backgammon set up
You may worry about your hair-do today, but tomorrow much peanut butter will
be sold.

I’d rather lose a hand than be raped. Feel free to disagree, if you can manage to do so without sneering. It’s not an argument based on reasoned facts.

You have to realise your opinion in isolation here is pretty meaningless. You are not the aribiter of deciding the pecking order of misfortunes.

Remember that condescending thing I mentioned? You’re doing it again. Knock it off.

No - I really meant what I said - as in, no irony, no offense meant to be given - I really think your posts are constructed around a very particular identification with a perceived victim class. Call that condascending - that’s exactly what I’m reading from your posts.

And speaking of action, since you’re so gung ho about more regulation, why don’t you tell us about your suggestions?

Well I’ve already said regulation is the only way to highlight problems and therefore deal with them. Same as any other industry. You’re never going to eliminate abuse altogether, just as you’re never going to get zero accidents in the construction industry through foul play, or companies cutting corners, or sheer human negligence. Happens in every industry.

You keep pointing out only women can be victims, and I’m a little suspicious how you don’t concede there can ever be male victims of abuse in porn, just like any other industry, nor have you even bothered to say what kind of action you’d like to see happen - it just seems you’re happy to wallow in a problem you claim is serious and affects women only. It smacks a little of victim identity politics.

Remember that condescending thing I mentioned? You’re doing it again. Knock it off.

I’m happy to concede that there are male victims in porn, although I suspect they are fewer in number, if for no other reason that that there are fewer male porn performers than women. (I have my own thoughts on this, but that’s separate.) I’ve not heard any specific stories about the abuse of men in porn, but by all means, direct us to them. (John Holmes and his coke addition, maybe?)

And speaking of action, since you’re so gung ho about more regulation, why don’t you tell us about your suggestions?

Losing a hand can mean becoming homeless and ultimately dying a hungry beggar, but I guess rape is rape, and that must be worse, according to you. Or ‘qualitatively different’ whatever that means in this context. I’m not really into putting victims of misfortune onto different levels of pedestals. I think other people’s misfortunes and how much they suffer from them is a subjective and endless speculative debate not worth getting into - and I’m not sure why you made that bizarre comparison.

Without starting an oppression Olympics, I think sex work and the particular kinds of dangers associated with it are unique in a way necessitating action.

What action? More regulation? If so, I agree with you (again).

What concrete proposals do you have for the porn industry - what is this necessary action you allude to?

You keep pointing out only women can be victims, and I’m a little suspicious how you don’t concede there can ever be male victims of abuse in porn, just like any other industry, nor have you even bothered to say what kind of action you’d like to see happen - it just seems you’re happy to wallow in a problem you claim is serious and affects women only. It smacks a little of victim identity politics.

Without starting an oppression Olympics, I think sex work and the particular kinds of dangers associated with it are unique in a way necessitating action. And without starting a flame war, I’d suggest that rape is qualitatively different from, say, losing a hand in an industrial accident.

I think it’s also impossible for men clicking around online to know definitively whether everyone involved is over 18, practicing safe sex, and acting freely. “Responsible consumers” is not a phrase that gets bandied about in porn use for good reason.

I’m guessing your point is that you believe abuse is prevalent in the porn industry and proportionally higher than other industries, and you believe this abuse is worse than abuses faced in other industries, hence your attention to the abuses in porn. Otherwise, all things being equal, if you put a spotlight on any industry, you will always find abusers and victims.

Anyway, interesting discussion, and I think we probably agree on most things here.

Funny, you might actually have asked me this rather than just making baseless assumptions. I have no quarrel with sexually explicit videotapes. I have a problem when they involve abuse.

The key word here is ‘potential’…But if you think all users of porn slide down that same slope, you are wrong, and Hugo is wrong here too.

Hence the emphasis on the word potential. Not everyone who uses porn has a problem managing their interests in it. For plenty of men, it just doesn’t hold their attention. Others have a much better sense of the line between film and their own lives. I, unlike Hugo, don’t have an issue with porn from an explicitly Christian or feminist perspective. I think it becomes a problem when people head down that slippery slope (which I don’t think you’d deny does happen in some cases.)

When the mainstream porn industry had its HIV scare, they talked about people contracting the disease in unregulated shoots without condoms in South America. I think this highlighted how regulated the industry is.

It highlights what goes on in the mainstream, American porn industry. It’s not doing a damn thing for the people in South America where the footage was shot. Porn is not all Digital Playground and Candida Royalle.

