Poetess Eve Merriam:
"I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, 'Mommy, what was war?' "
17 October 2009
blondesense
Poetess Eve Merriam:
"I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, 'Mommy, what was war?' "
“I actually do read male authored works oooonce in a loooong view while.”
Great - Great - Grandma Adeline Baach Maas, 1896 - 1985, had three cherry trees to the north side of her wraparound porch and front yard. Out along the country dirt road, these swayed: one of only a very few memories I own ... of her homeplace farm.
She ... a woman 98 pounds total -- maybe -- of which about four of them were spent up in the six inch - wide brim of her massive black, wool - felt hat with on its left the huuuuuge red rose which she always wore ... when dressed to the nines.
Adeline Baach was born in 1896, the same year as the writing and publication of Englishman (Alfred Edward) A E Housman's poem of below:
LOVELIEST OF TREES, THE CHERRY NOW
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, for my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
She ... a woman 98 pounds total -- maybe -- of which about four of them were spent up in the six inch - wide brim of her massive black, wool - felt hat with on its left the huuuuuge red rose which she always wore ... when dressed to the nines.
Adeline Baach was born in 1896, the same year as the writing and publication of Englishman (Alfred Edward) A E Housman's poem of below:
LOVELIEST OF TREES, THE CHERRY NOW
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, for my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
11 October 2009
thebondbetweenmotherandchild
APA: The Bond Between Mother and Child
Without a secure motherly attachment, children’s bodies activate a stress reaction to unexpected events.
By Beth Azar
Monitor staff
With the cutting of the umbilical cord, physical attachment to our mothers ends and emotional and psychological attachment begins. While the first attachment provides everything we need to thrive inside the womb, many psychologists believe the second attachment provides the psychological foundation and maybe even the social and physical buffer we need to thrive in the world.
Psychologists’ research shows that the quality of care infants receive affects how they later get along with friends, how well they do in school and how they react to new, and possibly stressful, situations.
The psychological construct of attachment, developed in the late 1950s, describes how babies become attached to their primary-care giver, usually their mothers. Securely attached babies consider ‘Mom’ a safe base from which to explore their environment.
They gain assurance from her presence and use her as a source of comfort when they are distressed or upset. Insecurely attached babies seek comfort from their mothers, but gain less assurance from her.
Attachments infants and children form with other primary-care providers also affect a child’s development, research shows. The nature and impact of such attachments have become a focus for researchers interested in the increase in daycare for very young children.
Social development
Many researchers have found correlations between secure mother-infant attachment and later psychological and social development. Infants who securely attach to their mothers become more self-reliant toddlers and have a better sense of self-esteem, said Alan Sroufe, PhD, an attachment researcher at the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.He’s been following a group of 180 disadvantaged children-now age 19-since before birth, looking at mother-infant attachment and multiple developmental measures such as the kids’ expectations from relationships with parents and friends. He’s also looking at the children’s life stress, success in school and peer relationships.
Sroufe has found that even though these children lead unstable lives, if they had a secure mother-infant attachment they were likely to be self-reliant into adolescence, have lower rates of psychopathology, enjoy successful peer relationships through age 16 and do well in school-especially in math-at all ages.
Sroufe doesn’t think infant attachment affects aptitude, but he believes it affects confidence, attitude and, subsequently, attendance and achievement.
His sample has more life stress and less social support than the average, middle-class samples most researchers study. He’s found that this stress-including instability and loss-can deflect even the most positive life course.
‘Kids who had secure attachment histories but suffer losses will become less secure,’ said Sroufe.
He also found that anxious, poorly attached infants can become more secure if their mothers enter stable love relationships or alleviate their symptoms of depression.
Buffering stress
Secure infant attachment may provide children with a crucial tool for dealing with stress by buffering their physiological reaction to novel or unexpected events, said Megan Gunnar, PhD, of the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.To test this theory, Gunnar exposes children to mildly stressful events and measures changes in their stress-related hormones. An increase in the hormone cortisol, for example, indicates an extreme stress reaction.
In a recent study now in press, Gunnar, along with her then- graduate student Melissa Nachmias, PhD, and others, exposed 77 18-month-old children to three stimuli that the children could choose to approach or avoid: a live clown, a robot clown and a puppet show. Mothers were always present, but for the first three minutes with each stimulus researchers asked them not to participate. For the second three minutes, researchers told the mothers to try to comfort their children.
After the experiment, researchers measured cortisol levels in the children’s saliva. A week later, the researchers measured mother-child attachment using the ’strange-situation’ test (a commonly used measure of attachment).
As expected, the researchers found no increase in cortisol for children who approached the stimuli without fear. However, cortisol levels for inhibited children, who appeared scared and wouldn’t approach the stimuli, varied depending on their attachments to their mothers. Inhibited children who had secure attachments showed no increase in cortisol while inhibited children with insecure attachments showed an increase.
‘The secure children seemed to be saying, ‘This is scary but I feel safe,” said Gunnar. ‘They had the resources to cope.’
Mothers of more inhibited children differed dramatically in how they responded to their child’s distress. Mothers of socially attached children were able to calm their children immediately. They seemed to have an established history with the child that didn’t require any work.
But mothers with insecure attachments were working hard to get their fearful children to not be fearful, said Gunnar. ‘They seemed to think it was their job to change the child, to make the child look bold.’
In a similar real-life experiment, also in press, Gunnar measured cortisol in about 60 toddlers who received inoculations from a physician. She again found that only fearful, insecure children exhibited increased salivary cortisol.
Secure attachments may act as a buffer against the stress of new, strange or scary events, Gunnar said. Without that buffer, children find it difficult to cope and their bodies activate a stress reaction.
No attachment
And what happens if there is no motherly attachment? Psychobiologist Mary Carlson, PhD, of Harvard Medical School, asked that question when she went to Romania last September to measure cortisol levels in orphans.Many Rumanian mothers can’t afford to care for a newborn, and send their children directly from the hospital maternity wards to orphanages. The children receive little to no physical or emotional stimulation from the caretakers in the orphanages. She worked with two groups of 30 children. As part of another study, one group received enriched care-one adult for four children-for a year, six months prior to Carlson’s visit. The other group received standard 20-child-to-one-adult care the entire time.
On an average day for a typical child, cortisol levels peak in the morning and decrease by the end of the day. In both groups of orphans, however, cortisol levels increased from morning to noon and decreased slightly by evening.
There were slight differences
for the children who received the enriched care, but because it ended six months before Carlson could study them, there’s no way to know if the care had positive effects that then diminished when the children returned to standard care.Rhesus monkeys reared with a ’surrogate mother’ made of a wire frame covered by cloth-a poor mother substitute-demonstrate abnormal cortisol cycling similar to those of the Rumanian orphans, according to experiments by Gunnar and Stephen Suomi, PhD, Thomas Boyce, PhD, and Maribeth Champaux, PhD, at the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development.
Gunnar wanted to know if the monkeys simply cycled improperly, or if it was a matter of ‘no mommy, no attachment, no buffer.’ So, she and her colleagues repeated the experiment, making sure to keep the monkeys’ environment unusually quiet-removing even normal daily movements around the lab. The monkeys produced normal cycles.
For these severely deprived monkeys, any stimulation seems to cause stress; they have no buffer to cope with even normal, daily events, said Gunnar.
These studies show that the most basic biological systems depend on social stimulation early in life, said Carlson. Without it, children lack the foundation to deal with everyday life, let alone trauma and stress.
Beyond the mother
With more children entering daycare, researchers have begun to look beyond mother-infant attachment to primary caregiver attachment, whether it be a mother, father or daycare provider.’If you take the notion that children form attachments from the daily mundane experiences of care-feeding, diaper changing, caressing-you need to look at all the caregivers,’ said Carollee Howes, PhD, at the University of California, Los Angeles.
In a series of studies, Howes found that the attachments children form with their primary caregivers is remarkably similar to the attachments they form with their mothers.
However, secure attachments only occur with 50 percent of caregivers as opposed to 70 percent of mothers. The lower rate of attachment probably reflects the lower quality and closeness of the caregiver relationship, said Howes.
In terms of effect, Howes and her colleagues found that in a group of 48 4-year-olds, attachment to a child-care provider better predicted peer interactions than mother-child attachment. Toddlers with secure attachments to teachers were more gregarious and more likely to engage in pretend play with peers; preschoolers were more sociable. Children with insecure teacher attachments were more hostile, aggressive, antisocial and withdrawn.
‘Attachments are relationships that develop from interactions,’ said Howes. ‘We have to figure out who the caregivers are’ and make sure they’re all competent.
While this is a relief to mothers who want or have to work, it also emphasizes the need for high- quality child care, Howes pointed out.
Many attachment researchers find themselves playing the part of child advocates, they admit. Their research points to the need for social policies that allow mothers to stay home or that require high-quality daycare for all children.
‘Babies need a lot of love and a lot of work, and denying that would be wrong,’ said Sroufe.
Without a secure motherly attachment, children’s bodies activate a stress reaction to unexpected events.
By Beth Azar
Monitor staff
With the cutting of the umbilical cord, physical attachment to our mothers ends and emotional and psychological attachment begins. While the first attachment provides everything we need to thrive inside the womb, many psychologists believe the second attachment provides the psychological foundation and maybe even the social and physical buffer we need to thrive in the world.
Psychologists’ research shows that the quality of care infants receive affects how they later get along with friends, how well they do in school and how they react to new, and possibly stressful, situations.
The psychological construct of attachment, developed in the late 1950s, describes how babies become attached to their primary-care giver, usually their mothers. Securely attached babies consider ‘Mom’ a safe base from which to explore their environment.
They gain assurance from her presence and use her as a source of comfort when they are distressed or upset. Insecurely attached babies seek comfort from their mothers, but gain less assurance from her.
Attachments infants and children form with other primary-care providers also affect a child’s development, research shows. The nature and impact of such attachments have become a focus for researchers interested in the increase in daycare for very young children.
Social development
Many researchers have found correlations between secure mother-infant attachment and later psychological and social development. Infants who securely attach to their mothers become more self-reliant toddlers and have a better sense of self-esteem, said Alan Sroufe, PhD, an attachment researcher at the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.He’s been following a group of 180 disadvantaged children-now age 19-since before birth, looking at mother-infant attachment and multiple developmental measures such as the kids’ expectations from relationships with parents and friends. He’s also looking at the children’s life stress, success in school and peer relationships.
