The Dilemmas of Gurlz’ Desires: Perverting the Post-Patriarchal Order

Abstract

The possibility of a gurlz’ desire of their own not being overshadowed by boyz’ desire, is the ethical challenge presented by the paradoxical figure of the “dirty virgin” in post-patriarchy. How to be a sexual subject and remain so without being positioned as a sexual object can take on a hysterical psychic structure to ensure feminine jouissance. Repressed illicit pleasure by the “moral society” is unabashedly let loose by the obscene underside of this respectability by the porn industry, which is haunted by Sade’s moral ruse of sexual equality. The Sadean “categorical imperative” of the body to enjoy pleasure, as Lacan famously argued,¹ was simply the obverse side of the Kantian “categorical imperative” of the moral mind. De-Oedipalization brings these two structuring fantasies together as the Law that separates them begins to slide and wane. The “bad virgin” is but one of a number of other equally compelling fantasmatic strategies, which addresses this moral and ethical conflict. In this chapter gurlz’ desires are discussed to better grasp why music is such a primary site/sight/cite for postfeminist identification.