{"product_id":"sex-and-punishment-four-thousand-years-of-judging-desire-9781619021556","title":"Sex and Punishment: Four Thousand Years of Judging Desire","description":"The \"raging frenzy\" of the sex drive, to use Plato's phrase, has always defied control. However, that's not to say that the Sumerians, Victorians, and every civilization in between and beyond have not tried, wielding their most formidable weapon: the law. At any given point in time, some forms of sex were condoned while others were punished mercilessly. Jump forward or backward a century or two (and often far less than that), and the harmless fun of one time period becomes the gravest crime in another. \u003ci\u003eSex and Punishment\u003c\/i\u003e tells the story of the struggle throughout the millennia to regulate the most powerful engine of human behavior. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWriter and lawyer Eric Berkowitz uses flesh-and-blood cases--much flesh and even more blood--to evoke the entire sweep of Western sex law, from the savage impalement of an ancient Mesopotamian adulteress to the imprisonment of Oscar Wilde in 1895 for \"gross indecency.\" The cast of \u003ci\u003eSex and Punishment\u003c\/i\u003e is as varied as the forms taken by human desire itself: royal mistresses, gay charioteers, medieval transvestites, lonely goat-lovers, prostitutes of all stripes, London rent boys. Each of them had forbidden sex, and each was judged--and justice, as Berkowitz shows, rarely had much to do with it. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith the light touch of a natural storyteller, Berkowitz spins these tales and more, going behind closed doors to reveal the essential history of human desire.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Counterpoint LLC\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 04\/09\/2013\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781619021556\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 456\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.40lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.80h x 5.90w x 1.10d","brand":"Eric Berkowitz","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":36662411329692,"sku":"9781619021556","price":16.11,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0473\/0804\/6492\/products\/img_996d984d-3992-4d39-bbf7-61ad84ac08b6.jpg?v=1603901834","url":"https:\/\/pastforward.org\/products\/sex-and-punishment-four-thousand-years-of-judging-desire-9781619021556","provider":"Past Forward","version":"1.0","type":"link"}