The Sexual Contract

In Lynn Hunt’s Inventing Human Rights, we have already seen complications with biases regarding who has proposed needs for rights and equality, who they were intended for and who oversees their implementations. In this reading, women are still being discussed as somewhat passive to men, and yet, they are not completely excluded and ignored. They are wanted, necessary and purposeful to men. In The Sexual Contract, there is a distinction mentioned regarding natural conditions and civil conditions. The significance of these conditions are who these conditions can be associated with. Natural conditions are associated with women, where women are irrelevant in public and political issues, but are inclusive as subordinates and sex-objects in the private world of marriage. Civil conditions, however, are associated with men of privilege and their roles in government and ultimate dominance.

 

Men, who are a part of this patriarchal government that women are mostly excluded from, have created these civil liberties and systems of governments not only to be authoritative over politics, but to be authoritative over women and to have access to hetero-sexual relations. The marriage contract to officialize the relationship between man and woman is odd though, according to Locke, considering that women are claimed to be naturally subjected to men. This can be related to previously mentioned historical needs to declare natural rights, rights that are supposedly self-evident. Due to the emphasis on marriage, sexual relations are a political move, a move that needs both man and woman to make. “The sons overturn paternal rule not merely to gain their liberty but to secure women for themselves. Their success in their endeavor is chronicled in the story of the sexual contract” (p. 2).

 

Incorporation of women into a sphere that “is and is not in civil society” is portrayed through obvious marriage contracts, though considered mostly of natural and private matter, are publicly acknowledged in civil societies. Their involvement goes deeper, as mentioned in chapter three, whereas their obedience is an act done submissively with the expectation of protection by the man in return. Here, because marriage is a private matter, we can see some limitations on forceful male power, apart from political standing, if the wife is willingly involved in making a marriage work for both partners’ benefits. Locke brings up the topic of family, where women are again inclusive, considering their parental power and voice over their children. In situations where there are problems between a married man and women, women have been known to exercise their right to leave their husbands, which proves that men, again, have no absolute control in all standings.

 

Incorporation of women are also evident through women’s contribution to trade and industry. Women, who are of a lower-ranking and status than men, make an economical difference when acknowledging prostitution; sexual favors in return for compensation. The contribution and profit the act has on capitalist production should make them recognizable in a capitalist and civil society, and yet, because of their subjection, their contributions are overlooked. Though it may not be considered morally ethical, their role is played in satisfying men in a civil society that isn’t so chivalrous and gallant.

 

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