Sroufe has found that even though these children lead unstable lives, if they had a secure mother-infant attachment they were likely to be self-reliant into adolescence, have lower rates of psychopathology, enjoy successful peer relationships through age 16 and do well in school-especially in math-at all ages.
Sroufe doesn’t think infant attachment affects aptitude, but he believes it affects confidence, attitude and, subsequently, attendance and achievement.
His sample has more life stress and less social support than the average, middle-class samples most researchers study. He’s found that this stress-including instability and loss-can deflect even the most positive life course.
‘Kids who had secure attachment histories but suffer losses will become less secure,’ said Sroufe.
He also found that anxious, poorly attached infants can become more secure if their mothers enter stable love relationships or alleviate their symptoms of depression.
Buffering stress
Secure infant attachment may provide children with a crucial tool for dealing with stress by buffering their physiological reaction to novel or unexpected events, said Megan Gunnar, PhD, of the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.To test this theory, Gunnar exposes children to mildly stressful events and measures changes in their stress-related hormones. An increase in the hormone cortisol, for example, indicates an extreme stress reaction.
In a recent study now in press, Gunnar, along with her then- graduate student Melissa Nachmias, PhD, and others, exposed 77 18-month-old children to three stimuli that the children could choose to approach or avoid: a live clown, a robot clown and a puppet show. Mothers were always present, but for the first three minutes with each stimulus researchers asked them not to participate. For the second three minutes, researchers told the mothers to try to comfort their children.
After the experiment, researchers measured cortisol levels in the children’s saliva. A week later, the researchers measured mother-child attachment using the ’strange-situation’ test (a commonly used measure of attachment).
As expected, the researchers found no increase in cortisol for children who approached the stimuli without fear. However, cortisol levels for inhibited children, who appeared scared and wouldn’t approach the stimuli, varied depending on their attachments to their mothers. Inhibited children who had secure attachments showed no increase in cortisol while inhibited children with insecure attachments showed an increase.
‘The secure children seemed to be saying, ‘This is scary but I feel safe,” said Gunnar. ‘They had the resources to cope.’
Mothers of more inhibited children differed dramatically in how they responded to their child’s distress. Mothers of socially attached children were able to calm their children immediately. They seemed to have an established history with the child that didn’t require any work.
But mothers with insecure attachments were working hard to get their fearful children to not be fearful, said Gunnar. ‘They seemed to think it was their job to change the child, to make the child look bold.’
In a similar real-life experiment, also in press, Gunnar measured cortisol in about 60 toddlers who received inoculations from a physician. She again found that only fearful, insecure children exhibited increased salivary cortisol.
Secure attachments may act as a buffer against the stress of new, strange or scary events, Gunnar said. Without that buffer, children find it difficult to cope and their bodies activate a stress reaction.
No attachment
And what happens if there is no motherly attachment? Psychobiologist Mary Carlson, PhD, of Harvard Medical School, asked that question when she went to Romania last September to measure cortisol levels in orphans.Many Rumanian mothers can’t afford to care for a newborn, and send their children directly from the hospital maternity wards to orphanages. The children receive little to no physical or emotional stimulation from the caretakers in the orphanages. She worked with two groups of 30 children. As part of another study, one group received enriched care-one adult for four children-for a year, six months prior to Carlson’s visit. The other group received standard 20-child-to-one-adult care the entire time.
On an average day for a typical child, cortisol levels peak in the morning and decrease by the end of the day. In both groups of orphans, however, cortisol levels increased from morning to noon and decreased slightly by evening.
There were slight differences
for the children who received the enriched care, but because it ended six months before Carlson could study them, there’s no way to know if the care had positive effects that then diminished when the children returned to standard care.Rhesus monkeys reared with a ’surrogate mother’ made of a wire frame covered by cloth-a poor mother substitute-demonstrate abnormal cortisol cycling similar to those of the Rumanian orphans, according to experiments by Gunnar and Stephen Suomi, PhD, Thomas Boyce, PhD, and Maribeth Champaux, PhD, at the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development.
Gunnar wanted to know if the monkeys simply cycled improperly, or if it was a matter of ‘no mommy, no attachment, no buffer.’ So, she and her colleagues repeated the experiment, making sure to keep the monkeys’ environment unusually quiet-removing even normal daily movements around the lab. The monkeys produced normal cycles.
For these severely deprived monkeys, any stimulation seems to cause stress; they have no buffer to cope with even normal, daily events, said Gunnar.
These studies show that the most basic biological systems depend on social stimulation early in life, said Carlson. Without it, children lack the foundation to deal with everyday life, let alone trauma and stress.
Beyond the mother
With more children entering daycare, researchers have begun to look beyond mother-infant attachment to primary caregiver attachment, whether it be a mother, father or daycare provider.’If you take the notion that children form attachments from the daily mundane experiences of care-feeding, diaper changing, caressing-you need to look at all the caregivers,’ said Carollee Howes, PhD, at the University of California, Los Angeles.
In a series of studies, Howes found that the attachments children form with their primary caregivers is remarkably similar to the attachments they form with their mothers.
However, secure attachments only occur with 50 percent of caregivers as opposed to 70 percent of mothers. The lower rate of attachment probably reflects the lower quality and closeness of the caregiver relationship, said Howes.
In terms of effect, Howes and her colleagues found that in a group of 48 4-year-olds, attachment to a child-care provider better predicted peer interactions than mother-child attachment. Toddlers with secure attachments to teachers were more gregarious and more likely to engage in pretend play with peers; preschoolers were more sociable. Children with insecure teacher attachments were more hostile, aggressive, antisocial and withdrawn.
‘Attachments are relationships that develop from interactions,’ said Howes. ‘We have to figure out who the caregivers are’ and make sure they’re all competent.
While this is a relief to mothers who want or have to work, it also emphasizes the need for high- quality child care, Howes pointed out.
Many attachment researchers find themselves playing the part of child advocates, they admit. Their research points to the need for social policies that allow mothers to stay home or that require high-quality daycare for all children.
‘Babies need a lot of love and a lot of work, and denying that would be wrong,’ said Sroufe.
03 October 2009
Maternal Deprivation
On one mahaTmA's 140th year after birthing, his quotation in the Prologue of the Mother - Fucking Trilogy, "Even if I am a Minority of One, the Truth is still the Truth."
--- Mohandas K. Gandhi // // http://bluemaas.public.iastate.edu
"Years ago, still small, I lost my mother.
Everyone wept around me,
but I grieved in silence,
Ignorant that to relieve sorrow,
a flood of tears must fall."
--- Thich Nhat Hanh, Viet Nam
[[[from the 20 September 2009 Domestic Violence by Proxy // http://justice.posterous.com
"Some unfortunate women after years of enduring domestic violence have then lost custody to the batterers who abused them. In these cases, batterers have made good on their threat to attack their ex - partner in the place she is the most vulnerable -- by taking her children away from her.
After separation, these batterers continue to wage their campaign of manipulation and abuse by attempting to convince involved children that their mothers never loved them. [thuggishly ... and hourly ... perpetrating the INVISIBILITY of her].
Looking for a way to describe their batterers' behavior, some mothers have called what their batterer is doing "parental alienation syndrome."
"In reality, what these women are describing from their ex - partners is better termed Domestic Violence by Proxy ..." For the article and more information, see: http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/DVP.html
and http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html .
Filed under // punishing mother therapeutic jurisprudence
Comments [1]
Recent comments randijames said...
AKA Maternal Deprivation [Syndrome]. Please noncustodial mothers, stop trippin off of pedo "parental alienation syndrome"]]]
--- Mohandas K. Gandhi // // http://bluemaas.public.iastate.edu
"Years ago, still small, I lost my mother.
Everyone wept around me,
but I grieved in silence,
Ignorant that to relieve sorrow,
a flood of tears must fall."
--- Thich Nhat Hanh, Viet Nam
[[[from the 20 September 2009 Domestic Violence by Proxy // http://justice.posterous.com
"Some unfortunate women after years of enduring domestic violence have then lost custody to the batterers who abused them. In these cases, batterers have made good on their threat to attack their ex - partner in the place she is the most vulnerable -- by taking her children away from her.
After separation, these batterers continue to wage their campaign of manipulation and abuse by attempting to convince involved children that their mothers never loved them. [thuggishly ... and hourly ... perpetrating the INVISIBILITY of her].
Looking for a way to describe their batterers' behavior, some mothers have called what their batterer is doing "parental alienation syndrome."
"In reality, what these women are describing from their ex - partners is better termed Domestic Violence by Proxy ..." For the article and more information, see: http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/DVP.html
and http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html .
Filed under // punishing mother therapeutic jurisprudence
Comments [1]
Recent comments randijames said...
AKA Maternal Deprivation [Syndrome]. Please noncustodial mothers, stop trippin off of pedo "parental alienation syndrome"]]]
26 September 2009
http://echidne-of-the-snakes.com
[from the Snakes' Echidne and her Posse this week:
" ... as the mother of 3 boys ... "
"What if you grow up believing that women should enjoy sperm in their eyes, to be sexual beings?"]
On Porn, Sex And Pincushions
It has been much on my mind because the recent let's-bash-women happiness study did not analyze the impact of the enormous increase on Internet porn on women's and men's happiness gap. And because of something Amanda (from whom I stole that pincushion part in the title) at Pandagon wrote recently:
With that in mind, I want to link this excellent post by Becky Sharper, who has a wonderful sense of irreverence in the face of people who are going to give you the least generous read imaginable when you suggest that perhaps porn isn't all roses and fountains of gold. I hesitate to open this can of worms, because when I pointed out that the facial exists in porn as a symbolic marker of female degradation, many, many, many people deliberately misread me, claiming that I said that coming on the outside was wrong, or that if any touched your face, it was wrong, or that you're a bad person if you like being degraded in bed. All I said was that it's funny to me that something that is overtly about employing the "this slut deserves to be humiliated" trope in porn gets to send its message to an audience that wants to hear negative things about sexual women, and the rest of us will pretend that they just didn't say that.
