Warwick’s review of Pornography: Men Possessing Women > Likes and Comments
210 likes · Like
Excellent analysis!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist...
I wonder how the Anti-Porn Laws will demarcate their limitations and amendments. The word "abuse" at the risk of its generalisation can get a bit problematic when dealing with the detractors.
Thank you so much. I rewrote this a hundred times and still find it hard to be as direct as I'd like. I guess I'm still conflicted myself. Like most people, probably.
Oh! Thanks, Praj, I was just about to reply to your comment on the other review. As you say, I think when it becomes a legal issue then you really tie yourself in knots. The UK has for some reason been pretty bad in this area, compared to the US.
Oh, i think my comment got wrongly posted. Sorry for that. And, thanks for your reply :)
It's my fault, it's because I posted the same review under both books – bit confusing, I realise…
One question i have for you is this. How authentic do you feel your emotional perception of the women in porn is. When I view different porn I can have very different emotional reactions to it. Even when the ccontent is similar. Obviously on one hand they are actors and actresses, but in much of the porn that's available on the net is pretty raw and it seems possible to me to see differences in how the women are experiencing the actual things they are doing. However there seems to be many things that can complicate this picture. How do you rate your ability to accurately judge whether the woman is uncomfortable or not?
Warwick wrote: Dworkin can't accept that anyone could take part in porn of their own free will – or if they do, it must be a free will corrupted by male-supremacist society to the point where it can no longer be taken as their own. That means she's forced into what seems to me to be the absurd and antifeminist position of denying their agency completely: less sophisticated women may think they know what they want, but Andrea Dworkin knows better. Stoya or Sasha Grey might see themselves as intelligent and articulate businesswomen with a lot of sexual curiosity; Andrea Dworkin sees only ‘the dummy forced by the pimp-ventriloquist’.
Who's objectifying who now?
Very good question. I have a problem with postmodernist critiques of many industries (i.e., Foucault on the asylum or the prison) because the deny agency, see passive victims everywhere.
I appreciate McElroy's argument, as you present it here:
Porn and feminism are, she claims, natural bedfellows that share a common interest in exploding traditionalist views of women as wives and mothers with rigidly controlled sexual freedom. Pleasure – entirely absent from Dworkin's account – becomes a key concept. Far from corrupting women's idea of sex, porn can be, McElroy argues, a way for women to explore and expand sexuality in a safe and controlled environment.
McElroy seems to be addressing the situation of the Orthodox Jewish women, I read about in this article in the Sunday New York Times Magazine. Of course, it's very sad to see women being raised in an environment where they are discouraged from seeking pleasure in sex, taught to believe that they are ugly if they enjoy sex. The Joy of Sex came along at just the right time for me, and it's obvious that someone should write a version for these women.
On the other hand, humiliation seems to be an essential element of much porn. I say this from very limited experience. I've read Sade as a historian. I have never watched a pornographic film billed as such, although I have watched Last Tango in Paris. I felt sorry for Maria Schneider's character and for the actress who was brutalized in the course of making the picture:
I agree, that Dworkin is unjustified in evoking the Holocaust, although I appreciate the rhetorical value of doing so. But I can't help but think of Jean Améry, who was tortured by the Gestapo in a prison at Breendonk, Belgium). In At the Mind's Limits: Contemplations by a Survivor on Auschwitz and Its Realities, he compares torture to rape:
I suspect that sexual humiliation is equally indelible and, in the light of what I know about porn, would prefer not crossing the boundaries.
Thanks for a thought-provoking and honest review.
globulon wrote: "How do you rate your ability to accurately judge whether the woman is uncomfortable or not? "
Not well, which is exactly why I feel conflicted about it and why interviews with people in the industry, of the sort that are presented in McElroy, are so welcome.
It is a central issue. Kink.com, for example, is a site that's renowned for the size of its female following, despite the fact that in some ways it's some of the most extreme porn out there. One possible reason for this is that after the scenes themselves there is an interview with the main actress – who in the scene itself might have been sobbing or whatever – grinning from ear to ear and talking about what she just went through as an actress and what she got out of it and the input she had into it. In this way they make the consent and the level of fantasy manifest, and this is clearly very powerful for many viewers.
"intellectual absolution"
I've never heard it called that.
Sorry, couldn't resist. Mighty review, Warwick. Your honesty and earnestness on such a fraught topic are admirable.
Fortunately Dworkin seems to have lost the war here as sex-positive feminism gains ever more ground, but I'm astonished that she persuaded anyone with such desperate rhetorical gambits as marching Holocaust victims in to testify. Sheesh! Porn actresses do not get forcibly separated from their families, tattooed, relieved of all possessions, exposed to inhumane medical experiments, worked as slaves, gassed to death, and then skull-mined for their gold fillings by any but the most disreputable porn studios, mostly in the Miami area.
When I was in grad school a seminar class was addressed by an anti-porn author whose name I forgot long ago. Even the more prudish students had a hard time with her argument that ALL porn harmed women, and was tantamount to rape. I asked her "What about porn that doesn't have any women in it?" She seemed like she was about to scoff at my introducing such an imaginary category before she realized. There followed an awkward silence that would be much less awkward today. It was a little frightening to me because I wasn't "out" to these people.
Then I have to give her credit for the most effortful argumentative gymnastic performance by which she universalized the phenomenon of objectification while particularizing the victimization, to assure me that I'm also part of the problem. I admired her attempt to keep me from being marginalized in the discussion. I still wasn't buying it because so much of her argument was based on essentialist assertions that didn't square with my experience as at the time I had a female roomie who watched WAY more porn than I, but who was in no way promiscuous.
But you are so right to note the deficiency of the free speech argument and the agency of the actresses when it comes to banishing qualms. On the bright side, at least in one way porn has become less degrading to women: a hedgehog like Ron Jeremy would never make it today, competing with the likes of Charles Dera or Julian Rios. Or so I hear. I myself have never seen these men nor viewed any pornography.
Well Warwick, I was actually quite taken aback with this review. It's excellently written, of course, as is normal with you but this is a subject that I think about but don't really wish to venture too far into.
All these different types of porn... I think that it is better if I stay with my thoughts. I can, of course, as I'm a woman. A little bit of porn... but then where is the dividing line?
All I can say is that we have our own needs and wants and it's best to keep them personal to a couple or to the individual concerned. There's nothing worse than shocking a friend...
Lisa wrote: "humiliation seems to be an essential element of much porn"
It is, and it seems to be getting more so – although, as I say, it's balanced by an equally prominent push in the opposite direction. It's a big question why so many people, and of both sexes, find humiliation such a draw.
It probably does influence people's real-life sexual tastes a little, but really I think this happens with every generation. Most of the things I read about the supposed pornification of young people seem to me to come down to generation-gap issues; as well as porn, young people now have access to the most full and comprehensive sexual advice in history just by opening Google, and most of the advice out there is surprisingly (perhaps) sensible.
As for the experiences of women on set, yeah it's terrifying. I've never been able to watch Last Tango precisely because I read that quote first, and it's I think the constant fear of everyone who wants to enjoy porn that such incidents are common. McElroy says her research suggests that it's very rare, but see also my reply to globulon above.
The truth is I don't know how healthy these things really are even as fantasies – psychologists can't agree about it – and I'm very aware when I try to talk about it that the stakes are not as high for me as they are for women because of the way sexual violence works. I would love to believe that sexual fantasy is a closed world which doesn't have to answer for real-life incidents, but the realist in me tells me there must be linkages – even if I reject the simplistic correspondence that Dworkin sees.
Anyway thanks for your interesting comments.
This is just fantastic writing. Thank you for the work.
That sounds really amazing what you are saying about them having interviews. I really like that idea.
Gregsamsa wrote: "What about porn that doesn't have any women in it?"
Thanks Greg. AD has been roundly criticised for her treatment of gay porn, and homosexuality in general, in this book, even by people who otherwise like it. She mostly ignores it, but occasionally takes time to point out that gay men ‘conspire’ in the heterosexual male tyranny over women.
I marked this section in my Kindle and went over it several times, but I still can't work out how she computes it. Gayness just doesn't seem to figure in her concept of sexual relations.
Lynne wrote: "we have our own needs and wants and it's best to keep them personal to a couple or to the individual concerned. There's nothing worse than shocking a friend... "
Thanks Lynne, and I'm sorry if I shocked you!
Interesting discussion. What will really disappoint gender-warriors like Dworkin, eventually-- is that the internet is providing a really potent antidote to porn. To the taboo aspects that make it feasible. Which will sooner rather than later make their crusade a lost cause.
No redlight district, no nasty bookshop or theater, no looking over the shoulder, no unmarked manila envelope. Just the guiding hands of Microsoft and Google, and the invisible hand of the free market which will calmly predict: availability + oversupply = diminished value, lower demand.
There will perhaps be some future enlightened era when it is laughable that the narrative elements of porn-- so much more telling than the physics-- are viewed as we do the victorian ideas that 'ladies boots' or the 'can-can' are somehow titillating. A time when the very concept of porn is centered only around the awkward age of fourth graders, for those few months it may take to grasp the obvious and move on.
And Dworkin, well, she may come to your house at night and bite you if you keep this up.
