broken families? For Eberstadt, the main root of the problem is the widespread availability and acceptance of contraception which she believes has led to the massive changes in our behavior and the resulting problems in society. As a Catholic she vigorously defends the Church’s teachings on contraception. She blames abandoning (in the case of Protestants) and ignoring those teachings as the cause not only of society’s problems but of the decline of Protestant churches and the priest sex scandal.
The question is “What is the sexual revolution?” Was the revolution the introduction of cheap, available, effective contraception or is it a change in our morals concerning sex? Did contraception bring about the change in morals or did the introduction of contraception coincide with the change in morality and enable the resulting behavior? In the Epilogue Eberstadt states, “after all, if such unprecedented sexual freedom weren’t just what most of the customers ordered, the Pill and its companions would have stayed in their boxes.”
I agree with Eberstadt that the rejection of church teaching is the cause of the problem, but it is not the teaching on contraception. Marriage is valuable, leads to happiness and benefits society even if it contains inherent difficulties, which Eberstadt wonderfully champions. The heart of the sexual revolution is the idea that sex should be enjoyed any time and in any way and that marriage and children are not that important. Eberstadt does not ask this question, but the answer to who won the battle of the sexes is clear. Men did. They received what they always wanted: sex with no consequences or commitment. They even convinced women to pay for the contraception!
Many churches are in decline because, like society, they are abandoning the teachings of God’s Word. The Bible teaches that marriage is good and children are a blessing from God. This fundamental outlook on life as well as the Bible’s guidelines on how marriage and family should work has been abandoned leading to the disaster we see today. Even though the ideals of the Bible’s teachings cannot always be achieved in an imperfect world (no divorce for instance), affirming the correctness of those teachings and striving to achieve them lead to a happier and healthier society. Scientific studies and our common experience confirm this.
February 6, 2015
This book catalogs the empirical evidence of the social, psychological, physical and spiritual wreckage left in the wake of the sexual revolution. Documenting the wide array of demonstrable deleterious effects on men, women, young adults, and children, the weight of the arguments and evidence are hefty. From increases in divorce and unwed motherhood, to erosion of family ties and greater social estrangement; from the rise of pornography, to abortion; more and more social science and empirical data confirms the traditionalist, over the liberationist, position.
The bulk of the book covers these empirical findings that support her thesis, as well as citing lettered opinions of non-traditionalist and non-religious psychologists, biologists, sociologists who nevertheless concur with some key point made against the sexual revolution. For instance, a secular sociobiologist who makes the case that the advent of the Pill, and widespread and easy access to contraception, has resulted "in the breakdown of families, female impoverishment, trouble in the relationship between the sexes, and single motherhood", as well as declaring that “contraception causes abortion.”
Throughout this central section of the book, Eberstadt presents a powerful case, though I think she could have dealt with potential objections more strongly. For example, when she notes that some might make a correlation/causation objection to some argument, she merely dismisses it out of hand, when it could have been easily dealt with from her perspective. In certain circumstances, correlation is enough to make the case; if, for example, the fact that divorce and breakdown of the family visa vis more single motherhood etc. have demonstrably increased as a result of the changes wrought in the 60s (on this level, causation can be demonstrated, more or less), then establishing correlation between, say, broken families and worse financial strife, greater chances of children from broken families being imprisoned etc. is all that is required. When the fact of significant increases in polluted chickens and rotten eggs is undeniable, as are the forces which precipitated the increase, which came first is not the point.
Eberstadt also includes two intriguing "thought experiment" chapters that theorize the stigma and taboos surrounding food consumption today, and the moralistic attitudes that go with it, have switched with the taboos and attitudes that used to accompany sex, before the 1960s. The second chapter of that sort posits a similar switch in attitudes about pornography and tobacco on the same timeline: what is today socially acceptable and taken as a mostly immutable fact of life in mainstream culture (pornography) was yesterday reviled and taboo; what yesterday was socially acceptable and taken as a mostly immutable fact of life in mainstream culture (tobacco) is now reviled and taboo. This makes the case that the anti-moralist attitudes of the liberal, liberationist ethic are mostly a false veneer and that the moral preening just takes on a different guise.
It also makes the hopeful argument that weight of evidence and education can overturn a seemingly entrenched social fact, even when there is a lobby and industry on the side of not doing so (smoking), and make it taboo. Eberstadt sees hope that this could happen with pornography, given the ever increasing evidence of its empirically demonstrable social and personal negative effects.
The closing chapter is rather delightful as it makes the case that, more and more, Humanae Vitae -- the 1968 papal encyclical of Pope Paul VI condemning contraception -- though universally reviled by secularists, is being vindicated by more evidence daily. A fitting close to the book.
The bulk of the book covers these empirical findings that support her thesis, as well as citing lettered opinions of non-traditionalist and non-religious psychologists, biologists, sociologists who nevertheless concur with some key point made against the sexual revolution. For instance, a secular sociobiologist who makes the case that the advent of the Pill, and widespread and easy access to contraception, has resulted "in the breakdown of families, female impoverishment, trouble in the relationship between the sexes, and single motherhood", as well as declaring that “contraception causes abortion.”
Throughout this central section of the book, Eberstadt presents a powerful case, though I think she could have dealt with potential objections more strongly. For example, when she notes that some might make a correlation/causation objection to some argument, she merely dismisses it out of hand, when it could have been easily dealt with from her perspective. In certain circumstances, correlation is enough to make the case; if, for example, the fact that divorce and breakdown of the family visa vis more single motherhood etc. have demonstrably increased as a result of the changes wrought in the 60s (on this level, causation can be demonstrated, more or less), then establishing correlation between, say, broken families and worse financial strife, greater chances of children from broken families being imprisoned etc. is all that is required. When the fact of significant increases in polluted chickens and rotten eggs is undeniable, as are the forces which precipitated the increase, which came first is not the point.
Eberstadt also includes two intriguing "thought experiment" chapters that theorize the stigma and taboos surrounding food consumption today, and the moralistic attitudes that go with it, have switched with the taboos and attitudes that used to accompany sex, before the 1960s. The second chapter of that sort posits a similar switch in attitudes about pornography and tobacco on the same timeline: what is today socially acceptable and taken as a mostly immutable fact of life in mainstream culture (pornography) was yesterday reviled and taboo; what yesterday was socially acceptable and taken as a mostly immutable fact of life in mainstream culture (tobacco) is now reviled and taboo. This makes the case that the anti-moralist attitudes of the liberal, liberationist ethic are mostly a false veneer and that the moral preening just takes on a different guise.
It also makes the hopeful argument that weight of evidence and education can overturn a seemingly entrenched social fact, even when there is a lobby and industry on the side of not doing so (smoking), and make it taboo. Eberstadt sees hope that this could happen with pornography, given the ever increasing evidence of its empirically demonstrable social and personal negative effects.
The closing chapter is rather delightful as it makes the case that, more and more, Humanae Vitae -- the 1968 papal encyclical of Pope Paul VI condemning contraception -- though universally reviled by secularists, is being vindicated by more evidence daily. A fitting close to the book.
October 7, 2016
Wow. I was initially interested in this book because I have been against hormonal birth control for it's abortifacient effects since I found out how the Pill works a few years ago. Ever since I went off the Pill I have been more aware of the negative effects that the Pill, and the sexual revolution of the 60's, have had on our society, so this book caught my eye. Unfortunately the societal effects of the pill are not something that is obvious unless you have been sensitized to it, or unless someone points it out - and Eberstadt did that brilliantly in this book.
I won't say that the raw data was anything that I haven't heard before, but I was just floored by the author's insights in this book. I would never have connected some of these dots, but once she pointed them out I could see them so plainly. She has an incredible amount of historical evidence and research to back her points.
One of the things that really surprised me and made me think was her portrayal of food as the new sex, and porn as the new tobacco - i.e. the way we treat those things has reversed over the last 60 years. I would have thought this was a bit of a useless observation until she started talking about HOW our views of tobacco have changed, and what triggered it - and that gave me hope that there is potential for our views to change again, that people may see the truth when it comes to the harmful effects of porn and "junk sex", as she termed it.
