*I’ve often said that a test of the depth of a friendship is how much you can insult or flirt with the friend. And you kind of develop the depth of a friendship by testing where the limits are. And concerns about sexual harrassment cause me to not test such limits.
*
So you would characterize your behavior with your close male friends as flirtatious, Sua?
I think it’s relatively easy in most instances to identify where the line is… it is unacceptable to ** actively impose on another ** : no touching, no personal inquiries, no forcing to attend meetings in a grossly sexualized atmosphere (strip club). However, if the business permits Penthouse Pets in a given worker’s area, that’s not an active imposition on another. (By the way, let’s define our terms a little more precisely: Penthouse Pets and Playboy bunnies may be sexual, and some people may in fact be offended by them, but they hardly qualify as “porn”)
Ah, stoid, glad you’re still in this one :).
First, I’m not arguing that the mere presence of porn in the workplace necessarily constitutes either a hostile environment or sexual harassment. (Years ago I interviewed for a job as a part-time copyeditor with the publisher of several magazines including Jugs and–I kid you not–Crochet Fantasy. I was specifically asked if I would mind the ambience, and I specifically answered no. As it happens I didn’t get the job.)
Second, my point was that centerfolds almost inevitably mean different things to different sexes; not that they necessarily constituted a hostile environment, not that they necessarily qualify as “porn.” I was trying to get at the larger picture in your OP (the double standard); not to name specific grounds for sexual harassment.
All of that said, I think for some people it’s very hard to draw the line–and that’s why they feel so intimidated and upset.
Even your position that Penthouse Pets “hardly qualify as ‘porn’” is debatable.
(For the record, I don’t see Penthouse Pets as “porn,” but, on the other hand, I don’t see “porn” itself as a huge problem. Though I do find most porn I’ve seen very disappointing and, as I said, geared for perceived male tastes rather than female.)
Penthouse-style centerfolds, once famous for their “pink” shots, used to be considered pretty obscene. Now that people have grown accustomed to their legality they no longer are. Surely you’ve seen The People vs. Larry Flynt.
Look at the difference between X-rated movies of the past and typical R-rated movies today. Last Tango in Paris? Midnight Cowboy? Would these be X-rated movies today? People used to believe that D.H. Lawrence’s novels were dirty books.
And yet, with all that increased permissiveness, some things haven’t changed. What do you, stoid, make of the fact that erect penises are still verboten in what is supposedly a permissive sexual culture? Why is the phallus being kept under wraps? 
I certainly flirt with everyone. But then, I want to have sex with most people, so what can I say?
Hmm. My coworkers don’t know that, however. Wonder if they would react differently…?
By the way, Stoid, seeing as Penhouse regularly displays penetration, I think it pretty much qualifies as porn.
Well, Mandelstam, I hadn’t read the link before, but having twice made atttempts to slog my way through it, I will just concede any point you want to make that is based on that article. Anything to keep from having to read such a turgid writing style.
Whatever.
This is exactly what I’m talking about. Just because its difficult to determine exactly where sexual harassment begins doesn’t mean that we should ban anything that could possibly be considered SH. I know that that makes it easy for lawyers because when the bar is set on the floor there is no possibility of any grey area. But it makes the law look like an ass because now you have all these rediculous claims of SH, and people become contemptuous and disgusted by the whole idea.
But we don’t “ban anything that could possibly be considered” sexual harassment. We prohibit, via federal and state statutes, behavior that is sexual harassment. If a plaintiff cannot convince a jury that she was harassed because of her gender, she cannot recover a penny.
And since you’re convinced the bar is set so low, how 'bout some examples of successful sexual harassment suits where the bar was set too low, in your opinion? Let’s make this concrete, instead of arguing the abstract.
**bnorton **: "Anything to keep from having to read such a turgid writing style. "
Here, for anyone who’s been too busy to take a look, are a few samples of what bnorton finds too taxing for his reading comprehension.
“[T]he real issue isn’t sex, it’s sexism on the job. The fact is, most harassment isn’t about satisfying sexual desires. It’s about protecting work–especially the most favored lines of work–as preserves of male competence and authority.”
