My post on Monday on Ethan and his views on porn is getting more hits than any other post I’ve put up since writing about Cho Seung-Hui a few weeks ago.
There’s a good debate about the male sex drive and porn use in the comments section below my post and Ethan’s original one at Crucial Minutiae. Lynn shares her own contribution to the discussion here. Clearly, a lot of us are taking issue with his original thesis that there were only three possible options for men “overwhelmed” by the hornies.
Ethan was a bit less than enthusiastic about my views on radical intimacy and relationship. He writes in a comment:
The other issue is that I’m a real relativist when it comes to relationships. This mostly comes from my mother, who is a psychotherapist and feminist. I believe that the presence of pornography in a relationship–or its total absence–is something that should be discussed and agreed upon within a relationship. As in, there is no outside morality that holds any sway within the confines of your relationship. Only what you and your lover agree upon matters. That’s my view.
Yikes. That makes me very uncomfortable. As several other people immediately pointed out, no “discussion” takes place in a vacuum. Let’s say a man — like an Ethan — brings into his relationship his belief that the male sex drive is an overwhelmingly powerful force. Let’s say he also brings in his steadfast belief that he can compartmentalize, meaning that he can “use” porn (read: masturbate to it, let’s be honest, boys) without having the images he see have any deleterious effect on his relationship with his girlfriend.
Let’s say his girlfriend brings in what many women bring in: the strong and powerful desire to be “different from the other women”, the ones who “are too uptight about porn and strip clubs.” So boyfriend brings his story of his tsunami-force libido, and girlfriend brings her desire to be pleasing, and then they have an “open discussion” without “any outside forces” influencing the relationship. They ignore “outside morality.” Sounds very progressive and mature, no doubt, but it ignores completely the reality that we all bring our people-pleasing, our control issues, and our pre-determined views into the discussion.
With all respect to Ethan, I’ve seen a lot of these discussions go down. Often, but not always, girlfriend says that boyfriend’s porn use makes her uncomfortable. Boyfriend explains that using porn isn’t really cheating, because as Ethan says, “thoughts are not actions.” (Masturbation, brother, is an action.) Boy explains his remarkable male ability to compartmentalize, to move seamlessly between spending an hour on his computer hunting down the next exciting image or video and seeing his girlfriend as a complete human being. Girlfriend isn’t really convinced, but since she’s not a guy — and since boyfriend seems so emphatic — she starts to wonder if maybe this kind of compartmentalization can work. At this point, boyfriend points out that using porn is much better than having an actual affair, and he sometimes (if he’s got the chutzpah) suggests that girlfriend should be grateful that this is “all” he does. Boyfriend usually structures a false set of options, typically in which porn appears as the Least Bad Thing. He tells girlfriend she can:
1. Have more sex with him (or “different” sex) with him to meet his needs
2. Have him go crazy with horniness and be miserable — and just maybe, prone to infidelity
2. Let him use porn “on the side”
Obviously, not all women fall for this argument. But plenty do. And so it’s not enough to say that “every relationship can define its boundaries for itself”; we need to acknowledge the myths, assumptions, and needs that each person brings to the discussion. And when both parties to the discussion consider the discourse of the overwhelming male sex drive to be an incontrovertible fact rather than a myth, than the entire subsequent conversation will take place under false premises. And the outcome will not be the best.
Note: I’m quite aware that there are some very stereotypical assumptions in the scenario I paint here. My goal is not to reinforce those stereotypes, but to expose as fallacious the idea that “outside morality” (or cultural discourses) can ever be successfully excluded from a relationship discussion.
UPDATE #1: Let me be clear, Ethan’s writings were not about his actual relationship with his girlfriend. He writes at his place: …I do want to make the point that I was writing about what I see as the general condition of porn and men in relationships, and the role of compartmentalization, NOT the specific conversation/framework that my girlfriend and I have on the subject… Fair enough, and I’m happy to clarify.
UPDATE #2: Let me link with enthusiasm to No Porn Northampton, which has been kindly linking to me. They’ve got some good stuff up.