Even though, from my perspective, the implicit argument---that women who have a lot of sex, or with a lot of men are sluts who deserve humiliation---is anti-sex. In other words, for all the sex in porn, much of it adheres to the "family values" narrative, where a sexual woman is used up and deserves nothing but abuse. Being truly pro-sex, in my view, means believing that women who have sex, a lot of sex, or a lot of partners do not forfeit a single ounce of their dignity or humanity.
Becky notes that the heavy use of anal sex in porn has resulted in an uptick in anal sex in real life. And though I know a good half of the commenters will pretend I didn't say this: This isn't, in and of itself, a bad thing. Just like coming on the outside is a fine way to spice things up, anal sex also can be a lot of fun for straight couples in the right circumstances. But porn morphs rather mundane sex acts into tropes about hurting and humiliating women, and then those tropes are repeated in bedrooms for that purpose. The problem with this is that many of the women engaging in these deliberately humiliating behaviors don't get off on being submissives or being degraded. They're doing it just because they thing that's what sex is.
I repeat: like coming on the outside, there's a way to do anal sex that isn't about hurting, humiliating, and punishing a sexual woman. (If only I knew the secret number of times to repeat to avoid being misread!) There are entire excellent books about it, and whole lines of sex toys that exist solely to exploit the sensitivity of that area of the body. In fact, straight men can put things up their butt and like it, too! This is not being questioned. (I predict 5 comments before someone suggests I questioned this.)
But porn doesn't show anal sex in the pro-woman way that many practice it, where there's an attempt to warm you up, make you comfortable, go slow, and stop if there's any discomfort. Like Becky says:
Problem is, hetero mainstream porn isn't depicting the kind of careful, attentive interaction that makes anal sex pleasurable. In fact, in porn there's no attention paid to the woman's pleasure--or even her comfort--at all. The male actors just plunge in and start pounding.
Emphasis mine.
Isn't it awesome how anyone criticizing porn must now explain very carefully why that criticism is not being anti-sex? But Amanda is brave, so she does the necessary work anyway.
I have written about some of my concerns earlier, but they are worth repeating, especially as I'm a little bit clearer about what I don't like when it comes to the extremely wide-spread use of porn. Here's the list:
1. I worry that too many confuse porn images with real actual human sex, that especially young viewers of porn go away with the expectation that real sex will be like porn. Yet porn is called porn and not art, say, for the very reason that it cuts out everything but the purely instrumental use of another person (or persons) for the purpose of getting an orgasm. I'm sure many people can make that distinction, especially among older users of porn who have also had real-life sex. But what happens if porn images are, in essence, your education in sexuality? What if you grow up believing that women should enjoy sperm in their eyes, to be sexual beings?
2. Hence my concern over the male-centeredness of heterosexual porn. That market is geared towards men and the women in the porn are there to do things that will get men off. If some men like humiliating women in bed, then that's what the female porn actors pretend that they will like. No, you don't need to use lube before plunging into my anus (a vulnerable part of the body, by the way, in the medical sense). Yes, please, urinate all over me. And so on.
That you can find all kinds of porn, even feminist porn, doesn't negate this problem at all. Because if most men, including the very young men, watch male-centered porn (and not feminist porn, say) then that's what their idea of sex will become: Something in which women don't have to be asked what they want, and in which women who don't want anal plunging or sperm all over their faces are somehow anti-sex or frigid. Because the women in porn like it!
3. If I am correct about all this, the impact of porn might be to make both young men and women to equate sex with what goes on in male-centered porn. I don't know if I am correct, but I see something of this sort taking place in discussions about sex on the Internet (and in the insults on political comments threads: Swallow, bitch, swallow). To even suggest that what is being talked about is male-centered heterosexual porn and not sex in general labels you as an anti-sex prude.
To re-frame this in feminist terms: I worry what porn is doing to the way young heterosexual women learn about sexuality. Is it just a service you provide men? Suck a lot of cock, let them come on your face or in your ass? Even if this is not what your body actually likes to do?
Comments (47) | Trackback (0)
Posted by: echidne / 9/23/2009 02:07:00 PM
I'm so glad you wrote this.
Suzie | Homepage | 09.23.09 - 4:32 pm | #
I worry about this too, as the mother of 3 boys. The lack of awareness of the woman's enjoyment in most video porn is appalling. I don't want their formative understanding of sex to be the distorted, frequently-misogynistic view presented by porn.
My only hope is in being clear and direct, to explain that porn may have its place, but the overwhelming emphasis on domination over women makes it cancerous to creating a real, healthy relationship with a woman.
Sam-I-am | Homepage | 09.23.09 - 5:17 pm | #
To re-frame this in feminist terms: I worry what porn is doing to the way young heterosexual women learn about sexuality. Is it just a service you provide men? Suck a lot of cock, let them come on your face or in your ass? Even if this is not what your body actually likes to do?
And then even worse, those same young women become receptive to the cultural conservative notion that sex is icky and women should hate it because, well, who likes sperm in your eye? Clearly only really sick people would like that, right? Worse and worse.
Gavel Down | 09.23.09 - 5:46 pm | #
I hate it that so many people think that porn is an accurate representation of sex. It's so confusing to me that men don't realize that the women in porn are being paid to act a certain way and that may not reflect the actual desires of the woman. I've met men who were genuinely shocked and surprised that I wanted to watch them take their clothes off or, ya know, enjoy sex for myself.
In porn, women are hot and men are generally mediocre because they're basically just placeholders. I don't watch much straight porn becuase the men simply aren't that hot. Even in the cases where the man is as hot as the woman, the camera is more focused on the woman. So of course men interpret this as "women don't like porn, and they must not like sex". The problem is that porn just isn't made for women.
I also get really frustrated about the anal sex thing. I'm sure some people like it and that's great for them, but I'm just no interested in doing it. However, at least half of the guys I hook up with insist that if I would just let them shove their magical penis up there, I would suddenly like it. I have no doubt that porn is responsible for this attitude. I'm very pro-sex and that's exactly why I'm not a big fan of the current state of porn. I like sex to be enjoyable for everyone involved, rather than a favor that one person does for another without enjoyment or pleasure.
catgirl | 09.23.09 - 5:47 pm | #
Even mainstream movies and tv ignore straight female sexual desire. The men get an ordinary looking man to identify with and a gorgeous female love interest for the male character and the audience to ogle. The actress playing the love interest is often much younger as well.
Sometimes there are movies with handsome leading men, but the camera doesn't film them the way it does with women, making sure you get a nice long look at the chest and butt, having them wear skimpy clothes. Even in R rated sex scenes the focus is on the woman. We get to see her and not him undressing, moaning, etc.
anna | 09.23.09 - 7:09 pm | #
Another scary thing: Many (most? all?) of our desires are formed from experiencing the world. Boys and girls who see porn (or have contact with porn culture) may catch on that this is supposed to be exciting and arousing, but is forbidden to them. Desires will be formed that are hard to undo.
Suzie | Homepage | 09.23.09 - 8:33 pm | #
Beautifully, sadly written.
I've a 13 year old daughter who is just on the cusp of curiosity. I dread the impression that she'll get from the subhumanizing, omnipresent porn. Her sexuality, self-esteem, and health of her future relationships can be so casually destroyed my the mindless porno-bulemia of our culture.
ColoKate | 09.23.09 - 10:18 pm | #
We have been worrying and fretting for fifty years that through media saturation we would get to a point where people were no longer easily able to distinguish between fact and fiction, myth and reality.
I think every indication is that we have arrived.
We have publishers putting out non-fiction books full of myths and made up stories.
The news media has moved through the infotainment stage to propaganda.
Carefully scripted shows are presented as "reality" teevee.
"Scientists" use scenes from films and teevee shows to support their arguments regarding social interaction as though it were representative real human interaction.
At the highest levels of government they are arguing that if it didn't kill you it wasn't torture.
Porn is obviously torture, but since the woman smiles and we assume she gets paid for her pain and humiliation, it's just another form of entertainment.
thebewilderness | 09.23.09 - 10:19 pm | #
yes there are alot of assholes in the world. and alot of bad porn. no shit. why not just come out and ask people to recommend good movies instead of saying all men, sex, porn and climaxes are negative, humiliating, slutty...(all the while saying you dont mean to say what your saying)
oh fer crissakes | 09.23.09 - 11:52 pm | #
and plenty of films do show women being pleased. hell the summer indie hit 'away we go' opens with the young husband going down on his wife.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:06 am | #
why not just come out and ask people to recommend good movies instead of saying all men, sex, porn and climaxes are negative, humiliating, slutty...(all the while saying you dont mean to say what your saying)
You talking to me? I didn't say any of those things, actually. In particular, that "all" word wasn't used.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 12:19 am | #
"porn is called porn and not art, say, for the very reason that it cuts out everything but the purely instrumental use of another person (or persons) for the purpose of getting an orgasm."
and there you have it.
first rather than just saying that most porn is bad art you claim that all porn is no form of art at all.
see what I mean about that too broad brush? if you were painting windows you'd be all over the glass.
art: is simply self expression.
thats all. it might be good or bad, simple or complex, stupid or genius, found, folk, modern, abstract...natural, semantic, sexual...but pretty much everything is art.
art is a neutral word. it requires adjectives. people make the same mistake with the word 'love'.
next you claim that no erotic representation has existed in the history of humankind which depics both sex and compassion. pretty sweeping wouldnt you say.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:28 am | #
yes I'm talking to 'you'. although yes you using anothers quotes.
and I dont mean to be mean, just short and clear.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:30 am | #
...(all the while saying you dont mean to say what your saying)
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:33 am | #
Gravatar 'you' meaning your post.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:33 am | #
Gravatar anyhoo..have a nice night. i'm just passing thru, didnt mean to ring the bell or wake the dog.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:35 am | #
Gravatar ...and 'wake the dog' was a figure of speech, um...which had nothing to do with you [woman starts beating stranger with cast iron frying pan]
no. no. really it was just a non-gender oriented figure of...oh fuck it..[stranger starts running]
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:45 am | #
oh fer appears to be one of those I was just speaking of who cannot tell the difference between scripted behavior on film and actual human behavior on film.
I don't imagine they can tell the difference between a woman smiling while under threat and a woman smiling who is pleased either.
thebewilderness | 09.24.09 - 1:01 am | #
Porn is the graphic representation of the torture and rape of women.
