In contemplating the idiosynracies of airport workers, I realized how completely different American airport workers are from those in other countries. I thought for quite some time about that and could not, for the life of me, come up with a reason for the difference. It got me thinking about some of the unexplained quirks of American culture.
I have lived all but 2 years of my life in this country. I've visited every state but North Dakota (I don't think that requires explanation) and I've spent significant time in at least a dozen of those states. In spite of all that, I fear there will always be things about this place that I will never understand. I've tried to drill down into the psyche of the average American to understand why he is so eager to form a line behind any two people standing together, even when there is nothing obvious to stand in line for. I will never get how anyone not born in the tri-state area could ever, EVER like the New York Yankees. And as hard as I try, I don't think I will ever be able to wrap my brain around the American aversion to sex with the dead.
To be clear, I am not condoning the sort of posthumous coitus that requires stealing a body from a morgue or absconding with a family friend from the viewing at the funeral home. If I am anything, I am a believer in the rule of law, and stealing is just plain wrong. But what about wives or girlfriends or the homeless? I'm sure I don't need to tell you that if I ever stumble upon the lifeless body of some hot little teen runaway, you can bet your ass I'm going to tuck her away somewhere until I can come back for her. Leopards pull their kill up into trees to keep it away from hyenas. I drag dead teen runaways behind hotel dumpsters to keep them away from deadsex poachers. It's the law of the jungle, really.
Don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about either! It's just like when you were younger and you would go to Tower Records or Barnes & Noble, find a CD or a book you wanted, and then hide it in a completely different section so no one would snatch it up in the time it took you to run home, con your mom out of $20, and run back. The next time you find a dead homeless chick in a dumpster and want to pass judgment, resist the urge for a second and remember that time you hid "The Chronic" in the World Music section. Same difference.
The wives and girlfriends thing is truly the most perplexing part. You had sex with them all the time when they were alive because you were physically attracted to them and you loved them. You didn't have sex with them just because they were alive. Why should your sex life have to suffer just because she's not alive anymore? You still love her and she's still hot...well, not literally...and that's all that should matter. I refuse to bend to the will of this stodgy, puritanical sexual ethos.
The negative opinions of sex with the dead I have encountered with respect to girlfriends all adopt some variant of the slippery slope argument. "If you let people have sex with their dead girlfriends, you're opening the door to sex with dead friends, dead acquaintances, dead clients..." Any attempt at a rebuttal is met with something like, "what's next?! Sex with dead children?!" You see, that's where I draw the line. How do you have a thoughtful, legitimate policy debate with someone who runs around telling everyone the sky is falling? For the last time, I am not advocating sex with dead children. If anything, I think awareness, legalization, and promotion of sex with the dead will create institutional checks against that sort of pedonecrophilia. For your information, I follow the old adage, "if there's grass on the field, play ball." Just because the grass is dead, doesn't mean it's not suitable for a ballgame.
The only argument I have found compelling is one that involves the woman having donated her body to science. She has made it expressly known that once she dies, she would like her body to be properly maintained until a reputable scientific organization can take possession of her corpse and utilize it for the advancement of science and, in some small way, the betterment of all mankind. Nearly as important from a public policy perspective, no medical school student paying $40k a year to get an education should be expected to deal with an 8 month old pool of crusted semen when he or she cuts open the woman's stomach for the first time. Nor should they be responsible for the detection and removal of things like flash-bang grenades and room service-sized ketchup bottles from her colon.
The lesson to be learned, obviously, is to make your intentions perfectly clear in your will as to what you would like to be done with your body upon your death. Science is an option, as is cremation or immediate burial. However, if your love for your husband or boyfriend or life partner is as deep and abiding as you claim it to be, you might want to consider letting him have custody of you for a period of time after your death. It won't be forever of course since you'll start to stink and everything, but that is something for your significant other to deal with.
Ultimately, I'm tired of being judged. I'm not a thief or a pedophile. I pay my taxes and I vote. The seemingly uncomfortable fact that I prefer my women like I prefer my gazpacho should not detract from any of that. I can't stop you from making your snap value judgments, but you won't know a goddamn thing until you have walked a mile in my deadsex shoes.
Posted by nils at 8:05 AM