In the interest of keeping my posts to a minimum, this post will discuss the "Pornography: Men Possessing Women" article by Andrea Dworkin and the Avedon Carol article, "A Feminist Argument Against Censorship."
Article 1: I found it extremely interesting that this article (or excerpt) was written in 1981, since it sounded like it was written only a few weeks ago for today's contemporary audience. Of course, this is because the issue of pornography and which side supports it is a classic issue, but I think the reason why it sounded to relevant to me is because in the near three decades since this article was written, the author's statements have only become more pronounced. For instance, a few years ago there was a reality show (that sadly my mom loved to watch) that dealt with the daily lives of a few of the Playboy girls in Hugh Hefner's mansion. From what I know about the show, it was a light, fluffy, "it's so much FUN to work in Hefner's mansion, hehe" type of show. No issues or concerns about working in the porn and pleasure business were ever discussed: their lives were perfect, and they were in that business because they wanted to be. To me, this only reinforced the stereotype that girls enter prostitution because they WANT to, not because they NEED to in order to support their children on a single paycheck. And let's face it, most prostitutes don't need additional jobs because their one profession pays more than enough money.
In regards to the second article, I am surprised again how old the article really is--in 1996 the Internet was still young and used by very few people, so Congress enacting laws against child pornography would have hardly been a concern compared to today, when a simple Google search could uncover horrendous images and videos of exploited children. Also, where has this Congressional "decency" legislation gone? Aside from music, television and anime censorship (which is a whole other topic)against trivial things like curse words, where are the real crackdowns on child porn rings? Is that crickets I hear? Only very rarely are such discoveries and busts reported in the media, but an episode of Family Guy will be put in all of the newspapers and featured on the prime time news networks.
Granted, this is my own opinion, but I feel as if our priorities are majorly screwed up. Rant aside, I like the second article and how it mentions that often it is the feminist ideals that will often be the ones censored, even though it is for "our" benefit.
I think you've hit on an interesting point, that the feminist-separatist argument from Dworkin does have some resonance today with anti-porn rhetoric. But the porn industry has also radically changed (this article pre-dates the internet); how do these same views apply to internet porn?
ReplyDeleteThe child pornography problem is a disturbing thing, but what also disturbs me is how easy it seems to be to entrap someone and accuse them of child porn tendencies when that is not the case.
For a very interesting and not always sympathetic view of this topic, the film THE WOODSMAN, directed by Nicole Kassell and starring Kevin Bacon as a pedophile recently released from prison, is highly recommended.