I skimmed the first 50 or so posts of this thread a few days ago and have now looked at page 2 – so it’s possible I’ve missed quite a bit here. My thoughts on the various matters covered in stoid’s OP could take me pages and pages to elaborate. And I’m too busy to do that :).
I gather that there’s some consensus that sexual harassment at the workplace should be about addressing economic and professional harm rather than about barring sex itself. Most of the feminists I know, male as well as female, (and I know a lot), support that position. Here is an article published a few years ago in The Nation, making that kind of argument. (Aside to Sam: from what little I know on the subject, sexual harassment law in Canada is somewhat different.)
minty, on the whole I agree with your position and wring’s, but I also think there’s less substantive disagreement between stoid and you than it might appear, especially if stoid were able to recognize some of the inconsistencies in her own position. My quibble with your position, minty, is on the matter of sexual difference. You write:
"Whether it’s nature or nurture or both, we’re actually quite different. And if women are more likely to feel offended or belittled by porn than are men, who the hell are you to tell them they’re wrong? Point is, they are offended or belittled, and you telling them they ought not to be is nothing more than saying “I like porn and so should you!”
I think it needs to be pointed out here that porn itself, by and large, makes this difference an all but self-fulfilling prophecy. With the exception of porn intended for gay men, I have rarely seen any porn either intended or likely to appeal to my personal interest in the male physique. Porn’s double standard is huge: from the unattractive men that are often cast in the kind of softporn one tends to see on midnight cable TV, to the bar on revealing much of the male body, to the outright illegality of images of erect penises. This porn double standard extends throughout our entire sexual culture. If I had a dollar for very every movie or ad that features an out-of-shape, ordinary, or over-the-hilll guy paired up with a nubile hot babe (or several nubile hot babes) I’d be the richest poster on the SDMB ;). Now why is that the case?
stoid, what you overlook is that what a lot of porn communicates to women is an ideal of sexual attractiveness that they will never be able to attain; while what it communicates to men is a standard of desire that they should actively pursue. IMO neither men nor women ultimately gain from this (which doesn’t mean that I’m against porn; I’m certainly not for censoring it).
My point is that the position of the straight female viewer of typical porn is quite different from that of the straight male viewer. And unless you take that into account, you don’t really see why it is that, say, centerfolds in the workplace–which is to say, images of nude or semi-nude young, photo re-touched, surgically enhanced, well-worked out women–will inevitably mean different things to different sexes. And that doesn’t have to have anything to do with a person’s level of tolerance for sex and the sexual.
Sua, I’m curious, if you care to share it, why you feel you must censor your behavior with female colleagues in order to avoid the appearance of sexual harassment. I’m asking sincerely. I’ve heard other men express similar feelings and I’d like to hear more about it. Because if fear of the appearance of harassment is keeping you from socializing with female co-workers as you would male then the effect is clearly counterproductive.
Let me add that in my line of work I’m very often alone, and in a relatively private space with individuals of both sexes, most of whom are in the 19-23 age-range. I’d have to be blind not to notice how attractive some of these people are. And sometimes the subject matter under discussion, for entirely appropriate reasons, has some sexual bearing. Depending on the individual, I sometimes feel entirely comfortable or not; but in all cases I feel confident that nothing I say or do is going to either be or appear to be inappropriate, because I have no inappropriate intentions or designs. (I don’t mean that I have no thoughts that would be inappropriate to express; I am flesh and blood and I take it as a matter of course that proximity to attractive individuals will occasion responses of many kinds.) But, whatever the case may be, there’s a purpose to what I’m doing with that individual: I am helping him or her; he or she is telling me something I need to know; we are collaborating on something; I am trying to build a bond of trust and cooperation with that individual and he or she with me. I am a professional; and the person with me either is also a professional or is in the process of becoming one. By the very nature of things, therefore, we have something to share and I feel confident that I can explore that relationship to the fullest; and because I can relate to that person professionally, I can also get to know that person as a friend if we both choose.
Admittedly, it may help that I’m in a monogamous relationship so that my obligations to my partner present one curb on any interest I might feel in another person, inside or out of the workplace. But that situation has not always been the case for me. Speaking for myself, I know that my own sense of myself as a professional, and my own interest in and respect for other people with whom it is my job to interact, makes it seem highly unlikely to me that I would ever do or say anything that another person would experience as harassing. So I’m wondering, if you care to elaborate, how and why it is so different for you.
stoid, IMO feminism and feminists have very little to do with the problems that you identify. Few feminists are in the business of suggesting that women need to be protected from exposure to sexual themes. IMO the problems you point to are traceable to a complex interaction of two things: 1) Americans’ bizarrely inconsistent views towards sex (both sin and obsession); and 2) persistent and pervasive sexual double standards that run from porn, to advertising, to stigmatizing the same sexual conduct for women when men would be congratulated for it (which again, probably hurts both men and women).