…so repeating a lie because you believe it’s true is still lying? Am I hearing you correctly?
(”weapons of mass destruction” comes to mind, too)
In terms of your intention, of course not. In terms of the damage the lie can do, you bet it can be just as destructive. Impact isn’t always contingent on intent.
You raise what is, of course, a very important rejoinder to Ethan’s comment. But the conversation you describe isn’t actually the kind of open relationship-creation that Ethan is talking about, it just mimicks its form. If radical intimacy means anything to me, it means actually accomplishing what that Ethan describes. Your republic of two should be a radical democracy. This can’t happen if it’s governed by “Hugo’s relationship rules” or “God’s relationship rules) OR letting the identities we bring to the relationship be ruled by silly gender stereotypes that justify questionable behavior and demands.
So, to sum up, I think Ethan’s very right on the theory here, but I suspect he’s falling short of that, by letting a convenient and somewhat sexist script play out in place of that real conversation.
it’s not enough to say that “every relationship can define its boundaries for itself”; we need to acknowledge the myths, assumptions, and needs that each person brings to the discussion.
Still, at some point you have to trust that your partners are acting for themselves, not just out of some socially-delimited myths/assumptions/needs. Beyond a certain point, it’s just patronising and condescending to assume that your partners aren’t capable of determining for themselves what they find acceptable in a relationship.
No question, Sara. And I suppose what I wrote here tends to apply much more to younger folks (in their first or second serious relationship) than older ones. But I don’t think it’s patronizing to recognize that many of us are consciously or unconsciously affected by these myths, and I think it’s reasonable for us to not always take what the other person says to us automatically at face value as a result.
DJW, even the most democratic relationship doesn’t evolve in a complete vacuum, uninfluenced by social and cultural pressures. Acknowledging those pressures, copping to them, and exploring why it is we feel as we do — that’s a universally good thing to do.
A major theme of porn is that women enjoy being cajoled or forced into certain sexual acts, that they will come to leave their inhibitions behind and enjoy themselves, that ‘no’ really means ‘yes’. For example:
Testimony in Minneapolis: Porn and the Death Spiral of a Marriage
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2007/04/21/my-boyfriend-is-addicted-to-porn-what-should-i-do.aspx
…we would have incredible arguments with each other. I would tell him I loved him, I only wanted to love him, I wanted to be a good wife, I wanted our marriage to work, but I didn’t want to be with these other people. It was he I wanted to be with, and no one else. He told me if I loved him I would do this. And that, as I could see from the things that he read me in the magazines initially, a lot of times women didn’t like it, but if I tried it enough I would probably like it, and I would learn to like it. And he would read me stories where women learned to like it.
Testimony of Wanda Richardson, Harriet Tubman Women’s Shelter
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2007/02/07/testimony-in-minneapolis-pornography-extreme-anti-women-socialization.aspx
If you look at a lot of pornography, it shows women being beaten, humiliated, tied up. It shows women tied and stabbed, poked, prodded and abused by devices, assaulted by several men or animals, and many ugly and degrading things. When you see a woman being battered, you see a lot of the same ugliness and violence at the same time. Not only do they portray women as liking and deserving this sexual abuse, it shows them as enjoying it, deserving it. And that is what one of the great myths of battery is, is that women deserve to be battered and that they enjoy it. If they didn’t like it, they wouldn’t stay…
Testimony of Elana Bowman, Member of the Women Against Violence Against Women Coordinating Committee
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2007/04/06/testimony-in-los-angeles-psychiatrist-rapes-patient-as-therapy-for-inhibitions.aspx
I was working up the papers for a restraining order at the Domestic Violence Project, when a woman began telling me that her husband confessed to her that he had raped his daughter from his first marriage, and that he served time for it. She asked him how he could do that to his own blood. He answered that it was all right, that the little girl hadn’t minded it, and that he had enjoyed it enough for both of them. He had seen the pictures of it, and when girls did it enough, they liked it, and that they really did like it or they wouldn’t do it in the pictures he had seen. We talked more about that, and I asked her if she thought that the porn he read was any cause of what he had done. She said, “Of course,” and he had those magazines now, and she had had enough. She had a little girl too, and she was doing all she could to stop him from getting to her daughter.