The above viewpoint was the one that I had honestly never even considered before, but I've also given a lot of thought to the effects of the Pill - if you haven't, I think each chapter in this book would be just as revolutionary for you. I could write a paragraph on each chapter, but I won't - I'll just say that she presents the evidence of how the sexual revolution has effected women, men, children, and young adults in very negative ways - and how nothing will get better until we give up our "will to disbelieve" what the evidence is clearly showing us.
She wraps it all up on a chapter about the one official hold-out on artificial contraception, which is the Catholic Church's position on it in the Humanae Vitae. I am not Catholic, and I don't agree with some major Catholic doctrines, but it was just eerie how Paul VI's predictions in that document have all come to pass. I was also not aware that Protestant denominations okayed artificial birth control only in the 1930's, in contradiction to the hundreds of years of Christian tradition on the issue of birth control before that - and that switch on this issue historically led to many not-great results, including the sexual revolution. So yes, wow. It all gave me a lot to think about.
I HIGHLY recommend this one. The issues addressed in this book are too important, and the risks of choosing wrong are too high, for us to bury our heads in the sand.
I won't say that the raw data was anything that I haven't heard before, but I was just floored by the author's insights in this book. I would never have connected some of these dots, but once she pointed them out I could see them so plainly. She has an incredible amount of historical evidence and research to back her points.
One of the things that really surprised me and made me think was her portrayal of food as the new sex, and porn as the new tobacco - i.e. the way we treat those things has reversed over the last 60 years. I would have thought this was a bit of a useless observation until she started talking about HOW our views of tobacco have changed, and what triggered it - and that gave me hope that there is potential for our views to change again, that people may see the truth when it comes to the harmful effects of porn and "junk sex", as she termed it.
The above viewpoint was the one that I had honestly never even considered before, but I've also given a lot of thought to the effects of the Pill - if you haven't, I think each chapter in this book would be just as revolutionary for you. I could write a paragraph on each chapter, but I won't - I'll just say that she presents the evidence of how the sexual revolution has effected women, men, children, and young adults in very negative ways - and how nothing will get better until we give up our "will to disbelieve" what the evidence is clearly showing us.
She wraps it all up on a chapter about the one official hold-out on artificial contraception, which is the Catholic Church's position on it in the Humanae Vitae. I am not Catholic, and I don't agree with some major Catholic doctrines, but it was just eerie how Paul VI's predictions in that document have all come to pass. I was also not aware that Protestant denominations okayed artificial birth control only in the 1930's, in contradiction to the hundreds of years of Christian tradition on the issue of birth control before that - and that switch on this issue historically led to many not-great results, including the sexual revolution. So yes, wow. It all gave me a lot to think about.
I HIGHLY recommend this one. The issues addressed in this book are too important, and the risks of choosing wrong are too high, for us to bury our heads in the sand.
August 31, 2019
Title: (Brief) overview of (mostly) current societal problems with no (readily apparent) solutions
I came late to the party on this one (it was published in 2012), and I think I've learned my lesson from now on: reconsider reading a book on the social sciences that is more than, say, two years old. Our times are moving too fast. So, even at 7 years out, I find this work somewhat dated already.
I read this book immediately after reading Libido Dominandi: Sexual Liberation and Political Control by E. Michael Jones, and there are certain similarities. Jones and Eberstadt are both Catholic. Both sometimes wear their Catholicism on their sleeves as they write. (Jones more than Eberstadt.) Both drop Latin phrases here and there throughout, so have your laptop or mobile handy for translation services. Both assume much previous reading from their audience; Jones is much worse than Eberstadt in this regard; still, Eberstadt drops such names and terms as the Monyihan Report, Kant, Aquinas, the Anglican Church, Casti Connubii, blog posts and opinion pieces in the popular press, novels, movies, etc ec often providing little or no context. In other words, if you've never heard of the blog post, article, movie, or novel, you'll be lost. And, like Jones, Eberstadt could have used scripture to support her reasoning and arguments more effectively.
And then there's the title. Yes. The title. If you want to put off a majority of your readers at the outset, go for the jugular, is that it? Because most readers believe Adam and Eve is a fairy tale. A quaint fairy tale that pisses them off because of its many-layered ramifications for life, belief, faith (or lack thereof), relations between the two genders (if you still believe there are only two genders), and God (or lack thereof).
Setting all that aside, there's much to enjoy about the book. Eberstadt has done a real service, I think, by simply writing and publishing a book like this, to even question the validity of progressive ideals ("progress" = societal good; in this equation, "progress" generally means tearing down the perceived establishment). For example, for decades, and even today, the normal family unit (father-mother dyad with biologically conceived children) has been the target of feminist-marxist thought leaders and activists. And she does a very good job of collecting together and presenting popular and scientific thought on a variety of related topics (sex, porn, sex education, family structures) and what it all means for society. Mostly.
In some cases she stumbles.
For example, Eberstadt truly seems puzzled by the lack of logical thinking among progressives and The Left, often wondering aloud in the text why they see the bad results of the sexual revolution in front of their faces (in the form of the general lowering of moral standards in Western societies; a rise in infidelity; rise in fatherless homes and the subsequent rise in juvenile delinquency; a lessening of respect for women by men; coercive use of reproductive technologies by government) but yet seemingly don't recognize it. Solzhenitsyn drew the same parallels for leftists in the West who not only failed to see the degeneracy of communism staring them in the face but rather *embraced* it. The same applies today, and there's nothing puzzling about it, I think, unless you're unwilling to recognize it for yourself. And that is simply this: some people love the darkness. Progressives cannot learn because it is not in their nature to learn; they must always be "progressing," always be tearing down some establishment, some established order; because this is what they do. Evidence abounds all around our society of this type of decay. Scriptural application here would be: "Do not answer a fool according to his folly", and: "The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness."
Like a good Catholic, Eberstadt is quick to showcase Catholic thinkers, theologians, and popes, but she's short on actual scripture. It's a weakness of her work because she missed some real opportunities to share life wisdom.
And, unfortunately, in later parts of the book her logic becomes convoluted. For example, she quotes the female Roman Catholic philosopher Anscombe: "If contraceptive intercourse is permissible, then what objection could there be after all to mutual masturbation, or copulation in vase indebito, sodomy, buggery..." (p. 150). I had to really pause over this passage to take it in and marvel at it. And I still can't get to a place in my thinking where every sexual act must necessarily be tied inextricably to the possibility of creating human life.
Another example: "By giving benediction in 1930 to its married heterosexual members purposely seeking sterile sex, the Anglican church lost, bit by bit, any authority to tell its other members--married or unmarried, homosexual or heterosexual--not to do the same. To put the point another way, once heterosexuals start claiming the right to act as homosexuals, it would not be long before homosexuals started claiming the rights of heterosexuals." (p. 150)
I had to read that twice to try to understand its logic, but I still can't do it. Better to simply state the obvious points on heterosexuality vs. homosexuality, I think. That is: if everyone in the world were homosexuals practicing exclusive homosexual sex, the human race would die (but there are some extreme progressives who think humans are a disease on the earth, so perhaps this isn't a good example); so heterosexual intercourse is needed to continue the human race. Ergo, homosexuality is not a natural state of being.
Her logical connections between pedophile priests and contraception seem absurd to me.
Is abortion repugnant to me personally as a Christian? Yes, it is. And at the same time I completely understand that public policy must make way for human laziness and stupidity. (Why don't all the people put away the weights at the gym after they're done using them? Because certain people are lazy and selfish.) Thus, some reasonable accommodation must be made in the public sphere on this issue.
In the end, Eberstadt is short on real-world answers and useful solutions, and at times seems simply naive. For example: "Seen in the light of actual Christian tradition, the question is not after all why the Catholic Church refused to concede the point [on contraception use]; it is rather why just about everyone else in the Judeo-Chrisitan tradition did. Whatever the answer, ..." (p. 156). Well, here's the answer: a little leaven leavens the whole bunch. (But, what exactly is this "Judeo-Christian tradition" anyway? Can there be such a thing with such hatred and animosity from one group to the other? See Why Don’t Jews Like the Christians Who Like Them?
