The Blowfish Blog

A Tale of Two Scandals: The Obligatory Eliot Spitzer and “American Idol” Stripper Column

When the governor of New York resigns due to the revelation that he had sex with a prostitute — and a contestant on a top-rated TV reality show is found to have been a stripper — sex columnists around the world are driven to the stories like salmon returning home to spawn. So this is kind of an obligatory column. I am powerless to control myself. Can’t . . . stop! Must . . . blog . . . about . . . Spitzer . . . and . . . the “American Idol” . . . stripper! Send . . . help!

But until help arrives, I’m going to have fun with it.

Here’s the thing I keep thinking about Governor Eliot Spitzer. Yes, the hypocrisy. Yes, the irony of a law- and- order, anti- prostitution governor being caught with a hooker. Yes, the fascinating pattern of public figures in politics and religion indulging in the exact same tabooed sex acts they preach against most vehemently. Yes, the increasingly repugnant spectacle of the wronged wife having to stand by her man at his podium of shame. Lots of people have said this already, better than I.

So apart from all that, here’s what I keep thinking:

A weird part of me is glad he’s a Democrat.

Bear with me. My political affiliation hasn’t changed lately (except that I switched my registration from Green back to Democrat so I could vote in the last primary). It’s just that I’m starting to think that the “it’s always the right-wingers who are caught in the sex scandals” analysis — an analysis I’ve indulged in myself — is just a little too simplistic.

Remember Gary Hart, anybody? Ted Kennedy? Bill Clinton?

People screw around. People cheat on their spouses and partners. People — men, mostly, although a few women as well — have sex with sex workers. And politically powerful men have been screwing around with lovers and mistresses and hookers for centuries. (Politically powerful women, too. The horse story about Catherine the Great is an urban legend . . . but the stories about her many lovers are well-documented. IMO, the main reason we haven’t had a Congresswoman/ gigolo scandal yet is that there aren’t that many women in Congress. Give it time.) Screwing around knows no political affiliation. It is the spirit of bipartisanship itself.

I do think politicians and preachers have a weird connection between public sexual condemnation and private sexual indulgence. I’ve written about it before. But I also think this conclusion all by itself is just a little too easy. I think it’s important to remember that cheating on your spouse — whether with a mistress or a boy-toy, a lover or a hooker — really isn’t something we can blame on right-wing repression and hypocrisy. The repression and hypocrisy, I’m happy to pin the right-wingers to the wall about . . . but the screwing around itself, I’m afraid, is just human nature.

So what does any of this have to do with the “American Idol” stripper?

Here’s the other thing I keep thinking.

In case you haven’t heard, “American Idol” contestant David Hernandez was recently discovered to have been a stripper at a gay strip club in Arizona — sparking a ridiculous shitstorm of controversy in the gossip columns and celebrity gossip blogs, and quite possibly getting him voted off the show last week.

And I truly do not get it.

The wig-out over the Spitzer story, I can understand. The guy is married, and married people ideally should keep their promises about monogamy (assuming they’re monogamous, which I’m guessing Spitzer was supposed to be). The guy won office on a law- and- order platform, and spoke out with “revulsion and anger” in 2004 when announcing arrests in a high-end prostitution ring . . . so there’s the irony and hypocrisy aspect of the deal. And of course, the guy is — or was — governor, and is supposed to have something vaguely resembling respect for the law.

But I do not get the wig-out over David Hernandez.

As far as I know, Hernandez is not married, or partnered, or anything but footloose and fancy-free, and his decision to be a stripper affected nobody but himself and his happy customers. As far as I know, Hernandez has never tried to curry public favor by condemning male strippers. And while it could be argued that patronizing prostitutes is inconsistent with being the highest upholder of the law in the state — what with it being illegal and all — there is nothing I can think of that makes being a male stripper inconsistent with being a pop singer. Hell, it’s probably given him some performance chops.

And as far as I know, stripping is entirely legal in Arizona.

So what the hell?

Why is this a story?

Why do people even care?

Okay, I get why people care. It’s about sex, and sex is always interesting. But why are people shocked and scandalized? Why are people acting as if Hernandez’s naked stripper body has befouled the purity and high standards of, for fuck’s sake, “American Idol”?

A lot of it, of course, is just that good old American Puritan knee-jerk freak-out about anything to do with sex. But I think there’s something else.

I think some of what we’re seeing is a clash of cultures. I think there’s beginning to be a stream in American culture — especially in youth culture — that doesn’t see sex and sex work as particularly shameful. Blame the Internet, blame video porn, blame decades of hard work from sex-positive activists like me. But more and more, I’m seeing young people who are willing and happy to bare all on the Web, at a strip club, for the “Girls Gone Wild” cameras, whatever.

And I think the Hernandez wig-out is partly a reaction, not just to the sexy stuff itself, but to the casualness and comfort with the sexy stuff. Strippers — especially male strippers at gay male strip clubs — are supposed to slink off the world stage with their heads hung down in disgrace. They’re not supposed to prance around shamelessly, doing a bad Vegas version of a Beatles song in front of millions of viewers as if nothing had happened. (Or, for that matter, proudly accept Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay.)

Well, I say good for him. I wish he’d been a better singer, but good for him anyway. I’m just eager for the day when senators and governors and Presidents are just as free to say, “Yes, I had sex with that woman/ man/ Olympic track team, and that’s nobody’s business but mine and my partner and the track team.” And then go on to sign farm legislation or crack down on white collar crime, as if nothing had happened.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2008. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, 20 March 2008 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.