Sometimes men and children as well.
Kinda hard to see past that to some dehumanized art concept.
thebewilderness | 09.24.09 - 1:05 am | #
wow. you poor thing. your head must hurt
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
if its good sex its good porn if its bad sex its bad porn.
oh fer crisspybacon | 09.24.09 - 1:22 am | #
oh theres my bus...[wanders off]
oh fer crisspybacon | 09.24.09 - 1:27 am | #
"too many confuse...images with real [life]."
yes. and?
thats the story of:
-film
-IKEA instructions
-bible
-constitution
-songs
-dance
-...
yet you know what? Some are not confused. And some media are not corrupted. so theres that.
and cheese raviolis...they solve everything. with some fresh chopped tomatoes spinach and seasalt. (good with eggs too) mmmm.
oh fer crisspybacon | 09.24.09 - 1:47 am | #
note: I understand your general concern about male-centeredness of things as illustrated in the classic cartoon of two women talking about actually finding a movie in which the women discuss something other than men (see link).
I understand male-centeredness can be a problem in life, in films, and specifically in films with sexual content. Firstly many people who are men are inconsiderate. Secondly everyone wants to be able to see people like themselves in life, in films, and in films with sexual content. Yet the larger problem is inconsiderate people. after all do you like inconsiderate women? hopefully not. thats all
http://petitesophist.blogspot.co...08/09/ rule.html
oh fer crisspybacon | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 10:28 am | #
"Even mainstream movies and tv ignore straight female sexual desire. The men get an ordinary looking man to identify with and a gorgeous female love interest for the male character and the audience to ogle. The actress playing the love interest is often much younger as well."
Oh, I know! It's everywhere, even game shows. On Wheel of Fortune, men get Vanna White to look at, and women get Pat Sajak. On Deal or No Deal, men get 50(?) beautiful, skimpy models to ogle, and women get one middle-aged bald guy to look at. It's the same situation with most news anchors, too.
catgirl | 09.24.09 - 10:35 am | #
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ziz...yphus/34585797/
oh fer crisspybacon | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 10:41 am | #
Porn is the graphic representation of the torture and rape of women.
Sometimes men and children as well.
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
This is my biggest problem with the Great Porn Debate.
There doesn't seem to be any agreement as to how to decide whether a particular film/video/etc. is pornography or not, and the participants (including, unfortunately, Echidne) don't ever bother to say how they define "pornography." Everyone seems to assume that everybody already knows what pornography is, but they all apparently assume something different. It makes the whole discussion sound a bit psychotic.
For example, if you use the first definition quoted above, it's hard to imagine how there could even be such a thing as "feminist pornography."
I also sometimes get the impression that some participants are happy to be vague as to what they mean, so that the word can mean whatever is most convenient for them at the moment.
AMM | 09.24.09 - 10:49 am | #
Great post, Echidne. I agree with your point, which I haven't seen elsewhere, that the presence of feminist porn doesn't solve the problem if the young consumers are going to be consuming the other kind.
I've seen some porn scripts and yes, most do depict the (almost always female) recipient of facials or anal sex as being used or being a slut to be dehumanized. Whether or not the actress is consenting doesn't make this a good message.
octogalore | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 12:29 pm | #
AMM, the second definition applies to porn in theory. The first definition applies to porn in practice.
Kali | 09.24.09 - 12:32 pm | #
In light of the fact that human trafficking is at epidemic proportions, how does anyone know if the porn they watch has not been made by women or girls forced into these acts? This would make anyone buying or watching this garbage an accessory to a crime, as far as I'm concerned.
Apparently ethics, morals, and a personal conscience are things we all extract and put on a shelf when it comes to this "degradation-of-women" type of entertainment. Men have their needs you know, therefore cannot be held responsible...
EL | 09.24.09 - 1:03 pm | #
amongst his/her flurry of noise making, oh fer makes one point I agree with:
"too many confuse...images with real [life]."
yes. and?
thats the story of:
-film
-IKEA instructions
-bible
-constitution
-songs
-dance
-...
I think the primary problem with porn consumption isn't that there is crap out there (there will always be crap) but that there is very little porn (or erotic art or whatever) that values women (and people in general). I agree completely with echidne that there is a real threat that bad porn can negatively influence young people's perception of sex... but if there is a true marketplace of ideas about sex people will not be brainwashed by a single distorted view. At that point they may have several views to choose from, but will abandon those that don't feel real in comparison. This would not eliminate the association between sexist porn and sexism (as those who are sexist will still seek out sexist porn - since it feels more "real" to them) but it could reduce causality - i.e. it could cut down on the possibility of misconceptions by naive people due to porn (by having less naive people).
As usual, talking to kids (and others) about such issues (love, sex, sexism, media, crime) could also help significantly. How many people, for example, are consumers of porn without fully realizing its common connection with sexual slavery and exploitation? Perhaps also porn needs to be more above ground - regulated like organic farming or other consumer products - so that a consumer could consciously choose porn confirmed to be free of criminal elements. Suppression only feeds oppression.
Roger | 09.24.09 - 3:10 pm | #
Everyone seems to assume that everybody already knows what pornography is, but they all apparently assume something different. It makes the whole discussion sound a bit psychotic.
For example, if you use the first definition quoted above, it's hard to imagine how there could even be such a thing as "feminist pornography."
I also sometimes get the impression that some participants are happy to be vague as to what they mean, so that the word can mean whatever is most convenient for them at the moment.
A good point. The meaning I attributed to porn when writing the post was what you would find if you seek what's called vanilla porn by some on the net. The sites are not making movies with a plot. They just show sexual acts of various types, and the vast majority of them are geared towards getting a straight man to orgasm, not towards other goals, artistic or not.
Those sites are not the ones which explicitly trade in pain, humiliation and suffering of women.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 4:02 pm | #
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
if its good sex its good porn if its bad sex its bad porn.
Good sex for whom? Bad sex for whom? It's quite possible to show sex which is really good for one participant and really bad for another participant.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 4:04 pm | #
That, to me, is part of the problem with this argument.
The "good sex" idea is not about the actors, but rather about the viewer.
The actors are doing their job, purportedly voluntarily, for money. They are making a product for sale.
They may be making a good or bad product, but their pleasure in the process is beside the point.
The viewer decides if they have been deceived sufficiently to believe the actors are enjoying themselves.
It is called "suspending disbelief". We do it when we are reading or viewing a story that we know to be fiction.
It astonishes me the degree to which people will argue that what they choose to believe about what they see in a film is accurate, while what the people say who made the film is not.
thebewilderness | 09.24.09 - 5:02 pm | #
The viewer decides if they have been deceived sufficiently to believe the actors are enjoying themselves.
But in the actual porn it's not really even quite that. It's whether the viewer comes or not, ultimately, and that depends on how the actor playing the viewer's role appears to be enjoying it all. The other actor/actors are kind of like dildoes.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 5:32 pm | #
I believe it was Twisty who said, "if it's not degrading to women, then it's not porn".
Personally, I thought that was fairly accurate, as referring to intercourse with a pro-all-human slant as "erotic porn" or "feminist porn" misses the entire point of what most people have internalized nowadays when they hear the term "porn". It's one of those linguistic whatchmacallits, like pleasant murder or dry water.
The advantage to cease using the term "porn" and to begin using a new term when referring to pro-all-human intercourse is that it creates a definitively seperate space. That harmful crap is over there, wallow in the dirt all you want -- we'll be over here having lots of luscious pro-all-human sex. (Obviously, it needs a snazzier term than "pro-all-human" sex, but hopefully you get the idea.)
To me, "feminist porn" only sounds like a weaker version of regular porn.
m Andrea | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:19 pm | #
"Even though, from my perspective, the implicit argument---that women who have a lot of sex, or with a lot of men are sluts who deserve humiliation---is anti-sex. In other words, for all the sex in porn, much of it adheres to the "family values" narrative, where a sexual woman is used up and deserves nothing but abuse. Being truly pro-sex, in my view, means believing that women who have sex, a lot of sex, or a lot of partners do not forfeit a single ounce of their dignity or humanity. "
I am totally stealing that. And not giving Amanda a link back unless I am feeling extremely generous. Because normally she's a total handmaiden of the patriachy. And the people I am going to share that with, don't need yet another source of feminist lite.
m Andrea | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:28 pm | #
In most porn the "actor playing the viewers role" is the camera lens. Viewers prepared to view sex are accepting the role of voyeur. I hear a lot about the so-called "diversity" of porn, but when the sexuality of all consensual porn is exhibitionism that expands into everything else viewers see, I doubt true diversity can come from such a narrow starting point.
Voyeurism is a sex act, and 99% of people viewing porn 99% of the time don't get the permission of the people they're watching get fucked. Porn-watchers assume because of the fact of the filming that people in porn have given permission to everyone viewing them, but viewers don't learn their real names or seek to verify their willing involvement in porn.
The De Anza case was about a gang-rape at a party. Most people walking into a situation where eight men were gang-raping a drunken girl wouldn't stand by, watch, and decide to masturbate. Yet I guarantee that no small number of times porn users are getting their voyeuristic sex on they have done exactly that, walked into a situation where a woman was being raped by multiple men, assumed consent to their voyeurism where none is given, and started masturbating.
It's an acceptable area of concern that women might be pressured into accepting sex acts they find degrading or unpleasurable because of what's seen in pornography. However, people discussing this effect often gloss over that porn is used as a tool to "break in" prostitutes and that prostituted women endure more sexual violence prior to entering prostitution compared to the general populace. If the "average" women might be harmed by re-enacting porn with their boyfriends, then what terrible sufferings must prostituted women be experiencing as they endure triggering sexual violations by strange men while their pain is preserved on film forever. Research finds prostitutes who are filmed for porn have worse PTSD than unfilmed prostitutes partly due to a relentless, lifelong fear of limitless voyeurs of their shame.
Factor in the profit motive driving pornographers to hurt prostituted women in ways it doesn't drive boyfriends to hurt their girlfriends, and feminists should be seriously more concerned for prostituted women performing in porn than in “average” women being unfinancially pressured to imitate those non-recorded acts with their lovers.
sam | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:31 pm | #
How el bizzaro. I swear I posted two comments.
m Andrea | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:41 pm | #
Factor in the profit motive driving pornographers to hurt prostituted women in ways it doesn't drive boyfriends to hurt their girlfriends, and feminists should be seriously more concerned for prostituted women performing in porn than in “average” women being unfinancially pressured to imitate those non-recorded acts with their lovers.