Amazing review and raises huge # of questions--please forgive the free association that follows. I'd forgotten how much Dworkin's arguments shaped discourse on sex during my college ('91)/early grad school years and I feel like I'm only shaking them off now. The early anti-porn movement had nothing to say about women as consumers of porn--as if what? we're too proper? we don't like dirty stuff? The way female sexuality is conceived is pretty horrifying to me now--talk about obliterating agency. But I've found that "slut-shaming" and sexual puritanism find equally fertile ground among the left wing as the right.
Ironically, I say this as someone who dislikes most 'hetero" porn, not because I disapprove but because it fails in its objectives--like I get way more grossed out than aroused. I generally assume that's because it's totally geared towards a male viewer/consumer and (to risk a massive generalization) what male porn viewers want from their female partner doesn't leave a lot of room for my desires/fantasies. (Gay porn on the other hand does not have that problem, as Colby Keller's legions of female fans have discovered.) Mr. Keller's skills notwithstanding, I overwhelmingly prefer written erotic material to video. That sidesteps the problem of the adult industry, but not the ethics of the content, and I admit I like (and write) a lot of stuff that is considered "objectionable"--non-con for example. Here again, stuff that is produced by/for women has a very different feel than stuff produced for men--at least for me. While I respect people's right not to read hard-core stuff obviously, I no longer have a lot of time for the "damage to society" arguments about erotica--I don't think reading 'non-con' turns women into rapists or rape apologists; moreover, I think that (theoretical) damage must be weighed against the damage done by condemning women for having 'improper' fantasies.
J. wrote: "There will perhaps be some future enlightened era when it is laughable that the narrative elements of porn-- so much more telling than the physics-- are viewed as we do the victorian ideas that 'ladies boots' or the 'can-can' are somehow titillating."
Yes, exactly. Thanks J.
Lilia wrote: "not because I disapprove but because it fails in its objectives"
See, this is the way porn SHOULD be critiqued – not ‘this is acceptable, this is unacceptable’, but ‘this is hot, this isn't’.
Thanks for all your thoughtful comments. Before I had kids I wrote a lot of ‘erotica’, under male and female pseudonyms, and it paid a fair few bills for me when I still had time to write, so I totally relate to what you say. I actually think – maybe I already said this somewhere above, I can't remember – that the boom in that area is not unconnected to women's greater involvement in porn itself, which has changed the industry in all kinds of ways.
J. wrote: "There will perhaps be some future enlightened era when it is laughable that the narrative elements of porn-- so much more telling than the physics-- are viewed as we do the victorian ide..."
Well that will be a disappointment to those of us who actually prefer the narrative bits rather than the clinical/comic act. Tension is awesome. Granted the acting is often execrable but not always, and that's a different issue anyhow.
Gregsamsa wrote: " ... prefer the narrative bits..."
Agreed, and that is where this becomes a Goodreads topic; tension and its narrative entanglements are part of what we analyze around here. But somehow the structural build in porn (okay lets get used to the idea that everything we write here is a double entendre) -- is always either simplistic or a little idiotic.
And if as we agree the frame not the act is the intriguing thing, then, well . . . oh, excuse me, there's a buxom meter-maid ringing the doorbell here and it seems she's all out of breath ... brb..
Warwick wrote: "Lilia wrote: "not because I disapprove but because it fails in its objectives"
See, this is the way porn SHOULD be critiqued – not ‘this is acceptable, this is unacceptable’, but ‘this is hot, thi..."
I can't help but feel that there is still a big double standard about women's consumption of erotic material vs. men's. It was most obvious to me post Fifty Shades of Grey, with the unbelievable amounts of outrage, mockery and condescension that was leveled at women who liked the book. A lot of critics were up in arms that it was just wank-fodder, to which I can't help saying, EXACTLY, yes, thank you--about time--we need more. Wank-fodder is to say the least, highly subjective--it's fine if something doesn't do it for you, but I'm not sure why critics felt they had the right to get so indignant that readers found something hot that they didn't like. Except of course that the readers were women--how much outrage do we hear from mainstream newspapers that some bestselling porno has a dumb storyline and bad acting?
A few things to say, but unfortunately they don't really cohere. Oh well...
I do think you identify a huge problem with any sort of Marxist (/Rousseauian/etc) analysis, which is that the concept of false consciousness is a terribly dangerous one. It's hard to dismiss outright, because experiences teaches us that some individuals do seem to express false consciousness: they claim to have one opinion, seemingly sincerely, while everything else about them screams the opposite. But it's very dangerous when we expand that to the social level, because essentially it's closing our eyes to everything that disagrees with us. So as we go through the human race eliminating the views of more and more people from consideration on the grounds of false consciousness, how can we have any confidence left about the accuracy of our own interpretations? Particularly since the false consciousness argument ends up directed at exactly the people who are disadvantaged and marginalised already - it's victims who are potentially indoctrinated, and therefore victims who get ignored and devalued in Marxist critiques. Turns out only the views of socially-conservative white middle-class academics really count as authenthic experiences... so that's a total revolution in symbolic power relations, isn't it?
This is also I guess related to one of the biggest problems I had with Dworking and Mackinnon when I had to read them for uni. It's not that their conclusions are objectionable (though sometimes they are), it's that they don't seem to have any actual argument. It's just "clearly this is the case, and anyone who disagrees is a rapist and/or has been brainwashed by rapists into becoming a traitor to all womankind."
We're meant to just take their word that everyone else has screwed up views on sex. I'm sorry - so I'm meant to believe that all men are violent rapists, that all sex is rape, that all women hate sex and have no interest in penises.... this is the NON-screwed-up view of human sexuality, is it? Frankly the argument 'if people view porn the men will stop thinking of themselves as soulless animals with no feelings or desires beyond a need to be violent, and the women will start enjoying sex!' somehow... doesn't really make their side of the debate seem appealing. Why is this a bad thing, exactly?
In addition to dehumanising women by discounting any pro-porn, or even pro-sex opinions, Dworkin is also essentially treating women as sex objects herself: they are defined through their roles in sex. I find it disturbing that Dworkin automatically assumes that if women are visibly sexual, people won't be able to take them seriously. In reality, most people are able to recognise that women (and men) have many dimensions - what a woman likes to get up to in the bedroom (and indeed whether she wants other people to watch) says nothing at all about whether she can run a company, or a country. Now sure, there are some bigots who think that a sexual woman is good for nothing but sex. But Dworkin seems unable to imagine anybody NOT thinking like that, which makes me worry about how SHE sees women. Because it seems that for her, once a woman allows herself to be 'victimised' by a penis, she's not longer an independent, intelligent woman capable of a full and varied life. It's the old dichotomy: whore or virgin. Sure, Dworkin doesn't use those names, but I don't see why relabelling 'whore' as 'brainwashed victim' and 'virgin' as 'enlightened independent woman' is really a great step forward.
And I think a big alarm bell here should be how close Dworkin ends up to male conservative elites. These porn bans in the UK, they're not being pushed through by liberals, they're being pushed through by the conservative party. they're being pushed through by a bunch of white men who went to eton. And you know who else have been pushing for bans on 'extreme' (ie nonstandard) porn? The tabloids.
Yes, the Sun. Who happily - defiantly - have full-page pictures of naked women on their pages as 'news'.
And on one level that's just hypocrisy, fine, happens all the time. But it also reveals something else: these porn bans aren't really about the degrading effects of porn. They're about creepy deviants who Sun readers find disgusting. They may not have enough support to actually ban the sex acts, but they'll ban depictions of them in order to make those 'deviants' feel less confidant, more alone, less likely to act in ways the Sun and the Conservative party find immoral. [Well, ways the conservative party claims to find immoral, but that have always been weirdly popular with actual tory MPs...]
The wider point there being: any attempt to ban publications is an attempt to limit the expression of different ways of life. And we need to ask: whose ways of life are we trying to hide? Because it becomes a lot harder to ask those questions once the bans are in place and the guys in charge can pretend that those people don't exist, or can speak on their behalf.
So Dworkin's policy proposals are self-sustaining. The more you ban pornography, the easier it is to believe that Dworkin is right about women, than any woman who likes sex must be warped and ruined. If she could just ban women from talking about sex altogether (can't the written word, the spoken word, also be pornographic?), then she'd be sure to win the argument!
---------
thanks to greg for mentioning gay porn. The Dworkin/Mackinnon brand of feminism insists on portraying certain issues as a battle of the sexes, men against women... but the reality is almost always more complicated. There are male pornstars, just as there are (a lot of!) male prostitutes. And there are female consumers of porn. There is porn produced by men starring only men and designed to be watched by men; and there is porn produced by women starring only women and designed to be watched by women. And to me that makes it prima facie a little laughable to view everything in terms of what men do to women. Yeah, I'm sure those gay men are doing it just to control women.
[I take warnings about the welfare of pornstars more seriously when they also acknowledge that there are health and safety risks to the men as well, and that some of the men also have histories of abuse and poverty and so forth... not just in gay porn, but also the guys in straight porn. If you want to view porn as an inherently abusive industry OK, but then do it seriously and consider all the victims, don't just say it's the Male Patriarchy exploiting Womankind. If someone wants to rely on marxist analyses of exploitation and false consciousness, then they shouldn't stop at men vs women, they should bring in the whole marxist slate of concerns about class and power structures.]