Robert Jensen: When Examining Complex Social Phenomena, Scientific Method Has Limits; Listen to the Stories of the Victims (explicit language)
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2006/12/16/robert-jensen-scientific-method-stories-victims.aspx
“I know all about you bitches, you’re no different; you’re like all of them. I seen it in all the movies. You love being beaten. (He then began punching the victim violently.) I just seen it again in that flick. He beat the shit out of her while he raped her and she told him she loved it; you know you love it; tell me you love it…” [Silbert and Pines, 1984, p.864]
Another major theme of porn is that pain is pleasurable. For example:
Statement of Rev. Susan Wilhelm: “…the sex became especially abusive after he started using pornography” (explicit language)
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2007/02/23/reverend-susan-wilhelm-sex-became-especially-abusive-after-pornography-explicit.aspx
He exposed me to the pornography, too. Once we saw an X-rated film that showed anal intercourse. After that, he pressed me to try it. I agreed to once, but found the experience very painful. He kept trying periodically. He told me my vagina had become as sloppy as an old sow’s and he could not get pleasure any other way. He also used to pinch and bite me. When I said “it hurts,” he would say, “no, it doesn’t.” I became numb. I lost track of my own feelings. One time, he said in reference to himself sexually, “it’s supposed to hurt.”
Lizzy Borden: We don’t shoot “all the lovey-dovey stuff that there’s not a big market for” (explicit language)
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2006/12/08/lizzy-borden-we-dont-shoot-all-the-loveydovey-stuff-that-theres-not-a-big-market-for-explicit-language.aspx
“Yeah. She’s really going to get hit. She likes it. It’s good. Sometimes, it makes you more horny when you’re getting hit. It makes you more, like, more tingly down in your genital area. You should try it. You should hit your wife a little bit…”
Martin Amis: “A rough trade” (explicit)
http://nopornnorthampton.org/2006/08/22/martin-amis-a-rough-trade-explicit.aspx
“Rocco has far more power in this industry than any actress,” said Stagliano, pleased to be pulling one back for the boys (generally speaking, men are the also-rans of porno). “I was the first to shoot Rocco. Together we evolved toward rougher stuff. He started to spit on girls. A strong male-dominant thing, with women being pushed to their limit. It looks like violence but it’s not. I mean, pleasure and pain are the same thing, right?”
When you put this all together, it’s easy to see how many porn viewers could be tempted to cross the line into trying to coerce their lovers into doing something painful or that they simply don’t want to do. Porn is much more about power and domination than it is about unforced consent between equal adults.
Throwing in a slightly different idea in here is, what happens when it’s the woman looking at porn and not the guy? That script doesn’t really hold up anymore.
Fair enough. I suspect that the majority of arguments about porn do follow this script, and that men are much more likely than women to make use of pornography while in a committed relationship. But I was responding to Ethan, a man, describing how he and his GF have communicated about the topic.
DJW, even the most democratic relationship doesn’t evolve in a complete vacuum, uninfluenced by social and cultural pressures. Acknowledging those pressures, copping to them, and exploring why it is we feel as we do — that’s a universally good thing to do.
Right, absolutely. Taking apart and analyzing the sexist scripts we sometimes (often accidently!) let define us, our expectations, and our views about our partner and so on are, it seems to me, a crucial part of that particular radical democracy.
Let me be clear: I at no point was specifying how my girlfriend and I have communicated about this topic. I did not present her with those three options and tell her to choose. In my post, I was trying to communicate a notion generalized from years of discussion with other guys on the topic. The only part of what I said that does apply to my relationship with my girlfriend is that whatever pornography I do or do not look at, takes place in a context established between me and my girlfriend. So I’m happy for you to use me as your example, as long as you realize that I haven’t communicated the personal information you think I have. I was not using the pronoun “guys” as a loose stand-in for myself.
