The Lowdown on dirty pictures

From yesterday's treeware edition, my take on the misogynistic turn that porn has taken.

Understand that, overall, I have no problem with 99 per cent of porn and do not advocate its censorship -- or, indeed, censorship on any kind. But some of this stuff freaks even me out.

Listen, I am no prude. I get a kick out of some porn. I was at a strip club as recently as last month. I love sex. I talk dirty. But when I can easily find websites that show women subjected to what can only be described in a family newspaper as waterboarding by ejaculate – or simultaneous impalement on more than one fire pole, or sexual practices that will cause E. coli infections – I have to wonder where the industry gets these ideas.

Not exactly the fun and games most of us enjoy in the bedroom (or wherever your pleasure). It's as if, just like TV reality shows, the fear factor/cruelty/shock value has to be continuously ratcheted up to get them into the tent, especially online. And make no mistake, when you see women being brutalized this way, you are not seeing an act. That woman really is gagging, really is gasping for air, really is drowning.

Every second, 28,258 Internet users are viewing pornography.

Every second.

That's a lot of women who, for whatever their reasons, and most likely they are economic, are being tortured.

That's a lot of sticky keyboards.

There's a huge market for the domination of women.

I have received some email on the matter, including this missive from 'Dark Lady'' who says she works in the porn industry.

Let's ignore the fact that most porn really doesn't involve rougher sex.
Let's ignore the fact that most of those women involved with it
*request* it. Let's ignore the fact that most of the women in porn are
either there for the money or using it to explore all kinds of sex they
can't get from their prospective boyfriends. Let's ignore the fact that
the women are paid really well for their efforts. Let's just focus on
the fact that WOMEN DOMINATE MEN in porn, as well.

Oh, and that MEN DOMINATE MEN, also.

All that may be. The thing is, when some pretty sadistic stuff -- albeit between consenting adults -- goes mainstream, something has gone horribly awry in how men regard women, and how women see themselves.

UPPITY DATE (28/01/08): Two things.

I have received lots of email telling me that there is plenty of evidence to suggest that porn  leads to more violence. Writers have provided a number of links and stories but I haven't had a moment to dig too deeply into them. For example, here is Against Pornography, "a feminist anti-pornography website which aims at raising the awareness about the harms of pornography (as well as of prostitution) to women and children."

This story from last year, which suggests that sex offenders are getting younger and more violent, lends credence to what some critics of my piece have said: Children's easy access to online porn is a big problem.

The number of children under 18 accused of forcible rape, violent and nonviolent sex offenses rose from 24,100 in 1985 to 33,800 in 2004, the AP’s analysis found. Violent offenses include attempted rape and sexual assault, while nonviolent offenses including fondling, statutory rape and prostitution.

By comparison, rape and sexual assaults by adults decreased more than 56 percent from 1993 to 2004. Comparable statistics were unavailable before 1993.

The AP analyzed state and federal crime statistics, as well as independent research on juvenile sex offenders. Sources included the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics; the National Center for Juvenile Justice, a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit that specializes in statistical and policy research; and The Safer Society Foundation Inc., a Vermont nonprofit that works to prevent sexual abuse.

Today in the Star, education reporter Louise Brown had an eye-opener about how girls are subjected to increasing sexual harassment in school.

They can get grabbed on the breast or the backside at any time in the halls.

They hear girls being called "skank," "ho" or "slut" every day at school. Every day, sometimes from other girls.

And with sad regularity, they hear guys yell out which part of the male anatomy they want them to suck. "Guys always say that – it's disgusting, but a lot of girls laugh it off," says 16-year-old student Megan Brownlee.

"I'm shocked when girls don't get mad, because deep inside, you know the guys don't respect you."

Yet in the sexually charged halls of today's high schools, where lawyer Julian Falconer's recent report on school safety in Toronto uncovered "alarming rates" of harassment and assault, many girls don't seem to know how to say Stop, according to a group of young Scarborough women who attend what may be the only all-girls centre in Canada.