On the subject of women as creators of porn: it's maybe worth noting that the growth of amateur and semi-amateur pornography on the internet (and talking couples and middle-class western girls here, not the poor webcam girls from the third world who clearly have overriding economic motivations) has NOT resulted in a shift away from 'degrading' and 'misogynist' porn. Instead, there are women on the internet who - seemingly happily, seemingly of their own volition, and apparently even when they're not filming themselves, do plenty of things that a few decades ago would have been dismissed as absurd male fantasies that no woman could possibly enjoy.
Possibly... and here's a radical notion... people are different from one another and aren't all the same, and possibly that's not an inherently frightening thing?
Of course, it's possible that everyone's just brainwashed. OK. But if I'm going to believe that, I'd like to see some actual evidence. Give me statistics! Just saying "look at all these women making their own pornography - they MUST be brainwashed, no real woman would do that!" doesn't convince me. It's not an argument. Instead, tell me what evidence you actually have that, say, Jennifer Lawrence or Scarlett Johansen are deeply warped victims exploited by an uncaring machinery of misogynistic pimps. Because it seems on the surface that they're well-adjusted, intelligent and independent women.
[One good thing about the various leaks of female celebrities: it does at least make it harder to ill-characterise (either as whores or as victims) women who make naked photos/sex-tapes etc., by showing that even some well-respected and wealthy women do these things. You could still argue that it's OK to make PRIVATE porn but there's something wrong with you if you want to share it with anyone other than your monogamous life-partner, but that seems prima facie an even more awkward distinction to have to make...]
----
In passing, one thing might be worth clarifying. I haven't followed the latest batch of proscriptions, but the original anti-S&M laws in the UK a few years ago (S&M was only legalised at all here a few years earlier - requiring a wonderful little law footnote to the 'illegal to consent to being hurt or injured' law saying 'except for professional boxers'... as though the formulators suddenly realised they were accidentally banning boxing and and had to hurriedly explain 'oh no we didn't mean you we just mean those ghastly perverts! oh, knocking your brains out dressed only in underpants in front of a crowd of tens of thousands, that's PERFECTLY respectable!')... where was I? oh yes... the laws WEREN'T just focused on 'pornography' in the sense of material comissioned by companies and then sold for money. They also included - and I expect the most recent extensions also include - private material. It was (is?) legal to share with people depicted in the material, but illegal to share with anyone else and illegal for anyone else to possess.
Further reason to think, I think, that the laws are aimed not at innocent victims being magically corrupted and turned into serial killers (since personally, I've never had a total stranger offer me free pictures of their extreme sex parties... maybe I circulate in the wrong crowds?) but simply at marginalising and delegitimising everyone who engages in those activities.
Well, that was.. enervating. Imagine my pique when I realized it was Andrea Dworkin herself, utilizing a google gps-critical app, wanting an explanation for my comments in this context.
Telling her it was all a mistake, I gave her the co-ordinates of Warwick's bond-villain Swiss redoubt where it towers over the sheer alpine cliffs. Should have asked about the metermaid outfit.
Wastrel wrote: "So as we go through the human race eliminating the views of more and more people from consideration on the grounds of false consciousness, how can we have any confidence left about the accuracy of our own interpretations? .."
Because of course, academia is exactly where you need to go to throw off the shackles of false consciousness and indoctrination. The attitude was rampant during the 1990s. It's frightening how readily academic theorists were able to dismiss the experience of other people, especially more marginalized peoples--to speak for them, argue they know best--as opposed to accepting that all people are born into specific social contexts, all of which produce distortions. It took an incredible hubris to disrespect the subjectivity of others so thoroughly--and a complete unwillingness to listen rather than pontificate. We're seeing huge amounts from the US right wing currently on topics like living on the minimum wage. Sorry--bit off topic, but your comment was giving me flashbacks to my grad school days. Not to say I didn't drink that particular kool-aid, I did. Still trying to purge it from my system.
Thanks Wastrel, I really agree with almost all of that. Your comment about how thinkers from the left conspired with the right wing on this subject is particularly telling – this is exactly what happened with the Dworkin/MacKinnon legislation, where they actively sought out the support of Conservative family-values groups.
Lilia you're dead right about the double standard, though of course it cuts both ways – ‘bestselling pornos’ aren't discussed at all in mainstream newspapers.
Superb review and thread, Warwick.
It's a while since I read this book. However, I have some sympathy with Dworkin, if only because of the time in which she was writing. I'm sure many women sympathised with her views at the time. Quite apart from the role of pornography, it seemed to them that the relations between men and women were so bad then that the only legitimate response of women seemed to be separatism. Pornography was just a subset of this overall relationship. If you rejected the relationship, then you rejected the tools by which it was enforced, e.g., pornography. I assume that there is less support for separatism now than there was at the time. This might result from a perception that the relationship between the sexes needs to be improved rather than abandoned?
The other aspect of this debate that interests me is the element of free speech. In this case, pornography was opposed by a coalition of feminists and the right wing, the latter of whom thought that any sexual explicitness should be censored. This coalition survives in a more liberal environment in the guise of the protection of the interests of children. In Australia, it manifested itself relatively recently in a concerted attack on the photography of Bill Henson.
Gregsamsa wrote: " Sheesh! Porn actresses do not get forcibly separated from their families, tattooed, relieved of all possessions, exposed to inhumane medical experiments, worked as slaves, gassed to death, and then skull-mined for their gold fillings by any but the most disreputable porn studios, mostly in the Miami area.."
Warwick wrote: "No, that's true…it's almost as though porn isn't quite the same thing as the fucking Holocaust..."
Perhaps not, but "illegal immigrants" in various Western countries do get forced and even entrapped by being lured from their own countries into "acting" in porn vids - and many of the vids portray various 'lite' degrees of BDSM - come admit now, almost all (M/F) porn treats women as a product being consumed - and yes, I do have quite some experience watching porn vids, and of a variety of magazines etc. so I'm not speaking out of the mouth of a complete innocent here.
I used to think I don't have a problem with porn, and i don't have a problem with amateur porn where two people are just lustily ***ing away,(in an onbiously consensual manner) or some male or female are having fun showing off their rampant libido.
I do have a problem with the other kind that i mentioned though, and this tends to be a very commercialized exploitative kind.
I think I even prefer the M/M, F/F and the heavier more niche BDSM varieties to that male dominator XXXlite type of porn that so often does use women that were entrapped and often addicted to drugs to get there. And no, that is not a conspiracy theory, it really happens. (I know full well, that many porn actresses (and actors) are very happy with their jobs, I know I know - I'm not talking about them. )
J. wrote: "oh, excuse me, there's a buxom meter-maid ringing the doorbell here and it seems she's all out of breath ... brb..
That reminds me, I need to get my car from the mechanic's shop. I can't wait!
Travel I take your point but this sort of thing likely happens even more with dishwashers, seamstresses, and farm labor, but those activities don't carry the taboo required to damn the whole industry. No one's condemning the whole restaurant biz as inherently exploitative when I bet it is more so. I've never been a porn star but I have been a busboy. Restaurant kitchens are often very hostile and exploitative work environments, more so I'd wager than the average lawyered-up studio cautious about liabilities now that it's big business. I'm sure things were different in the days of 8mm stag films or early VHS, but I bet it would be hard to name a porn performer who is an "illegal" working under duress. For the people you are rightly concerned for, don't you think it would be better addressed by enforcement of wage and working condition laws, more serious investigation of sectors of the economy shielded by powerful entities' use of outsourcing or sub-sub-contracting (esp. in agriculture) and redress for workers fearing deportation?
Warwick I'm jealous! My reviews never inspire threads like this.
Hey Warwick, much respect. I'll read the thread more closely when I have time. For now I'm just showing support.
One thing: to judge all porn by the lowest common denominator is pointless. Yes, there's gross and wrong stuff out there, but that tells us nothing about porn as a whole, except that as yet there are few serious artists involved in it.
Gregsamsa wrote: "J. wrote: "oh, excuse me, there's a buxom meter-maid ringing the doorbell here and it seems she's all out of breath ... brb..
That reminds me, I need to get my car from the mechanic's shop. I ca..."
Those are true, will chat here in more detail a bit later.
Ian wrote: "Superb review and thread, Warwick.
It's a while since I read this book. However, I have some sympathy with Dworkin, if only because of the time in which she was writing. I'm sure many women sympat..."
Yes, McElroy had the advantage of writing 15 years after Dworkin, and I have the advantage of writing 20 years after that. Time has not worked in AD's favour, and I think you're right that the divide between the sexes, though in some ways as depressing as ever, is now seen as something to be eroded rather than reinforced. On the other hand, if she was upset by porn in the 70s I dread to think what she would have thought of the stuff currently out there.
Traveller wrote: "I think I even prefer the M/M, F/F and the heavier more niche BDSM varieties to that male dominator XXXlite type of porn"
Well one thing I wanted to say in the review but which I had to cut for length (I'm right up against the character limit there) – is that I find softcore porn like page 3 or FHM covers (photoshopped girls staring into the camera as though to say ‘you can have me’) much more offensive than hardcore material, which is just relatively-normal looking people having sex with each other, in admittedly inventive ways.
