Taking Leon at his word

Some people are taking Kass's call for the resurrection of old-school norms of female sexuality to heart. Dr. Michael Adams, for one.

Kass, on womanly virtue:

Many, perhaps even most, men in earlier times avidly sought sexual pleasure prior to and outside of marriage. But they usually distinguished, as did the culture generally, between women one fooled around with and women one married, between a woman of easy virtue and a woman of virtue simply. Only respectable women were respected; one no more wanted a loose woman for one's partner than for one's mother.

The supreme virtue of the virtuous woman was modesty, a form of sexual self-control, manifested not only in chastity but in decorous dress and manner, speech and deed, and in reticence in the display of her well-banked affections.

Adams, on the existence of an "Orgasm Festival" for college students that purports to teach them about the female body (AKA Shorter Kass):

Jessica Polka, an executive board member for the co-sponsor of the event, was recently quoted as saying that "We also have the goal of trying to work toward fighting the social stigma against female sexuality." In other words, she wants college women to become whores without being ostracized.

Some people made excuses for Kass and tried to defend his statements when his essay was dissected at Crooked Timber last week, but this is what Kass's reinstitution of the stigma on female sexuality will require: male authority figures calling women who are interested in sexual pleasure "whores."

As one commenter pointed out, it must be very uncomfortable to be a female student of Dr. Adams's. (h/t Feministe)