Liberalism can’t abide conservative evangelicals. James Q. Wilson, Winter 2008, City Journal.)
And again: "From time to time since 1968, some of the Catholics who accepted 'the only doctrine that had ever appeared as the teaching of the Church on these things,' in Anscombe's words, have puzzled over why, exactly, Humanae Vitae has been so poorly received by the rest of the world." She then lists out a few possible answers--bad timing, the secular media, lack of full explication of the matters, such as addressed decades later in John Paul II's Theology of the Body. She lands on "contraception itself"; borrowing the phrase from Archbishop Chaput. This view is sorely mistaken, though, because it focuses on a man-made invention to sidestep the most fundamental issue: man's broken heart, and man's broken relationship with God. This is foolishness to the unbeliever, of course. Which is why, I think, she's grasping at secular straws to make a spiritual argument. But it won't ever work, because I think you must dig much deeper, to the fundamentals, for the answer.
And again: "What happens when, for the first time in history--at least in theory, and at least in the advanced nations--adults are more or less free to have all the sex and food they want?" (p. 95) This is a terribly misguided statement, considering that women are the gatekeepers of sex (eggs are valued, sperm is not; women are a protected class, men are a disposable class) and that hunger is still a very real issue for 40 million Americans.
In other spots her analogies don't hold, for me. For example, Chapter 7, Is Pornography the New Tobacco? posits that, yes, porn can be compared to where tobacco was in the early/mid 1960s. Creators/distributors are opening new markets (money) by targeting women. The analogy doesn't hold because it's known that "men have more frequent and more intense sexual desires than women, as reflected in spontaneous thoughts about sex, frequency and variety of sexual fantasies, desired frequency of intercourse, desired number of partners, masturbation, liking for various sexual practices, willingness to forego sex, initiating versus refusing sex, making sacrifices for sex, and other measures. No contrary findings (indicating stronger sexual motivation among women) were found. Hence we conclude that the male sex drive is stronger than the female sex drive." (Source: Is There a Gender Difference in Strength of Sex Drive? Theoretical Views, Conceptual Distinctions, and a Review of Relevant Evidence. Roy F. Baumeister, Kathleen R. Catanese, Kathleen D. Vohs. Personality and Social Psychology Review. First Published August 1, 2001. Simply stated: women don't like, want, seek, or need sex as much as men do. Armed with information like this, it's hard to see how pornographers are going to make much economic inroads with female audiences. So, no, in the final analysis, porn is *not* the new tobacco.
All in all, though, I found this to be an interesting book with important things to say on the topic of sexual relations between men and women (specifically in the West) and how those have devolved since the invention of the pill. I suppose answers will only be forthcoming, though, when enough people look around and see the host of problems we've created for ourselves with our inventions. But by then it may be too late.
I liked it
3/5 Goodreads
4/5 Amazon
I came late to the party on this one (it was published in 2012), and I think I've learned my lesson from now on: reconsider reading a book on the social sciences that is more than, say, two years old. Our times are moving too fast. So, even at 7 years out, I find this work somewhat dated already.
I read this book immediately after reading Libido Dominandi: Sexual Liberation and Political Control by E. Michael Jones, and there are certain similarities. Jones and Eberstadt are both Catholic. Both sometimes wear their Catholicism on their sleeves as they write. (Jones more than Eberstadt.) Both drop Latin phrases here and there throughout, so have your laptop or mobile handy for translation services. Both assume much previous reading from their audience; Jones is much worse than Eberstadt in this regard; still, Eberstadt drops such names and terms as the Monyihan Report, Kant, Aquinas, the Anglican Church, Casti Connubii, blog posts and opinion pieces in the popular press, novels, movies, etc ec often providing little or no context. In other words, if you've never heard of the blog post, article, movie, or novel, you'll be lost. And, like Jones, Eberstadt could have used scripture to support her reasoning and arguments more effectively.
And then there's the title. Yes. The title. If you want to put off a majority of your readers at the outset, go for the jugular, is that it? Because most readers believe Adam and Eve is a fairy tale. A quaint fairy tale that pisses them off because of its many-layered ramifications for life, belief, faith (or lack thereof), relations between the two genders (if you still believe there are only two genders), and God (or lack thereof).
Setting all that aside, there's much to enjoy about the book. Eberstadt has done a real service, I think, by simply writing and publishing a book like this, to even question the validity of progressive ideals ("progress" = societal good; in this equation, "progress" generally means tearing down the perceived establishment). For example, for decades, and even today, the normal family unit (father-mother dyad with biologically conceived children) has been the target of feminist-marxist thought leaders and activists. And she does a very good job of collecting together and presenting popular and scientific thought on a variety of related topics (sex, porn, sex education, family structures) and what it all means for society. Mostly.
In some cases she stumbles.
For example, Eberstadt truly seems puzzled by the lack of logical thinking among progressives and The Left, often wondering aloud in the text why they see the bad results of the sexual revolution in front of their faces (in the form of the general lowering of moral standards in Western societies; a rise in infidelity; rise in fatherless homes and the subsequent rise in juvenile delinquency; a lessening of respect for women by men; coercive use of reproductive technologies by government) but yet seemingly don't recognize it. Solzhenitsyn drew the same parallels for leftists in the West who not only failed to see the degeneracy of communism staring them in the face but rather *embraced* it. The same applies today, and there's nothing puzzling about it, I think, unless you're unwilling to recognize it for yourself. And that is simply this: some people love the darkness. Progressives cannot learn because it is not in their nature to learn; they must always be "progressing," always be tearing down some establishment, some established order; because this is what they do. Evidence abounds all around our society of this type of decay. Scriptural application here would be: "Do not answer a fool according to his folly", and: "The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness."
Like a good Catholic, Eberstadt is quick to showcase Catholic thinkers, theologians, and popes, but she's short on actual scripture. It's a weakness of her work because she missed some real opportunities to share life wisdom.
And, unfortunately, in later parts of the book her logic becomes convoluted. For example, she quotes the female Roman Catholic philosopher Anscombe: "If contraceptive intercourse is permissible, then what objection could there be after all to mutual masturbation, or copulation in vase indebito, sodomy, buggery..." (p. 150). I had to really pause over this passage to take it in and marvel at it. And I still can't get to a place in my thinking where every sexual act must necessarily be tied inextricably to the possibility of creating human life.
Another example: "By giving benediction in 1930 to its married heterosexual members purposely seeking sterile sex, the Anglican church lost, bit by bit, any authority to tell its other members--married or unmarried, homosexual or heterosexual--not to do the same. To put the point another way, once heterosexuals start claiming the right to act as homosexuals, it would not be long before homosexuals started claiming the rights of heterosexuals." (p. 150)
I had to read that twice to try to understand its logic, but I still can't do it. Better to simply state the obvious points on heterosexuality vs. homosexuality, I think. That is: if everyone in the world were homosexuals practicing exclusive homosexual sex, the human race would die (but there are some extreme progressives who think humans are a disease on the earth, so perhaps this isn't a good example); so heterosexual intercourse is needed to continue the human race. Ergo, homosexuality is not a natural state of being.
Her logical connections between pedophile priests and contraception seem absurd to me.
Is abortion repugnant to me personally as a Christian? Yes, it is. And at the same time I completely understand that public policy must make way for human laziness and stupidity. (Why don't all the people put away the weights at the gym after they're done using them? Because certain people are lazy and selfish.) Thus, some reasonable accommodation must be made in the public sphere on this issue.
In the end, Eberstadt is short on real-world answers and useful solutions, and at times seems simply naive. For example: "Seen in the light of actual Christian tradition, the question is not after all why the Catholic Church refused to concede the point [on contraception use]; it is rather why just about everyone else in the Judeo-Chrisitan tradition did. Whatever the answer, ..." (p. 156). Well, here's the answer: a little leaven leavens the whole bunch. (But, what exactly is this "Judeo-Christian tradition" anyway? Can there be such a thing with such hatred and animosity from one group to the other? See Why Don’t Jews Like the Christians Who Like Them?