“We know that women who work in jobs traditionally held by men are more likely than other women to experience hostility and harassment at work. Much of the harassment they experience isn’t “sexual” in content or design. Even where sexually explicit harassment occurs, it is typically part of a broader pattern of conduct intended to reinforce gender difference and to claim work as a domain of masculine mastery. As one experienced [female] electrician put it…”[We]…face another pervasive and sinister kind of harassment which is gender-based, but may have nothing to do with sex. It is harassment aimed at us simply because we are women in a ‘man’s’ job, and its function is to discourage us from staying in our trades."
“(I)t becomes clear that the popular view of harassment is both too narrow and too broad. Too narrow, because the focus on rooting out unwanted sexual activity has allowed us to feel good about protecting women from sexual abuse while leading us to overlook equally pernicious forms of gender-based mistreatment. Too broad, because the emphasis on sexual conduct has encouraged some companies to ban all forms of sexual interaction, even when these do not threaten women’s equality on the job.”
After giving some examples of where the law’s narrowness has harmed men who are being harassed for unmasculine behavior, Schultz writes:
“Meanwhile, the traditional overemphasis on sex can lead to a repressive impulse to eliminate all hints of sexual expression from the workplace, however benign. Instead of envisioning harassment law as a tool to promote women’s equality as workers, the popular understanding of harassment encourages courts and companies to “protect” women’s sexual sensibilities.”
The latter in particular seems to be exactly the point that bnorton and some others are trying to make, were bnorton only able to deal with supposedly “turgid” style.
Yeesh, bnorton, have you considered posting in a forum where the links don’t require a 12th-grade reading level?
I offered bnorton some examples of behavior that might–or might not–constitute reasonable complaints and asked him his opinion. He replied: “This is exactly what I’m talking about. Just because its difficult to determine exactly where sexual harassment begins doesn’t mean that we should ban anything that could possibly be considered SH.”
Say what?
What “exactly” are you talking about? I asked you a question about hypothetical examples. You dodged the question entirely. Where do I say anything about a ban on “anything that could possibly be considered SH”? In fact, where do I say anything about “ban” at all?
Perhaps you’d like to take another crack at answering a simple question?
" I know that that makes it easy for lawyers because when the bar is set on the floor there is no possibility of any grey area."
Well as minty points out, and as the article you read explains at length, there is in fact plenty of grey area. Courts decide whether a case does or doesn’t have merits. The law’s definition leave much open to interpretation.
“But it makes the law look like an ass because now you have all these rediculous claims of SH, and people become contemptuous and disgusted by the whole idea.”
Well, as I see it, there is one person–to wit, you–whose contempt and disgust is based on what appears to be basic misunderstanding about the law, and shockingly poor reading skills.
So from my view the law’s looking a lot less asinine that some other parties.
But, hey, thanks for quoting Charles Dickens.
Well, shut my mouth! The Pet is getting fucked in her gatefold these days? Shows how far behind the times I am…
Pet fucking in a national magazine? I am way behind the times.
And I have no intention, whatsoever, in changing that.
Reminds me of what the Latin poet Seneca said, on the occasion of dining at a Japanese restaraunt that specialized in a cuisine centered around dangerous eels…
Oh, tempura! Oh, morays
It was my impression that many who claim sexual harrassment(and other types of claims against employers) are often given settlements because many employers think it would be cheaper than going to trial.
Was I mistaken?
Ding Ding Ding! spooje nails it again…
Why, because they are so deeply terrifying, of course. 
Honestly, I think there are a number of factors driving that, starting with the whole active/passive aspect of the feminine and masculine natures and forms. A naked woman could be thinking about her grocery shopping, for all we know, so we can enjoy her nakedness without feeling that it is necessarily pornographic. It is a passive nakedness. Erect males, however, are in an “active” mode, so to speak, and what is on their minds is kinda hard to argue with.
Howzat?
Hell yeah, I don’t remember offhand when they made the switch, but I’d say it was in the last four years or so… maybe less. I was shocked myself… and promptly extended my subscription. 
“A naked woman could be thinking about her grocery shopping, for all we know, so we can enjoy her nakedness without feeling that it is necessarily pornographic. It is a passive nakedness. Erect males, however, are in an “active” mode, so to speak, and what is on their minds is kinda hard to argue with.”
Sorry, stoid, this makes no sense at all to me. First of all, as erislover has explained, magazines do exhibit women engaged in sex acts, with men and with other women (and I gather you’d like to define pornography as the exhibition of a sexual act of some kind and in some form–which is fine with me because it doesn’t much matter to my position how pornography is defined).
