Pathologizing Difference | A Biopolitical Critique of Female Sexual Interest & Arousal Disorder

Female Sexual Interest/Arousal Disorder (FSIAD) introduced in the DSM-5, diagnoses persistent absence or reduction of sexual interest and arousal in women. This talk questions the diagnostic criteria of FSIAD functions that act as biopolitical instruments to impose the state's pronatalist ideologies.

FSIAD operates within a framework of compulsory sexuality, wherein variations in desire serve to justify a psychiatric classification. It also critically examines the diagnostic criteria’s validity, emphasizing its insufficient consideration of cultural differences in relational dynamics. When addressing low desire, biopolitical instruments of sexual optimization are utilized, effectively reframing the intervention as a form of neoliberal self-care.

In this way, capitalist economies. that are structurally dependent on renewable labor markets to sustain their economic growth, institutionalize heteronormativity and repronormativity, while framing variations in desire, interest and arousal as sites of intervention. This in turn, normalizes compulsory sexuality, aligning arousal with reproductive imperatives of the state and its demands for capitalistic accumulation.