Liberalism can’t abide conservative evangelicals. James Q. Wilson, Winter 2008, City Journal.)
And again: "From time to time since 1968, some of the Catholics who accepted 'the only doctrine that had ever appeared as the teaching of the Church on these things,' in Anscombe's words, have puzzled over why, exactly, Humanae Vitae has been so poorly received by the rest of the world." She then lists out a few possible answers--bad timing, the secular media, lack of full explication of the matters, such as addressed decades later in John Paul II's Theology of the Body. She lands on "contraception itself"; borrowing the phrase from Archbishop Chaput. This view is sorely mistaken, though, because it focuses on a man-made invention to sidestep the most fundamental issue: man's broken heart, and man's broken relationship with God. This is foolishness to the unbeliever, of course. Which is why, I think, she's grasping at secular straws to make a spiritual argument. But it won't ever work, because I think you must dig much deeper, to the fundamentals, for the answer.
And again: "What happens when, for the first time in history--at least in theory, and at least in the advanced nations--adults are more or less free to have all the sex and food they want?" (p. 95) This is a terribly misguided statement, considering that women are the gatekeepers of sex (eggs are valued, sperm is not; women are a protected class, men are a disposable class) and that hunger is still a very real issue for 40 million Americans.
In other spots her analogies don't hold, for me. For example, Chapter 7, Is Pornography the New Tobacco? posits that, yes, porn can be compared to where tobacco was in the early/mid 1960s. Creators/distributors are opening new markets (money) by targeting women. The analogy doesn't hold because it's known that "men have more frequent and more intense sexual desires than women, as reflected in spontaneous thoughts about sex, frequency and variety of sexual fantasies, desired frequency of intercourse, desired number of partners, masturbation, liking for various sexual practices, willingness to forego sex, initiating versus refusing sex, making sacrifices for sex, and other measures. No contrary findings (indicating stronger sexual motivation among women) were found. Hence we conclude that the male sex drive is stronger than the female sex drive." (Source: Is There a Gender Difference in Strength of Sex Drive? Theoretical Views, Conceptual Distinctions, and a Review of Relevant Evidence. Roy F. Baumeister, Kathleen R. Catanese, Kathleen D. Vohs. Personality and Social Psychology Review. First Published August 1, 2001. Simply stated: women don't like, want, seek, or need sex as much as men do. Armed with information like this, it's hard to see how pornographers are going to make much economic inroads with female audiences. So, no, in the final analysis, porn is *not* the new tobacco.
All in all, though, I found this to be an interesting book with important things to say on the topic of sexual relations between men and women (specifically in the West) and how those have devolved since the invention of the pill. I suppose answers will only be forthcoming, though, when enough people look around and see the host of problems we've created for ourselves with our inventions. But by then it may be too late.
I liked it
3/5 Goodreads
4/5 Amazon
January 25, 2023
"No single event since Eve took the apple has been as consequential for relations between the sexes as the arrival of modern contraception." Woah, bold claim Eberstandt.
While I don't know if she totally convinced me that this statement is true, she did provide some startling evidence and good analogies to think about how the sexual revolution and modern contraceptions have changed our society. In reality, we are all a social experiment since "full-proof" modern conception has been around for less than a hundred years. Never before has sex been separated from procreation.
There are many resources on the perceived biological effects of birth control, but not as many on the sociological level. I really appreciate Eberstandt's willingness to publish a book that talks about the effects of birth control on a society. (Because it is not a likeable viewpoint)
Where do I go from here? Another resource to add to my bookshelf when considering "just because everyone is doing it, does it mean it is good and I should do it?" I don't think this book will convince someone coming from a totally different worldview/viewpoint, but maybe it can help some think a little more critically on their contraceptive views. Also, it can help someone make an informed personal decision and begin to understand how our society became so sexualized.
Lastly, this personally was not a light read. The book contains lots of statistics on topics like pornography usage, college binge drinking, discontent feminists, and fatherless homes.
While I don't know if she totally convinced me that this statement is true, she did provide some startling evidence and good analogies to think about how the sexual revolution and modern contraceptions have changed our society. In reality, we are all a social experiment since "full-proof" modern conception has been around for less than a hundred years. Never before has sex been separated from procreation.
There are many resources on the perceived biological effects of birth control, but not as many on the sociological level. I really appreciate Eberstandt's willingness to publish a book that talks about the effects of birth control on a society. (Because it is not a likeable viewpoint)
Where do I go from here? Another resource to add to my bookshelf when considering "just because everyone is doing it, does it mean it is good and I should do it?" I don't think this book will convince someone coming from a totally different worldview/viewpoint, but maybe it can help some think a little more critically on their contraceptive views. Also, it can help someone make an informed personal decision and begin to understand how our society became so sexualized.
Lastly, this personally was not a light read. The book contains lots of statistics on topics like pornography usage, college binge drinking, discontent feminists, and fatherless homes.
September 27, 2012
Contraceptive sex is the social fact of our time. It sets the last 50 years apart from every other period of our species' history and is justly termed a revolution. The author intends this book as a series of "meditations" on the considerable costs of that revolution, now well documented.
The first interesting point that the author makes is that contraception is a necessary (though perhaps not sufficient) condition of the gradual destigmatization of sex outside of an exclusive, lifelong, gendered relationship. The second interesting point that she makes is that our culture is in a state of denial about the actual observable consequences of this process.
Several chapters examine the experiences of particular classes of people after the pill and ask the question, "Are they better off?" Women are unhappy. Men are bored. Children grow up in broken homes. Undergrads begin their adult lives... poorly. Most of the information in this section was already familiar to me. I was intrigued, however, by the speculation that the public reaction to the priest abuse scandal effectively smothered the previously formidable movement to normalize pedophilia that created cover for the abuse in the first place. "Moral jujitsu" indeed!
I didn't care for the Betty/Jennifer chapters. That our moral postures toward food vs. sex and tobacco vs. pornography have been reversed struck me as trivial. Sure there are parallels, but the effort to draw them out was just kind of repetitive and fluffy.
My biggest criticism of the book is that there wasn't as much data and argumentation as I was hoping for. It is more a sketch of the counterculture's objections than a detailed presentation. There are however, plenty of footnotes for those like me to explore further.
Quick read. 3 stars.
The first interesting point that the author makes is that contraception is a necessary (though perhaps not sufficient) condition of the gradual destigmatization of sex outside of an exclusive, lifelong, gendered relationship. The second interesting point that she makes is that our culture is in a state of denial about the actual observable consequences of this process.
Several chapters examine the experiences of particular classes of people after the pill and ask the question, "Are they better off?" Women are unhappy. Men are bored. Children grow up in broken homes. Undergrads begin their adult lives... poorly. Most of the information in this section was already familiar to me. I was intrigued, however, by the speculation that the public reaction to the priest abuse scandal effectively smothered the previously formidable movement to normalize pedophilia that created cover for the abuse in the first place. "Moral jujitsu" indeed!
I didn't care for the Betty/Jennifer chapters. That our moral postures toward food vs. sex and tobacco vs. pornography have been reversed struck me as trivial. Sure there are parallels, but the effort to draw them out was just kind of repetitive and fluffy.
My biggest criticism of the book is that there wasn't as much data and argumentation as I was hoping for. It is more a sketch of the counterculture's objections than a detailed presentation. There are however, plenty of footnotes for those like me to explore further.
Quick read. 3 stars.
May 3, 2014
A good sociological critique of the culture of lust, which breeds the culture of death: "It is the contention of this book that ... benign renditions of the story of the sexual revolution are wrong. That is to say, they are critically incomplete when measured against the weight of the evidence now before us" (15).
Eberstadt is right that there is a powerful "will to disbelieve" the evidence of the damage that lust does to society. It means that she is preaching to the choir, for the most part. But the choir needs to hear the gospel message, too. "Today I set before you life and death. Choose life!"