Second, when I see a centerfold with her lips parted, her eyes looking up to heaven, and her fingers between her crotch, I do not imagine that any viewer is expected to think that she’s “thinking about her grocery shopping.”
Third, you are now making a distinction that clouds your own argument: that is, you are distinguishing between non-pornographic and pornographic depictions of women as though the former is somehow okay and the latter not. Okay for what?
Fourth, on the active/passive divide. Here you bring up an interesting feature of male/female sexual difference–but you take it to an unwarranted extreme. Just because a guy has a hard-on doesn’t mean that he has it for anyone in particular. Maybe he has a thing for payapas and he’s thinking about his grocery shopping. ;). More important, I’m sure you’d concede that centerfolds where the woman looked bored wouldn’t be sexy; the idea is precisely to make the viewer think that she’s in the mood.
So, nice try, but none of these even remotely explains why there is a legal bar on erections. In England–a country with topless women on every newspaper–this goes so far that if a photo is taken of a person performing oral sex, the penis of the recipient has to be covered with a dot. (I’m not precisely sure how the law works in the US, but I have read that men’s magazines such as Penthouse would be eager to break it if they could get away with it.)
This is a plain old double standard, stoid. The male body is kept relatively sacrosanct, while the female body can be exposed to the max. Overexposure of men’s bodies makes the powers that be nervous. In our society, male potency is supposed to be about wealth and power with the actual equipment ketp as mystified as possible. That’s why businessmen get to wear tailored suits that hide all their rolls, paunches, etc.
Yes, there are ways in which that is changing: Abercromie and Fitch-style marketing, Calvin Klein underwear photos. But for the most part, we live in a world in which the visual complement to the word “sex” is a woman’s body–usually a young, scantily clad, or nude woman’s body. The man, if there is one, can be back in the shadows, fully or mainly dressed, good looking and in shape or not. The way “sex” is sold to us, he’s implicitly the consumer, she’s the product.
In this world women are supposed to buy magazines and commodities with sexy women on them and–surprise, surprise-- men are supposed to buy magazines and products with sexy women on them. Sexy men, of course, exist–in real life and at the movies–but, on the whole, their marketing potential to straight women is constrained (Bradd Pitt doesn’t hawk a line of pantyhose). And the use of sexy men in pornography geared for straight women is almost non-existent since almost no pornography geared for straight women exists.
Imagine a world in which every box of tampons had an Ambercombrie guy with his pants half unzipped: “Use it baby. You deserve it.”
Imagine the magazine rack in the supermarket. Next to Maxim, issues of Cosmo with a spread of Tom Cruise showing his butt to the camera, or Denzel looking straight into the camera with his tongue between his teeth.
Please note: I am not saying that I crave such a world. I don’t. To the extent that men are being held to unrealistically high standards of physical attractiveness, they’re only being pressured in ways that have long been hard on women. Men are pressured enough by other demands. It’s not at all my goal to make men more nervous than they already are about their muscle tone, or the size of their tackle.
But what I am saying is that the male and female experience of the world would only be the same if male flesh were plastered all over the place , for the explicit gaze of women, as female flesh is for men and women both.
Especially since cable TV and the Internet, pornography and quasi-pornographic images (e.g., lingerie models hawking products to women via photos that look like they belong in a men’s magazine) have become a feature of mainstream life as never before. My problem, as I’ve said, isn’t with pornography itself–I don’t at all object to the availability of sexually explicit materials for the enjoyment of adults–but to the double standard thus maintained.
Straight couples are increasingly expected to watch softporn–on cable, in hotel rooms, on video–and yet the stuff has nothing in it specifically for the female viewer. Presumably the female viewer can be turned on just by watching “sex,” or by the sexiness of the women’s bodies. Straight women may well be arousable by images of other straight women (I am); but they’d be helluva lot more aroused by images of a good-looking man who is, um, “active.”
Once again, I’m not demanding this as part of my personal utopia. I happen to think that sexual fantasy is better in its written, verbal, and performative varieties than in the form of images I see on the box. Most porn is still designed to facilitate masturbation, and is therefore extremely passive: watching, wanking ;).