Hugo, I also want to say that I agree that options D) and E) from your post (fantasizing about the partner or not masturbating) are viable ones that two people in a relationship can consider.
To an earlier commenter who wondered how I could give authority over such matters to my girlfriend, I think it’s all about trust. Hugo considers viewing pornography to be low-grade betrayal. Other people consider it to be no such thing. I argue that the only opinion that matters in this scenario is that of your significant other. If she (or he) feels it is a form of betrayal, a breach of trust, then you have a genuine issue to consider. Options D) and E) become a much more necessary consideration.
Ethan said: “I argue that the only opinion that matters in this scenario is that of your significant other.”
Spot on Ethan - that pretty much sums it up. It’s richly, ahem, ‘ironic’ that it appears that the people who are quickest to scold conservatives and others who raise questions about homosexual practices, the ethics re. abortion, etc., often telling them to “butt out of people’s private sex lives”, are the same people who rush to scold heterosexual men about using porn.
One person’s upstanding righteous citizen is another’s Puritanical prude.
Ethan, I am sorry if I implied that this was how you had communicated with your girlfriend. And you’re right — I do see pornography as a form of infidelity and betrayal. I also see it as exploitative of those who perform in it, so my objection is not solely limited to its effect on men and relationships.
#7 Antigone May 3rd, 2007 at 12:46 pm
Throwing in a slightly different idea in here is, what happens when it’s the woman looking at porn and not the guy? That script doesn’t really hold up anymore.
# 8 Hugo Schwyzer May 3rd, 2007 at 12:52 pm
Fair enough. I suspect that the majority of arguments about porn do follow this script, and that men are much more likely than women to make use of pornography while in a committed relationship. But I was responding to Ethan, a man, describing how he and his GF have communicated about the topic.
Before I pipe up on the old “double standard” refrain, mayhap you’d like to clarify this?
Either something is wrong on principle - or it’s not.
A possible different script….
1) Boyfriend and Girlfriend begin going out.
2) Somewhere along the line, girlfriend discovers boyfriend’s porn use. Maybe she stumbled on the stack of magazines at the bottom of his sock drawer, maybe she looked at his browser history. Given the wider acceptance of porn in our society it’s very possible he was quite upfront about it fairly early in the relationship.
3) Rather than taking one of the two healthy options available to her–deciding to join in and ordering up some good couples porn, or deciding it’s a deal breaker and ending the relationship–Girlfriend decides to pretend it’s OK because of course, she can change him! Her love will make him stop the one-hand cha cha! She’ll get him to stop using porn, especially after she’s moved in on him–with or without the marriage license–and has more leverage in his life.
4) Once it becomes clear that he isn’t going to change–and he never promised he would, and she knew he indulged in porn fairly early going in–Girlfriend finally does break it off with Boyfriend, having wasted time for both of them and possibly punishing him legally and financially on the way out the door, depending on how long they were together and how official they made the arrangement.
I’ve probably seen my scenario at least as often as Hugo has seen his.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest that just because the script changes, doesn’t make it any better. A betrayal is a betrayal: if Hugo thinks that pornography is betrayal for women, the same holds true for men.
HOWEVER:
When I said the script changes, I’m saying there is probably a lot less social pressure for guys to be up-front about how they feel about their wives/girlfriends looking at porn. Either for or against.
But, I’m not male: perhaps guys could enlighten me if they have felt social pressure to “go along” with their significant others porn use?
Oh, and sidenote: liberals critizing stuff =/= conservatives trying to ban stuff. Just so you know.
3) Rather than taking one of the two healthy options available to her–deciding to join in and ordering up some good couples porn, or deciding it’s a deal breaker and ending the relationship–
Wow, two whole options, huh? How about a woman who has her own sexual fantasy habits already in place, as most of us do, and has no need to mimic her boyfriend’s habits? “Join in,” indeed. And if a woman who does not want to masturbate to porn loves a man who does, she has to not mind, learn to not mind, or leave. She does not have to start doing what he’s doing, for exactly the same reasons that he does not have to stop watching porn to be like her. You understand that part of it well enough, but you don’t seem to see that it’s exactly as unreasonable to ask a woman to change her sexual tastes as to ask a man to do so.
