Porn

Dittany, check no-one has been accessing your hard drive!

Blimey! Did you just look that all up now?

Hmmm well lifeissweet I would dispute that

All sex, even consensual sex between a married couple, is an act of violence perpetrated against a woman." Catherine MacKinnon

"All men are rapists and that's all they are" Marilyn French Author, "The Women's Room" (quoted again in People Magazine) "All men are rapists and that's all they are ..." Feminist Marilyn French, People Magazine (Percent of reported rape or near-rape incidents = .07% [The FBI's Uniform Crime Report lists for the year 1996])

"[Rape] is nothing more or less than a conscious process of intimidation by which ALL MEN KEEP ALL WOMEN IN A STATE OF FEAR" [emphasis added] -- Susan Brownmiller (Against Our Will p. 6)

"Marriage as an institution developed from rape as a practice. Rape, originally defined as abduction, became marriage by capture. Marriage meant the taking was to extend in time, to be not only use of but possession of, or ownership." -- Andrea Dworkin.

"Heterosexual intercourse is the pure, formalized expression of contempt for women's bodies." -- Andrea Dworkin

"Romance is rape embellished with meaningful looks." Andrea Dworkin in the Philadelphia Inquirer, May 21, 1995..

"Under patriarchy, no woman is safe to live her life, or to love, or to mother children. Under patriarchy, every woman is a victim, past, present, and future. Under patriarchy, every woman's daughter is a victim, past, present, and future. Under patriarchy, every woman's son is her potential betrayer and also the inevitable rapist or exploiter of another woman," Andrea Dworkin, Liberty, p.58..

"One can know everything and still be unable to accept the fact that sex and murder are fused in the male consciousness, so that the one without the imminent possibly of the other is unthinkable and impossible." Andrea Dworkin, Letters from a War Zone, p. 21..

"In every century, there are a handful of writers who help the human race to evolve. Andrea is one of them."--Gloria Steinem

"And if the professional rapist is to be separated from the average dominant heterosexual [male], it may be mainly a quantitative difference." -- Susan Griffin "Rape: The All-American Crime"
(p. 86)

"When a woman reaches orgasm with a man she is only collaborating with the patriarchal system, eroticizing her own oppression..." -- Sheila Jeffrys

"I claim that rape exists any time sexual intercourse occurs when it has not been initiated by the woman, out of her own genuine affection and desire." -- Robin Morgan, "Theory and Practice: Pornography and Rape" in "Going to Far," 1974.

"Who cares how men feel or what they do or whether they suffer? They have had over 2000 years to dominate and made a complete hash of it. Now it is our turn. My only comment to men is, if you don't like it, bad luck - and if you get in my way I'll run you down." Letter to the Editor: "Women's Turn to Dominate" Signed: Liberated Women, Boronia -- Herald-Sun, Melbourne, Australia - 9 February 1996

Toward a Feminist Theory of the State. Catharine A. MacKinnon, 1989, First Harvard University Press (paperback in 1991) [a legal treatise comparing and contrasting feminism with COMMUNISM AND SOCIALISM]

"It is not only men convicted of rape who believe that the only thing they did that was different from what men do all the time is get caught."

"If sexuality is central to women's definition and forced sex is central to sexuality, rape is indigenous, not exceptional, to women's social condition."

"Under law, rape is a sex crime that is not regarded as a crime when it looks like sex. The law, speaking generally, defines rape as intercourse with force or coercion and without consent., Like sexuality under male supremacy, this definition assumes the sadomasochistic definition of sex: intercourse with force or coercion can be or become consensual."

"Compare victims' reports of rape with women's reports of sex. They look a lot alike....[T]he major distinction between intercourse (normal) and rape (abnormal) is that the normal happens so often that one cannot get anyone to see anything wrong with it." Catherine MacKinnon, quoted in Christina Hoff Sommers, "Hard-Line Feminists Guilty of Ms.-Representation," Wall Street Journal, November 7, 1991.

"The institution of sexual intercourse is anti-feminist" -- Ti-Grace Atkinson "Amazon Odyssey" (p. 86)

"In a patriarchal society all heterosexual intercourse is rape because women, as a group, are not strong enough to give meaningful consent." Catherine MacKinnon in Professing Feminism: Cautionary Tales from the Strange World of Women's Studies, p. 129..

"[Acquaintance rape] is more common than left-handedness, alcoholism and heart attacks." Naomi Wolf, The Beauty Myth (in the feminist attempt to build a case that "one in four" women have been raped in America.)

"[R]ape represents an extreme behavior, but one that is on a continuum with normal male behavior within the culture." Prof. Mary Koss of Kent State University (1982)

"Men who are unjustly accused of rape can sometimes gain from the experience." Catherine Comins, Vassar College Assistant Dean of Student Life in Time, June 3, 1991, p. 52..

As cited in Andrea Dworkin's "Right-Wing Women" "...I submit that any sexual intercourse between a free man and a human being he owns or controls is rape." -- Alice Walker in "Embracing the Dark and the Light," Essence, July 1982. (Feminists believe that marriage = ownership).