As far as couples go, I’d liken watching porn to watching TV, with the difference being that whereas most Americans lack the talent either to write a script or to act in a TV program, when it comes to sex that’s not true. Two willing parties means not only two functional bodies, but also two imaginations with an infinite capacity to dream up scenarios just right for the two people in question. To me that’s pornography ;).
OTOH, I’ve got nothing against couples or anyone else of age watching porn. I just think that until porn for straight couples really serves up a dish cooked for both parties, then we simply have a reaffirmation of a double standard that’s existed for way too long.
Back to the topic of harassment. minty presumably knows far better than I do how frequently settlements are made. But let’s say for argument’s sake that they’re frequent. How does that simple fact end up being an indictment of feminism or, as I’ve read it in this thread, “irrational” feminism, “radical” feminism?
For those with better reading skills than bnorton, an example is on hand of how at least one prominent feminist lawyer is arguing for a kind of sexual harassment practice that would be more empowering for men and women both, and that would not constitute some kind of prudish bar on the mere mention of sex.
So assuming, for argument’s sake, that spooje is right to say that settlements are frequent.
Are these settlements for cases where the grounds were specious?
Can we promote sexual equality at the workplace without making it impossible for a nice guy like Scylla to insult his close friends? ;).
More important, can we have a discussion about this complex problem without tagging “feminists,” radical or otherwise, as the usual suspects?
Yipes, sorry, the nice guy in question was Sua, not Scylla. Apologies to both posters. (Must have worked myself up thinking of all those ads ;).
Wow! Thanks for clearing that up for us . That changes everything doesn’t it?
Hmm… You know, I may have fallen into the McDonalds-coffee-spill pit. We’re always hearing about these outrageous law siuts which upon closer study turn out to be not outrageous at all. Such could be the case with some of these over-the-top SH suits I’ve heard about.
I didn’t mean to suggest that I couldn’t comprehend what Vicki Schultz wrote, I was simply critical of her writing style which I called, for lack of a better word, turgid. Maybe “contrived highbrow” would have been more descriptive. For me, reading stuff like that is like eating beets. I can make myself do it; I can digest it just fine; but with so much great stuff out there what’s the point?
With so much information coming at us these days we all have to choose what we spend out time on. Even you, buckaroo. Earlier you confessed that you didn’t bother to read the entire thread *"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. *
Hardly! You asked me a question about others continue to draw the line at erect penises, I ventured my opinion… it has and had nothing whatever to do with any argument I have made about anything. I was quite sure we had entered the Land of Tangentia and I was just along for the ride.
And I never said he did, just that he sexually stimulated.
Actually, I don’t agree. In this conversation, we have been discussing Centerfolds. (We’ve established that I’m way behind on the Penthous Pet business) so all along I’ve been thinking about Playboy-style centerfolds, which are generally the kinds of pictures that men hang on walls, and which I don’t think come across as sexually aroused most of the time at all. They have a wide smile, and are looking straight into the camera, and would look pretty much the same if they were modeling a bathin suit or a sports outfit, only there she just happens to be nekkid.
In addition, last time I checked, men don’t really require that any appearance of a naked woman involve her being turned on. They just like looking at naked women.
Your opinion, and I don’t really disagree. Like I said, I thought we were just offering opinions, and mine was about the reasoning that the powers who make up this stuff might offer. Yours is about the unspoken, even subliminal reason. I think both apply.
Another reason for which is that women are not, as rule, that consumed with interest at looking at naked men. Most of us can appreciate a finely-sculpted male form, but it’s not something we seek out, and we usually appreciate it most in context of the guy who owns it. i.e., there are a whole lot of great -looking bodies in Actorland, but the one that gives me a thrill is James Marsters playing the character of Spike… it’s all about the character. Men just like naked wimmins…any (attractive) naked wimmins will do. So why offer us naked men when it doesn’t motivate or move us? Some men will buy stuff if they think it will help them get cute chicks, so position thing next to cute chick and make subliminal connection, sell product. Doesn’t work with us. (Please excuse the many generalities, we all know that not everyone falls into any of these categories)
Again, women are not nearly as interested in visual pornography as men are. Certainly, we can get a little damp at an interesting view of bodies bumping, but as a general rule, women want context. Who is fucking who? Why are they fucking? What is there relationship to each other? How did they end up like this? Is he saying anything nasty? Most women would really rather be told a story than watch a context-free sex scene.
