When former Arkansas governor and presidential contender Mike Huckabee used the phrase “ick factor” in describing his opposition to gay marriage, news organizations jumped on the comment and Huckabee defended himself by attributing the phrase to the LGBT community.
In particular, he cited Chicago philosopher and professor Martha Nussbaum. “Nussbaum has often made reference to the ‘ick factor’ in her professional writings and is credited with applying the phrase to the GLBT community,” Huckabee wrote.
But Nussbaum, in an email to Politico, said she has never used the phrase and demanded an apology from Huckabee.
“I have never used the phrase ‘ick factor’ in any of my three books dealing with the emotion of disgust, or in any articles,” Nussbaum wrote.
She then went on to explain the philosophy behind the phrase she does use:
I use the term “projective disgust” to characterize the disgust that many people feel when they imagine gay sex acts. What does that term mean, and to whom does it apply? The view I develop, on the basis of recent psychological research, is that projective disgust has its origin in a discomfort with one’s own body and its messier animal aspects, including sexuality, and that, in a defense mechanism, disgust is then projected outward onto vulnerable groups who are characterized as hyperphysical and hypersexual. In this way, the uncomfortable people displace their discomfort onto others, who are then targeted for various forms of social discrimination.
Thus the people to whom the term “projective disgust” applies are the insecure and emotionally stunted people who campaign against equal rights for gays and lesbians, not gays and lesbians themselves.
“Mr. Huckabee has gotten bad information about my work and has completely turned its meaning upside down, imputing to me a position (that gays and lesbians are disgusting) that I criticize as childish and morally deficient,” she wrote. Huckabee “owes me a public apology,” she added.
Hucakbee could not immediately be reached for comment.
In the original profile, published in the New Yorker, Huckabee discussed his opposition to gay marriage.
“I do believe that God created male and female and intended for marriage to be the relationship of the two opposite sexes,” he said. “Male and female are biologically compatible to have a relationship. We can get into the ick factor, but the fact is two men in a relationship, two women in a relationship, biologically, that doesn’t work the same.”
Later, he defended the phrase, saying in a statement on his web site that it was a phrase used by the LGBT community.
“My use of the phrase ‘ick factor’ was as the established notion from within the Gay, Lesbian, Bi-sexual, Transgender (GLBT) community. It was not an indication of personal aversion, but rather a reference to an established phrase used mostly from same-sex marriage advocates and militants – not one I created,” he wrote.
And he cited both Nussbaum and a writer for Edge magazine, Joseph Erbentraut, with using the phrase.
(Ed. note: TPM inaccurately wrote, in covering this story, that Nussbaum “coined the phrase.” We’ve corrected the error.)
