Governor Mark Sanford crying for Argentina (photo:AP)
Well, that didn't take long.
Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina has admitted to an affair, which is why he was down way the fuck in Argentina. Witnessing yet another politician self-destruct has me again thinking, why does any of this matter? This culture's singular obsession with sex is maddening. We blew how much money during that Ken Starr/Clinton/Lewinsky circus? Who gives a fuck?! As soon as something event remotely shifty happens, people's ears perk up. Like "What? Oooooh? Looks juicy!" We're an entire country of gossip queens.
This of course brings to mind Eliot Spitzer, the former governor of New York who famously got caught Sir Humpsaloting some prostitutes. At least with that, Spitzer was revealed to be a glaring hypocrite in light of his crusade against prostitution. I don't know about Sanford's past and his platforms, but all of these cases end the same way, with some guy crying in front of the cameras. You'd think that after this happened enough times, people would start, I dunno', thinking that this sort of thing is common and not really worthy of getting worked up over. We live in world of instant communication, near-ubiquitous camera coverage, and, as I mentioned, a populous so bored with its own insignificant existence that anything interesting happening in others' lives becomes instant news fodder. Yet, still, men in positions such as this will put their entire careers and lives in jeopardy for some roll in the hay.
This incident basically destroys any chance that Sanford had for the Republican run in 2012. Why? What about having an affair has any bearing on that? Presidents have been ridiculous philanderers for all of history. Because regardless of what many people want to think, we're animals, and males in power will hump just about anything with two legs and a pulse (Or not! Pulse optional!). Some of our greatest presidents were comically unfaithful. Kennedy is well-known, but so was FDR, Teddy, and even the fat ones like Grover Cleveland were having illegitimate children. This behavior is part of the human animal.
I don't have much respect for even the very concept of sexual fidelity. I think our obsession with it is both a misogynistic and religious construct. Why misogynistic? Because who stands the lose the most from sexual infidelity? Men. Men don't want to raise a child that isn't genetically theirs. Emotional infidelity is damaging for the female, because she loses the support of the male, but that's not what we're talking about, here. We're talking about sex. No one cares that he may have been down there reading bad love poetry to this mystery woman. They care that he had sex with her.
Sexual fidelity is a fantasy. Some people have it, certainly, but that's because they want it. Others do not want it. It is not our place to judge them for that.
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