As a smut peddler myself, I can assure you that the lack of porn geared towards women has nothing to do with preserving power or subjugating women, it has to do with the fact that there is a much more limited market to sell to, and that market is much, much harder to please. Cheaper, faster, easier and WAY more profitable to cater to men.
The easy buck to be had in selling sex to women is being sold in the form of romance novels.
In other words, imagine a world controlled by ** Esprix **! When Playgirl was big (is it still around?) the biggest consumers were * gay men. * Men are visual, gay or straight, women generally aren’t. (which again, to head off any tangents of tangents,does not mean that women don’t care about appearances, they do, but I’m talking about what turns women on. Beautiful male bodies belonging to men they don’t know don’t really do it. They are nice to look upon, but they are not erotically charged for women. )
Which also explains why there is a huge, huge market for gay male porn and pretty much none for lesbians.
Why would you ever think, expect, or hope for male and female experineces of the world to be the same when men and women are not the same? It won’t happen, and I for one wouldn’t want it to. For such a thing to occur would mean pretty much everybody would have to in some way contort themselves into an unnatural shape, metaphorically speaking.
Rather than repress the sexual element of our being, or artificially inflate it to match others’, what we need is a way to deal with it without letting it interfere or dictate the limits of what women AND men are allowed to acheive or be.
But I’ve just pointed out that the double standard is not a patriarchal plot, it’s the market’s reponse to different natures of men and women.
Bingo. If I didn’t know you were a woman before, that would have given you away.
Because it is a result of pressure from a branch of feminism.
I guess we’d have to go citeseeing (yukyukyuk I crack myself up) to answer that for sure.
Well, we gotta tag someone. You wanna be ** it ** ?
stoid
OK, Penthouse Pets do not have sex with men in the magazine, but they do pee or insert phallus-like objects into their penetralia (yummy word for yummy things); none of this is done, I don’t think, on the actual centerfold picture (the fold-outs) as far as I can recall. The other, non-centerfold pics are of sex, orgies, oral sex, bondage, et cetera, with the final picture being the typical remenent of a “money shot”. Which I can’t stand, for the record (I hate the cum-shots in pornos, too).
I don’t think that detracts from any points, just want to be clear.
bnorton, thanks for the clarification.
eris, thanks for the running update on the contents of Penthouse (And I’m not surprised at all hear that the depictions of sex acts exclude the phallus in all its “active” glory for the legal reasons I’ve already referred to).
stoid, I get the feeling you think I’m attacking you, or your livelihood. I want to assure you, I intend neither. You have always been one of my favorite posters. And I have a very matter-of-fact position on the matter of pornography. I do not in the least feel that women who produce or sell pornography are feminist sell-outs; any more than I feel that strippers or, for that matter, housewives, are feminist sell-outs. I neither am nor respect that kind of feminist.
On the matter of the legal ban on erections, my basic assertion stands: why, if not for a pervasive double standard, does the ban exist?
You may see the question as purely tangential to the matter of “Why did feminism end up perpetuating the stereotypes it was supposed to destroy?” To my mind it is not. Because to my mind, the answer to the OP is that feminism didn’t, by and large, perpetuate the stereotypes; the stereotypes are rooted in a double standard that, by and large, feminism and feminists actively oppose.
On the matter of centerfolds. Yes, Playboy specializes in the girl-next-door with her clothes removed, while Penthouse serves up a panting vixen with her legs spread.
Different strokes for different folks
“[W]omen are not, as rule, that consumed with interest at looking at naked men. Most of us can appreciate a finely-sculpted male form, but it’s not something we seek out, and we usually appreciate it most in context of the guy who owns it.”
This may be true for you personally stoid, but I would include this as one of “the stereotypes” that I would like to see go out the window.
Although I do believe there are biological differences between men and women, on the whole, I believe that this type of difference–what turns us on–is much more to do with individual preference and with socialization than it is with physiology. I strongly suspect that both sexes equally enjoy nudity, and that both sexes are interested in context. There is much historical evidence to show that context, in particular, varies across time and across cultures. In our culture young girls almost never get a chance to see naked men. (Note that in some cultures where it’s more likely that they do, female genital mutiliation is practiced to keep female sexuality in line.) In our culture boys are much more likely to see naked women, and near-naked women at a very young age, because they’re all over the place.
