It鈥檚 Not a Woman鈥檚 Job to Protect a Man鈥檚 Virtue

It鈥檚 a story as old as the Bible itself: Female temptress threatens to destroy virtuous man with witchy powers of persuasion.

Robert Foster, Mississippi state representative and gubernatorial candidate, has righteously declared that he won鈥檛 be alone with any woman other than his wife. To protect himself, he demands a female journalist seeking to shadow him bring along a . Foster may be new to our Twitter feeds, but his philosophy reflects hundreds of years of mythology surrounding a woman鈥檚 capacity to destroy good men with some sort of vaginal magnetism.

In Homer鈥檚 Odyssey, poor Odysseus had to 聽of his ship just to withstand the power of the Sirens鈥� song. We鈥檝e got Jezebel, Delilah, Cleopatra, not to mention the hot neighbor in 3,000 Hollywood blockbusters about an聽otherwise totally chaste father brought to adulterous ruin by that woman. You know the one.

Oh, and Eve, of course. There鈥檚 always Eve. For the 鈥済entler sex,鈥� we sure have one hell of a reputation for destruction.

Mothers shield their sons from us. Professors refuse to shut their office doors behind us. Senior executives avoid sitting in conference rooms alone with the young and beautiful among us. (Sure, this makes career advancement a touch complicated, but if a woman really wanted to be an executive, she would have avoided being born a woman).

Foster explained himself on Twitter: 鈥淏efore our decision to run, my wife and I made a commitment to follow the 鈥楤illy Graham Rule,鈥� which is to avoid any situation that may evoke suspicion or compromise of our marriage. I am sorry Ms. Campbell doesn鈥檛 share these views, but my decision was out of respect of my wife.鈥�

Ah, the Billy Graham rule, created in 1948鈥�yes, 1948鈥�has been affectionately updated as the 鈥淢ike Pence Rule鈥� because our courageous vice president also refuses to be alone with women because he loves Jesus.

According to Pence and Foster, their decision demonstrates respect for the sanctity of marriage, though one wonders if they equally enjoy the side benefit of impressing their base of Trump-supporters battling for the gold medal in Cherry-Picked Piety Olympics.

This hypocrisy is only baffling if we forget that their declarations have nothing to do with spirituality and everything to do with upholding White supremacist patriarchy. This is about maintaining the White man鈥檚 place 鈥渁t the top鈥� of the race and gender ladder. Their cages for Brown children and their call for male chaperones for female journalists are about domination and control; their religion merely a tool to create and justify spaces delineated by gender and race.

The idea that a devoted, loving relationship could be destabilized by the mere presence of a woman doing her job for 15 hours is, at its core, an irrational and ridiculous assertion. It would be laughable if it didn鈥檛 materially degrade a woman鈥檚 capacity to function professionally. There鈥檚 no mythical magnetism in a woman鈥檚 body, no power to control men. And men aren鈥檛 brainless, moralless single-celled creatures who turn into putty in the presence of a woman.

Foster, Pence, and Billy Graham鈥檚 Virtue Vow of Insecurity reduces women to sexual beings, removes their autonomy, and situates them squarely in the male gaze. The idea that she could be separated from her gender or sexuality, that she is simply a reporter trying to do her job, is impossible, because that allows bodily autonomy.

In the world where these men operate, it becomes the woman鈥檚 responsibility to protect male virtue.

In the world where these men operate, it becomes the woman鈥檚 responsibility to protect male virtue. She must not wear those 鈥渟lutty鈥� clothes. She must not show too much skin. She must not be too pretty. The man defines the terms of her acceptance.

Of course, in the age of #MeToo, the Billy Graham Rule also serves to punish women for coming forward while furthering the narrative that the real victims are straight men. The truly insidious part of this, of course, is that a woman is much more likely to actually lose agency over her body, to actually not have a choice.

In reality, somewhere between 2 and 10 percent of sexual assault are unfounded, and very rarely do these result in criminal conviction. But the few false rape accusations get a lot of air time, and the hysteria around 鈥攅ven among feminists, there鈥檚 disagreement about whether it was misconduct or a 鈥渂ad date鈥濃€攃reates an idea that women are running around flinging false accusations every time they鈥檙e angry or want attention.

Fact is, three out of four rapes are . Women are more likely to be raped and stay silent than they are to create assault-related lies for personal gain.

And once again, if a man wants to avoid being accused of sexual harassment or assault, he should not harass or assault women. Instead, men like Pence and Foster are using our attempt to speak more openly about harassment, assault, and misconduct as a weapon against us. Now we are not only temptresses, we are potential liars鈥攏ot to be trusted.

Their declaration is an attempt to reinforce and reinstate the dominant position of the White Straight Man in a world shifting beneath their feet. It鈥檚 a retaliation against #MeToo and an attempt to shove women back into their rightful place as temptresses, liars, objects, vessels of sexuality through the male gaze.

It is a delineation of space鈥攁 last, tired fight. But聽it is failing. We aren鈥檛 going anywhere. We have made this space our home. And if they don鈥檛 like it, they can go back to where they came from.