These are good arguments for writing more about how prostitutes are treated. But it is not necessary (or even desirable, from my point of view) to rank the concerns in a particular way. For one thing, changes in general norms about what sex means for women affect billions of women if they are successful. That's why the possibility of such changes needs to be discussed.
This doesn't mean that what actually happens to unwilling or mistreated participants in the filming of porn wouldn't be an outrage of a totally different level, for each individual so affected.
In other words, work needs to be done in more than one direction.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:42 pm | #
Also, if the general ideas about what sex is become more woman-loathing (to use a word I know might be attacked), then one of the consequences of that is that the female actors in porn will face ever worsening treatments, too
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:44 pm | #
I agree the problem is multifaceted, and I brought that part of it up because the blogger discussing only porn's harm to non-porn women said in response to her boyfriend's claim the 'actresses' are all consenting, "DUH, I KNOW THAT." [sic]
She doesn't know that. There are many excellent reasons for a feminist discussing the harms of porn to conclude opposite-wise about the women displayed in it that went unheeded.
sam | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 8:43 pm | #
Maybe it's hopeless, as m'Andrea sez, to rescue the term "porn" with any qualifier. Films deliberately designed to excite men and women to orgasm have definitely gotten nastier and nastier (and less and less sexy as a result, IMO) over the years, as Echidne sez.
We definitely need to find a better word for genuine eroticism than pro-all-human tho.
I think that there's a major brainwash problem here. When you , me, or one, or anybody watches sexually exciting images, very deep structures of the psyche get activated. Otherwise, what's the point.
Mix that with the sadism -- a nice exact term -- that Echidne is describing, and you combine an open read-write channel to program the brain, on one hand, with a visual or situational trigger to activate sadism in other (real sex) circumstances on the other. In short you're both associating erotic energy with sadistic energy and programming erotic situations to trigger sadistic scripts.
You could do it in a lab and I'd bet a good chili dog you'd get reproducible results.
And that really stinks for us as a society. Take something good and fundamental like sex. Link it to something nasty and counterproductive like sadism. Program it deep into the limbic systems of young and old. In a couple of generations sex could very well come to "mean" sadism.
Some very smart people have already suggested that, operationally, the equation already holds (Andrea Dworkin, I'm remembering you). And while I don't think it's come to that in individual lives, I can see her point when looking thru a larger social lens.
Not all sexual film is like that. The single greatest predictor in a sex film of sadism versus what I think of as genuine eroticism is, in my amateur opinion ...
The gender of the filmmaker.
Now who would've guessed that.
The second greatest is the presence or absence of men in the film.
It makes me think about the screwfly solution.
Or the Screwtape solution. It's an unpleasant note when some people can get rich really messing up the brains of masses of other people.
heraclitus | 09.24.09 - 10:08 pm | #
It is also important to remember that the effects of pornography are not just limited to the bedroom. Once you are willing to act sadistically to another person to get off the old hard on when else will you start to think (if you don't already) that the ends, what you want, are more important to the means? It will spread through the rest of the relationship, sex is not cut off from that.
It is not just the one relationship either. When people say "oh, it only effects his girlfriend/wife/friendw/bennies they have this consensual thing going on,(or, oh, it is no big deal he only does it for a wank by himself)" ignoring whatever you think about consent, it is ignoring that once a man is used to treating/viewing a woman/women in a specific way what is to stop him from having the line blurred between that and say everywhere else. Like I said, just because that door to the bedroom is closed doesn't mean it can't get out. Like men who insult women with porn tropes, or even something they don't think is an insult, or even just joking "among friends." So even if you have this great consensual thing with your boyfriend or whatever, no one else consented. No one else consented to up the skirt "shots" with cellphones, being stereotyped due to porn tropes (coed sluts, sexy librarian, hot lesbian, etc).
awfisticufferatlarge | 09.24.09 - 10:55 pm | #
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
if its good sex its good porn if its bad sex its bad porn.
Good sex doesn't necessarily make for good TV. I mean, much of what I find pleasurable wouldn't show up well on film because someone's head would be in the way.
zuzu | Homepage | 09.25.09 - 12:25 am | #
When people say "oh, it only effects his girlfriend/wife/ ..., it is ignoring that once a man is used to treating/viewing a woman/women in a specific way, what is to stop him from having the line blurred between that and ... everywhere else?
It's the same reason it's a good idea to prohibit violence against even people you think deserve it -- because once you start giving people permission to do awful things to one set of people, who's to say they'll stop there? Or, as I like to say, "if they'll do it to anyone, they'll do it to anyone."
Wehret den Anfaengen!
AMM | 09.25.09 - 10:10 am | #
I've kept this post and comment thread open in my browser for days now, and keep re-reading, because there is so much here that is very well-said.
Helen Huntingdon | 09.26.09 - 11:41 am | #
" ... as the mother of 3 boys ... "
"What if you grow up believing that women should enjoy sperm in their eyes, to be sexual beings?"]
On Porn, Sex And Pincushions
It has been much on my mind because the recent let's-bash-women happiness study did not analyze the impact of the enormous increase on Internet porn on women's and men's happiness gap. And because of something Amanda (from whom I stole that pincushion part in the title) at Pandagon wrote recently:
With that in mind, I want to link this excellent post by Becky Sharper, who has a wonderful sense of irreverence in the face of people who are going to give you the least generous read imaginable when you suggest that perhaps porn isn't all roses and fountains of gold. I hesitate to open this can of worms, because when I pointed out that the facial exists in porn as a symbolic marker of female degradation, many, many, many people deliberately misread me, claiming that I said that coming on the outside was wrong, or that if any touched your face, it was wrong, or that you're a bad person if you like being degraded in bed. All I said was that it's funny to me that something that is overtly about employing the "this slut deserves to be humiliated" trope in porn gets to send its message to an audience that wants to hear negative things about sexual women, and the rest of us will pretend that they just didn't say that.
Even though, from my perspective, the implicit argument---that women who have a lot of sex, or with a lot of men are sluts who deserve humiliation---is anti-sex. In other words, for all the sex in porn, much of it adheres to the "family values" narrative, where a sexual woman is used up and deserves nothing but abuse. Being truly pro-sex, in my view, means believing that women who have sex, a lot of sex, or a lot of partners do not forfeit a single ounce of their dignity or humanity.
Becky notes that the heavy use of anal sex in porn has resulted in an uptick in anal sex in real life. And though I know a good half of the commenters will pretend I didn't say this: This isn't, in and of itself, a bad thing. Just like coming on the outside is a fine way to spice things up, anal sex also can be a lot of fun for straight couples in the right circumstances. But porn morphs rather mundane sex acts into tropes about hurting and humiliating women, and then those tropes are repeated in bedrooms for that purpose. The problem with this is that many of the women engaging in these deliberately humiliating behaviors don't get off on being submissives or being degraded. They're doing it just because they thing that's what sex is.
I repeat: like coming on the outside, there's a way to do anal sex that isn't about hurting, humiliating, and punishing a sexual woman. (If only I knew the secret number of times to repeat to avoid being misread!) There are entire excellent books about it, and whole lines of sex toys that exist solely to exploit the sensitivity of that area of the body. In fact, straight men can put things up their butt and like it, too! This is not being questioned. (I predict 5 comments before someone suggests I questioned this.)
But porn doesn't show anal sex in the pro-woman way that many practice it, where there's an attempt to warm you up, make you comfortable, go slow, and stop if there's any discomfort. Like Becky says:
Problem is, hetero mainstream porn isn't depicting the kind of careful, attentive interaction that makes anal sex pleasurable. In fact, in porn there's no attention paid to the woman's pleasure--or even her comfort--at all. The male actors just plunge in and start pounding.
Emphasis mine.
Isn't it awesome how anyone criticizing porn must now explain very carefully why that criticism is not being anti-sex? But Amanda is brave, so she does the necessary work anyway.
I have written about some of my concerns earlier, but they are worth repeating, especially as I'm a little bit clearer about what I don't like when it comes to the extremely wide-spread use of porn. Here's the list:
1. I worry that too many confuse porn images with real actual human sex, that especially young viewers of porn go away with the expectation that real sex will be like porn. Yet porn is called porn and not art, say, for the very reason that it cuts out everything but the purely instrumental use of another person (or persons) for the purpose of getting an orgasm. I'm sure many people can make that distinction, especially among older users of porn who have also had real-life sex. But what happens if porn images are, in essence, your education in sexuality? What if you grow up believing that women should enjoy sperm in their eyes, to be sexual beings?
2. Hence my concern over the male-centeredness of heterosexual porn. That market is geared towards men and the women in the porn are there to do things that will get men off. If some men like humiliating women in bed, then that's what the female porn actors pretend that they will like. No, you don't need to use lube before plunging into my anus (a vulnerable part of the body, by the way, in the medical sense). Yes, please, urinate all over me. And so on.
That you can find all kinds of porn, even feminist porn, doesn't negate this problem at all. Because if most men, including the very young men, watch male-centered porn (and not feminist porn, say) then that's what their idea of sex will become: Something in which women don't have to be asked what they want, and in which women who don't want anal plunging or sperm all over their faces are somehow anti-sex or frigid. Because the women in porn like it!
3. If I am correct about all this, the impact of porn might be to make both young men and women to equate sex with what goes on in male-centered porn. I don't know if I am correct, but I see something of this sort taking place in discussions about sex on the Internet (and in the insults on political comments threads: Swallow, bitch, swallow). To even suggest that what is being talked about is male-centered heterosexual porn and not sex in general labels you as an anti-sex prude.
To re-frame this in feminist terms: I worry what porn is doing to the way young heterosexual women learn about sexuality. Is it just a service you provide men? Suck a lot of cock, let them come on your face or in your ass? Even if this is not what your body actually likes to do?
Comments (47) | Trackback (0)
Posted by: echidne / 9/23/2009 02:07:00 PM
I'm so glad you wrote this.