Warwick wrote: "Traveller wrote: "I think I even prefer the M/M, F/F and the heavier more niche BDSM varieties to that male dominator XXXlite type of porn"
Well one thing I wanted to say in the review but which I..."
Hmm, it might be that I'd been exposed to relatively XXX hardcore porn via a male friend who admittedly probably has tastes to the... err ... more dominant side (in fact his....'tastes' were the sole reason that I never felt interested in becoming romantically involved with him.)
So are you truly telling me that there are a lot of porn vids out there that are kind of like animated versions of Hustler magazine? A lot of it? Where the woman seems to you as if she's perhaps genuinely enjoying it? (Not just gritting her teeth to get through it or in a haze of drugs to get through it?)
Oh, and PS. "hardcore" is definitely not just two normal people getting on with it. ;)
Maybe we are speaking of two different worlds here. To me 'pictures of naked people posing' is relative innocuous; even though it is possible that (how naked are we talking here, and how explicit are the poses?) - that it might be demeaning to a, let's say a college girl who is trying to make some money to pay for her studies - at least she does not have to endure being painfully raped including anally -(in these movies there seems to be a 'code' that they have to penetrate all 3 orifices of each each woman) by groups of men with huge penises, which is what harder core porn is about.
Some of it is definitely about that, but you seem to be talking about quite a specific type of material when it seems to me there is a huge range out there. Of course, there is a massive amount of material where the woman ‘seems’ to be genuinely enjoying it. I think I mentioned X-Art above, they are very famous for that. The question – and McElroy tries to address this specifically – is how real that enjoyment is, and the answer is perhaps more reassuring than you might have thought. Certainly there's no doubt about it when it comes to much so-called amateur material, which is made and uploaded by women themselves.
What upsets me about the softcore stuff is what I said. It's not the fact that it's naked people posing, it's the fact that – unlike hardcore porn – it is all women, and – unlike hardcore porn – their skin and body shape has been digitally altered, and – again unlike most hardcore porn – the women are gazing into the camera, at the viewers, saying ‘you can have me any time’. This I find much more deceptive and damaging than hardcore material where two (or more) people are actually engaging with each other for real.
There is so much to comment on in your review, and with this particular topic, it is doubly hard, because there is such a wide range of opinions that are possible, that it seems one should, before commenting, make your own position as clear as possible first.
Most of my own arguments would certainly be in line with both the positions you had mentioned, namely
:
the argument that it is fundamentally abusive in its production (a manipulative industry run by men, coercing women with damaged backgrounds into humiliating sex acts);
and
the argument that, no matter how ‘free-range’ its production, it is damaging in its effects on society (promoting a grossly unhealthy image of women, sexualising violence, distorting young people's sexual education).
I disagree a bit with both of those positions though, in that I feel they should both be qualified.
I cannot honestly imagine a world without porn, but it is also true that a lot of it give teenage boys the idea that all women are highly libidinous and should also be immediately available sexually speaking; these boys expect their female schoolmates to act in a similar manner, and to be similarly available. Not an entirely sound message to be sending out there, and has in itself caused a lot of frustration and misogyny in male quarters. ..and there certainly are a lot of women around who have extremely high libido's who in the past the were disparagingly called "nymphomaniacs".
...and that these women really exist - that there truly are heterosexual women who literally physically have libido's high enough for them to desire sex several times a day, I have no doubt of.
...but Dworkin herself is obviously light years removed from this demographic. :D And to tell you the honest truth, I take feminists like Dworkin and Irigaray with a huge pinch of salt and giggles. Look, they obviously felt that they had to sound like Derrida, Deleuze, Foucault, and the rest of the French theorists by couching their arguments in overwrought melodramatic tones, which I sadly feel detracts from the theses stated rather than gain the respect of the level-headed person. I suppose one has to kind of try and read between the lines of all the hysterics going on, eh?
But once all of that is said, then I guess one can start moving on to more subtle arguments regarding the two positions you mentioned.
I'm going to end this comment here to try and avoid writing one of those page-long comments of mine. They become harder to read and edit as their length increase.)
Traveller wrote: "There is so much to comment on in your review, and with this particular topic, it is doubly hard, because there is such a wide range of opinions that are possible, that it seems one should, before ..."
I understand your position and I sympathise with it. That is why I read books like this and try to understand the industry and its effects better. On the whole I am more reassured than alarmed, but I always have to bear in mind that I want to be reassured so…there's lot of second-guessing myself that goes on.
Ian wrote: "True. ;)"
Ha, I know you are (Possibly? Noncomittaly?) referring to the post length there (which I'd already increased since you looked) but, sir, I ask thee to speak for thine own Egyptian face in this regard, oh, he who writes reviews that literally run off the page! :P
Warwick wrote: "I find softcore porn like page 3 or FHM covers (photoshopped girls staring into the camera as though to say ‘you can have me’) much more offensive..."
Me too, especially for its effect on little girls, along with advertising, pop music, teen comedies...
Well argued review as usual, Warwick - Dworkan seems to have left herself ridiculously open to attack.
But if there was ever a hydra subject, this must be it; every 'head' would have a different perspective, as no doubt your commentators show in this comment thread which is dauntingly lengthy so I haven't read it.
Two thoughts: I'm reminded of the Wolinsky cartoon you posted a few weeks ago in your review of one of his books which made the point that though women may do what men seem to want they actually may want something quite different...
The other thought is prompted by your mention of fantasy which I believe is a truly wonderful tool, and by coming across a quote from the rascally raunchy but super subtle Lawrence Sterne about the importance of leaving a lot to the imagination...
The truest respect which you can pay to the reader's understanding, is to...leave him something to imagine, in his turn, as well as yourself.
Warwick wrote: "I understand your position and I sympathise with it. That is why I read books like this and try to understand the industry and its effects better. On the whole I am more reassured than alarmed, but I always have to bear in mind that I want to be reassured so….."
At least you are aware and concerned, which is more than one can say for most people..
Gregsamsa wrote: "especially for its effect on little girls, along with advertising, pop music, teen comedies...."
There's no doubt in my mind that little girls are being sexualized at an early age for the benefit of the sellers of bra's, hair products, make-up, jewelery and accessories, clothing, etc, in order for them to make more money out of the masses. And it is almost impossible to stop it, especially since children and teenagers fall for it exactly because they are teenagers and children... :(
Oh, and since you mentioned 'classic' actresses like Jenna Jameson and Sasha Gray, Warwick, (I think they'd certainly qualify for the er "highly libidinous woman" tag), I'd mention that it has always been VERY obvious to me that Sasha Gray actually enjoys her work. (There was a point where I was exposed to a LOT of SG - she was a fave of the friend I mentioned earlier.)
She has the most amazing ability to be a dom from a sub position....and it takes a certain inner strength and cunning to act the way that she does - making the sub actually come across as having her own strange form of power.
Still, I would feel a lot more comfortable if this kind of porn was harder to come by for the younger 'uns....
EDIT: Pardon if sometimes there are sections of sentences left out of posts; GR posts have this annoying habit of highlighting a complete sentence if you only wanted to replace a single word; resulting in it removing the entire sentence, which one doesn't always notice. I'm starting to think I must preview every single post to check that there aren't any left out. (That one was intentional) :P
Warwick, that's a great review.
Personally, I've always thought Dworkin was a bombastic idiot who doesn't understand anything about women who are not like herself (and who ARE they?), or about women who feel, as you describe that: ‘Sex isn't something men do to you. It isn't something men get out of you. Sex is something you dive into with gusto and like it every bit as much as he does.’
When it becomes something other than that, it it no longer consensual, and that's a whole other bag of potato chips. I could never get my head around the fact that Dworkin was married to two different men over her lifetime. One wonders how that went down.
(Also, her tossing child sex abuse into the text, as if it belonged there, is ignorant to a deplorable degree.)
Fionnuala wrote: "a quote from the rascally raunchy but super subtle Lawrence Sterne"
Thanks, and nice quote. Now a XXX adaptation of Tristram Shandy, that would be something to see…
Traveller wrote: "I would feel a lot more comfortable if this kind of porn was harder to come by"
wait
T.D. wrote: "Warwick, that's a great review.
Personally, I've always thought Dworkin was a bombastic idiot who doesn't understand anything about women who are not like herself (and who ARE they?), or about wo..."
Yes, I tend to agree. The thing is – given her reputation – I was really looking forward to reading her. I hoped I could be someone who saw through all the supposed misandry to the challenging arguments beneath. But the truth was I really did find her impossible to follow, and offensive – not just to men, but in all kinds of ways.
back to top
Excellent analysis!http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist...
I wonder how the Anti-Porn Laws will demarcate their limitations and amendments. The word "abuse" at the risk of its generalisation can get a bit problematic when dealing with the detractors.
Thank you so much. I rewrote this a hundred times and still find it hard to be as direct as I'd like. I guess I'm still conflicted myself. Like most people, probably.
Oh! Thanks, Praj, I was just about to reply to your comment on the other review. As you say, I think when it becomes a legal issue then you really tie yourself in knots. The UK has for some reason been pretty bad in this area, compared to the US.