If it’s unreasonable to ask a man to stop watching porn to suit you, it’s unreasonable to ask a woman to start. You can’t have it both ways.
Finally, why do you suggest that she find “couples porn” to share, and not something she would enjoy privately on her own, just like her boyfriend does? That would be a lot more symmetrical.
Sophonisba,
Point taken. A woman could, I suppose, accept the porn use, realize it ain’t going away and just live with the fact that it happens without participating and continue the relationship. Or yeah, I guess she could do parallel porn of her own. I’ve never heard of either happening but in this wide world I suppose it probably has somewhere. I have heard of the “can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.” Approach. And I’ve heard of plenty of cases where a woman breaks it off with a guy because of his porn use, which is certainly her right. But the “I can change him!” approach–which is ridiculous, unfair and doomed to failure–seems to be the most common scenario. YMMV.
Also, point of order: It’s not unreasonable to ASK for anything. It’s the DEMANDING that something change–especially after months or years of accepting it with no problem–that I have a problem with.
When I said the script changes, I’m saying there is probably a lot less social pressure for guys to be up-front about how they feel about their wives/girlfriends looking at porn. Either for or against.
But, I’m not male: perhaps guys could enlighten me if they have felt social pressure to “go along” with their significant others porn use?
I don’t know about that - the whole shaming routine of “afraid of an empowered woman’s sexuality” springs up.
Oh, and sidenote: liberals critizing stuff =/= conservatives trying to ban stuff. Just so you know.
Oh, you Republicrats are really all the same in your desire to impose your own version of “the way things ought to be” on free people. Same song, just different verses.
Gonzman: Speaking as an unashamed social democrat, I really don’t experience the need you seem to be suggesting I must to extend the rule of the state into the private negotiations around porn-use in relationships.
Throwing in a slightly different idea in here is, what happens when it’s the woman looking at porn and not the guy?
I rather suspect that if the woman in Hugo’s fictional scenario decided to start collecting magazines full of buff naked men, the fictional man’s response would not necessarily be “Woohoo!”
Additionally, while Hugo likes to pretend there’s no difference between On Our Backs and Bang Bus Chapter XXXIII: Invasion of the MILFs, there’s a lot of range in porn, and there’s a big difference between finding that your boyfriend or husband likes to look at pictures of nude women vs. his entire collection consisting of “barely legal” magazines and videos.
NBarnes May 3rd, 2007 at 6:20 pm
Gonzman: Speaking as an unashamed social democrat, I really don’t experience the need you seem to be suggesting I must to extend the rule of the state into the private negotiations around porn-use in relationships.
Like I said, ya’ll just have a different verse of morality you want to shove down people’s throats at the point of a gun. As a matter of principle - Democrat = Republican = Taliban = etc. etc. ad nauseum, ad infinitum. All the same thing, only different in WHICH vision of morality you think everyone should live by.
Yeah, yeah - I know, I know: “But OURS is ENLIGHTENED! That makes it different!” The eternal refrain of the true believer.
Uh, Gonzman, I believe NBarnes was pointing out that s/he *doesn’t* want to extend the rule of the state into private negotiations about porn-use.
Or is this one of those “stupid lying leftists” things I’m obviously missing, where if we say we don’t want state intervention, it really means we want state intervention?
Seriously, dude–there’s no functional difference between “Pornography is bad and destructive, and its use should be abandoned and actively discouraged by good and decent people” and “Pornography use should be a criminal offense under the law” are just two versions of the same song? That’s a mighty big brush you’re wielding there…
I really think it’s important, especially in sexual matters, for people to be able to hold the view both that something is bad and should be discouraged, and that it should be outside the realm of state intervention. I’ll defend that view against those folks who insist that I must want the state to ban every sexual thing that I disapprove of, and that, if I don’t want to do such, I’m lax and really do approve of that thing that they want banned (some things that people want banned I see nothing wrong with, but some I dislike myself and simply don’t want banned). And I’ll also defend that view against people who think that every assertion of a desire to dissuage people from doing X is a desire to bring the state in to ban it.
