"Even if we set aside rape fantasy and bondage porn, a large amount of pornography involves physical abuse, often even showing it as something the woman desires or "deserves." Porn often uses pejoratives towards actresses. There's a large bit of internet pornography which involves tricking the woman. The subset of porn involving pain for the female is much much larger than that involving pain for the male.
Is it just me, or have any commentators or amateur muckraking feminists on teh itnerwebz
ever encountered amateur pornography? Animated porn? Interactive pornographic games? I couldn't attest to any strict per capita majority, but you can be rest assured that a similar volume of prospective viewers visit sites that contain much wider varieties of porn than the Ms. Airbrushed Faketits paradigm to which journalists and/or would-be ethicists have focused their attention with their myopic laser focus for decades now. It is an outdated concept of what constitutes a pornographic film, picture, etc. that disproportionately dominates and clouds the vision of the retro-feminists who think they still have something relevant to say about an unambiguously shitty industry that, by rights and by the cruel market logic by which it has historically played, should be dead by now. (Anyone ever heard of the Pirate Bay? Demonoid? Streaming media? The Bittorrent protocol? Anyone?)
As someone who has periodically indulged in pretty much any kind of porn imaginable (even some that I didn't previously know existed), I have a very hard time caring about the 'professional' porn industry, at least in connection with my own viewing habits, since I do not regularly solicit that particular industry's services when watching internet porn. I suspect that many porn consumers - male and female alike - feel similarly. Why they don't speak up in these contexts is beyond me.
Yes, viewing, or even making any of these kinds of pornography, including fantasy rape is a far cry from actual rape. But all contribute to the idea that women aren't actually people."
No they don't.
you cannot explain away all dominating porn with a kink-friendly attitude. you can't deny some porn is disturbing for more reasons than "you aren't into that kink."
Yes I can.
"the issue, for me, is that its a legal impossibility to give consent prospectively. thats why its probematic to “contract” for it. consent, by definition, must be constantly re-negotiated, but contracts, by defintion are not renegotiated after they are executed. the definitions are at odds.
Double facepalm. Prospective consent for untoward or unexpected consequences is given every day in a multitude of social contexts, from ethical, evidence-based medicine (say, consent to undergo a surgical procedure, the physiological consequences of which are sometimes unpredictable and could be irreversible) to supervised jet-skiing and bungee jumping (waivers, etc.).
although there are many, many out there who are giving testimonials about how they were brutalized in the industry, and had to “go with the flow” no matter how painful and degrading things got after the contracts were signed. their testimonials frankly illustrate how problematic prospective consent actually is. for example, that there will be “consequences” to her stopping the activity that go beyond STOPPING THE ACTIVITY. the addition of extra consequences to “stopping” that dont exist in real life sexual encounters creates coersion."
This is wrong on at least two levels: 'Real-life sexual encounters' are valued over and above the viewing of pornography precisely because such experiences are multidimensional and highly interactive. I have never once encountered a human relationship of any kind that was not in some way founded upon what the above quote refers to as 'coercion' - and I
especially have yet to encounter a sexual relationship that did not revolve around social and psychosexual pressures of one sort or another. Billions of women and men outside of the porn industry are plagued daily by crippling insecurities and perceived obligations regarding sex and sexuality. Almost
every 'sexual encounter' contains untold layers of 'extra' emotional and psychological consequences 'to "stopping"' (to say nothing of continuing) above and beyond the banal and the obvious.
Secondly, why must professional pornographic scenes be even roughly analogous in their deployment to the real world of human sexuality? Again, this is a primitive notion that harks back to the twentieth century, during which one couldn't find a single atom of pornographic media, most of which featured relatively pedestrian content, without begging, borrowing, stealing, or, more prevalently, purchasing a video, magazine, poster, or whatever from Playboy, Hustler, or less reputable firms. 'Professional' porn, no matter what your opinion of it (I find it formulaic, unintentionally humorous, and boring, but to each his/her own), is interested foremost in simulation, as opposed to faithful representation, of both real and imagined sex acts. The actors in pornographic videos aren't 'having real sex' any more than Bruce Willis is 'really dispatching a henchman in hand-to-hand combat to the death' in [insert Bruce Willis movie], so why should anyone expect that pornographic actresses be treated the same way, or even similarly at all, during filming as they would be when with a lover? Of course, it goes without saying that every actor should be treated ethically and with the respect that they are rightfully due, but the issue here is far more subtle. This brings the conversation roundabout to the perennially hairy ethical issues of 'informed consent,' to which I think SideOrder did effective justice above. These women (many of whom are well over the age of 25, 30, and even 40 years) are
not children. They are, I think, well past the threshold age after which society deems them sufficiently grown up to make these sorts of decisions for themselves. If the consequences prove too degrading or painful for them to endure, then it is likely a combination of moral turpitude on the part of the industry
and the naive complicity of the females it employs that have conspired to make it so - neither of the two factors alone could produce such a miserable state of affairs possible in the first place.
[Feminist perspectives re. porn, much like feminist perspectives on anything, predictably dredge up the same old tired facets of gender politics, to which I tried to remain strictly allusive in my responses above. Among the more obvious concerns are: To what extent do feministic moralists get to decide for
other women what constitutes degradation? On what or whose authority do they cast their sweeping social judgments? What research can they cite in support of their views? For contrasting views of pornography as such within feminism itself,
see here.]
Also, from the same excerpt, for the lulz:
Pubic hair is shaved off to give the women the look of young girls or rubber dolls.
No. I shouldn't have to spell this one out, but here it goes: A little elementary evolutionary biology is all it takes to explain away Hedges' Prepubertal Sex Doll thesis in sufficient detail. A lower volume of body hair is generally preferred on females because a lower volume of body hair is a prominent sex characteristic of females as a gender, much like large breasts, wider hips, softer facial features, &c. Not everyone is into hairless gals, in much the same way that some people choose female mates with prominent, sharply defined facial features, or who have large quantities of adipose tissue, but most people seem to prefer less body hair on women rather than more. Carried to its logical extreme, the consequences of this basically innocent aesthetic preference are exactly what we see in pornographic videos (and often IRL, at that). I wonder if Mr. Hedges is into pit hair as well? Or is that just namelessly different somehow?
Pornography does not promote sex, if one defines sex as a shared act between two partners. It promotes masturbation.
Lol, no shit, Chris.
It promotes the solitary auto-arousal that precludes intimacy and love.
Says who? Chris Hedges, again? 8)
[From a former pr0nz addict:] “You want the women you are with to be like the women in porn. I was scared to get involved in a relationship. I did not know how extensive the damage was. I did not want to hurt anyone. I kept away from women.”
Yup, it was definitely just the porn.
I could do this all day. The potential for lulz is seemingly boundless.