Listen, I live in what you might call a very nice neighbourhood, very close to a middle school. As I type this, I am watching the kids out on lunch (and litter the street) break.

What I have witnessed over the years shocks and saddens me.

A couple of weeks ago, as my guy and I were pulling into my driveway, we saw two boys go up to several girls and knee them in the crotch. Not hard kicks but sexual probes. The girls laughed but I could see that they weren't happy. As adults, we stepped in. The boys skulked away. The girls seemed relieved.

Draw your own conclusions.

Comments

[Darklady]

(THIS COMMENT HAS BEEN EDITED.)

Thanks for the quote, Antonia.

That having been resolved... who are you to tell her she's being degraded? Isn't that her decision?

When I interviewed Brian Surewood last year, he told me that a lot of the rough stuff he does on camera is at the specific request of the young starlets he works with. They are exploring, they want someone who's older and got a good head on their shoulders to help them explore, and they're getting paid to explore. Sounds like a win-win and not any kind of degrading situation to me.

IMO degradation has less to do with what one does and more to do with whether one does it with consent and understanding. A housewife denied employment opportunities by her husband but forced to have even the most gentle of sex is far more degraded than the horny 20-something who's always wondered what it's like to ...

My guess is that what you are reacting to is mostly social training that says certain activities are innately degrading. One of the things that porn has opened up is a dialogue about what makes a thing degrading and what doesn't.

I believe these are all examples of personal preference. Lots of people do lots of things I don't find appealing, but as long as everyone is consenting and nobody is being coerced, it's really none of my business.

Why do YOU think that it's a "problem" for someone to have sex in a way that YOU don't want to have sex? Is their sex life your business? No. Your sex life is your business. My sex life is my business. Other peoples' sex lives are their businesses.

There are people within the adult industry that I don't respect. I would not work for them and I would not encourage others to work for them. I have spoken with some who have worked with these people and they did not enjoy the experience. It may well be that those people were "degraded," because the person they worked with intended to degrade them. But their degradation was not dependent upon a type of sexual play -- it was dependent upon the way they were treated.

As for what's "mainstream in the bedroom." How do you know what is and isn't? And how do you know that there aren't a lot of things people would like to try but that they feel kept from trying because other people have decided for them that such activities aren't acceptable... even having the discussion to find out if their partners would like to engage in them isn't acceptable. The only "problem" I see with 20-something boys wanting to do X,Y, or Z is how they communicate that to their prospective partners -- and how they collaboratively determine what they will or will not do.

The internet's great "sin" is that it has allowed its participants to become exposed to all manner of information previously denied them. Social conservatives HATE the internet because it's empowered sexual "deviants" to realize that they're really not that deviant... and that they can find other people who enjoy what they enjoy, whether that's something they like to DO or something they just like to WATCH. Ultimately, the internet is like a television; if you don't like what you're seeing, you can look at something that you do like seeing.

You may base what you do in the bedroom on what other people think is acceptable or "mainstream," but I prefer to be more involved in that decision making process.

If you want to fret about how "something has gone horribly awry in how men regard women" I'd stop watching porn and start paying attention to the Real World, where women make less money, where sexually adventurous women are vilified, where access to birth control or abortion is becoming more difficult, etc. While you're trying to find an association between vigorous porn and social imbalance (an association you probably won't find), there's a LONG history of mistreatment of women (and the disabled, and gays, etc.) that society has very much sanctioned. Ya can't blame porn for that -- but you can blame a lot of perfectly respectable institutions that have long demanded such injustices.

But blaming porn is just more fun, isn't it?

[H. M. Riley]

Maybe there should be another name for less-than-porny porn to distinguish it from the more over-the-top (not a sexual position -lol) porn that is cruel and objectifying.