Eberstadt is right that there is a powerful "will to disbelieve" the evidence of the damage that lust does to society. It means that she is preaching to the choir, for the most part. But the choir needs to hear the gospel message, too. "Today I set before you life and death. Choose life!"
October 20, 2012
This is a fascinating book, mostly because of the statistics she includes. She has a very good argument for the damage the pill has caused to society. My only complaint is that the book is too short! She has done a lot of excellent research, but I'd like to see the book expanded to about 400 pages....to include more information, more specifics, details about the studies, etc. etc. It's worth the read for sure.
January 15, 2014
Incredible book. Great research, insightful theses (most notable: "Is Food the New Sex?"), and Eberstadt is a phenomenal writer. Originally heard about her through Ken Meyers' Mars Hill Audio Journal, and Al Mohler's Thinking in Public. I look forward to reading her book on secularization very soon. Highly recommended!
April 19, 2015
Umiddelbart syntes jeg ved første øjekast det virkede som en spændende debatbog, men bogen viste sig at være et langt unuanceret og polemisk korstog mod prævention.
May 20, 2019
Stanford's Hoover Institute presents a poignant argument on the social harms and implications of a world post-contraception. How has pornography, condoms, and the Pill c.1968 changed our development?
'Twas written in part to a response on 1968 Pope Alexander's Humanae Vitae, the Catholic church's take on Birth Control. This was a time when Malthusian theorizing on an eventual limit of resource sharing - spurred by the conception of United Nations as a measure to resolve Cold War proclivities to anxiety, as well as failed Eugenics movements in mainstream politics, Germany and other Facist governments, which resulted in Civil Rights Era reformation - was at the height of influence in the World as we know it.
Naomi Wolf, "the Porn Myth", New York magazine 2003
[the onslaught of porn is responsible for deadening male libido in relation to real women, and leading men to see fewer and fewer women as porn-worthy]
80% of Pornography is consumed by men; consumption starts in late adolescence. Where pornography in the 80's was once limited to Playboy magazine and could only be furtively glanced at without drawing suspicion, pornography is now as Comedian Michael Che noted, "boobs in every young son's pocket". Destigmatized by those who consume pornography, teenagers go so far as to proudly display their boorish, ignorant consumption of said seemingly harmless task.
When in fact, pornography consumption has many harms, hidden and well known. Hidden harms include proclivity to 1. be unsatisfied by vanilla sex with one women as porn has taught boys that sex is anything but vanilla. 2. be more sexually aggressive, from sex without dating in college to one-night stands. Well known harms include 1. disgust immediately following the act, 2. addiction.
To elaborate, contraception has harms for both women and men, in and out of marriage. Marriage can now be postponed to late 30s, once both parties have well-developed careers underway and are ready to curtail this leading ambition in their life. Though sexual attraction has far and away been lost as their most appealing attribute, many professionals choose to wait for this time in their lives for marriage. In this forestalled waiting period to fruition, man has become a "child-man", retaining childhood tendencies of videogames and binge drinking well into adulthood; once he gets married, he know has domestic skills and assumes the role of "competitor wife" in a sexless marriage, where he will split domestic tasks with his wife, but she will be upset in how she does them. Where housewives tend to pout and spend days planning a dinner or change in seasonal decorations, househusbands perform their duties as simple and quick as possible. Along with this role reversal of the traditional nuclear family, marriages made among enlightened, older, educated, and sophisticated people who for most of their life, who have taken a vow of self-denial in pursuit of a greater truth, have less interest in sex.
For women, women's morning talk shows or other popular "chick fare" [reveal a wildly contradictory mix of chatter about how wonderful it is that women are now liberated for sexual fun-and how mysteriously impossible it has become to find a good, steady, committed boyfriend at the same time]. This is like a scantily clad women who goes out with her boyfriend, only to have passes made at her by others around, yet is surprised that romance and longing have gone out of dates.
expansion into our educated, digital age of information
[plenty of young men and women will graduate exactly as was promised-as the beneficiary of expanded intellectual, social, and other horizons, replete with fond memories and enriched understanding-and with dignity and sense of self remaining intact](80)
[In the 1950s, to take one example from the index, only 12 percent of college students agreed that "I am an important person, whereas that figure was 80 percent by the late 1980s. This "narcissism epidemic", as some have termed it, has in turn given rise to speculation about what might account for such an exaggerated sense of oneself: Capitalism? Indulgent ego-pampering parenting? Digital technology that relentlessly raise the bar for personal appearance?]
'Twas written in part to a response on 1968 Pope Alexander's Humanae Vitae, the Catholic church's take on Birth Control. This was a time when Malthusian theorizing on an eventual limit of resource sharing - spurred by the conception of United Nations as a measure to resolve Cold War proclivities to anxiety, as well as failed Eugenics movements in mainstream politics, Germany and other Facist governments, which resulted in Civil Rights Era reformation - was at the height of influence in the World as we know it.
Naomi Wolf, "the Porn Myth", New York magazine 2003
[the onslaught of porn is responsible for deadening male libido in relation to real women, and leading men to see fewer and fewer women as porn-worthy]
80% of Pornography is consumed by men; consumption starts in late adolescence. Where pornography in the 80's was once limited to Playboy magazine and could only be furtively glanced at without drawing suspicion, pornography is now as Comedian Michael Che noted, "boobs in every young son's pocket". Destigmatized by those who consume pornography, teenagers go so far as to proudly display their boorish, ignorant consumption of said seemingly harmless task.
When in fact, pornography consumption has many harms, hidden and well known. Hidden harms include proclivity to 1. be unsatisfied by vanilla sex with one women as porn has taught boys that sex is anything but vanilla. 2. be more sexually aggressive, from sex without dating in college to one-night stands. Well known harms include 1. disgust immediately following the act, 2. addiction.
To elaborate, contraception has harms for both women and men, in and out of marriage. Marriage can now be postponed to late 30s, once both parties have well-developed careers underway and are ready to curtail this leading ambition in their life. Though sexual attraction has far and away been lost as their most appealing attribute, many professionals choose to wait for this time in their lives for marriage. In this forestalled waiting period to fruition, man has become a "child-man", retaining childhood tendencies of videogames and binge drinking well into adulthood; once he gets married, he know has domestic skills and assumes the role of "competitor wife" in a sexless marriage, where he will split domestic tasks with his wife, but she will be upset in how she does them. Where housewives tend to pout and spend days planning a dinner or change in seasonal decorations, househusbands perform their duties as simple and quick as possible. Along with this role reversal of the traditional nuclear family, marriages made among enlightened, older, educated, and sophisticated people who for most of their life, who have taken a vow of self-denial in pursuit of a greater truth, have less interest in sex.
For women, women's morning talk shows or other popular "chick fare" [reveal a wildly contradictory mix of chatter about how wonderful it is that women are now liberated for sexual fun-and how mysteriously impossible it has become to find a good, steady, committed boyfriend at the same time]. This is like a scantily clad women who goes out with her boyfriend, only to have passes made at her by others around, yet is surprised that romance and longing have gone out of dates.
expansion into our educated, digital age of information
[plenty of young men and women will graduate exactly as was promised-as the beneficiary of expanded intellectual, social, and other horizons, replete with fond memories and enriched understanding-and with dignity and sense of self remaining intact](80)
[In the 1950s, to take one example from the index, only 12 percent of college students agreed that "I am an important person, whereas that figure was 80 percent by the late 1980s. This "narcissism epidemic", as some have termed it, has in turn given rise to speculation about what might account for such an exaggerated sense of oneself: Capitalism? Indulgent ego-pampering parenting? Digital technology that relentlessly raise the bar for personal appearance?]
April 12, 2018
Mary Eberstadt is an extremely gifted essayist. Her articles, as published in places such as First Things and Crux are well-researched, convicting works of journalistic art. After reading a Mary Eberstadt essay or interview it's all I can think about the rest of the day.