I distinctly remember the first time I saw a penis and it made a very big impression on me ;).
I also remember, at about age 12, a friend of mine whose mother owned a copy of Playgirl which my friend had accidentally found. We were all very interested in its contents. Did I then go to the 7/11 and buy a copy of of the magazine for myself? Hell no–I’d have sooner peed my pants in public. Girls growing up when I did (I’m 37) were supposed to be “nice,” not sex-starved. (I gather that hasn’t really changed very much either.)
Of course, I could see plenty of copies of Playboy and Penthouse at home because my father subscribed to both. Like many men of his generation, he really liked the journalism ;). My mother was not–so far as I know–hiding Playgirl in her closet. So, like most girls of my generation I had to find out about sex in books, from gossip with my friends, and from rock n’ roll.
Though it’s embarassing to admit it, I seem to recall having a particular pre-pubescent thing for–gulp–Rod Stewart. Anyone ever watch The Song Remains the Same and notice that you can tell which side Robert Plant “dresses on” (to use the tailor-specific term)?
By your lights stoid, this interest in the male physique makes me unusual. I have my doubts about that.
“Some men will buy stuff if they think it will help them get cute chicks, so position thing next to cute chick and make subliminal connection, sell product. Doesn’t work with us. (Please excuse the many generalities, we all know that not everyone falls into any of these categories)”
Actually, I think it does work with us–or would. Think about all the crap women buy to help them get guys! I suspect that the explicit appeal of the “cute guy” factor would work just fine–whether it’s Leonardo di Caprio for the younger set, or whomever. Let’s not forget that rock and roll was born to the screams of young women going wild at the sight of Elvis’s gyrating pelvis. Once again, this made the powers that be very nervous indeed.
Certainly there is no shortage of teen idol magazines and other paraphernalia for young girls with pictures of “cute guys.” I see no reason to believe that girls are biologically programmed to lose this interest in the visual at, say, age 16. Rather girls, like most people, do what’s socially acceptable for them to do. At right about the time that girls might be interested in checking out the Full Monty, what they get instead is a lot of conflicting messages 1) that they’d better invest their time and energy turning themselves into hot babes or no boys will like them; 2) that if their “nice” girls they won’t be interested in sex at all, except for “romance,” marriage, maternity, and finding a provider.
“As a smut peddler myself, I can assure you that the lack of porn geared towards women has nothing to do with preserving power or subjugating women, it has to do with the fact that there is a much more limited market to sell to, and that market is much, much harder to please.”
As I said above, I have no problem with your making smart business decisions for yourself. I’m not expecting you, or any other individual, to pioneer a product for which there’s no proven audience. But what I am suggesting is that simply because the market doesn’t seem to be there now, doesn’t mean that nature made it that way.
Sometime around 1750 or so–for reasons I could but won’t go into–the idea came about that women are less sexual than men–more maternal, and willing to engage in sex only to please husbands and produce babies. To some degree that vision of women has remained. Interestingly, though, prior to the 18th century women were often thought to be more sexual than men: Eve-like, prurient, curious, even insatiable. My point: times change and so do prevailing stereotypes about sexual “nature.”
…I’m talking about what turns women on. Beautiful male bodies belonging to men they don’t know don’t really do it. They are nice to look upon, but they are not erotically charged for women. )"
I think you’re going to have to speak for yourself on that one stoid. Speaking for myself, beautiful male bodies do turn me on (though my thoughts on what constitutes a “beautiful male body” don’t necessary conform exclusively to the Calvin Klein type).
"Which also explains why there is a huge, huge market for gay male porn and pretty much none for lesbians. "
First, lesbians are also socialized as women. Second, how would you know what the market for lesbian porn is since lesbians can buy porn produced for men–including porn featuring lesbian sex acts?
“Why would you ever think, expect, or hope for male and female experineces of the world to be the same when men and women are not the same? It won’t happen, and I for one wouldn’t want it to.”
I did not say that I wanted anybody’s experience of the world to be the same. I merely pointed out that experience of the world is inevitably gender-specific. Just as it is often race-specific. Unless we go to terrific extremes to avoid it, the world as we know it will regard us as men/women, black/white, often straight/gay. Three hundred years ago our born rank would have trumped these other factors. My point, though, was only that men and women will inevitably view centerfolds differently–not that I aspire to normalize all human experience.
