Date: 15 Jan 97 22:14:45 EST
From: "Margaret J. Campbell" <76710.1375@CompuServe.COM>
To: <ch-scene@listserv.oit.unc.edu>
Subject: Re: Flynt, porn, & femin
Message-ID: <970116031444_76710.1375_HHB67-1@CompuServe.COM>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Ross;
Thanks for the nice words. As soon as I figure out how to go
entirely
without sleep, I promise, I'll post more.
Adam--the piece currently sitting on an editor's desk, and which
will, with
luck, move me into the book anthology category, may run under the
name
Charity Primmer, which is an acquaintance's mother. No, really.
And the
mother thinks it is a hoot.
Diane;
I'm afraid I don't get your connection of my not being able to parse
Chris's
messages with what you see as my trivialization of rape. I
don't see what
you're talking about at all. If it was in response to something
Chris said,
I wasn't joking, I can't read his messages. If he talked about
rape, I
wouldn't know it.
FWIW, rape is an act of violence that may share some of the same
actions
(such as vaginal/penile, anal/penile, oral/penile contact) that
sex has, but
this is purely coincidental, as it is coincidental that burglary
and moving
have some of the same actions. Rape is an act of violence.
Now. Do you have a different distinction?
As for snuff films, believe who you will. Me, I tend to believe
those that
really, really wanted to prove their existence, but finally admitted
that
they were unable to.
Is it sexist to make a film about raping and killing women?
Most likely.
But if that is your point, pornography is the least of your worries.
Common ground? How about the 1st Amendment? All of this
stuff *is* legal.
Constitutionally protected, even. If I wanted to write a story
wherein I
kidnapped a small boy and raped him, that would be legal, and has
been done
in mainstream literature. I'm blanking on the author, but
I will probably
always remember the book The Manhood Ceremony, which was very
mainstream, and turned around just that plot. (It also strongly
implied
that this was how gay men were made, they were raped when they were
young, and grown gay men rape children. The book was amazingly
offensive
all around.) But things that are offensive are constitutionally
protected.
I don't know all the names you bring out as being anti-porn but not
anti-sex. I'm quite willing to believe that some of them think
that. But
everyone I've read, which does include Steinam, draw a line at what
sex
should include, even if consensual. It may have changed of
late, but at one
point Ms. magazine wouldn't even acknowledge the existence of the
pro-sex
faction. Read Pat Califia (I think it may be in Public Sex)
for one account
of the censorship, and remember MacKinnon saying Friedan was not
a feminist.
What quotes, specifically, are you calling insipid? I'm afraid
I don't keep
a complete list of everything I've said online.
"If the material is free of sexism, racism, homophobia, and respectful
to all
parties involved..." Who gets to make these determinations?
How familiar
are you with the work of Robert Mapplethorpe? One of his photos
is of a
black man in a suit, with his dick hanging out. The man's
head is cut
off. In response to this photo, Essex Hemphill said "Mapplethorpe's
'Man in
a Polyester Suit" ...presents a black man without a head, wearing
a business
suit, his trousers unzipped, and his fat, long penis dangling down,
a penis
that is not erect.... What is insulting and endangering to black
men is
Mapplethorpe's conscious determination that the faces, the heads,
and by
extension, the minds and experiences of some of this black subjects
are not
as important as close-up shots of their cocks."
Sounds reasonable, doesn't it? I mean, the man doesn't have
a head, how can
that be free of "racism, homophobia" and is certainly isn't respectful.
The man, however, was Mapplethorpe's lover, who agreed to pose *only*
if his
head was cut off, in order to protect his job. Shat Hemphill
saw in the
photo was most likely not there in the minds of Mapplethorpe and
his lover.
Who gets to define whose opinion counts?
As for Hustler and Falwell--what they printed was lacking in any
sort of
taste. But was it parodying Falwell's public image?
Unquestionably. And
parody is, thank you Supremes, protected speech.
I'm afraid Dworkin *is* using porn to make money. She could
have written on
the sexism inherent in, say, the fashion industry. Or the
fast food
industry. But she chose porn, and as a result, she gets book
contracts, and
people pay to hear her speak, and to see her slides of bad, evil
porn.
The main difference between what the pornographers sell and what
Dworkin
sells is that the pornographers have releases from the models, and
they pay
them. Dworkin, to the best of my knowledge, doesn't.
As for the ACLU, I do suppose you know that it stands for American
Civil
Liberties Union, yes? Are they to turn down constitutional
cases because
they might make money? Saying that they sometimes work for
people who can
pay them is *not* saying that they are for sale to the highest bidder.
Oh, I knew I forgot something--working on the fringes of porn means
keying
orders in for Adam & Eve for a few years, then reviewing movies
for them for
a few years more. Very much on the fringes. And I never,
ever, heard a
discussion of snuff films.