So I suppose I was expecting that same type of bitingly intelligent, air-tight, brutally honest writing in Adam and Eve after the Pill. What I found was the introduction and final chapter, "The Vindication of Humanae Vitae," were vintage Eberstadt, while the rest of the book seemed of a considerably lower quality, and filled with strained, half-formed arguments.
For example, chapters 6 and 7, "Is Food the New Sex," and "Is Pornography the New Tobacco?" were thought-provoking, but read as long-winded explanations of certain interesting opinions. Now, I must admit that I agree with Eberstadt in essence, but she could have kept these ideas as "thought experiments," or as interesting, passing comments. I believe this would have actually given them incisive power. But instead she pulls the reader through some forty pages of arguments that are lacking in evidence and abounding in anecdote. It was tiresome. Just seeing the number of times she uses phrases like "the point is plain enough" put up red flags for readers. When clear facts do support a tight argument, then such modifiers (including "obviously" and "clearly") are not only unnecessary but are annoying and cause some doubts in the reader's mind. These chapters, along with chapter 4, subtitled, "The Pedophilia Chic Then and Now," definitely seemed the least convincing to me, although, again, in substance I agree with the direction where Eberstadt is headed.
Now, the final chapter, "The Vindication of Humanae Vitae" is masterful. It put me on the path of changing the way I think about artificial contraception. What more could Eberstadt want? The final chapter is, I suppose, worth more than the rest of the book.
So I suppose I was expecting that same type of bitingly intelligent, air-tight, brutally honest writing in Adam and Eve after the Pill. What I found was the introduction and final chapter, "The Vindication of Humanae Vitae," were vintage Eberstadt, while the rest of the book seemed of a considerably lower quality, and filled with strained, half-formed arguments.
For example, chapters 6 and 7, "Is Food the New Sex," and "Is Pornography the New Tobacco?" were thought-provoking, but read as long-winded explanations of certain interesting opinions. Now, I must admit that I agree with Eberstadt in essence, but she could have kept these ideas as "thought experiments," or as interesting, passing comments. I believe this would have actually given them incisive power. But instead she pulls the reader through some forty pages of arguments that are lacking in evidence and abounding in anecdote. It was tiresome. Just seeing the number of times she uses phrases like "the point is plain enough" put up red flags for readers. When clear facts do support a tight argument, then such modifiers (including "obviously" and "clearly") are not only unnecessary but are annoying and cause some doubts in the reader's mind. These chapters, along with chapter 4, subtitled, "The Pedophilia Chic Then and Now," definitely seemed the least convincing to me, although, again, in substance I agree with the direction where Eberstadt is headed.
Now, the final chapter, "The Vindication of Humanae Vitae" is masterful. It put me on the path of changing the way I think about artificial contraception. What more could Eberstadt want? The final chapter is, I suppose, worth more than the rest of the book.
August 13, 2018
Eberstadt's book on the consequences of the sexual revolution is as interesting as it is sobering. Not only it is thoroughly researched, but her theological insights are helpful for anyone considering the traditional Christian position on birth control. She does a great job elucidating the Catholic Church's teaching on it, especially Humanae Vitae, while also pointing out how Martin Luther and John Calvin condemned its practice. Ever since the Anglicans embraced it in the 1930s, contraception has also been embraced in most Protestant communities. Eberstadt calls the postive nature of this embrace into question.
January 20, 2022
Good book on the Sexual Revolution and its impact on 20thc Christianity. Most of note is the section on college sexual culture and really encapsulates all that is morally bankrupt about hookup culture. The book started to lose me around the "is food the new sex" arguement, by which I think the author means to talk about there is a moral code expected when people adhere to certain diets but we expect nothing of people's sexual habits in that same way. I think I'll read this again for sure
March 16, 2021
A remarkable book that explores what the sexual revolution and the societal dependence and love for contraception has done to women, men, children, and young adults. Eberstadt is incisive and insightful yet easy to read, and paints a clear picture of the sin in our lives.
If I were to be truly critical of anything, it would be that the Catholic position on sin has the tendency to be more of an external than an internal thing. It's the same thing that I struggled with when reading Pope John Paul II's Theology of the Body; it does feel to an extent that, from this perspective, no sin would exist without the temptation, or that the temptation forms the sin to a degree. It is true that when a certain temptation is so readily available (and legal!), it does in fact shape public morality to an extent.
If I were to be truly critical of anything, it would be that the Catholic position on sin has the tendency to be more of an external than an internal thing. It's the same thing that I struggled with when reading Pope John Paul II's Theology of the Body; it does feel to an extent that, from this perspective, no sin would exist without the temptation, or that the temptation forms the sin to a degree. It is true that when a certain temptation is so readily available (and legal!), it does in fact shape public morality to an extent.
May 20, 2018
En este pequeño ensayo (176 páginas en su edición en castellano), Eberstadt realiza un completo recorrido por las consecuencias, evidentes y no evidentes, de la revolución sexual. El libro comienza analizando lo que ella denomina la voluntad de no creer, es decir, la actitud por parte de los académicos actuales que les lleva a no querer asumir que dicha revolución sexual ha sido negativa para la sociedad en base a sus consecuencias, trazando un paralelismo con la actitud de muchos intelectuales frente a la U.R.S.S. previa a la caída del muro de Berlín. Irónicamente, y parafraseando a Juan Vázquez de Mella y Fanjul, estamos en una época que levanta tronos a las causas y cadalsos a las consecuencias, tal y como se analiza en el resto de la obra.
Un ejemplo de ello son las consecuencias de la revolución en las mujeres, que según diferentes estudios que analiza la obra, tienen hoy en día menores índices de felicidad, así como una mayor dificultad en tener un “amor romántico” que perdure más allá del sexo inmediato. Por otra parte, los estudios sociológicos muestran también que los hombres se ven inclinados a una mayor inmadurez, consecuencia de la falta del instinto protector, vinculada a que cada vez tienen menos qué proteger y a una búsqueda constante de la novedad sexual en detrimento de una sexualidad estable. El libro también analiza los efectos de la revolución sexual en los niños (centrándose en la pedofilia chic, a Dios gracias en retroceso) así como en los jóvenes (entre los que se extiende la cultura de la violación y la asunción de conductas sexuales de riesgo a pesar de la educación sexual cada vez más temprana e intensa).
Eberstadt también hace un paralelismo interesante con las actitudes frente a sexo y comida, y frente a pornografía y tabaco, y cómo estas actitudes han evolucionado con los años. La transmutación de los valores deseada por Friedrich Nietzsche ha provocado que, en un giro imprevisto (aunque sólo en ciertos ámbitos), las normas alimentarias sean una causa moral en sí misma.
Finalmente, finaliza la obra con una defensa de la Humanae Vitae de Pablo VI, analizando cómo sus predicciones sobre lo que traería la extensión de la cultura de la anticoncepción se han visto tristemente confirmadas.
En su conjunto, la obra es argumentativa pero muy accesible, por el modo en que está escrita. La autora pone a disposición del lector un amplio abanico de estudios en los que se puede profundizar, y sienta las bases para un estudio más detallado de la cuestión. Desde mi punto de vista, dará argumentos y servirá para ordenar ideas a aquellos que adviertan las consecuencias de la revolución sexual, pero también podría ser interesante para establecer un diálogo con aquellos que se encuentran en el “otro lado” de este combate, siempre que se aproximen a la obra con una mentalidad abierta.
Sobre el particular de la edición en castellano, hay algunos aspectos mejorables especialmente en la traducción. Dejando de lado alguna nota no traducida, a veces se aprecia un cierto descuido en la revisión (se habla de el filósofo G.E.M. Anscombe, cuando era una mujer), pero lo que más delito tiene es hablar de Martin Luther (por Lutero) y de John Calvin (por Calvino): por favor, que esto se mejore en siguientes ediciones.