Now, responding to several other people:
A woman could, I suppose, accept the porn use, realize it ain’t going away and just live with the fact that it happens without participating and continue the relationship. Or yeah, I guess she could do parallel porn of her own. I’ve never heard of either happening but in this wide world I suppose it probably has somewhere.
Then you need to get around more, Chief. I’ve heard of at least as many women accepting a partner’s porn use without participating themselves as I’ve heard of going out and getting “couple’s porn.”
The other issue is that I’m a real relativist when it comes to relationships.
I’m not. I’m a semi-relativist. The way I see it, if I were an extreme non-relativist, I’d be inclined to believe, not only that what felt right or wrong to me in a relationship was absolute, but that everyone else knows I’m right, and is just pretending otherwise out of selfishness or whatever. And I’ve run into that sort of person: not only is abortion wrong, but every woman who has one is aware of this and wracked by guilt, not only is homosexuality wrong, but deep down gay people know how dubious and unloving their relationships are, not only is casual sex wrong, but nobody really enjoys it. I think that, in general, people are aware they’re doing wrong (and have to stifle that knowledge) when they can visibly see that they’re hurting another person who’s right there with them, otherwise our feelings are all over the map. So, with porn, as a semi-relativist, I’d assume that some of what feels creepy to me really does feel OK to many men and women, at least as long as someone isn’t visibly suffering in the making of it. Also, some specific things really are individual to the particular relationship (for instance, for my bipolar husband, there are things that we both agree are signs that he’s heading into mania, and that it’s time to caution him about that - whether other couples are OK about those same things doesn’t matter, since other couples aren’t worried about mania).
But being a “real relativist” seems to me to involve commiting myself in advance to the idea that whatever people say they like is equally good and healthy, that there are no ways of doing relationships that are more healthy or workable than others, and that people are best off making decisions as little units of two without looking outside themselves at all. And that’s not where I am.
Gonzman,
DJW is absolutely correct that the statement “Pornography is bad and destructive, and its use should be abandoned and actively discouraged by good and decent people” does not equal the statement “Pornography use should be a criminal offense under the law,” and I say that as someone who supports reasonable efforts by communities to restrict the availability and production of pornography. Perhaps the greatest obstacle which faces those of us who are intensely interested in reviving/developing a sense of manners, civility, and civic morality, is the common assumption that any possible attempt to discourage a damaging product or behavior must be tantamount to the imposition of an official board of censors. Not the same. You can, in fact, humbly attempt to improve to the best of your understanding–through education, through persuasion, and through (yes) certain selective laws–the relationships and sensibilities and perspectives of both oneself and others without being the Taliban. Unless you want to argue there was no difference between living in the United States in the 1950s, and living in Afghanistan in the 1990s, that is. You may not prefer to live in either place, but I certainly hope that, given a choice, you’d at least recognize the difference between the former and the latter.
Lynn-Gazis Sax: “Chief. I’ve heard of at least as many women accepting a partner’s porn use without participating themselves as I’ve heard of going out and getting ‘couple’s porn.’”
Let me clarify a little here: I’ve heard of some women who start off with the “don’t ask, don’t tell” attitude towards porn but then eventually move on to the “I demand that you get rid of it now that I’m a part of your life” model. Heard of that plenty, including in my own marriage. A woman who will continue to leave it alone, who will recognize that his use is part of the overall package going into the relationship and never complain about it as long as he at least keeps the door shut? I guess it’s theoretically possible, but I’ve never heard of a relationship continuing for very long on that basis.
Lynn,
“I really think it’s important, especially in sexual matters, for people to be able to hold the view both that something is bad and should be discouraged, and that it should be outside the realm of state intervention.”