"Compare victims' reports of rape with women's reports of sex. They look a lot alike....[T]he major distinction between intercourse (normal) and rape (abnormal) is that the normal happens so often that one cannot get anyone to see anything wrong with it." Catherine MacKinnon, quoted in Christina Hoff Sommers, "Hard-Line Feminists Guilty of Ms.-Representation," Wall Street Journal, November 7, 1991.

"I feel that 'man-hating' is an honorable and viable political act, that the oppressed have a right to class-hatred against the class that is oppressing them." -- Robin Morgan, (editor of MS magazine)

A young woman at the University of Pennsylvania who wore a short skirt complained of a "mini-rape" because a young man walked past her and said, "Nice legs." (Camille Paglia and Christine Hoff Sommers, "Has Feminism Gone Too Far?" Think Tank with Ben Wattenberg, Produced by New River Media, Washington, DC, November 4, 1994.)

"Female heterosexuality is not a biological drive or an individual women's erotic attraction or attachment to another human animal which happens to be male. Female heterosexuality is a set of social institutions and practices... Those definitions... are about the oppression and exploitation of women [by men]." Marilyn Frye, Willful Virgin: Essays in Feminism, 1976-1992 ( Freedom: Crossing Press,1992) p.132.

[Author comment] And finally, a very disturbing account of the lengths feminists are allowed to go to in our educational institutions in order to vilify and demonize young men.

At the University of Maryland, some female students posted the names of male students selected at random, young men about whom they knew nothing, under the heading "Potential Rapists." The message was that all men are potential rapists, though the men actually named probably did not find much comfort in that... (John Leo, "De-escalating the gender war" U.S. News and World Report, April 18,1994, p.24.)

Carmen - it is not infantalising women. Two of the women arguing with you on this thread are extremely eloquent, articulate, well read women who would once have defended pornography. They were sucked in and will admit it. Women may consent, they may sign up to something and not realise that it's sapping away their soul until later. It's not that they are stupid, or feeble, it is that we are conditioned to think that this is acceptable.

Whilst I normally disagree with Dittany and I do on the surface here, that many women freely engage in this and aren't "exploited" as such, I do stop to think about their motivation now.

Do they ever genuinely enjoy it? (Possible)
See it as a valid career option? (also possible)
See is as a route to "better" things ie actress/star? (very possible)

If you look below the surface, in each of those scenarios you can imagine a point when they WERE taken advantage of. They might see it as "free will" but is it REALLY?

Feminists do not hate men.

Dittany, to clarify: I do not know what your definition of pornography is. There are shades of grey which some may define as porn and others won't.

I personally believe the word pornography is meaningless because it's just a construct that is often used very vaguely. So I talk about mediatised sex acts which is more descriptive and less emotive.

Let me also clear this up:
I did NOT claim that women being victimised must be feeble. Don't even suggest I did.

I argued that there is a school of thought operating under the guise of feminism which suggests that women do not have the ability to refuse to sign a consent form (extraneous factors such as blackmail and alcohol removed).

This is extremely disempowering and damaging. If we cannot accept that a woman's no means no, we infantilise her.

Sunny, I don't agree that prostitution has been the biggest industry throughout history. I can't think of a single time period or culture where that has been the case.

But like all aspects of the sex industry, prostitution is more common in some cultures than others. I want us to become like some of the other Western cultures where sex as a performance is comparatively rare.

I don't think you can have any social justice campaign that is based on the idea that we cannot change as individuals or as a culture.

Well many men are hated by certain supporters of radical feminism does that mean you will stop being a feminist?

Good for you, once again, Sunny. Unfortunately women are not objectified by individual men who love them, they are objectified by an entire culture, so it's not exactly comparable.

Well lifeissweet thats where we differ I objectify men as such all the time by in the past having sex with them casually or by masturbating/watching them in videos and I love men. All the men in my life have been wonderful my dad, brothers, husband, all my male friends etc so I really dont think me doing this makes any difference. I dont think it does the other way round either. I dont think looking at a naked member of the opposite sex and masturbating over it involves hatred personally.

Sunny - the bits that don't allow the bits that do - that's why you can't separate it into good and bad.

Yes but portofino as I said a million times not all of teh sex industry involves abuse or violence

Actually, Sunny, in a way neither do I, because it's all part of pornification. It is all part of making porn acceptable. Page 3 girls and objectification (I would even say hatred) of women is a slippery slope to violence and rape. It is all dehumanising women.

"Sex is normal and wishing to watch others have sex is normal and nothing will ever change that."

That might be true, but it is not normal that other people might suffer so that we can get our jollies!

Well for a start dittany doesnt even differentiate between hardcore porn with violence and rape and page 3 girls!!

I'm confused now.

We are talking about porn and whether there is any such thing as ethical porn.

Where did this expand into all sex in the media?

Yes but BFE its because of what has happened to her that it has messed her up. Its like saying someone who has been raped and ends up on drugs or as an alcholic is the same as someone who has a normal life and upbringing who occasionally smokes weed and has a glass of wine on an evening. There is a whole range of difference. That is the same as what there is in the sex industry.

You're like a dog with a bone, aren't you?

You answer none of my questions but interrogate me.

You did miss the point completely though by telling me that there is rape and abuse in pornography. I know that and it had nothing to do with any arguments I was making.