Un ejemplo de ello son las consecuencias de la revolución en las mujeres, que según diferentes estudios que analiza la obra, tienen hoy en día menores índices de felicidad, así como una mayor dificultad en tener un “amor romántico” que perdure más allá del sexo inmediato. Por otra parte, los estudios sociológicos muestran también que los hombres se ven inclinados a una mayor inmadurez, consecuencia de la falta del instinto protector, vinculada a que cada vez tienen menos qué proteger y a una búsqueda constante de la novedad sexual en detrimento de una sexualidad estable. El libro también analiza los efectos de la revolución sexual en los niños (centrándose en la pedofilia chic, a Dios gracias en retroceso) así como en los jóvenes (entre los que se extiende la cultura de la violación y la asunción de conductas sexuales de riesgo a pesar de la educación sexual cada vez más temprana e intensa).
Eberstadt también hace un paralelismo interesante con las actitudes frente a sexo y comida, y frente a pornografía y tabaco, y cómo estas actitudes han evolucionado con los años. La transmutación de los valores deseada por Friedrich Nietzsche ha provocado que, en un giro imprevisto (aunque sólo en ciertos ámbitos), las normas alimentarias sean una causa moral en sí misma.
Finalmente, finaliza la obra con una defensa de la Humanae Vitae de Pablo VI, analizando cómo sus predicciones sobre lo que traería la extensión de la cultura de la anticoncepción se han visto tristemente confirmadas.
En su conjunto, la obra es argumentativa pero muy accesible, por el modo en que está escrita. La autora pone a disposición del lector un amplio abanico de estudios en los que se puede profundizar, y sienta las bases para un estudio más detallado de la cuestión. Desde mi punto de vista, dará argumentos y servirá para ordenar ideas a aquellos que adviertan las consecuencias de la revolución sexual, pero también podría ser interesante para establecer un diálogo con aquellos que se encuentran en el “otro lado” de este combate, siempre que se aproximen a la obra con una mentalidad abierta.
Sobre el particular de la edición en castellano, hay algunos aspectos mejorables especialmente en la traducción. Dejando de lado alguna nota no traducida, a veces se aprecia un cierto descuido en la revisión (se habla de el filósofo G.E.M. Anscombe, cuando era una mujer), pero lo que más delito tiene es hablar de Martin Luther (por Lutero) y de John Calvin (por Calvino): por favor, que esto se mejore en siguientes ediciones.
July 19, 2017
Mary Eberstadt’s book is a worthwhile contribution to the discussion regarding the ill effects of the sexual revolution. I don’t have much to critique in her work. Instead, I would just urge anyone to pick up any or her books. In other words, Eberstadt in her own words is far more beneficial than anything I have to say. With that being said, here are my highlights:
Introduction: “Modern contraception is not only a fact of our time; it may be the central fact, in the sense that it is hard to think of any other whose demographic, social, behavioral, and personal fallout has been as profound” (p.11).
“It may be possible to imagine the Pill being invented without the sexual revolution that followed, but imagining the sexual revolution without the Pill and other modern contraceptives simply cannot be done” (p.12).
“In this standard celebratory rendition, the sexual revolution has been a nearly unmitigated boon for all humanity. Along with its permanent backup plan, abortion, it has liberated women from the slavery of their fertility, thus freeing them for personal and professional opportunities they could not have enjoyed before. It has liberated men, too, form their former chains, many would argue—chiefly from the bondage of having to take responsibility for the women they had sex with and/or for the children that resulted” (p.14-15).
Eberstadt proceeds throughout the rest of the book to demolish the claim that the sexual revolution has improved the quality of life for most Americans. She writes, “contrary to conventional depiction, the sexual revolution has proved a disaster for many men and women; and second, its weight has fallen heaviest on the smallest and weakest shoulders in society—even as it has given extra strength to those already strongest and most predatory” (p. 15-16).
Chapter 1: In the first chapter Eberstadt draws a parallel of the culture’s denial of problems of the Cold War to our denial today of the problems that have attended and resulted from the sexual revolution.
“I have dwelt on this analogy to the Cold War because it illuminates a related problem that so often seems inexplicable in our own time: the powerful will to disbelieve the harmful effects of another world-changing social and moral force. That would be the sexual revolution, or the destigmatization and demystification of nonmarital sex and the reduction of sexual relations in general to a kind of hygienic recreation in which anything goes so long as those involved are consenting adults” (p.24).
“This resolute refusal to recognize that the revolution falls heaviest on the youngest and most vulnerable shoulders—beginning with the fetus and proceeding up through children and adolescents—is perhaps the most vivid example of the denial surrounding the fallout of the sexual revolution. In no other realm of human life do ordinary Americans seem so indifferent to the particular suffering of the smallest and weakest. Our campuses especially ring with self-righteous chants of those protesting genocide in Darfur, or wanton cruelty to animals, or gross human rights violations by oppressive governments such as China’s. These are all real problems about which real students shed tears. Such selective deployment of compassion is one of the more curious features of our time. People who in any other context would pride themselves on defending the underdog is when the subject is the sexual revolution” (p.29).
“When people look back on this or any other momentous debate decades or centuries from now, one of the first things they will want to know is whose corner reason and empiricism and logic were in” (p.35).
Chapter 2: “The pressure on women to accept pornography as an inconsequential and entertaining fact of life rises steadily—and outside the circles of the conservative and the religious, there is little cultural ammunition for any woman who wants to resist it” (p.52).
“In the postrevolutionary world, sex is easier had than ever before; but the opposite appears true for romance. This is perhaps the central enigma that modern men and women are up against: romantic want in a time of sexual plenty. Perhaps some of the modern misery of which so many women today so authentically speak is springing not from a sexual desert, but from a sexual flood—a torrent of poisonous imagery, beginning now for many in childhood, that has engulfed women and men, only to beach them eventually somewhere alone and apart, far from the reach of one another” (p.53).
Chapter 6: Here Eberstadt says that food has become the new sex. Before the sexual revolution, the average adult female would consider sexual immorality just that, wrong, and a non-negotiable. Everyone “knew” fornication, adultery and having children out of wedlock was sin. In our day it has flip-flopped. The non-negotiable sin is unhealthy eating. People’s food practices have become more important that sexual. Eberstadt does a great job of exposing that paradox.
Chapter 7: Pornography is the new tobacco. The same reasoning is applied in chapter 6 towards this parallel in chapter 7. 6 and 7 were both strong chapters.
Chapter 8: In chapter 8 Eberstadt discusses contraception. In the Reformation John Calvin called it the unforgiveable crime. (p.156) Consider the fact the Calvin wasn’t talking about the pill but of contraception itself!
Eberstadt shows that the Catholic Church was the only tradition to not cave on this issue.
“Seen in the light of actual Christian tradition, the question is not after all why the Catholic Church refused to concede the point; it is rather why just about everyone else in the Judeo-Christian tradition did. Whatever the answer, the Catholic Church took, and continues to take, the public fall for causing the collapse—when actually, in theological and historical terms, she was the only one not collapsing” (p.156).
“If Paul VI was right about so many of the consequences deriving from contraception, it is because he was right about contraception itself. This is exactly the connection few people want to make today, because contraceptive sex—as commentators from all over, religious or not, agree—is the fundamental social fact of our time. And the fierce and widespread desire to keep it so is responsible for a great many perverse outcomes” (p.157).
Epilogue: Eberstadt concludes regarding the effects of the sexual revolution: “Every family in America by now has been shaped by one or more of its facets—divorce, single parenthood, abortion, cohabitation, widespread pornography, open homosexuality. This fact that were all in this together also gives people powerful reason to deny the true costs” (p.160).
Introduction: “Modern contraception is not only a fact of our time; it may be the central fact, in the sense that it is hard to think of any other whose demographic, social, behavioral, and personal fallout has been as profound” (p.11).
“It may be possible to imagine the Pill being invented without the sexual revolution that followed, but imagining the sexual revolution without the Pill and other modern contraceptives simply cannot be done” (p.12).
“In this standard celebratory rendition, the sexual revolution has been a nearly unmitigated boon for all humanity. Along with its permanent backup plan, abortion, it has liberated women from the slavery of their fertility, thus freeing them for personal and professional opportunities they could not have enjoyed before. It has liberated men, too, form their former chains, many would argue—chiefly from the bondage of having to take responsibility for the women they had sex with and/or for the children that resulted” (p.14-15).