Oh, i think my comment got wrongly posted. Sorry for that. And, thanks for your reply :)
It's my fault, it's because I posted the same review under both books – bit confusing, I realise…
One question i have for you is this. How authentic do you feel your emotional perception of the women in porn is. When I view different porn I can have very different emotional reactions to it. Even when the ccontent is similar. Obviously on one hand they are actors and actresses, but in much of the porn that's available on the net is pretty raw and it seems possible to me to see differences in how the women are experiencing the actual things they are doing. However there seems to be many things that can complicate this picture. How do you rate your ability to accurately judge whether the woman is uncomfortable or not?
Warwick wrote: Dworkin can't accept that anyone could take part in porn of their own free will – or if they do, it must be a free will corrupted by male-supremacist society to the point where it can no longer be taken as their own. That means she's forced into what seems to me to be the absurd and antifeminist position of denying their agency completely: less sophisticated women may think they know what they want, but Andrea Dworkin knows better. Stoya or Sasha Grey might see themselves as intelligent and articulate businesswomen with a lot of sexual curiosity; Andrea Dworkin sees only ‘the dummy forced by the pimp-ventriloquist’.Who's objectifying who now?
Very good question. I have a problem with postmodernist critiques of many industries (i.e., Foucault on the asylum or the prison) because the deny agency, see passive victims everywhere.
I appreciate McElroy's argument, as you present it here:
Porn and feminism are, she claims, natural bedfellows that share a common interest in exploding traditionalist views of women as wives and mothers with rigidly controlled sexual freedom. Pleasure – entirely absent from Dworkin's account – becomes a key concept. Far from corrupting women's idea of sex, porn can be, McElroy argues, a way for women to explore and expand sexuality in a safe and controlled environment.
McElroy seems to be addressing the situation of the Orthodox Jewish women, I read about in this article in the Sunday New York Times Magazine. Of course, it's very sad to see women being raised in an environment where they are discouraged from seeking pleasure in sex, taught to believe that they are ugly if they enjoy sex. The Joy of Sex came along at just the right time for me, and it's obvious that someone should write a version for these women.
On the other hand, humiliation seems to be an essential element of much porn. I say this from very limited experience. I've read Sade as a historian. I have never watched a pornographic film billed as such, although I have watched Last Tango in Paris. I felt sorry for Maria Schneider's character and for the actress who was brutalized in the course of making the picture:
I should have called my agent or had my lawyer come to the set because you can't force someone to do something that isn't in the script, but at the time, I didn't know that. Marlon said to me: 'Maria, don't worry, it's just a movie,' but during the scene, even though what Marlon was doing wasn't real, I was crying real tears. I felt humiliated and to be honest, I felt a little raped, both by Marlon and by Bertolucci. After the scene, Marlon didn't console me or apologise. Thankfully, there was just one take.So, as you acknowledge, it's complicated. I used to teach a course on Deviance and I remember a discussion about porn where some of the students (who were greater consumers than I) acknowledged that they'd acquired tastes for activities that never would have occurred to them, and they weren't sure they liked having these tastes. But it was too late. They'd opened Pandora's Box--a great film, by the way, from a time and place where a greater range of tastes was permitted to be explored in film and in society, although it's not clear, as I suggested in a recent column on Weimar, and as Christopher Isherwood himself admitted, in retrospect, that all participants were entering into the game with the same gusto: "Hadn't there been something youthfully heartless in my enjoyment of the spectacle of Berlin in the early thirties, with its poverty, its political hatred and its despair?" he wrote in his memoir.
I agree, that Dworkin is unjustified in evoking the Holocaust, although I appreciate the rhetorical value of doing so. But I can't help but think of Jean Améry, who was tortured by the Gestapo in a prison at Breendonk, Belgium). In At the Mind's Limits: Contemplations by a Survivor on Auschwitz and Its Realities, he compares torture to rape:
[The torturer] "forces his own corporeality on me... He is on me and thereby destroys me. It is like a rape, a sexual act without the consent of one of the two partners."Torture robs the victim of "trust in the world," the certainty that his self is inviolate and that others will respect the boundaries of his self. Once lost, this fundamental trust in the world can never be regained. Torture, says Amery, has an "indelible character. Whoever was tortured, stays tortured."
I suspect that sexual humiliation is equally indelible and, in the light of what I know about porn, would prefer not crossing the boundaries.
Thanks for a thought-provoking and honest review.
globulon wrote: "How do you rate your ability to accurately judge whether the woman is uncomfortable or not? "Not well, which is exactly why I feel conflicted about it and why interviews with people in the industry, of the sort that are presented in McElroy, are so welcome.
It is a central issue. Kink.com, for example, is a site that's renowned for the size of its female following, despite the fact that in some ways it's some of the most extreme porn out there. One possible reason for this is that after the scenes themselves there is an interview with the main actress – who in the scene itself might have been sobbing or whatever – grinning from ear to ear and talking about what she just went through as an actress and what she got out of it and the input she had into it. In this way they make the consent and the level of fantasy manifest, and this is clearly very powerful for many viewers.
"intellectual absolution"I've never heard it called that.
Sorry, couldn't resist. Mighty review, Warwick. Your honesty and earnestness on such a fraught topic are admirable.
Fortunately Dworkin seems to have lost the war here as sex-positive feminism gains ever more ground, but I'm astonished that she persuaded anyone with such desperate rhetorical gambits as marching Holocaust victims in to testify. Sheesh! Porn actresses do not get forcibly separated from their families, tattooed, relieved of all possessions, exposed to inhumane medical experiments, worked as slaves, gassed to death, and then skull-mined for their gold fillings by any but the most disreputable porn studios, mostly in the Miami area.
When I was in grad school a seminar class was addressed by an anti-porn author whose name I forgot long ago. Even the more prudish students had a hard time with her argument that ALL porn harmed women, and was tantamount to rape. I asked her "What about porn that doesn't have any women in it?" She seemed like she was about to scoff at my introducing such an imaginary category before she realized. There followed an awkward silence that would be much less awkward today. It was a little frightening to me because I wasn't "out" to these people.
Then I have to give her credit for the most effortful argumentative gymnastic performance by which she universalized the phenomenon of objectification while particularizing the victimization, to assure me that I'm also part of the problem. I admired her attempt to keep me from being marginalized in the discussion. I still wasn't buying it because so much of her argument was based on essentialist assertions that didn't square with my experience as at the time I had a female roomie who watched WAY more porn than I, but who was in no way promiscuous.
But you are so right to note the deficiency of the free speech argument and the agency of the actresses when it comes to banishing qualms. On the bright side, at least in one way porn has become less degrading to women: a hedgehog like Ron Jeremy would never make it today, competing with the likes of Charles Dera or Julian Rios. Or so I hear. I myself have never seen these men nor viewed any pornography.
Well Warwick, I was actually quite taken aback with this review. It's excellently written, of course, as is normal with you but this is a subject that I think about but don't really wish to venture too far into.All these different types of porn... I think that it is better if I stay with my thoughts. I can, of course, as I'm a woman. A little bit of porn... but then where is the dividing line?
All I can say is that we have our own needs and wants and it's best to keep them personal to a couple or to the individual concerned. There's nothing worse than shocking a friend...
Lisa wrote: "humiliation seems to be an essential element of much porn"It is, and it seems to be getting more so – although, as I say, it's balanced by an equally prominent push in the opposite direction. It's a big question why so many people, and of both sexes, find humiliation such a draw.
It probably does influence people's real-life sexual tastes a little, but really I think this happens with every generation. Most of the things I read about the supposed pornification of young people seem to me to come down to generation-gap issues; as well as porn, young people now have access to the most full and comprehensive sexual advice in history just by opening Google, and most of the advice out there is surprisingly (perhaps) sensible.
As for the experiences of women on set, yeah it's terrifying. I've never been able to watch Last Tango precisely because I read that quote first, and it's I think the constant fear of everyone who wants to enjoy porn that such incidents are common. McElroy says her research suggests that it's very rare, but see also my reply to globulon above.
The truth is I don't know how healthy these things really are even as fantasies – psychologists can't agree about it – and I'm very aware when I try to talk about it that the stakes are not as high for me as they are for women because of the way sexual violence works. I would love to believe that sexual fantasy is a closed world which doesn't have to answer for real-life incidents, but the realist in me tells me there must be linkages – even if I reject the simplistic correspondence that Dworkin sees.
Anyway thanks for your interesting comments.
This is just fantastic writing. Thank you for the work.
That sounds really amazing what you are saying about them having interviews. I really like that idea.
Gregsamsa wrote: "What about porn that doesn't have any women in it?"Thanks Greg. AD has been roundly criticised for her treatment of gay porn, and homosexuality in general, in this book, even by people who otherwise like it. She mostly ignores it, but occasionally takes time to point out that gay men ‘conspire’ in the heterosexual male tyranny over women.
I marked this section in my Kindle and went over it several times, but I still can't work out how she computes it. Gayness just doesn't seem to figure in her concept of sexual relations.
Lynne wrote: "we have our own needs and wants and it's best to keep them personal to a couple or to the individual concerned. There's nothing worse than shocking a friend... "Thanks Lynne, and I'm sorry if I shocked you!
Interesting discussion. What will really disappoint gender-warriors like Dworkin, eventually-- is that the internet is providing a really potent antidote to porn. To the taboo aspects that make it feasible. Which will sooner rather than later make their crusade a lost cause. No redlight district, no nasty bookshop or theater, no looking over the shoulder, no unmarked manila envelope. Just the guiding hands of Microsoft and Google, and the invisible hand of the free market which will calmly predict: availability + oversupply = diminished value, lower demand.
