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| Sunday, 25 July 2004 |
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Power, sex and voyeurism by Malinda Seneviratne Some months ago, the Dinakara wanted my views on politicians and sex. The question was asked in the context of several sex scandals involving prominent politicians. "What is it with power and sex ?" the young reporter asked me. What is given below is more or less what I told the boy. I do not believe that when people acquire power their hormonal activity increases all of a sudden. I am sure all these people did whatever they do now before they became powerful. It might be that they have better opportunity to do it. On the other hand, with power, they are subject to greater scrutiny and are therefore naturally exposed to greater risks of discovery. Personally, I have better things to do than worry about what consenting adults do whether it is in a parked car or a sleazy hotel room as long as they do not transgress norms pertaining to decency and privacy. I am more interested in whether or not they do their job, especially if they are being kept by the taxpayer. Whether or not a given minister has an active sex life with multiple partners, is not my business. If his/her sex life somehow prevents him/her from doing a good job, then and only then does it become a public issue. We are a liberal society. When I entered university as a 19-year-old who was utterly naive about matters sexual, I had thought sexual experimentation was something only rich teenagers could enjoy, at parties where boys and girls would be stuck to each other, "dancing" in total darkness or in parked cars. My fellow undergraduates who had never been to such "parties" laughed at me. They educated me about these things. They told me that they had walked to school through shrub jungle, and through shrub jungle they had returned home. Hide and seek was the game they played, and "Hide-and-seek" had been a code word for sexual experimentation. "In our villages," they told me, "we know who is sleeping with whom, where, when and how". The relevant kuhakakama is an urban middle-class-and-above malady, I believe Fantastic material This is why this business of the Chief Justice allegedly doing "it" with someone in a parked car somewhere close to parliament makes me wonder what all the fuss is about. Sure, there are interesting legal angles to the issue, questions regarding immunity and the impartiality of the legal process which might make fantastic material for legal comment. The CJ's political loyalties and indeed political ambitions are clearly grist in the mill called political intrigue. But why is Victor Ivan so worried ? What is the kunu rasaya that persuades him to devote so much editorial space to this allegation ? For that matter, is there something lacking in Lasantha Wickramatunge's libido for him to lay it out so thickly on a double-page spread ? Have they lived in some sort of sexual cocoon all their lives ? What is the psycho-sociology of the rampant voyeurism they are demonstrating ? Watchdogs I conclude the following: 1) They are both so privileged that they can afford to spend their time peeping into parked cars to see who is doing what to whom. If this is what allows them to get their rocks off, I would be the last person to grudge them the pleasure; except of course that they both happen to be editors of publications that are purported to act as watchdogs. I cannot bring myself to accept that either of these people are salivating perverts, but they seem intent on making me change my mind. I wonder, what would Lasantha and Victor do if they saw, say, Ranil Wickremesinghe doing the down-and-dirty somewhere and with some strange woman ? Would he be surprised ? Would he splash the sordid details all over his newspaper (sic) ? What would Victor do if he spotted Lasantha in a parked car in a compromising position, and vice versa ? Which brings us to their second possible motive: the exigencies of political loyalty. They have eyes for the Manages of this world, but not the P.M.B. Cyrils and the countless other UNPers who have abused power. Such blinds are not accidental and for this reason they cannot claim to have integrity. But let us get back to the juicy stuff. Yeah, the sex. Years ago, when Bill Clinton got entangled with Monica Lewinsky, I told my friends from the USA: "Why are you obsessed with this ? Surely, you people know that the vast majority of married men and women in the USA have extramarital affairs ? Bill is merely proving that he is the product of democratic representation, a man of the people, so to say !" Eduardo Galeano observed: "In 1998, we got Monica Lewinsky; we had Monica for breakfast, lunch and dinner; we got her at home and wherever we went. I am sure something else happened in 1998, but I do not remember !" If Victor Ivan and Lasantha Wickramatunge were the high priests of (mis) information dissemination, then some unknown chronicler, reflecting on the year 2004 might very well say: "2004 was about Sarath Silva; I am sure something else would have happened that year, but I cannot remember". Great promise My memory has not got cluttered that much. Yet. I do remember the UNF's election campaign in 2001. The great promise back then was that once in power, the Chief Justice would be impeached. Wasn't done. When the party leadership finally decided to go ahead, it was too late. Maybe it is because we have all this as relevant "political backdrop", that I detect in these allegations and breaking-story hype just one thing: a forlorn whine. Sad. Very sad. |
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