[sooey]

What a load, DarkLady. If you think you sound any different than a Tobacco Company lobbyist or Kentucky Coal Mine owner or any other rapacious and greedy business operator, you're mistaken. Your aggressive defence just indicates how badly the Porn Industry needs regulating by government to ensure that occupational health and safety standards - which exist by law - are practiced by the Porn Industry and enforced by government inspection - in order to protect workers. By the way, anybody can view porn on the internet - that alone violates societal standards requiring adult consent.

As in - Internet porn is freely accessible to children. Only the most disingenuous porn industry honcho would pretend otherwise.

Yup. To be perfectly frank, you sound like somebody who makes a lot of money exploiting Porn Industry workers, except who goes that extra mile even the worst exploiters of workers won't go by claiming "they like it" and "they ask for it" and "what business is it of yours?" as if the Porn Industry is somehow above the law.

Pointing your finger and shouting "Prude" at anybody questioning your practices? Nice try.

No one from any other industry would dare hype that bullshit in this day and age, DarkLady. It's you who stepped out of Dickens.

Porn Workers Unite! Smash the State!

[Kuri]

"But blaming porn is just more fun, isn't it?"

I don't think that Antonia was blaming porn, per se, but raising a dialogue about the meaning of what is fast becoming one of the most popularly consumed genres of media in our culture. I have tried to discuss music videos with narratives of domestic violence for similar reasons. For both activists and academics, it's importance to take apart the symbolism and meanings of this expression and

For example, darklady, you speak of people's "personal preference" to be dominance or submissive. So what does that say that broadly speaking we have a mass phenomonom of sexual expression centred around relationships of dominance and submissiveness? Why is this narrative so prominant, and then further reproduced through pornography?

Finally, sooey is right to point out that pornography is widely available to children. I would add that this is happening precisely at a point in time when sex ed. is being actively reduced or changed to a naive "abstinence only" program. (This is much better documented in the US, but I've heard anecdotal evidence of this happening in many Canadian schools as well.) So when you have a lot of teens looking for direction in what sexuality means, and finding primarily narratives of dominance and submission, what kind of education are they getting? I don't believe it paints a very optimistic picture of today's girls, especially as in both porn and in general patriarchal society is making it pretty clear that it is men who are meant to be dominant.

Personally, porn narratives such as the ones Antonia links to appear pretty damn socially conservative, too.

[Wascally Wabbit]

I doubt you'll get too many takers jumping into this subject Zerb.
DarkLady - assuming she is really speaking from knowledge of that business,makes some interesting points.
You, on the other hand, threw into the mix the lack of manners and respect in the shcool yard, as if there was some proven linkage with Porn...which I fail to see.

[C Martin]

British authorities have blamed an increase in sex attacks by children on exposure to pornography: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23387540-details/Web+is+blamed+for+20+per+cent+leap+in+sex+attacks+by+children/article.do

The rape crisis centre in Ireland (which is a country that has shown a huge leap in sexual assault figures in recent years) also is noting a relationship between pornography and sexual assault. http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2007/06/07/story36654.asp
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/women-and-men-at-risk-after-nights-socialising-1258676.html

Reuters had an article last year about cyber bullying now encompassing boys getting their girlfriends to take their clothes off (pictures which then make their way into cyberspace) http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSL2841434120070328?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

Gee, where are they getting these ideas from??

[Twiss Butler]

So you wrote a good story on the pornography industry trade show in Las Vegas, a press ritual that has begun to rival the perennial Ground Hog day story. But why did you think it necessary to include the following disclaimer in your report?

“Listen, I am no prude. I get a kick out of some porn. I was at a strip club as recently as last month. I love sex.”

Why do you think that you have to reassure the reader that you are an ok genuine woman when you express mild criticism of acts degrading, dehumanizing, and causing physical and psychological harm to women presented as sexual entertainment and stimulation for men? Is this the sex you love? To attempt this kind of fine line drawing suggests that you don’t know when you are being insulted.