There will perhaps be some future enlightened era when it is laughable that the narrative elements of porn-- so much more telling than the physics-- are viewed as we do the victorian ideas that 'ladies boots' or the 'can-can' are somehow titillating. A time when the very concept of porn is centered only around the awkward age of fourth graders, for those few months it may take to grasp the obvious and move on.
And Dworkin, well, she may come to your house at night and bite you if you keep this up.
Amazing review and raises huge # of questions--please forgive the free association that follows. I'd forgotten how much Dworkin's arguments shaped discourse on sex during my college ('91)/early grad school years and I feel like I'm only shaking them off now. The early anti-porn movement had nothing to say about women as consumers of porn--as if what? we're too proper? we don't like dirty stuff? The way female sexuality is conceived is pretty horrifying to me now--talk about obliterating agency. But I've found that "slut-shaming" and sexual puritanism find equally fertile ground among the left wing as the right.Ironically, I say this as someone who dislikes most 'hetero" porn, not because I disapprove but because it fails in its objectives--like I get way more grossed out than aroused. I generally assume that's because it's totally geared towards a male viewer/consumer and (to risk a massive generalization) what male porn viewers want from their female partner doesn't leave a lot of room for my desires/fantasies. (Gay porn on the other hand does not have that problem, as Colby Keller's legions of female fans have discovered.) Mr. Keller's skills notwithstanding, I overwhelmingly prefer written erotic material to video. That sidesteps the problem of the adult industry, but not the ethics of the content, and I admit I like (and write) a lot of stuff that is considered "objectionable"--non-con for example. Here again, stuff that is produced by/for women has a very different feel than stuff produced for men--at least for me. While I respect people's right not to read hard-core stuff obviously, I no longer have a lot of time for the "damage to society" arguments about erotica--I don't think reading 'non-con' turns women into rapists or rape apologists; moreover, I think that (theoretical) damage must be weighed against the damage done by condemning women for having 'improper' fantasies.
J. wrote: "There will perhaps be some future enlightened era when it is laughable that the narrative elements of porn-- so much more telling than the physics-- are viewed as we do the victorian ideas that 'ladies boots' or the 'can-can' are somehow titillating."Yes, exactly. Thanks J.
Lilia wrote: "not because I disapprove but because it fails in its objectives"See, this is the way porn SHOULD be critiqued – not ‘this is acceptable, this is unacceptable’, but ‘this is hot, this isn't’.
Thanks for all your thoughtful comments. Before I had kids I wrote a lot of ‘erotica’, under male and female pseudonyms, and it paid a fair few bills for me when I still had time to write, so I totally relate to what you say. I actually think – maybe I already said this somewhere above, I can't remember – that the boom in that area is not unconnected to women's greater involvement in porn itself, which has changed the industry in all kinds of ways.
J. wrote: "There will perhaps be some future enlightened era when it is laughable that the narrative elements of porn-- so much more telling than the physics-- are viewed as we do the victorian ide..."Well that will be a disappointment to those of us who actually prefer the narrative bits rather than the clinical/comic act. Tension is awesome. Granted the acting is often execrable but not always, and that's a different issue anyhow.
Gregsamsa wrote: " ... prefer the narrative bits..." Agreed, and that is where this becomes a Goodreads topic; tension and its narrative entanglements are part of what we analyze around here. But somehow the structural build in porn (okay lets get used to the idea that everything we write here is a double entendre) -- is always either simplistic or a little idiotic.
And if as we agree the frame not the act is the intriguing thing, then, well . . . oh, excuse me, there's a buxom meter-maid ringing the doorbell here and it seems she's all out of breath ... brb..
Warwick wrote: "Lilia wrote: "not because I disapprove but because it fails in its objectives"See, this is the way porn SHOULD be critiqued – not ‘this is acceptable, this is unacceptable’, but ‘this is hot, thi..."
I can't help but feel that there is still a big double standard about women's consumption of erotic material vs. men's. It was most obvious to me post Fifty Shades of Grey, with the unbelievable amounts of outrage, mockery and condescension that was leveled at women who liked the book. A lot of critics were up in arms that it was just wank-fodder, to which I can't help saying, EXACTLY, yes, thank you--about time--we need more. Wank-fodder is to say the least, highly subjective--it's fine if something doesn't do it for you, but I'm not sure why critics felt they had the right to get so indignant that readers found something hot that they didn't like. Except of course that the readers were women--how much outrage do we hear from mainstream newspapers that some bestselling porno has a dumb storyline and bad acting?
A few things to say, but unfortunately they don't really cohere. Oh well...I do think you identify a huge problem with any sort of Marxist (/Rousseauian/etc) analysis, which is that the concept of false consciousness is a terribly dangerous one. It's hard to dismiss outright, because experiences teaches us that some individuals do seem to express false consciousness: they claim to have one opinion, seemingly sincerely, while everything else about them screams the opposite. But it's very dangerous when we expand that to the social level, because essentially it's closing our eyes to everything that disagrees with us. So as we go through the human race eliminating the views of more and more people from consideration on the grounds of false consciousness, how can we have any confidence left about the accuracy of our own interpretations? Particularly since the false consciousness argument ends up directed at exactly the people who are disadvantaged and marginalised already - it's victims who are potentially indoctrinated, and therefore victims who get ignored and devalued in Marxist critiques. Turns out only the views of socially-conservative white middle-class academics really count as authenthic experiences... so that's a total revolution in symbolic power relations, isn't it?
This is also I guess related to one of the biggest problems I had with Dworking and Mackinnon when I had to read them for uni. It's not that their conclusions are objectionable (though sometimes they are), it's that they don't seem to have any actual argument. It's just "clearly this is the case, and anyone who disagrees is a rapist and/or has been brainwashed by rapists into becoming a traitor to all womankind."
We're meant to just take their word that everyone else has screwed up views on sex. I'm sorry - so I'm meant to believe that all men are violent rapists, that all sex is rape, that all women hate sex and have no interest in penises.... this is the NON-screwed-up view of human sexuality, is it? Frankly the argument 'if people view porn the men will stop thinking of themselves as soulless animals with no feelings or desires beyond a need to be violent, and the women will start enjoying sex!' somehow... doesn't really make their side of the debate seem appealing. Why is this a bad thing, exactly?
In addition to dehumanising women by discounting any pro-porn, or even pro-sex opinions, Dworkin is also essentially treating women as sex objects herself: they are defined through their roles in sex. I find it disturbing that Dworkin automatically assumes that if women are visibly sexual, people won't be able to take them seriously. In reality, most people are able to recognise that women (and men) have many dimensions - what a woman likes to get up to in the bedroom (and indeed whether she wants other people to watch) says nothing at all about whether she can run a company, or a country. Now sure, there are some bigots who think that a sexual woman is good for nothing but sex. But Dworkin seems unable to imagine anybody NOT thinking like that, which makes me worry about how SHE sees women. Because it seems that for her, once a woman allows herself to be 'victimised' by a penis, she's not longer an independent, intelligent woman capable of a full and varied life. It's the old dichotomy: whore or virgin. Sure, Dworkin doesn't use those names, but I don't see why relabelling 'whore' as 'brainwashed victim' and 'virgin' as 'enlightened independent woman' is really a great step forward.
And I think a big alarm bell here should be how close Dworkin ends up to male conservative elites. These porn bans in the UK, they're not being pushed through by liberals, they're being pushed through by the conservative party. they're being pushed through by a bunch of white men who went to eton. And you know who else have been pushing for bans on 'extreme' (ie nonstandard) porn? The tabloids.
Yes, the Sun. Who happily - defiantly - have full-page pictures of naked women on their pages as 'news'.
And on one level that's just hypocrisy, fine, happens all the time. But it also reveals something else: these porn bans aren't really about the degrading effects of porn. They're about creepy deviants who Sun readers find disgusting. They may not have enough support to actually ban the sex acts, but they'll ban depictions of them in order to make those 'deviants' feel less confidant, more alone, less likely to act in ways the Sun and the Conservative party find immoral. [Well, ways the conservative party claims to find immoral, but that have always been weirdly popular with actual tory MPs...]
The wider point there being: any attempt to ban publications is an attempt to limit the expression of different ways of life. And we need to ask: whose ways of life are we trying to hide? Because it becomes a lot harder to ask those questions once the bans are in place and the guys in charge can pretend that those people don't exist, or can speak on their behalf.
So Dworkin's policy proposals are self-sustaining. The more you ban pornography, the easier it is to believe that Dworkin is right about women, than any woman who likes sex must be warped and ruined. If she could just ban women from talking about sex altogether (can't the written word, the spoken word, also be pornographic?), then she'd be sure to win the argument!
---------
thanks to greg for mentioning gay porn. The Dworkin/Mackinnon brand of feminism insists on portraying certain issues as a battle of the sexes, men against women... but the reality is almost always more complicated. There are male pornstars, just as there are (a lot of!) male prostitutes. And there are female consumers of porn. There is porn produced by men starring only men and designed to be watched by men; and there is porn produced by women starring only women and designed to be watched by women. And to me that makes it prima facie a little laughable to view everything in terms of what men do to women. Yeah, I'm sure those gay men are doing it just to control women.