Just to add on to what I wrote above, I probably don’t disagree with you here on anything major, but it’s worth pointing that “the realm of state intervention” is pretty broad. To have absolutely no involvement from the state in sexual matters whatsoever would mean that your opinion about “something [that] is bad and should be discouraged” will forever have to be kept private and could not guide your actions as a voter or citizen in any way. Among other things, it would mean that the good site Hugo has linked to, No Porn Northhampton, which says it “support[s] the reasonable regulation of sexually oriented businesses…[and] call[s] on landlords to exercise sound judgment about whom they rent to,” would be totally out of luck.
I have four daughters, and on occasion, while discussing different notions of freedom in my classes, I note that in no serious sense do my girls today any longer have the option–the “freedom”–to grow up and develop in a culture where they will not be at least occasionally, if not repeatedly, be viewed through, assessed in light of, marketed to, and face damaging social/sexual expectations at least partially informed by, our often downright misogynistic pornographic culture. Do I want to get rid of the freedoms that undergird that culture? Not really. Do I wish for the revival and extension of public environments wherein which the free choices that spread that culture are–thanks to the thoughtful critiques of people like Hugo–somewhat less accepted and enabled? Well, yes.
arielladrake May 4th, 2007 at 6:52 am
Uh, Gonzman, I believe NBarnes was pointing out that s/he *doesn’t* want to extend the rule of the state into private negotiations about porn-use.
Or is this one of those “stupid lying leftists” things I’m obviously missing, where if we say we don’t want state intervention, it really means we want state intervention?
No ma’am.
I stated that you and the right wing of your Republicrat party both want state intervention - just in different things. Two people chimed in claiming they didn’t want state intervention in matters of Porn.
Never said you wanted state intervention to shove your morality down other people’s throats - as far as PORN goes. But as far as other matters? Sure ya do.
Makes you and Jerry Fallwell just different sides of the same coin.
True, Russell, there are different sorts and gradations of “state intervention,” and some I’m fine with. (For instance, licensing marriages at all is a form of “state intervention,” and one I think is useful.)
Russel said: “DJW is absolutely correct that the statement “Pornography is bad and destructive, and its use should be abandoned and actively discouraged by good and decent people” does not equal the statement “Pornography use should be a criminal offense under the law,” and I say that as someone who supports reasonable efforts by communities to restrict the availability and production of pornography. Perhaps the greatest obstacle which faces those of us who are intensely interested in reviving/developing a sense of manners, civility, and civic morality, is the common assumption that any possible attempt to discourage a damaging product or behavior must be tantamount to the imposition of an official board of censors.”
So following Gonz’s theme here, how is what you describe above any different than the recent Supreme Court ruling upholding legislation putting restrictions on only the most severe, barbaric forms of abortion? If you were to believe the feminists, the SCOTUS started down a slippery-slope to banning abortion, so how is putting restrictions on porn any different vis-a-vis “slippery slope” arguments?
I agree with Gonz: Same song, different verses.
Because the Supreme court upheld a law BANNING “partial-birth abortion”. No one, ever, said anything about making porn illegal.
This false equivication is really old.
A woman who will continue to leave it alone, who will recognize that his use is part of the overall package going into the relationship and never complain about it as long as he at least keeps the door shut? I guess it’s theoretically possible, but I’ve never heard of a relationship continuing for very long on that basis.
Well, Chief, now you’ve heard of it. We’ve been together 15 years, married for 10 of them. For a while, we were both downloading our own flavors of porn. After a while I stopped because porn got to be boring. I’ve never asked him to stop, but I have noticed that his consumption has dropped off considerably on its own.
Folks, let’s stay on porn - ’cause this is an excellent discussion — and away from the minefield of abortion. I’ll have another post on all this later today, lord willin’.
I’ve never really had a problem with my partners’ porn use (or masturbating, or fantasizing, etc.). I don’t think this is because of the well-known desire to “be different from other women” (though I can’t deny experiencing that desire). I have a pretty radical view of how people ought to relate to each other, and my philosophy in this area is so different from Hugo’s that arguing about it would be silly. I enjoy reading Hugo’s perspective anyway.