As to what I wish for: I wish for equality of opportunity–something that you seemed to be in favor of in your OP–not conformity of experience or personality.
I wish for a world beyond self-fulfilling stereotypes. On the one hand, you claim to be against stereotypes (the stereotype of the shrinking violet female who must be protected against sex); on the other, you are ready to defend such stereotypes as “natural” or otherwise inevitable (the stereotype of the women who’s turned on by “romance” but not by a good-looking male body in full active mode).
Can you not recognize the inconsistency there?
“Rather than repress the sexual element of our being, or artificially inflate it to match others’, what we need is a way to deal with it without letting it interfere or dictate the limits of what women AND men are allowed to acheive or be.”
This sounds very nice stoid, but it doesn’t erase the inconsistencies in your own position, and it certainly doesn’t accurately describe mine. I’m not at all in favor of sexual repression. And your notion of “artificial inflation” is predicated on the very stereotypes of female sexuality that you claim to want to surpass.
“But I’ve just pointed out that the double standard is not a patriarchal plot, it’s the market’s reponse to different natures of men and women.”
Feminism has gone a long way since the “patriarchal” rhetoric of the 1970s, and you, of all people, ought to know that the market is always being used as a defense of all kinds of unequal status quos.
I wrote earlier: “I happen to think that sexual fantasy is better in its written, verbal, and performative varieties than in the form of images I see on the box.”
stoid replied:“Bingo. If I didn’t know you were a woman before, that would have given you away.”
Really? And if I didn’t know you were a pornographer before, that would have given you away.
To wit: I have never in my life met or talked to a man, straight or otherwise, who wouldn’t rather live out a fantasy, with a real-live human to whom he’s attracted, than buy a magazine or a video and jerk himself off.
Any men reading this who disagree?
IMO people turn to porn for any or some combination of these reasons:
they have no sex life at all and they want something to stimulate masturbation.
they do have a sex life but it’s unsatisfying because they’re not or are no longer attracted to their partner(s).
they have a fantasy that they’re ashamed to reveal to their partner and so they gratify it through porn
they or their partner have found that porn adds something to their sex life.
(IMO, a large number of men fall into category #3. They have a fantasy and they’re ashamed to talk about it. But that’s the topic of another thread.)
I wrote previously: “[L]et’s say for argument’s sake that [out-of-court settlements are] frequent. How does that simple fact end up being an indictment of feminism or, as I’ve read it in this thread, “irrational” feminism, “radical” feminism?”
stoid:“Because it is a result of pressure from a branch of feminism.”
Which branch would that be? Do you have a cite in which a feminist or feminist organization is promoting out-of-court settlements for sexual harassment? Or a cite in which feminists urge women to make prudish complaints about allusions to sex in the workplace?
Bear in mind: I do feel that there are counterproductive feminist positions on the matter of sexual harassment. However, I feel that 1) they are the minority of feminist positions; 2) that if one looks at these positions in good faith they never boil down to a desire for prudishness; 3) that the public’s familiarity with such positions is almost always indirect, coming at the hands of the media and usually the right-wing media; and 4) that there’s a lot of conflation between conservative and so-called “feminist” positions on sexuality in general.
Most feminists feel that sexual harassment should be about combatting economic and professional harm to women. That is N.O.W.'s position; it is the position found in The Nation, it is a prevalent position within feminist legal studies and feminist academia.
You may recall that when Paula Jones was suing Clinton for sexual harassment, her legal counsel was being paid for by conservatives. And in fact there was a lot of controversy because most feminists felt that she was getting the “conservative” version of sexual harassment (i.e. anti-sex) rather than the “liberal/progressive” version of sexual harassment (i.e. anti-discrimination).
And, yes, stoid, we would indeed have to go “citeseeing” to see how many settlements are specious, or to do with prudishness.
But wouldn’t that be better than simply assuming that they are? Or simply assuming that, insofar as they are, some “branch” of feminism is to blame?
I have no problem at all with a self-styled feminist who makes her living as a pornographer.
I do, however, ask that a self-styled feminist with a good head on her shoulders hold herself to rigorous account when she lays blame for social problems on “feminism.”