So what do you propose? Are you saying regulate it more?

Well, mainstream American porn is already highly self-regulating. They’re business, incorporated entities, and need to defend themselves against regular attacks from politicians, et al. But as a percentage of the total porn market, American entrepreneurs who are worried about being nailed (sorry, terrible pun) by the IRS don’t make up anything approaching a majority. Leaving aside the people who work for mainstream production companies, there is a lot less regulation, if any. No protocols about condoms, HIV testing, etc. The only thing everyone gets on the bandwagon about is kiddie porn, although it’s still produced by some vile human beings somewhere. The abuse is real. I don’t know how you crack down on it without cracking down on the producers and users as a whole.

The key word here is ‘potential’. One drink of alcohol has the potential to lead a person to alcoholism. One slice of cake has the potential to lead someone to morbid obesity. These are facts, because food and alcohol can become addictions. Porn can be addictive too, no question. You can pretty much think of any activity and you’ll find it’s dangerous if you take it to an extreme. Moderation in everything (as I have stated in a previous post). But if you think all users of porn slide down that same slope, you are wrong, and Hugo is wrong here too.

A lot of people exploring their sexual appetite find it gets more nuanced the more they explore - you could say ‘refined’, just as we refine a lot of our tastes. This can lead people to view actually more particular fetishes or even softer porn. It’s really difficult to chart an individual’s journey here.

When the mainstream porn industry had its HIV scare, they talked about people contracting the disease in unregulated shoots without condoms in South America.

I think this highlighted how regulated the industry is. What came to light was the number of HIV tests actors have to go through and the strong reaction from the industry itself. This exception highlighted the rule of a regulated industry.

Porn exists. You (I think) want to eradicate it somehow. Fair enough. We’re entitled to our beliefs and I respect your belief. But hundreds of millions of people love it, and millions of people around the world are employed in some way to porn. You then face up to the fact it’s not going to go away. So what do you propose? Are you saying regulate it more? I agree with you. Are you saying ‘just get rid of it’? Well, how?

Also, there are women who love making porn for free - amateurs. What do you say to them? They can’t do what they like doing? How do you stop them? Should we stop them? Is anyone being harmed in those situations?

I ask genuine questions here - this is interesting.

Well, in part I mention it because not all porn is what’s made by Vivid. Many aspects of the American porn industry are reasonably well regulated and safe. But I think it’s silly to pretend that stuff like Jenna Loves Bella and Pirates are all there is to the porn industry. When the mainstream porn industry had its HIV scare, they talked about people contracting the disease in unregulated shoots without condoms in South America. Porn is not just domestic. The internet means that you can watch stuff shot in Thailand and stuff that’s clearly abusive and cruel and made outside those nice standards. If Hugo’s theory holds water (and I think to an extent it does), vanilla porn isn’t going to hold people’s interest for very long. The quest for novelty has the potential to become a quest for the extreme. And the extreme requires people who are either into that (a group which becomes smaller the closer you get to edge play) or people who are coerced.

(I also mention it because it references porn specifically in the context we’ve been discussing and Google’s really not so helpful when trying to find stuff about porn unless you want to watch it.)

You point to Wikipedia that itself has no specifics (and Wikipedia has many, many disputes with a lot of its entries) and two individuals’ accounts and a PDF about prostitution. I don’t know why you are trying to conflate prostitution (the ’sex trade’) with women working in a legal, regulated porn industry. The article mentions that sometimes children are forced to work in pornography. I don’t dispute this kind of thing goes on - and it’s highly illegal and wrong. But they are talking about unregulated, illegal porn ’shoots’. Illegal activity. I am not going to argue for that kind of thing.

This is what a regulated porn industry does not get itself involved in. It has money to make. It has licenses to lose. You’re pointing to illegal acts and saying “hey look! The entire porn industry is terrible!”. It’s like going to a market that sells copies of Lacoste t-shirts that fall apart after a day and you suddenly say Lacoste are bad at making t-shirts. It’s a misrepresentation.

I’m also betting that a lot of this illegal activity happens in countries where they don’t have a regulated porn industry to take the lion’s share of money (people follow the money).

I’m not sure what you want here - to make all porn illegal (i.e. make it all unregulated?). Or evangelise to all porn users that it’s ‘wrong’ to view porn, and thus cleanse the world of porn? What do you see wrong with a more pragmatic solution to regulate a porn industry?