Suzie | Homepage | 09.23.09 - 4:32 pm | #
I worry about this too, as the mother of 3 boys. The lack of awareness of the woman's enjoyment in most video porn is appalling. I don't want their formative understanding of sex to be the distorted, frequently-misogynistic view presented by porn.
My only hope is in being clear and direct, to explain that porn may have its place, but the overwhelming emphasis on domination over women makes it cancerous to creating a real, healthy relationship with a woman.
Sam-I-am | Homepage | 09.23.09 - 5:17 pm | #
To re-frame this in feminist terms: I worry what porn is doing to the way young heterosexual women learn about sexuality. Is it just a service you provide men? Suck a lot of cock, let them come on your face or in your ass? Even if this is not what your body actually likes to do?
And then even worse, those same young women become receptive to the cultural conservative notion that sex is icky and women should hate it because, well, who likes sperm in your eye? Clearly only really sick people would like that, right? Worse and worse.
Gavel Down | 09.23.09 - 5:46 pm | #
I hate it that so many people think that porn is an accurate representation of sex. It's so confusing to me that men don't realize that the women in porn are being paid to act a certain way and that may not reflect the actual desires of the woman. I've met men who were genuinely shocked and surprised that I wanted to watch them take their clothes off or, ya know, enjoy sex for myself.
In porn, women are hot and men are generally mediocre because they're basically just placeholders. I don't watch much straight porn becuase the men simply aren't that hot. Even in the cases where the man is as hot as the woman, the camera is more focused on the woman. So of course men interpret this as "women don't like porn, and they must not like sex". The problem is that porn just isn't made for women.
I also get really frustrated about the anal sex thing. I'm sure some people like it and that's great for them, but I'm just no interested in doing it. However, at least half of the guys I hook up with insist that if I would just let them shove their magical penis up there, I would suddenly like it. I have no doubt that porn is responsible for this attitude. I'm very pro-sex and that's exactly why I'm not a big fan of the current state of porn. I like sex to be enjoyable for everyone involved, rather than a favor that one person does for another without enjoyment or pleasure.
catgirl | 09.23.09 - 5:47 pm | #
Even mainstream movies and tv ignore straight female sexual desire. The men get an ordinary looking man to identify with and a gorgeous female love interest for the male character and the audience to ogle. The actress playing the love interest is often much younger as well.
Sometimes there are movies with handsome leading men, but the camera doesn't film them the way it does with women, making sure you get a nice long look at the chest and butt, having them wear skimpy clothes. Even in R rated sex scenes the focus is on the woman. We get to see her and not him undressing, moaning, etc.
anna | 09.23.09 - 7:09 pm | #
Another scary thing: Many (most? all?) of our desires are formed from experiencing the world. Boys and girls who see porn (or have contact with porn culture) may catch on that this is supposed to be exciting and arousing, but is forbidden to them. Desires will be formed that are hard to undo.
Suzie | Homepage | 09.23.09 - 8:33 pm | #
Beautifully, sadly written.
I've a 13 year old daughter who is just on the cusp of curiosity. I dread the impression that she'll get from the subhumanizing, omnipresent porn. Her sexuality, self-esteem, and health of her future relationships can be so casually destroyed my the mindless porno-bulemia of our culture.
ColoKate | 09.23.09 - 10:18 pm | #
We have been worrying and fretting for fifty years that through media saturation we would get to a point where people were no longer easily able to distinguish between fact and fiction, myth and reality.
I think every indication is that we have arrived.
We have publishers putting out non-fiction books full of myths and made up stories.
The news media has moved through the infotainment stage to propaganda.
Carefully scripted shows are presented as "reality" teevee.
"Scientists" use scenes from films and teevee shows to support their arguments regarding social interaction as though it were representative real human interaction.
At the highest levels of government they are arguing that if it didn't kill you it wasn't torture.
Porn is obviously torture, but since the woman smiles and we assume she gets paid for her pain and humiliation, it's just another form of entertainment.
thebewilderness | 09.23.09 - 10:19 pm | #
yes there are alot of assholes in the world. and alot of bad porn. no shit. why not just come out and ask people to recommend good movies instead of saying all men, sex, porn and climaxes are negative, humiliating, slutty...(all the while saying you dont mean to say what your saying)
oh fer crissakes | 09.23.09 - 11:52 pm | #
and plenty of films do show women being pleased. hell the summer indie hit 'away we go' opens with the young husband going down on his wife.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:06 am | #
why not just come out and ask people to recommend good movies instead of saying all men, sex, porn and climaxes are negative, humiliating, slutty...(all the while saying you dont mean to say what your saying)
You talking to me? I didn't say any of those things, actually. In particular, that "all" word wasn't used.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 12:19 am | #
"porn is called porn and not art, say, for the very reason that it cuts out everything but the purely instrumental use of another person (or persons) for the purpose of getting an orgasm."
and there you have it.
first rather than just saying that most porn is bad art you claim that all porn is no form of art at all.
see what I mean about that too broad brush? if you were painting windows you'd be all over the glass.
art: is simply self expression.
thats all. it might be good or bad, simple or complex, stupid or genius, found, folk, modern, abstract...natural, semantic, sexual...but pretty much everything is art.
art is a neutral word. it requires adjectives. people make the same mistake with the word 'love'.
next you claim that no erotic representation has existed in the history of humankind which depics both sex and compassion. pretty sweeping wouldnt you say.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:28 am | #
yes I'm talking to 'you'. although yes you using anothers quotes.
and I dont mean to be mean, just short and clear.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:30 am | #
...(all the while saying you dont mean to say what your saying)
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:33 am | #
Gravatar 'you' meaning your post.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:33 am | #
Gravatar anyhoo..have a nice night. i'm just passing thru, didnt mean to ring the bell or wake the dog.
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:35 am | #
Gravatar ...and 'wake the dog' was a figure of speech, um...which had nothing to do with you [woman starts beating stranger with cast iron frying pan]
no. no. really it was just a non-gender oriented figure of...oh fuck it..[stranger starts running]
oh fer crissakes | 09.24.09 - 12:45 am | #
oh fer appears to be one of those I was just speaking of who cannot tell the difference between scripted behavior on film and actual human behavior on film.
I don't imagine they can tell the difference between a woman smiling while under threat and a woman smiling who is pleased either.
thebewilderness | 09.24.09 - 1:01 am | #
Porn is the graphic representation of the torture and rape of women.
Sometimes men and children as well.
Kinda hard to see past that to some dehumanized art concept.
thebewilderness | 09.24.09 - 1:05 am | #
wow. you poor thing. your head must hurt
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
if its good sex its good porn if its bad sex its bad porn.
oh fer crisspybacon | 09.24.09 - 1:22 am | #
oh theres my bus...[wanders off]
oh fer crisspybacon | 09.24.09 - 1:27 am | #
"too many confuse...images with real [life]."
yes. and?
thats the story of:
-film
-IKEA instructions
-bible
-constitution
-songs
-dance
-...
yet you know what? Some are not confused. And some media are not corrupted. so theres that.
and cheese raviolis...they solve everything. with some fresh chopped tomatoes spinach and seasalt. (good with eggs too) mmmm.
oh fer crisspybacon | 09.24.09 - 1:47 am | #
note: I understand your general concern about male-centeredness of things as illustrated in the classic cartoon of two women talking about actually finding a movie in which the women discuss something other than men (see link).
I understand male-centeredness can be a problem in life, in films, and specifically in films with sexual content. Firstly many people who are men are inconsiderate. Secondly everyone wants to be able to see people like themselves in life, in films, and in films with sexual content. Yet the larger problem is inconsiderate people. after all do you like inconsiderate women? hopefully not. thats all
http://petitesophist.blogspot.co...08/09/ rule.html
oh fer crisspybacon | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 10:28 am | #
"Even mainstream movies and tv ignore straight female sexual desire. The men get an ordinary looking man to identify with and a gorgeous female love interest for the male character and the audience to ogle. The actress playing the love interest is often much younger as well."
Oh, I know! It's everywhere, even game shows. On Wheel of Fortune, men get Vanna White to look at, and women get Pat Sajak. On Deal or No Deal, men get 50(?) beautiful, skimpy models to ogle, and women get one middle-aged bald guy to look at. It's the same situation with most news anchors, too.
catgirl | 09.24.09 - 10:35 am | #
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ziz...yphus/34585797/
oh fer crisspybacon | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 10:41 am | #
Porn is the graphic representation of the torture and rape of women.
Sometimes men and children as well.
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
This is my biggest problem with the Great Porn Debate.
There doesn't seem to be any agreement as to how to decide whether a particular film/video/etc. is pornography or not, and the participants (including, unfortunately, Echidne) don't ever bother to say how they define "pornography." Everyone seems to assume that everybody already knows what pornography is, but they all apparently assume something different. It makes the whole discussion sound a bit psychotic.
For example, if you use the first definition quoted above, it's hard to imagine how there could even be such a thing as "feminist pornography."
I also sometimes get the impression that some participants are happy to be vague as to what they mean, so that the word can mean whatever is most convenient for them at the moment.
AMM | 09.24.09 - 10:49 am | #
Great post, Echidne. I agree with your point, which I haven't seen elsewhere, that the presence of feminist porn doesn't solve the problem if the young consumers are going to be consuming the other kind.
I've seen some porn scripts and yes, most do depict the (almost always female) recipient of facials or anal sex as being used or being a slut to be dehumanized. Whether or not the actress is consenting doesn't make this a good message.
octogalore | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 12:29 pm | #
AMM, the second definition applies to porn in theory. The first definition applies to porn in practice.
Kali | 09.24.09 - 12:32 pm | #
In light of the fact that human trafficking is at epidemic proportions, how does anyone know if the porn they watch has not been made by women or girls forced into these acts? This would make anyone buying or watching this garbage an accessory to a crime, as far as I'm concerned.
Apparently ethics, morals, and a personal conscience are things we all extract and put on a shelf when it comes to this "degradation-of-women" type of entertainment. Men have their needs you know, therefore cannot be held responsible...
EL | 09.24.09 - 1:03 pm | #
amongst his/her flurry of noise making, oh fer makes one point I agree with:
"too many confuse...images with real [life]."
yes. and?
thats the story of:
-film
-IKEA instructions
-bible
-constitution
-songs
-dance
-...