But basically, I think the inside of a person’s head is their own business. I value understanding my partners way more than having them conform to my desires, and I see that as basically a trade-off, in that when you start demanding that people behave in a certain way, you incentivize them to lie. (Lying is morally OK with me when the intent is to protect your own privacy, but I prefer to make it safe for partners to be open with me.)
Leaving aside the question of whether porn is exploitative (it most likely is, but I don’t tend to think about that), it doesn’t intrinsically bother me for people, including my lovers, to look at it. But then, it barely if at all bothers me for my lovers to have other lovers, so, like I said…I’m just a freak. (As I suspect is true for most people, a lot of my philosophy arises out of my feelings.)
As far as porn affecting the relationship…I don’t know that I buy that so much. If the relationship is not working for me I’ll seek to change or end it, but I’m not comfortable preemptively asking people to give up habits that “may” have marginal effects. I wouldn’t want my partner to ask me to stop having a beer a few times a year lest I should maybe become an alcoholic. (It would be different if I had a demonstrated problem with substance abuse or something.)
Heard of that plenty, including in my own marriage.
Your own marriage was to a woman who was bipolar, right? And not particularly stabilized with medication? As someone with a bipolar husband (now stable and med compliant), I’d say that sudden changes from “this is OK with me” to “I DEMAND you stop this” could be a symptom of the disease.
Normally, for a woman who’s stable, I’d expect “I DEMAND you stop this” to be preceded by a lot of “I’m not comfortable with this” rather than a lot of “Oh, I’m fine with this, really.”
I don’t really like the idea that asking one’s partner for more and more varied sex belongs on a continuum with porn. While obviously fantasy and representations of sex are in some way similar to sex (masturbatory or partnered), they are not of a piece in my view. In fact, I think (and I have said in comments on this blog before) that representations of sex can be measured by how much they are like sexual conduct (an interaction between participants, whether creator or recipient) or converesely like a product.
Tam:
Yes. Politics stops at my skin.
I don’t believe the real disagreement lies between those who favor the regulation of what we call “pornography” and what we don’t; rather it lies between those who want to get into other people’s heads and those who don’t.
I support sensible regulation of pornography. I want the sets regulated for health and safety, and to ensure that only willing participants over 18 get involved. Beyond that, I consider that kind of regulation, and support for that kind of regulation a moral obligation. And I believe, equally strongly, that every person as an obligation not to contribute to causing harm to other people.
But I do not believe that the government has a right to police what goes on in other people’s heads. The standard assumptions about “pornography”, that it can produce essentially no response other than arousal, does not convince me. The use of medical terms such as addiction to describe ideas concerns me deeply.
In fact, I believe the conflation of concerns about pornography as a source of bad ideas with pornography as an exploitative workplace does a great mischief: it seems to have distracted us from taking steps to protect the performers in what we call pornography.
Antigone: Obviously you missed the part about “slippery slope.”
John, I don’t believe that’s a distraction at all. In a blame-the-victim political climate where the government’s attitude towards all workplaces is “well, we’re sure you know best”, and where malfeasance by employers gets a slap on the wrist–how much attention is anyone going to pay to less “legitimate” industries?
Mythago:
People will pay exactly as much attention as they choose to whatever issues they choose. We can certainly choose to pay little or no attention to the hard problem of ensuring that only willing performers and models appear in what we call pornography, and we can choose instead to debate the question of whether pornography does more ham to relationships than internet poker, or Monday through Saturday night football, hockey, or basketball. Like all choices, that one has consequences, and I would like us to address them intentionally.
You’re assuming that a woman will (probably) be too weak to stand up for what she really wants in a discussion. I disagree but if you’re correct, then porn is a furfy - the REAL issue is her weakness and inability to stand up for herself.
You seem to be arguing that one partner (the man) should subsume their strongly held beliefs so that another partner (the woman) doesn’t have to subsume their strongly held beliefs!
Isn’t it a better goal to empower both individuals enough to REALLY discuss the issue? That way they can come to a mutually agreeable position OR a mutual recognition of the incompatibility.