[I take warnings about the welfare of pornstars more seriously when they also acknowledge that there are health and safety risks to the men as well, and that some of the men also have histories of abuse and poverty and so forth... not just in gay porn, but also the guys in straight porn. If you want to view porn as an inherently abusive industry OK, but then do it seriously and consider all the victims, don't just say it's the Male Patriarchy exploiting Womankind. If someone wants to rely on marxist analyses of exploitation and false consciousness, then they shouldn't stop at men vs women, they should bring in the whole marxist slate of concerns about class and power structures.]
On the subject of women as creators of porn: it's maybe worth noting that the growth of amateur and semi-amateur pornography on the internet (and talking couples and middle-class western girls here, not the poor webcam girls from the third world who clearly have overriding economic motivations) has NOT resulted in a shift away from 'degrading' and 'misogynist' porn. Instead, there are women on the internet who - seemingly happily, seemingly of their own volition, and apparently even when they're not filming themselves, do plenty of things that a few decades ago would have been dismissed as absurd male fantasies that no woman could possibly enjoy.
Possibly... and here's a radical notion... people are different from one another and aren't all the same, and possibly that's not an inherently frightening thing?
Of course, it's possible that everyone's just brainwashed. OK. But if I'm going to believe that, I'd like to see some actual evidence. Give me statistics! Just saying "look at all these women making their own pornography - they MUST be brainwashed, no real woman would do that!" doesn't convince me. It's not an argument. Instead, tell me what evidence you actually have that, say, Jennifer Lawrence or Scarlett Johansen are deeply warped victims exploited by an uncaring machinery of misogynistic pimps. Because it seems on the surface that they're well-adjusted, intelligent and independent women.
[One good thing about the various leaks of female celebrities: it does at least make it harder to ill-characterise (either as whores or as victims) women who make naked photos/sex-tapes etc., by showing that even some well-respected and wealthy women do these things. You could still argue that it's OK to make PRIVATE porn but there's something wrong with you if you want to share it with anyone other than your monogamous life-partner, but that seems prima facie an even more awkward distinction to have to make...]
----
In passing, one thing might be worth clarifying. I haven't followed the latest batch of proscriptions, but the original anti-S&M laws in the UK a few years ago (S&M was only legalised at all here a few years earlier - requiring a wonderful little law footnote to the 'illegal to consent to being hurt or injured' law saying 'except for professional boxers'... as though the formulators suddenly realised they were accidentally banning boxing and and had to hurriedly explain 'oh no we didn't mean you we just mean those ghastly perverts! oh, knocking your brains out dressed only in underpants in front of a crowd of tens of thousands, that's PERFECTLY respectable!')... where was I? oh yes... the laws WEREN'T just focused on 'pornography' in the sense of material comissioned by companies and then sold for money. They also included - and I expect the most recent extensions also include - private material. It was (is?) legal to share with people depicted in the material, but illegal to share with anyone else and illegal for anyone else to possess.
Further reason to think, I think, that the laws are aimed not at innocent victims being magically corrupted and turned into serial killers (since personally, I've never had a total stranger offer me free pictures of their extreme sex parties... maybe I circulate in the wrong crowds?) but simply at marginalising and delegitimising everyone who engages in those activities.
Well, that was.. enervating. Imagine my pique when I realized it was Andrea Dworkin herself, utilizing a google gps-critical app, wanting an explanation for my comments in this context. Telling her it was all a mistake, I gave her the co-ordinates of Warwick's bond-villain Swiss redoubt where it towers over the sheer alpine cliffs. Should have asked about the metermaid outfit.
Wastrel wrote: "So as we go through the human race eliminating the views of more and more people from consideration on the grounds of false consciousness, how can we have any confidence left about the accuracy of our own interpretations? .."Because of course, academia is exactly where you need to go to throw off the shackles of false consciousness and indoctrination. The attitude was rampant during the 1990s. It's frightening how readily academic theorists were able to dismiss the experience of other people, especially more marginalized peoples--to speak for them, argue they know best--as opposed to accepting that all people are born into specific social contexts, all of which produce distortions. It took an incredible hubris to disrespect the subjectivity of others so thoroughly--and a complete unwillingness to listen rather than pontificate. We're seeing huge amounts from the US right wing currently on topics like living on the minimum wage. Sorry--bit off topic, but your comment was giving me flashbacks to my grad school days. Not to say I didn't drink that particular kool-aid, I did. Still trying to purge it from my system.
Thanks Wastrel, I really agree with almost all of that. Your comment about how thinkers from the left conspired with the right wing on this subject is particularly telling – this is exactly what happened with the Dworkin/MacKinnon legislation, where they actively sought out the support of Conservative family-values groups.Lilia you're dead right about the double standard, though of course it cuts both ways – ‘bestselling pornos’ aren't discussed at all in mainstream newspapers.
Superb review and thread, Warwick.It's a while since I read this book. However, I have some sympathy with Dworkin, if only because of the time in which she was writing. I'm sure many women sympathised with her views at the time. Quite apart from the role of pornography, it seemed to them that the relations between men and women were so bad then that the only legitimate response of women seemed to be separatism. Pornography was just a subset of this overall relationship. If you rejected the relationship, then you rejected the tools by which it was enforced, e.g., pornography. I assume that there is less support for separatism now than there was at the time. This might result from a perception that the relationship between the sexes needs to be improved rather than abandoned?
The other aspect of this debate that interests me is the element of free speech. In this case, pornography was opposed by a coalition of feminists and the right wing, the latter of whom thought that any sexual explicitness should be censored. This coalition survives in a more liberal environment in the guise of the protection of the interests of children. In Australia, it manifested itself relatively recently in a concerted attack on the photography of Bill Henson.
Gregsamsa wrote: " Sheesh! Porn actresses do not get forcibly separated from their families, tattooed, relieved of all possessions, exposed to inhumane medical experiments, worked as slaves, gassed to death, and then skull-mined for their gold fillings by any but the most disreputable porn studios, mostly in the Miami area.."Warwick wrote: "No, that's true…it's almost as though porn isn't quite the same thing as the fucking Holocaust..."
Perhaps not, but "illegal immigrants" in various Western countries do get forced and even entrapped by being lured from their own countries into "acting" in porn vids - and many of the vids portray various 'lite' degrees of BDSM - come admit now, almost all (M/F) porn treats women as a product being consumed - and yes, I do have quite some experience watching porn vids, and of a variety of magazines etc. so I'm not speaking out of the mouth of a complete innocent here.
I used to think I don't have a problem with porn, and i don't have a problem with amateur porn where two people are just lustily ***ing away,(in an onbiously consensual manner) or some male or female are having fun showing off their rampant libido.
I do have a problem with the other kind that i mentioned though, and this tends to be a very commercialized exploitative kind.
I think I even prefer the M/M, F/F and the heavier more niche BDSM varieties to that male dominator XXXlite type of porn that so often does use women that were entrapped and often addicted to drugs to get there. And no, that is not a conspiracy theory, it really happens. (I know full well, that many porn actresses (and actors) are very happy with their jobs, I know I know - I'm not talking about them. )
J. wrote: "oh, excuse me, there's a buxom meter-maid ringing the doorbell here and it seems she's all out of breath ... brb.. That reminds me, I need to get my car from the mechanic's shop. I can't wait!
Travel I take your point but this sort of thing likely happens even more with dishwashers, seamstresses, and farm labor, but those activities don't carry the taboo required to damn the whole industry. No one's condemning the whole restaurant biz as inherently exploitative when I bet it is more so. I've never been a porn star but I have been a busboy. Restaurant kitchens are often very hostile and exploitative work environments, more so I'd wager than the average lawyered-up studio cautious about liabilities now that it's big business. I'm sure things were different in the days of 8mm stag films or early VHS, but I bet it would be hard to name a porn performer who is an "illegal" working under duress. For the people you are rightly concerned for, don't you think it would be better addressed by enforcement of wage and working condition laws, more serious investigation of sectors of the economy shielded by powerful entities' use of outsourcing or sub-sub-contracting (esp. in agriculture) and redress for workers fearing deportation?
Warwick I'm jealous! My reviews never inspire threads like this.
Hey Warwick, much respect. I'll read the thread more closely when I have time. For now I'm just showing support. One thing: to judge all porn by the lowest common denominator is pointless. Yes, there's gross and wrong stuff out there, but that tells us nothing about porn as a whole, except that as yet there are few serious artists involved in it.
Gregsamsa wrote: "J. wrote: "oh, excuse me, there's a buxom meter-maid ringing the doorbell here and it seems she's all out of breath ... brb.. That reminds me, I need to get my car from the mechanic's shop. I ca..."
Those are true, will chat here in more detail a bit later.
Ian wrote: "Superb review and thread, Warwick.It's a while since I read this book. However, I have some sympathy with Dworkin, if only because of the time in which she was writing. I'm sure many women sympat..."
Yes, McElroy had the advantage of writing 15 years after Dworkin, and I have the advantage of writing 20 years after that. Time has not worked in AD's favour, and I think you're right that the divide between the sexes, though in some ways as depressing as ever, is now seen as something to be eroded rather than reinforced. On the other hand, if she was upset by porn in the 70s I dread to think what she would have thought of the stuff currently out there.