I think the primary problem with porn consumption isn't that there is crap out there (there will always be crap) but that there is very little porn (or erotic art or whatever) that values women (and people in general). I agree completely with echidne that there is a real threat that bad porn can negatively influence young people's perception of sex... but if there is a true marketplace of ideas about sex people will not be brainwashed by a single distorted view. At that point they may have several views to choose from, but will abandon those that don't feel real in comparison. This would not eliminate the association between sexist porn and sexism (as those who are sexist will still seek out sexist porn - since it feels more "real" to them) but it could reduce causality - i.e. it could cut down on the possibility of misconceptions by naive people due to porn (by having less naive people).
As usual, talking to kids (and others) about such issues (love, sex, sexism, media, crime) could also help significantly. How many people, for example, are consumers of porn without fully realizing its common connection with sexual slavery and exploitation? Perhaps also porn needs to be more above ground - regulated like organic farming or other consumer products - so that a consumer could consciously choose porn confirmed to be free of criminal elements. Suppression only feeds oppression.
Roger | 09.24.09 - 3:10 pm | #
Everyone seems to assume that everybody already knows what pornography is, but they all apparently assume something different. It makes the whole discussion sound a bit psychotic.
For example, if you use the first definition quoted above, it's hard to imagine how there could even be such a thing as "feminist pornography."
I also sometimes get the impression that some participants are happy to be vague as to what they mean, so that the word can mean whatever is most convenient for them at the moment.
A good point. The meaning I attributed to porn when writing the post was what you would find if you seek what's called vanilla porn by some on the net. The sites are not making movies with a plot. They just show sexual acts of various types, and the vast majority of them are geared towards getting a straight man to orgasm, not towards other goals, artistic or not.
Those sites are not the ones which explicitly trade in pain, humiliation and suffering of women.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 4:02 pm | #
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
if its good sex its good porn if its bad sex its bad porn.
Good sex for whom? Bad sex for whom? It's quite possible to show sex which is really good for one participant and really bad for another participant.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 4:04 pm | #
That, to me, is part of the problem with this argument.
The "good sex" idea is not about the actors, but rather about the viewer.
The actors are doing their job, purportedly voluntarily, for money. They are making a product for sale.
They may be making a good or bad product, but their pleasure in the process is beside the point.
The viewer decides if they have been deceived sufficiently to believe the actors are enjoying themselves.
It is called "suspending disbelief". We do it when we are reading or viewing a story that we know to be fiction.
It astonishes me the degree to which people will argue that what they choose to believe about what they see in a film is accurate, while what the people say who made the film is not.
thebewilderness | 09.24.09 - 5:02 pm | #
The viewer decides if they have been deceived sufficiently to believe the actors are enjoying themselves.
But in the actual porn it's not really even quite that. It's whether the viewer comes or not, ultimately, and that depends on how the actor playing the viewer's role appears to be enjoying it all. The other actor/actors are kind of like dildoes.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 5:32 pm | #
I believe it was Twisty who said, "if it's not degrading to women, then it's not porn".
Personally, I thought that was fairly accurate, as referring to intercourse with a pro-all-human slant as "erotic porn" or "feminist porn" misses the entire point of what most people have internalized nowadays when they hear the term "porn". It's one of those linguistic whatchmacallits, like pleasant murder or dry water.
The advantage to cease using the term "porn" and to begin using a new term when referring to pro-all-human intercourse is that it creates a definitively seperate space. That harmful crap is over there, wallow in the dirt all you want -- we'll be over here having lots of luscious pro-all-human sex. (Obviously, it needs a snazzier term than "pro-all-human" sex, but hopefully you get the idea.)
To me, "feminist porn" only sounds like a weaker version of regular porn.
m Andrea | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:19 pm | #
"Even though, from my perspective, the implicit argument---that women who have a lot of sex, or with a lot of men are sluts who deserve humiliation---is anti-sex. In other words, for all the sex in porn, much of it adheres to the "family values" narrative, where a sexual woman is used up and deserves nothing but abuse. Being truly pro-sex, in my view, means believing that women who have sex, a lot of sex, or a lot of partners do not forfeit a single ounce of their dignity or humanity. "
I am totally stealing that. And not giving Amanda a link back unless I am feeling extremely generous. Because normally she's a total handmaiden of the patriachy. And the people I am going to share that with, don't need yet another source of feminist lite.
m Andrea | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:28 pm | #
In most porn the "actor playing the viewers role" is the camera lens. Viewers prepared to view sex are accepting the role of voyeur. I hear a lot about the so-called "diversity" of porn, but when the sexuality of all consensual porn is exhibitionism that expands into everything else viewers see, I doubt true diversity can come from such a narrow starting point.
Voyeurism is a sex act, and 99% of people viewing porn 99% of the time don't get the permission of the people they're watching get fucked. Porn-watchers assume because of the fact of the filming that people in porn have given permission to everyone viewing them, but viewers don't learn their real names or seek to verify their willing involvement in porn.
The De Anza case was about a gang-rape at a party. Most people walking into a situation where eight men were gang-raping a drunken girl wouldn't stand by, watch, and decide to masturbate. Yet I guarantee that no small number of times porn users are getting their voyeuristic sex on they have done exactly that, walked into a situation where a woman was being raped by multiple men, assumed consent to their voyeurism where none is given, and started masturbating.
It's an acceptable area of concern that women might be pressured into accepting sex acts they find degrading or unpleasurable because of what's seen in pornography. However, people discussing this effect often gloss over that porn is used as a tool to "break in" prostitutes and that prostituted women endure more sexual violence prior to entering prostitution compared to the general populace. If the "average" women might be harmed by re-enacting porn with their boyfriends, then what terrible sufferings must prostituted women be experiencing as they endure triggering sexual violations by strange men while their pain is preserved on film forever. Research finds prostitutes who are filmed for porn have worse PTSD than unfilmed prostitutes partly due to a relentless, lifelong fear of limitless voyeurs of their shame.
Factor in the profit motive driving pornographers to hurt prostituted women in ways it doesn't drive boyfriends to hurt their girlfriends, and feminists should be seriously more concerned for prostituted women performing in porn than in “average” women being unfinancially pressured to imitate those non-recorded acts with their lovers.
sam | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:31 pm | #
How el bizzaro. I swear I posted two comments.
m Andrea | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:41 pm | #
Factor in the profit motive driving pornographers to hurt prostituted women in ways it doesn't drive boyfriends to hurt their girlfriends, and feminists should be seriously more concerned for prostituted women performing in porn than in “average” women being unfinancially pressured to imitate those non-recorded acts with their lovers.
These are good arguments for writing more about how prostitutes are treated. But it is not necessary (or even desirable, from my point of view) to rank the concerns in a particular way. For one thing, changes in general norms about what sex means for women affect billions of women if they are successful. That's why the possibility of such changes needs to be discussed.
This doesn't mean that what actually happens to unwilling or mistreated participants in the filming of porn wouldn't be an outrage of a totally different level, for each individual so affected.
In other words, work needs to be done in more than one direction.
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:42 pm | #
Also, if the general ideas about what sex is become more woman-loathing (to use a word I know might be attacked), then one of the consequences of that is that the female actors in porn will face ever worsening treatments, too
Echidne | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 7:44 pm | #
I agree the problem is multifaceted, and I brought that part of it up because the blogger discussing only porn's harm to non-porn women said in response to her boyfriend's claim the 'actresses' are all consenting, "DUH, I KNOW THAT." [sic]
She doesn't know that. There are many excellent reasons for a feminist discussing the harms of porn to conclude opposite-wise about the women displayed in it that went unheeded.
sam | Homepage | 09.24.09 - 8:43 pm | #
Maybe it's hopeless, as m'Andrea sez, to rescue the term "porn" with any qualifier. Films deliberately designed to excite men and women to orgasm have definitely gotten nastier and nastier (and less and less sexy as a result, IMO) over the years, as Echidne sez.
We definitely need to find a better word for genuine eroticism than pro-all-human tho.
I think that there's a major brainwash problem here. When you , me, or one, or anybody watches sexually exciting images, very deep structures of the psyche get activated. Otherwise, what's the point.
Mix that with the sadism -- a nice exact term -- that Echidne is describing, and you combine an open read-write channel to program the brain, on one hand, with a visual or situational trigger to activate sadism in other (real sex) circumstances on the other. In short you're both associating erotic energy with sadistic energy and programming erotic situations to trigger sadistic scripts.
You could do it in a lab and I'd bet a good chili dog you'd get reproducible results.
And that really stinks for us as a society. Take something good and fundamental like sex. Link it to something nasty and counterproductive like sadism. Program it deep into the limbic systems of young and old. In a couple of generations sex could very well come to "mean" sadism.
Some very smart people have already suggested that, operationally, the equation already holds (Andrea Dworkin, I'm remembering you). And while I don't think it's come to that in individual lives, I can see her point when looking thru a larger social lens.
Not all sexual film is like that. The single greatest predictor in a sex film of sadism versus what I think of as genuine eroticism is, in my amateur opinion ...
The gender of the filmmaker.
Now who would've guessed that.
The second greatest is the presence or absence of men in the film.
It makes me think about the screwfly solution.
Or the Screwtape solution. It's an unpleasant note when some people can get rich really messing up the brains of masses of other people.
heraclitus | 09.24.09 - 10:08 pm | #
It is also important to remember that the effects of pornography are not just limited to the bedroom. Once you are willing to act sadistically to another person to get off the old hard on when else will you start to think (if you don't already) that the ends, what you want, are more important to the means? It will spread through the rest of the relationship, sex is not cut off from that.
It is not just the one relationship either. When people say "oh, it only effects his girlfriend/wife/friendw/bennies they have this consensual thing going on,(or, oh, it is no big deal he only does it for a wank by himself)" ignoring whatever you think about consent, it is ignoring that once a man is used to treating/viewing a woman/women in a specific way what is to stop him from having the line blurred between that and say everywhere else. Like I said, just because that door to the bedroom is closed doesn't mean it can't get out. Like men who insult women with porn tropes, or even something they don't think is an insult, or even just joking "among friends." So even if you have this great consensual thing with your boyfriend or whatever, no one else consented. No one else consented to up the skirt "shots" with cellphones, being stereotyped due to porn tropes (coed sluts, sexy librarian, hot lesbian, etc).
awfisticufferatlarge | 09.24.09 - 10:55 pm | #
No. Porn is the graphic representation of sex. thats all.
if its good sex its good porn if its bad sex its bad porn.