Why would you go to a strip club, much less brag on it? Are you really blind to or in denial of what it means and has always meant politically to display a nude body for the amusement and derision of clothed viewers? Men understood and condemned the pornographizing of male prisoners in Abu Ghraib (but said little about the abuse of women there – perhaps because that was seen as normal collateral damage of war, reinforced by the pornography they all use). This case, like the stripping of Jews by Nazi storm troopers fully armored in uniforms, helmets, and boots, was clearly understood as deliberate acts of direct physical threat and subordination. It provokes the visceral understanding conveyed by the sight of an animal helpless on its back submitting to a vicious predator.

It has been sensibly observed that “Seeing another woman subordinated subordinates a woman.” The reason that US women have been denied -- from day one of the US Constitution to this moment -- the guarantee of equal protection of the law that all men receive as a Constitutional birthright is that a huge proportion of men see all women as members of the class c..t. and keeping them legally in that despised group pays off in privilege for all men as surely as seeing non-whites as inferior pays off for whites. But since the non-white class includes men whom other men respect for not taking subordination lying down (or bending over), the c..t class remains as Yoko Ono described them “the [n-word] of the world.” Being on average bigger and heavier than women matters.

You need not allow yourself to be intimidated by men’s self-serving claim that freedom of speech is “offended” when women dare to speak truth to the power of pornography (and its twin abuse prostitution). Are we really supposed to be dumb enough to believe that “slammin’ three-way action” is speech? Why genuflect to a guarantee of freedom of speech that does not include you?

So if you want to tell the truth that pornographers are packaging abuse of women as entertainment for adults (and the boys who model their sexual behavior on it, and the girls who are trained to accept that behavior as a male entitlement, and the boys and girls who are shown it by adults to urge compliance to abuse, not to mention the girls and women shown it by pimps and johns and ordered to do it like that or else) say it loud – without disclaimers. That headline should have been “Sexual abuse of women sells.”

Sports who fall for the "they beg for it" line put out by industry fronts like "Brian Surewood" as well as women too smart to buy it, should read Chapter 3 of researcher Melissa Farley's 2007 report Prostitution and Trafficking in Nevada: Making the Connections (www.prostitutionresearch.com)on "Mind Control by Pimps."

[annemarie]

I wholeheartedly agree with this that Twiss Butler wrote:

So if you want to tell the truth that pornographers are packaging abuse of women as entertainment for adults ...say it loud – without disclaimers. That headline should have been “Sexual abuse of women sells.”

Yup.

Disclaimers of the sort we're discussing here typically make us sound mealy-mouthed, wishy-washy, unsure of our selves, lacking conviction or certainty of opinion. Do they really belong in an opinion blog? And especially in one where the blogger is described as "rude, bold, obstreperous", and "who can dish it out as well as take it"? I think not.

[Antonia]

So let me get this straight: I should not admit to liking the occasional dirty movie? I should not like it? I should be less than honest with my readers?

I should not go to a strip club for any reason at all, even research?

(And by the way, that's not why I went. It was the only bar within walking distance of where I was staying in a small town.)

What about Las Vegas revues where the women are topless? I have done that too. What about the Pussycat Dolls? The Spice Girls?

I believe in the decriminalization of ''prostitution.'' I believe that sex workers should have access to safe, clean working environments, including brothels they manage themselves. That means no pimps. That means the lines about common bawy houses should be stricken from Canada's Criminal Code.

Is that wrong too?

I think that drawing a connection between women buying fake boobs and making a living wrapping themselves around a pole and the Holocaust or Abu Ghraib is a real stretch to say the least.

Nobody forces them to do it.

They should be better paid and better treated, is my attitude. (This, of course, excepts human trafficking which is slavery and does not involve women making this choice.)

All this said, lines have been crossed and the availability of some of the most degrading material online is lowering the bar to unimaginable depths. But again, women are participating, I assume willingly.

