straight pornography is male gay in sensibility

Perhaps it's because we see so much blood and gore and violence in the media, that they just think it's another form of acting. Even women are desensitized to the way women are treated on TV and films. I remember being very shocked as a little girl. And then as a young teenager I remember wondering why the murder victim always had to be a woman. Now I don't question it. I just 'know' that murder victims on TV are women, with the odd exception. CSI: let's find the most sadistic way a woman can possibly be murdered and up the antse each week
And let's be honest, some men haven't got the first clue about women and probably believe they're enjoying it.

Good question Dittany, and one I will have to think about.

Another question - what came first, the misogyny or the porn?

If mainstream porn is an expression of hatred for women, then it is being made to sell to an audience of misogynists. We know that many many men really do hate women, and do rape them, and so on. So the fact that they have films which cater to their tastes is no surprise.

However many men don't hate women, but they see these films as it is what is available. So teh question is, do they affect these men, the normal ones?

In the way that porn is seeping into society at large, harder and nastier porn is seeping into a world where previously it was not consumed. Is this having an effect on men?

And this isn't a "what about the men", but to try and understand whether this type of porn is a problem for people who are being abused inside the industry, for women in the wider world, or for everyone.

Does this tie in with the rape conversations with the following thought

On teh rape threads it has been repeatedly been said that men are not incapable of reading facial expressions and body language, and that a man who says "how was I to know she didn't want it" when it should have been pretty bleeding obvious must be lying.

But if men have been raised from boyhood on films of sex where the women involved do not look like they are enjoying it, then maybe they do believe that this is what women look like when they have sex.

I know that sounds like I am giving an "out" which as you can imagine is not very comfortable for me, but may there be something in that?

And it ties in with a very old fashioned idea that women don't enjoy sex, they "lie back and think of england" and it's something that they put up with. If it's something that women put up with, rather than enjoy, then that means that you can do more or less whatever you like, as they won't enjoy any of it anyway.

Disclaimer: Most men are fine IME. Even the ones that have watched porn understand that it is not real life. And most men I know would walk out if shown a film that was explicitly abusive. (Unfortunately a lot of it is impicitly abusive and most people seem able to ignore that).

yes, there is no one sexuality for women, of course. I identify with some aspects of Sam, but that type of sexuality is the only one you really get to see usually in the media. And I definitely agree that porn and the media direct people's behaviour, which is stifling. Just as they direct men's expectations of what a woman should look like.

Agree with Dittany. The male viewer puts himself in the place of the man, the female viewer puts herself in the place of the woman.

Which is why men being exposed to mainstream porn is categorically a bad thing. It forces men into "being" the person who is doing these things, and as we have seen some of the things that they are then repeatedly being asked to "do" will amost certainly warp their view of what is right/acceptable/how women react etc etc and all teh rest of it.

Again I feel I have to say that some women do have a sexuality that is more usually found in men, and that there is nothing wrong with them for that.

it gets back to this averages thing - one average it may be that women and men have different sexualities, but for specific individuals many people have the sexuality more commonly found in the other sex, and that is fine.

If we're thinking predatory/bedpost notching type behaviour vs needing an emotional connection type stuff.

the problem with both mainstream porn and say what we were talking about the other day with the suggestion of "normal loving sex" for children in schools is that both of these direct ererging sexualities and potentially stifle them.

I know what you mean about 'acting' and about women accepting male sexuality as their own. I think Sam in sex and the city is a perfect example.
Remember that 'more' magazine for young teenagers that had the 'position of the fortnight'. I remember looking at them and thinking 'well, yes, it looks okay, but I don't see how it could beat what Kev did for me last Saturday'
Male and female sexuality is so different, I think.

I've often wondered this - why a 'straight' man would want to watch some guy waggling his huge penis around, watching it be sucked etc ... I assume they are getting off alot on the visual of the penis.

I can't even answer the argument the other way (do women get off on seeing the vaginas in porn) because I do!

I think that it is certainly true that inexperienced men who have been exposed to a lot of porn might be shit in bed.

Remember too that girls are being exposed to this version of sexuality now too, so sadly you might have a situation where inexperienced people are trying to replicate porn sex as that is the idea of what sex is that they have been given, and thus are denied the experience of experimenting for themselves and finding out what makes them tick, also in porn the point is usually missed that it's supposed to be fun/enjoyable etc.

Does it allow that myth to develop? Some of the most mind-blowing sexual experiences I've ever had was when I was young with boys of my own age, and I think it's because they hadn't been exposed to that much porn.
Do you think it's possible that the more porn a bloke watches the worse he'll be in bed?

Sakura: but I think that treating sexual expression and sexually explicit media - indeed, 'wank material' as something irrelevant, unimportant and nasty is not a good idea because it allows the myth that sex is something irrelevant and nasty that women dislike and need to be protected from, to flourish.

Yes I think that's closer to the mark BitofFun.
The 'acting out the hatred towards the mother' argument is a sneaky way of saying misogyny is women's fault.

Just wanted to say thanks to dittany for that link to Robert Jensen's piece on porn, sex and cruelty uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/freelance/pornography&cruelty.htm which was very thought provoking.

I'm a bit late to this, but I would say that mainstream porn is less about repressed homoeroticism than it is about male narcissism.

I think that it is geared towards a fairly immature version of male sexuality, where the main, er, thrust of the issue is about wish-fulfilment and identification with an unrealistic position of power.

In porn, the fantasy protagonist is basically saying 'Woo-hoo, look what my penis can do, it can go anywhere!'

They don't need to engage with the female receptacle in any way, because they are just an unthreatening generic fembot on which they can visit the imaginary power of their almighty cock.

It is an immature version of sexuality, but functions as a lowest common denominator for the marketing men.

I am far from convinced that most men actually see women like this, but I think it corresponds with a level of development in most men which pornographers can make money from.

yes but the profit makers, the ones who do really well under a captitalist system, have to have a certain, how shall we say, ruthlessness about them. They fuck the environment and they fuck women and children.

But they're not synonymous. They may feed off each other, but their motives are not the same. I lean more towards the view that profit-making, not misogyny, leads.

capitalism and patriarchy feed off each other. That's why feminists tend to gravitate towards Marxism.

Hijacked by men, or hijaked by profitmakers, Sakura? How do you define the hijackers and what is their motive?

SGB, I see your point about making women-friendly porn, I really do, but I also think that it can only take place in a post-revolutionary utopia in the distant, distant future. Because any attempt to do the kind of porn your talking about is going to be hijacked by men, so the only option feminists have got is to say 'no' to porn. If saving one woman from one of the scenes dittany's post means lots of people go without wanking material, well, then so be it. It's a trade off I'm willing to make.

steth, OH I know gay men can be misogynistic, especially in works of literature written by gay men, so I'm not trying to generalise but I'M thinking more along the lines of how gay men and women get along so well in groups. I think you can generalize about that. I watch 'so you think you can dance' (I LOVE IT) and the entire programme is more or less populated by women and gay men, including the judges.