Traveller wrote: "I think I even prefer the M/M, F/F and the heavier more niche BDSM varieties to that male dominator XXXlite type of porn"Well one thing I wanted to say in the review but which I had to cut for length (I'm right up against the character limit there) – is that I find softcore porn like page 3 or FHM covers (photoshopped girls staring into the camera as though to say ‘you can have me’) much more offensive than hardcore material, which is just relatively-normal looking people having sex with each other, in admittedly inventive ways.
Warwick wrote: "Traveller wrote: "I think I even prefer the M/M, F/F and the heavier more niche BDSM varieties to that male dominator XXXlite type of porn"Well one thing I wanted to say in the review but which I..."
Hmm, it might be that I'd been exposed to relatively XXX hardcore porn via a male friend who admittedly probably has tastes to the... err ... more dominant side (in fact his....'tastes' were the sole reason that I never felt interested in becoming romantically involved with him.)
So are you truly telling me that there are a lot of porn vids out there that are kind of like animated versions of Hustler magazine? A lot of it? Where the woman seems to you as if she's perhaps genuinely enjoying it? (Not just gritting her teeth to get through it or in a haze of drugs to get through it?)
Oh, and PS. "hardcore" is definitely not just two normal people getting on with it. ;)
Maybe we are speaking of two different worlds here. To me 'pictures of naked people posing' is relative innocuous; even though it is possible that (how naked are we talking here, and how explicit are the poses?) - that it might be demeaning to a, let's say a college girl who is trying to make some money to pay for her studies - at least she does not have to endure being painfully raped including anally -(in these movies there seems to be a 'code' that they have to penetrate all 3 orifices of each each woman) by groups of men with huge penises, which is what harder core porn is about.
Some of it is definitely about that, but you seem to be talking about quite a specific type of material when it seems to me there is a huge range out there. Of course, there is a massive amount of material where the woman ‘seems’ to be genuinely enjoying it. I think I mentioned X-Art above, they are very famous for that. The question – and McElroy tries to address this specifically – is how real that enjoyment is, and the answer is perhaps more reassuring than you might have thought. Certainly there's no doubt about it when it comes to much so-called amateur material, which is made and uploaded by women themselves.What upsets me about the softcore stuff is what I said. It's not the fact that it's naked people posing, it's the fact that – unlike hardcore porn – it is all women, and – unlike hardcore porn – their skin and body shape has been digitally altered, and – again unlike most hardcore porn – the women are gazing into the camera, at the viewers, saying ‘you can have me any time’. This I find much more deceptive and damaging than hardcore material where two (or more) people are actually engaging with each other for real.
There is so much to comment on in your review, and with this particular topic, it is doubly hard, because there is such a wide range of opinions that are possible, that it seems one should, before commenting, make your own position as clear as possible first. Most of my own arguments would certainly be in line with both the positions you had mentioned, namely
:
the argument that it is fundamentally abusive in its production (a manipulative industry run by men, coercing women with damaged backgrounds into humiliating sex acts);
and
the argument that, no matter how ‘free-range’ its production, it is damaging in its effects on society (promoting a grossly unhealthy image of women, sexualising violence, distorting young people's sexual education).
I disagree a bit with both of those positions though, in that I feel they should both be qualified.
I cannot honestly imagine a world without porn, but it is also true that a lot of it give teenage boys the idea that all women are highly libidinous and should also be immediately available sexually speaking; these boys expect their female schoolmates to act in a similar manner, and to be similarly available. Not an entirely sound message to be sending out there, and has in itself caused a lot of frustration and misogyny in male quarters. ..and there certainly are a lot of women around who have extremely high libido's who in the past the were disparagingly called "nymphomaniacs".
...and that these women really exist - that there truly are heterosexual women who literally physically have libido's high enough for them to desire sex several times a day, I have no doubt of.
...but Dworkin herself is obviously light years removed from this demographic. :D And to tell you the honest truth, I take feminists like Dworkin and Irigaray with a huge pinch of salt and giggles. Look, they obviously felt that they had to sound like Derrida, Deleuze, Foucault, and the rest of the French theorists by couching their arguments in overwrought melodramatic tones, which I sadly feel detracts from the theses stated rather than gain the respect of the level-headed person. I suppose one has to kind of try and read between the lines of all the hysterics going on, eh?
But once all of that is said, then I guess one can start moving on to more subtle arguments regarding the two positions you mentioned.
I'm going to end this comment here to try and avoid writing one of those page-long comments of mine. They become harder to read and edit as their length increase.)
Traveller wrote: "There is so much to comment on in your review, and with this particular topic, it is doubly hard, because there is such a wide range of opinions that are possible, that it seems one should, before ..."I understand your position and I sympathise with it. That is why I read books like this and try to understand the industry and its effects better. On the whole I am more reassured than alarmed, but I always have to bear in mind that I want to be reassured so…there's lot of second-guessing myself that goes on.
Ian wrote: "True. ;)"Ha, I know you are (Possibly? Noncomittaly?) referring to the post length there (which I'd already increased since you looked) but, sir, I ask thee to speak for thine own Egyptian face in this regard, oh, he who writes reviews that literally run off the page! :P
Warwick wrote: "I find softcore porn like page 3 or FHM covers (photoshopped girls staring into the camera as though to say ‘you can have me’) much more offensive..."Me too, especially for its effect on little girls, along with advertising, pop music, teen comedies...
Well argued review as usual, Warwick - Dworkan seems to have left herself ridiculously open to attack. But if there was ever a hydra subject, this must be it; every 'head' would have a different perspective, as no doubt your commentators show in this comment thread which is dauntingly lengthy so I haven't read it.
Two thoughts: I'm reminded of the Wolinsky cartoon you posted a few weeks ago in your review of one of his books which made the point that though women may do what men seem to want they actually may want something quite different...
The other thought is prompted by your mention of fantasy which I believe is a truly wonderful tool, and by coming across a quote from the rascally raunchy but super subtle Lawrence Sterne about the importance of leaving a lot to the imagination...
The truest respect which you can pay to the reader's understanding, is to...leave him something to imagine, in his turn, as well as yourself.
Warwick wrote: "I understand your position and I sympathise with it. That is why I read books like this and try to understand the industry and its effects better. On the whole I am more reassured than alarmed, but I always have to bear in mind that I want to be reassured so….."At least you are aware and concerned, which is more than one can say for most people..
Gregsamsa wrote: "especially for its effect on little girls, along with advertising, pop music, teen comedies...."
There's no doubt in my mind that little girls are being sexualized at an early age for the benefit of the sellers of bra's, hair products, make-up, jewelery and accessories, clothing, etc, in order for them to make more money out of the masses. And it is almost impossible to stop it, especially since children and teenagers fall for it exactly because they are teenagers and children... :(
Oh, and since you mentioned 'classic' actresses like Jenna Jameson and Sasha Gray, Warwick, (I think they'd certainly qualify for the er "highly libidinous woman" tag), I'd mention that it has always been VERY obvious to me that Sasha Gray actually enjoys her work. (There was a point where I was exposed to a LOT of SG - she was a fave of the friend I mentioned earlier.) She has the most amazing ability to be a dom from a sub position....and it takes a certain inner strength and cunning to act the way that she does - making the sub actually come across as having her own strange form of power.
Still, I would feel a lot more comfortable if this kind of porn was harder to come by for the younger 'uns....
EDIT: Pardon if sometimes there are sections of sentences left out of posts; GR posts have this annoying habit of highlighting a complete sentence if you only wanted to replace a single word; resulting in it removing the entire sentence, which one doesn't always notice. I'm starting to think I must preview every single post to check that there aren't any left out. (That one was intentional) :P
Warwick, that's a great review. Personally, I've always thought Dworkin was a bombastic idiot who doesn't understand anything about women who are not like herself (and who ARE they?), or about women who feel, as you describe that: ‘Sex isn't something men do to you. It isn't something men get out of you. Sex is something you dive into with gusto and like it every bit as much as he does.’
When it becomes something other than that, it it no longer consensual, and that's a whole other bag of potato chips. I could never get my head around the fact that Dworkin was married to two different men over her lifetime. One wonders how that went down.
(Also, her tossing child sex abuse into the text, as if it belonged there, is ignorant to a deplorable degree.)
Fionnuala wrote: "a quote from the rascally raunchy but super subtle Lawrence Sterne"Thanks, and nice quote. Now a XXX adaptation of Tristram Shandy, that would be something to see…
Traveller wrote: "I would feel a lot more comfortable if this kind of porn was harder to come by"wait
T.D. wrote: "Warwick, that's a great review. Personally, I've always thought Dworkin was a bombastic idiot who doesn't understand anything about women who are not like herself (and who ARE they?), or about wo..."
Yes, I tend to agree. The thing is – given her reputation – I was really looking forward to reading her. I hoped I could be someone who saw through all the supposed misandry to the challenging arguments beneath. But the truth was I really did find her impossible to follow, and offensive – not just to men, but in all kinds of ways.
I very much agree with your individualism. Respect to those that want to be a part of it and make it work.
I think I myself have a slightly darker take on the industry than you do, (I don't at all mean to suggest that you don't recognize the dark.) Still, I do think it's complicated and there is room for many different views and experiences.