[First published 13 April 2008. Re-read it today and decided to recycle it!]

What a fabulous fiasco it turned out to be, the hue and cry over the recent revelation by a scabious Murdoch-owned tabloid (News of the World) that a female math prodigy who entered Oxford University at 13 was now working in Manchester as a "£130-an-hour hooker" ten years later. Why the hue and cry? Simply because the girl, Sufiah Yusof, was supposedly Muslim, one of five children born to a Pakistani father and a Malaysian mother.



The crux of the problem is that morality has become inextricably linked to sexual behavior when morality and sex have very little to do with each other. Cutting edge thinker Robert Anton Wilson often wrote about the conflict between what he called the logogram and the biogram. Morality is part of the logogram - a set of assumptions and beliefs conjured by the verbal mind. Sexuality is part of the biogram - a reproductive strategy activated by biochemical, bioelectrical and sensory processes that do not take their cues from the analytical mind.


* Strong paternal authority
* Sexual repressiveness
* authoritarian values
* reactionary political ideologies

Sexual desires naturally urge a person to enter into all kinds of relations with the world, and to enter into close contact with others in a variety of forms. If these urges are repressed, they can only express themselves within the narrow confines of the family. In patriarchy, there is much more emphasis on sexual control than in matriarchy. If all the wealth passes through the father, you want to be very sure who the father is. If it passes through the mother, there is less concern as to who the father is. Monogamy will cease to be presented as the only legitimate form of sexual bonding. [Brief summary of a paper by Victor Daniels of Sonoma State University]
E.F. Baker, in an essay on Reich published in the Journal of Orgonomy wrote:
"Reich could only conclude that sex, which was formerly believed to be solely for reproductive purposes, had the vitally important function of maintaining a stable energy level within the organism. It would follow, then, that without sexual repression, there would be no neuroses. This is indeed the case in those societies that are sex-affirmative, such as the Trobriand Islanders.' Such societies are matrilineal in structure. In western civilization (and most Asiatic and other countries), a patriarchal form of social structure exists which is sex-negative. We have, therefore, to be concerned with the social cause of sexual problems and hence neuroses. Our whole society is oriented against true sexual freedom and, from infancy on, every effort is made to inhibit and repress any sexual manifestations. Boys and girls alike are severely reprimanded for any curiosity about the other's body, and adolescents who engage in sexual relations can be severely punished. Thus, only a few are allowed to grow up with a natural sexual attitude, and yet, when they marry, they are supposed to be able to function. Few find or attain a satisfying sexual relationship even in our day when youths are boldly showing their sexual interest and demanding its fulfillment."

Those who believe Sufiah Yusof needs to be saved from a life of sin and godlessness are themselves most likely to suffer from acute sexual repression. Growing up in a patriarchal culture and indoctrinated with erotophobic beliefs that equate pleasure with immorality, the existence of a sexually liberated female like Sufiah threatens the fundaments of their belief systems.

If I were living in the vicinity of Manchester, I might be sorely tempted to look Sufiah up. Not with the thought of saving her, of course, but it would be absolutely delicious to have a juicy discussion on algorithms and integral calculus with her while nonchalantly peeling off her algebra. Well, I'd better start saving up. This foxy lady who began life as a math genius doesn't come cheap!
[First posted 13 April 2008. Reposted 27 November 2013]