Eberstadt proceeds throughout the rest of the book to demolish the claim that the sexual revolution has improved the quality of life for most Americans. She writes, “contrary to conventional depiction, the sexual revolution has proved a disaster for many men and women; and second, its weight has fallen heaviest on the smallest and weakest shoulders in society—even as it has given extra strength to those already strongest and most predatory” (p. 15-16).
Chapter 1: In the first chapter Eberstadt draws a parallel of the culture’s denial of problems of the Cold War to our denial today of the problems that have attended and resulted from the sexual revolution.
“I have dwelt on this analogy to the Cold War because it illuminates a related problem that so often seems inexplicable in our own time: the powerful will to disbelieve the harmful effects of another world-changing social and moral force. That would be the sexual revolution, or the destigmatization and demystification of nonmarital sex and the reduction of sexual relations in general to a kind of hygienic recreation in which anything goes so long as those involved are consenting adults” (p.24).
“This resolute refusal to recognize that the revolution falls heaviest on the youngest and most vulnerable shoulders—beginning with the fetus and proceeding up through children and adolescents—is perhaps the most vivid example of the denial surrounding the fallout of the sexual revolution. In no other realm of human life do ordinary Americans seem so indifferent to the particular suffering of the smallest and weakest. Our campuses especially ring with self-righteous chants of those protesting genocide in Darfur, or wanton cruelty to animals, or gross human rights violations by oppressive governments such as China’s. These are all real problems about which real students shed tears. Such selective deployment of compassion is one of the more curious features of our time. People who in any other context would pride themselves on defending the underdog is when the subject is the sexual revolution” (p.29).
“When people look back on this or any other momentous debate decades or centuries from now, one of the first things they will want to know is whose corner reason and empiricism and logic were in” (p.35).
Chapter 2: “The pressure on women to accept pornography as an inconsequential and entertaining fact of life rises steadily—and outside the circles of the conservative and the religious, there is little cultural ammunition for any woman who wants to resist it” (p.52).
“In the postrevolutionary world, sex is easier had than ever before; but the opposite appears true for romance. This is perhaps the central enigma that modern men and women are up against: romantic want in a time of sexual plenty. Perhaps some of the modern misery of which so many women today so authentically speak is springing not from a sexual desert, but from a sexual flood—a torrent of poisonous imagery, beginning now for many in childhood, that has engulfed women and men, only to beach them eventually somewhere alone and apart, far from the reach of one another” (p.53).
Chapter 6: Here Eberstadt says that food has become the new sex. Before the sexual revolution, the average adult female would consider sexual immorality just that, wrong, and a non-negotiable. Everyone “knew” fornication, adultery and having children out of wedlock was sin. In our day it has flip-flopped. The non-negotiable sin is unhealthy eating. People’s food practices have become more important that sexual. Eberstadt does a great job of exposing that paradox.
Chapter 7: Pornography is the new tobacco. The same reasoning is applied in chapter 6 towards this parallel in chapter 7. 6 and 7 were both strong chapters.
Chapter 8: In chapter 8 Eberstadt discusses contraception. In the Reformation John Calvin called it the unforgiveable crime. (p.156) Consider the fact the Calvin wasn’t talking about the pill but of contraception itself!
Eberstadt shows that the Catholic Church was the only tradition to not cave on this issue.
“Seen in the light of actual Christian tradition, the question is not after all why the Catholic Church refused to concede the point; it is rather why just about everyone else in the Judeo-Christian tradition did. Whatever the answer, the Catholic Church took, and continues to take, the public fall for causing the collapse—when actually, in theological and historical terms, she was the only one not collapsing” (p.156).
“If Paul VI was right about so many of the consequences deriving from contraception, it is because he was right about contraception itself. This is exactly the connection few people want to make today, because contraceptive sex—as commentators from all over, religious or not, agree—is the fundamental social fact of our time. And the fierce and widespread desire to keep it so is responsible for a great many perverse outcomes” (p.157).
Epilogue: Eberstadt concludes regarding the effects of the sexual revolution: “Every family in America by now has been shaped by one or more of its facets—divorce, single parenthood, abortion, cohabitation, widespread pornography, open homosexuality. This fact that were all in this together also gives people powerful reason to deny the true costs” (p.160).
June 14, 2012
The sexual revolution is basically the worst thing that has happen to modern day society? So far, I'm not convinced. I really tried to keep an open mind (which, I'll admit, is hard for me to do when it come to sexuality and feminism). This book is chock full of reasoning taking right out of the Vatican during the Middle Ages. If you want to read something that is actually based on modern day social and public health research, stay far away from this book...now onto 50 Shades of Grey =)
June 13, 2012
A well researched depiction of the sexual revolution and how it has delivered the exact opposite on its promise of sexual "freedom" people are now more enslaved to sex than ever before and the results extend far and wide. Required reading of anyone attempting to form an opinion on contraception, pornography, abortion, gay marriage, etc.
August 6, 2012
Excellent, very thought-provoking read - maybe a bit academic for some. Eberstadt has obviously done her homework on this topic. In the wake of all the evidence, it is hard to understand how so many can still be in denial of the consequences of the liberal view our society continues to take relative to sexuality.
August 24, 2012
The author had a habit of throwing out an idea and then not fully developing it. For me this was very frustrating and took away from the ideas she was postulating. I would have preferred less preaching as well although the author did try to keep it toned down.
May 15, 2012
Well researched and written, the insights, facts and data are staggering
June 9, 2012
Well documented discussion of the results of the sexual revolution.
November 26, 2022
I appreciate the stance taken in this book and I would say I want to agree with it. However, I did not quite get what I was wanting from this book.
This book fails to fully make an understandable connection between the sexual revolution of the 1960’s and the variety of modern societal ills. The author claims that there is a clear line of causality, without fully illuminating that exact line. That is what I found most disappointing, as that is what I was looking for in this book.
The author relies on and quotes a lot of social articles, rather than bringing in more of a variety of proof. The amount of citations of these articles is indeed impressive, and there were many well used citations. However, I feel like only using this kind of source only tells us what people are saying. It does not show us what they are doing or how they are feeling, nor does it show any concrete, unbiased facts with which to base an argument on. There were a few actual statistics scattered here and there, but I think more of these would’ve been very beneficial. More empirical studies and findings actually cited would’ve greatly strengthened this book.
Finally, this book has a very Catholic foundation, whereas I would’ve preferred a more biblical foundation. The author seems to have posed this book as merely a defense of the Catholic Church’s opinion on contraception, rather than delving into the ideas, the human nature, and the spiritual warfare happening beneath it. I would’ve appreciated Eberstadt being bold and saying why contraception is spiritually and morally questionable, rather than just assuming the reader knows it is and leaving it at that. A sort of deep dive like that would’ve been much more fascinating.
This book fails to fully make an understandable connection between the sexual revolution of the 1960’s and the variety of modern societal ills. The author claims that there is a clear line of causality, without fully illuminating that exact line. That is what I found most disappointing, as that is what I was looking for in this book.
The author relies on and quotes a lot of social articles, rather than bringing in more of a variety of proof. The amount of citations of these articles is indeed impressive, and there were many well used citations. However, I feel like only using this kind of source only tells us what people are saying. It does not show us what they are doing or how they are feeling, nor does it show any concrete, unbiased facts with which to base an argument on. There were a few actual statistics scattered here and there, but I think more of these would’ve been very beneficial. More empirical studies and findings actually cited would’ve greatly strengthened this book.
Finally, this book has a very Catholic foundation, whereas I would’ve preferred a more biblical foundation. The author seems to have posed this book as merely a defense of the Catholic Church’s opinion on contraception, rather than delving into the ideas, the human nature, and the spiritual warfare happening beneath it. I would’ve appreciated Eberstadt being bold and saying why contraception is spiritually and morally questionable, rather than just assuming the reader knows it is and leaving it at that. A sort of deep dive like that would’ve been much more fascinating.
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