Good sex doesn't necessarily make for good TV. I mean, much of what I find pleasurable wouldn't show up well on film because someone's head would be in the way.
zuzu | Homepage | 09.25.09 - 12:25 am | #
When people say "oh, it only effects his girlfriend/wife/ ..., it is ignoring that once a man is used to treating/viewing a woman/women in a specific way, what is to stop him from having the line blurred between that and ... everywhere else?
It's the same reason it's a good idea to prohibit violence against even people you think deserve it -- because once you start giving people permission to do awful things to one set of people, who's to say they'll stop there? Or, as I like to say, "if they'll do it to anyone, they'll do it to anyone."
Wehret den Anfaengen!
AMM | 09.25.09 - 10:10 am | #
I've kept this post and comment thread open in my browser for days now, and keep re-reading, because there is so much here that is very well-said.
Helen Huntingdon | 09.26.09 - 11:41 am | #
09 August 2009
"""That's because a large portion of feminist scholars and activists are i) male – identified or ii) childless themselves and / or iii) the second wives of older men or iv) the partners of lesbian mothers or v) still carrying the culture's anti – mother belief systems or vi) well –meaning but just motherhood – ignorant and vii) so forth ––– so have a huge embarrassed problem with it themselves. It's not the gender – neutral, androgynous world they would prefer.
So ––– it's okay to demand that women who want to trot right back to work postpartum get facilitated in their efforts to do so, but there really is no desire or intention to facilitate women's wanting to actually BE with and nurture their children. Very cognitive dissonant.
The same thing comes up in the daycare / child care issue.
----------------------------
http://www.thelizlibrary.org
----------------------------
******
On 07 August 2009, c____ wrote:
I wish the breastfeeding issue was not only mentioned but publicly written about, discussed, and outraged against. This is one of those issues that when I've told people about it, most have simply not believed me. It seems to get no publicity at all.
c_____
*****
On 07 August 2009, l__ wrote:
Breastfeeding: Natural Protector Against Swine Flu
Cecilia is a lawyer. Why is there no mention in the article of the abomination of judges in child custody cases ordering mothers to stop breastfeeding in order to facilitate father's rights?
Why is there no mention in the article of the abomination of judges ordering women involuntarily to have to pump their breast milk like they were cows in order to facilitate men's exalted demands for playing mommy?
l__"""
So ––– it's okay to demand that women who want to trot right back to work postpartum get facilitated in their efforts to do so, but there really is no desire or intention to facilitate women's wanting to actually BE with and nurture their children. Very cognitive dissonant.
The same thing comes up in the daycare / child care issue.
----------------------------
http://www.thelizlibrary.org
----------------------------
******
On 07 August 2009, c____ wrote:
I wish the breastfeeding issue was not only mentioned but publicly written about, discussed, and outraged against. This is one of those issues that when I've told people about it, most have simply not believed me. It seems to get no publicity at all.
c_____
*****
On 07 August 2009, l__ wrote:
Breastfeeding: Natural Protector Against Swine Flu
Cecilia is a lawyer. Why is there no mention in the article of the abomination of judges in child custody cases ordering mothers to stop breastfeeding in order to facilitate father's rights?
Why is there no mention in the article of the abomination of judges ordering women involuntarily to have to pump their breast milk like they were cows in order to facilitate men's exalted demands for playing mommy?
l__"""
08 August 2009
“ … misogyny = ‘ ... an important cornerstone of the nation’s entertainment.’ ... “
misogyny = " ... an important cornerstone of the nation’s entertainment." ...
whether in its gyms, its schoolhouses, its engineering curricula, its print and video media or inside its ... family – law courtrooms.
http://bluemaas.public.iastate.edu/chapter_27, pages 230 - 231 ...
Women at Risk
By BOB HERBERT
07 August 2009 // http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/08/opinion/08herbert.html?_r=1
"... there would have been thunderous outrage if someone had separated potential victims by race or religion and then shot, say, only the blacks, or only the whites, or only the Jews. But if you shoot only the girls or only the women — not so much of an uproar.
We have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that the barbaric treatment of women and girls has come to be more or less expected.
We profess to being shocked at one or another of these outlandish crimes, but the shock wears off quickly in an environment in which the rape, murder and humiliation of females is not only a staple of the news, but an important cornerstone of the nation’s entertainment.
The mainstream culture is filled with the most gruesome forms of misogyny, and pornography is now a multibillion-dollar industry — much of it controlled by mainstream U.S. corporations.
One of the striking things about mass killings in the U.S. is how consistently we find that the killers were riddled with shame and sexual humiliation, which they inevitably blamed on women and girls. The answer to their feelings of inadequacy was to get their hands on a gun (or guns) and begin blowing people away.
... we should take particular notice of the staggering amounts of violence brought down on the nation’s women and girls each and every day for no other reason than who they are. They are attacked because they are female.
A girl or woman somewhere in the U.S. is sexually assaulted every couple of minutes or so. The number of seriously battered wives and girlfriends is far beyond the ability of any agency to count.
There were so many sexual attacks against women in the armed forces that the Defense Department had to revise its entire approach to the problem.
We would become much more sane, much healthier, as a society if we could bring ourselves to acknowledge that misogyny is a serious and pervasive problem, and that the twisted way so many men feel about women, combined with the absurdly easy availability of guns, is a toxic mix of the most tragic proportions.
whether in its gyms, its schoolhouses, its engineering curricula, its print and video media or inside its ... family – law courtrooms.
http://bluemaas.public.iastate.edu/chapter_27, pages 230 - 231 ...
Women at Risk
By BOB HERBERT
07 August 2009 // http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/08/opinion/08herbert.html?_r=1
"... there would have been thunderous outrage if someone had separated potential victims by race or religion and then shot, say, only the blacks, or only the whites, or only the Jews. But if you shoot only the girls or only the women — not so much of an uproar.
We have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that the barbaric treatment of women and girls has come to be more or less expected.
We profess to being shocked at one or another of these outlandish crimes, but the shock wears off quickly in an environment in which the rape, murder and humiliation of females is not only a staple of the news, but an important cornerstone of the nation’s entertainment.
The mainstream culture is filled with the most gruesome forms of misogyny, and pornography is now a multibillion-dollar industry — much of it controlled by mainstream U.S. corporations.
One of the striking things about mass killings in the U.S. is how consistently we find that the killers were riddled with shame and sexual humiliation, which they inevitably blamed on women and girls. The answer to their feelings of inadequacy was to get their hands on a gun (or guns) and begin blowing people away.
... we should take particular notice of the staggering amounts of violence brought down on the nation’s women and girls each and every day for no other reason than who they are. They are attacked because they are female.
A girl or woman somewhere in the U.S. is sexually assaulted every couple of minutes or so. The number of seriously battered wives and girlfriends is far beyond the ability of any agency to count.
There were so many sexual attacks against women in the armed forces that the Defense Department had to revise its entire approach to the problem.
We would become much more sane, much healthier, as a society if we could bring ourselves to acknowledge that misogyny is a serious and pervasive problem, and that the twisted way so many men feel about women, combined with the absurdly easy availability of guns, is a toxic mix of the most tragic proportions.
25 July 2009
IF there at all has to be a mawwiage, and IF it at all has to be accomplished within any religion's venue, then ... then the Midwest’s Ms Jillian's blissful boogie is THE only way to get it going: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-94JhLEiN0 with "explanation" by another Midwesterner, a preacher - type person named mAAs ... of http://callcenterinfo.tmcnet.com/news/2009/07/24/4290602.htm
19 July 2009
Haaaappy, Happy Birthday today, Grace Portia! -- Legion True
""" ... Grace Portia of the Listening College. She is my truest, my best friend; and when she does finally speak, she is sober, she is deliberate and she is measured. She does not speak with a tiny voice. I do well to listen to her, and that is what she says.""" -- Chapter 25, "Men of Conscience"
""" ... Grace Portia of the Listening College. She is my truest, my best friend; and when she does finally speak, she is sober, she is deliberate and she is measured. She does not speak with a tiny voice. I do well to listen to her, and that is what she says.""" -- Chapter 25, "Men of Conscience"
04 July 2009
14 June 2009
Sorry -- I’ve been away editing Chapter 27, that is, http://bluemAAs.public.iastate.edu/chapter_27
its 70 pages now posted ... and I’ll be back to blog very soon ... even as it is also on to the edits of the 104 pages (so far) of Chapter 28, "An Opera in Three Acts – But with Five Parts – – Act Three: Parts Four and Five."
-- -- as June's Full Moon wanes while its Ides and 2009's Summer Solstice ... wax on.
Blue
its 70 pages now posted ... and I’ll be back to blog very soon ... even as it is also on to the edits of the 104 pages (so far) of Chapter 28, "An Opera in Three Acts – But with Five Parts – – Act Three: Parts Four and Five."
-- -- as June's Full Moon wanes while its Ides and 2009's Summer Solstice ... wax on.
Blue
29 November 2008
Blue of Central Iowa
freethought bluemAAs December blue mAAs historical bluemAAs@yahoo.com October bluemAAs@iastate.edu http://www.wedemeyers.net yellow http://www.wedemeyers.net/photos/v/wedenwood-garden/planting_trees_2008_11 May central Iowa sunshine history silence white egalitarianism law cats tart cherries 1979 28 Scrabble 22 opera 1978 15 soccer baseball 1976 24 dancing sweat lodge legal cows walking hats Legion True generosity sisters sister September silver brothers brother August nature Abraham Zebulon Micah Wedemeyer Jacob Jake Wedemeyer winter solstice justice justice justice: Dr. Edinsmaier (ie, "re: i am snidE") """received his bachelor’s degree in math and physics from Iowa State University in 1968.""" O! O! O! O! soooo NOOOOT! ... what ludicrous, self - aggrandizing ... fiction! not surprisingly, such the falsehood ... an outright and soooo easily provable ... LIE! There is NO -- -- and there NEVER HAS BEEN ANY -- -- degree of any type whatsoever! in physics! ***heh heh heh!***
| The LONG VIEW REDEMPTION Blog |
|---|
28 November 2008
07 September 2006
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)