GLR September-October 2024

mischief, disorderly conduct, and criminal trespass, which could add up to a big fine and probably probation. If there’s an irony here, it is that several still photos of Trey went viral, which is to say that his penis became an object of interest for the millions who voyeuristically caught this act of vandalism. How Trey would feel about that is hard to gauge. “What would Freud say,” as we used to ask, about a guy who whips it out on a Klieg-lit front porch and pees while uttering “fuck the gays”? No doubt he basked in the virality of the moment; in the Age of TikTok, it’s all about getting your fifteen minutes. Follow the Sex Three separate items in this cycle’s BTW in cubator seem worth noting without too much fanfare, but to gether they point to a grander theme: • The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) voted to officially oppose in vitro fertilization (IVF) and fight to have it outlawed. • More states in the South and Midwest passed laws that seek to limit transgender rights, including access to medical care or to appropriate restrooms or other facilities. • The rate of abortion in the U.S. has actually risen since the Dobbs decision gutted abortion rights in 2022. What they have in common can best be observed in the SBC’s reasoning on the need to avoid “the unethical circumstances that happen when sex and conception are divided.” With that in mind, consider the jump in U.S. abortions from 82,000 per month before Dobbs to 86,000 today. The best explanation is that Dobbs acted as a stimulus for the production and use of self-administered abortion drugs, which can now be bought at your local drugstore (often OTC) or online. Their use continues the trajectory started by “the pill,” which expressly decoupled sex from procreation. In a related vein, the original argument against “sodomy,” which goes back centuries, was based on the assertion that all non-procreative sex was off limits and sinful, and it remains the underlying taboo: namely, the notion that sex can be an end itself, just for the hell of it. The persistence of the anti-sex ideology in the U.S., notwithstanding the late Dr. Ruth, is a vast mystery, to be sure, one that has real-world conse quences both expected and un-. Meta ban The widening net of books being banned in school libraries is bound to swallow up some unexpected and even ironic titles. As noted previously, a number of districts have banned the Bible for its violence and sexual situations. In the latest incident, a Florida school board has banned a book titled Ban This Book, a children’s title by Alan Gratz that was re moved from shelves in Indian River County school libraries by order of the county school board. The irony was not lost on the reporters and commenters who cited this incident—but it also makes perfect (non-ironic) sense. The message of Gratz’ 2017 book is that book-banning is wrong and should be resisted, which is just the kind of message that any book-banning offi cial would instinctively want to ban. Also, of course, the book’s title seems to be a direct taunt aimed at just such officials. What the board may not have foreseen is that banning a book called Ban This Book would be catnip for precisely the kinds of peo ple who buy books. Sales on Amazon soared and the number of ratings had leapt to almost 1,500 at press time. So, ban away; it only makes the book look sexier.

THE POWER O Y MIDLIFE OFGAY

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September–October 2024

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