I feel very similiar. I worked in a porn store for awhile and had to show videos on the televisions in the store. I refused to show anything that I felt was degrading (men telling women what to do, etc - this does not include S&M films, we weren't allowed to show them in store anyway). I, personally, felt that watching porn from the 70s and 80s tended to be a little better, although not always. I pretty much showed the kinds of things you would find at good vibes.
I support a woman's right to choose, in every way, what to do with her body. The thing that frustrates me about prostitution is how (because it's illegal) it is connected to crime and drugs, and sometimes, it seems, women are almost forced into the situation. I sometimes wonder how many people are prostitutes because they truly chose to be, and how many were almost forced into it through circumstances of their lives?
Yeah, and the same thing is true to an even greater extent in pornography.
Safe sex doesn't sell. Pornography that shows the man using a condom just doesn't sell as well as unsafe sex.
Vaginal sex doesn't sell as well as anal sex. And in those types of scenes there are commonly horribly unsafe things being done (ass-to-mouth blowjobs and the like).
Then you get up into the whole double penetration thing....
It's really sick how much pressure is put on the actors and actresses to engage in more and more risky behaviors. There's a huge amount of manipulation.
I wish it were all as simple as, "People want to have sex for money," but it isn't. There's a whole power dynamic out there that is really disturbing.
I love the idea of free, available counseling for all types of sex-workers (heck, I like the idea in general for all people as part of a national health care system).
Seconded on the feelings about pornography. If the majority of it were healthy sex showing both partners as human, I'd be all for it. Even in gay porn it seems that the "effeminate" partner is objectified.
I agree. In an ideal society, I would fully support (legalized) prostitution, stripping, and other forms of sexual entertainment for women who chose to do so. However, as the industries exist now, with the sexual climate that exists now, and with the lack of power women have now, choosing to go into one of these professions is highly risky. I think you should be able to acknowledge these risks and still call yourself sex-positive if you so wish: it looks like you're opposed to the dangers of the sex industry as it currently operates, not the industry itself.
As for books: Jane Sexes It Up by Merri Lisa Johnson is an anthology of essays written by mostly Third Wave, sex-positive feminists. Some of the pieces aren't that good, but there are a few worthwhile ones on prostitution and stripping which explore the idea of reclaiming prostitution/stripping as a form of empowerment. Elisabeth Eaves' Bare has been recommended to me, though I haven't had a chance to read it myself. It's written by a stripper, but obviously a lot of the same
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Thanks for the book recomendations. I did a little poking around in the related books area and found some other great things as well. It seems like this is a fairly common consideration for younger feminists.
On the other hand, prostitution and pornography (as they are now) on the whole present negative stereotypes about women and contribute to the sexualization of rape and objectification of women.
Actually, I would say that prostitution and pornography do not in themselves present negative stereotypes of women, but rather, they are valued as such by malestream authoritarian ideologies threatened by hedonistic-libertarian tendencies. Such ideologies seek to undermine pleasure because this has the effect of making men more violent.
Apologies, it made perfect sense to me when I wrote it. When I'm in deep-thought mode it's hard to remember to come outside of the echo chamber of my mind in order to make my thoughts clear to those who are not inside my brain with me. :-D
Basically my thought is that prostitution and pornography are not necessarily harmful to women, in that I can conceive of a society where they are aspects of positive and healthy expressions of sex and pleasure. But in this society, dominated as it is by overbearing authoritarian ideologues, the context around them is such that they are used as weapons against women.
In this article I quoted some time ago, it is theorized that "the deprivation of physical sensory pleasure is the principal root cause of violence."It follows that a hegemonic society, characterized by patriarchal and other patterns of class domination, would find this inverse relationship between pleasure and violence a useful one. Hegemony is institutionalized latent violence, meaning that what fundamentally keeps people in
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I support a woman's right to choose, in every way, what to do with her body. The thing that frustrates me about prostitution is how (because it's illegal) it is connected to crime and drugs, and sometimes, it seems, women are almost forced into the situation. I sometimes wonder how many people are prostitutes because they truly chose to be, and how many were almost forced into it through circumstances of their lives?
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Safe sex doesn't sell. Pornography that shows the man using a condom just doesn't sell as well as unsafe sex.
Vaginal sex doesn't sell as well as anal sex. And in those types of scenes there are commonly horribly unsafe things being done (ass-to-mouth blowjobs and the like).
Then you get up into the whole double penetration thing....
It's really sick how much pressure is put on the actors and actresses to engage in more and more risky behaviors. There's a huge amount of manipulation.
I wish it were all as simple as, "People want to have sex for money," but it isn't. There's a whole power dynamic out there that is really disturbing.
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Seconded on the feelings about pornography. If the majority of it were healthy sex showing both partners as human, I'd be all for it. Even in gay porn it seems that the "effeminate" partner is objectified.
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As for books: Jane Sexes It Up by Merri Lisa Johnson is an anthology of essays written by mostly Third Wave, sex-positive feminists. Some of the pieces aren't that good, but there are a few worthwhile ones on prostitution and stripping which explore the idea of reclaiming prostitution/stripping as a form of empowerment. Elisabeth Eaves' Bare has been recommended to me, though I haven't had a chance to read it myself. It's written by a stripper, but obviously a lot of the same ( ... )
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Actually, I would say that prostitution and pornography do not in themselves present negative stereotypes of women, but rather, they are valued as such by malestream authoritarian ideologies threatened by hedonistic-libertarian tendencies. Such ideologies seek to undermine pleasure because this has the effect of making men more violent.
Reply
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Basically my thought is that prostitution and pornography are not necessarily harmful to women, in that I can conceive of a society where they are aspects of positive and healthy expressions of sex and pleasure. But in this society, dominated as it is by overbearing authoritarian ideologues, the context around them is such that they are used as weapons against women.
In this article I quoted some time ago, it is theorized that "the deprivation of physical sensory pleasure is the principal root cause of violence."It follows that a hegemonic society, characterized by patriarchal and other patterns of class domination, would find this inverse relationship between pleasure and violence a useful one. Hegemony is institutionalized latent violence, meaning that what fundamentally keeps people in ( ... )
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I can give away the tomatoes I am growing in my backyard, but there isn't anything preventing me from selling them.
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I was under the impression that you were trying to explain why this might be the case.
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