Are they screwed up? desperate? colonized? Perhaps. But, if they consent, what are we gonna do about it? Force them into re-education camps?

And who draws the line? Where is it? Somewhere between Venus de Milo and Playboy and ... ??

And how do you make sure nobody crosses that line?

Finally, how do you stop men from looking?

[C Martin]

"But again, women are participating, I assume willingly."

We can't really know this though. The number of trafficked prostitutes in Britain is approximately 4,000. It's not a stretch to say that they, and women like them in other countries, are at times being filmed during sex acts. There are also numerous rape cases like this one involving a Mississauga teen http://www.thestar.com/article/189028 where her gang rape was filmed. Finally 57% of prostitutes reported having been sexually assaulted as children and a majority of female porn performers are also victims of child sex abuse, which no one would argue is extremely damaging in terms of self-esteem. Can we really call these women willing?

But for the ones who truly are, should that really permit men to perform any act on them, no matter how malicious? Porn performer Reagan Starr in a 2001 interview with Talk magazine, said that in one of her movies she was hit and choked until she couldn't breathe while sex acts were performed on her. She said other actresses cried because they were hurting so badly.

So I don't know how we draw a line or stop men from wanting to watch the abuse of women but the absolute first step is for society to admit this is a problem. When you have a significant amount of the male population orgasming to images of women in pain there is a problem. And as a culture we haven't even reached that first step yet.

[Antonia]

''When you have a significant amount of the male population orgasming to images of women in pain there is a problem. And as a culture we haven't even reached that first step yet.''

I agree -- and that was the WHOLE POINT of the original column.
So .. what do you do about it?

Parents are not policing what thei kids access online.
Schools have walked away.
Nobody goes to Church/temple (not that that is a guarantee of anything.)
The porn industrial complex is mind-bogglingly huge. It is international. All it takes to make it is a camera and a computer.
We can barely cope with child porn. How are we gonna deal with the rest of it?
Male indoctrination classes?

[sooey]

Continually publicize the actual working conditions in the porn industry and the complete and total lack of occupational health and safety standards and government regulation of it. And encourage consumers to boycott porn when they don't know where it comes from, how it was made, if the workers were even paid, etc.

Think drinking and driving, smoking around asthmatic children, buying South African wine during apartheid, Kathy Lee and the sweatshops and so on and so forth and more of the same etc etc.

So what if prostitution is the oldest profession? We used to be afraid of the forest, too. A little consumer shame would go a long way towards reducing the profits made by the producers of porn that dehumanizes people.

[C Martin]

In the case of young people I think more comprehensive sex ed could only help to illustrate the difference between reality and porn but dealing with the general population is harder. I think more people need to write articles like this and be willing to discuss the topic because people who aren't accessing these types of material may not have any idea how hostile much of the pornography actually is.

Maybe anti-violence campaigns need to widen their scope?? In particular I think men need to speak up about this more because studies show that watching this kind of porn results in men having less empathy and respect for women. It seems to follow then that female criticism wouldn't carry as much weight.

I wish the solutions were more obvious. It's an enormous problem but obviously isn't occuring in a vacuum. At the core I think it's just another form of misogyny.

[Darklady]

How sad. How very sad.

What? That so many women are not merely eager but anxious to assign victim status to other women... and all too often based purely upon their own personal discomfort with what other women do.

Antonia concludes that "We can't really know this though," when someone proposes that women are participating willingly in the sex biz.

Why? Why can't we know this? Is it because when someone who actually interacts with sex workers posts to a blog she gets insulted and shut down for not agreeing that women are invariably victims if they choose sex work? If we refuse to listen to or entertain opinions that differ from our own, then she's right -- we can't know much of anything except what we've decided to believe.

Men don't need to victimize us. We've got ourselves. That's beyond sad. That's pathetic.

While I don't believe for a minute that ALL women (or men, you sexist blog posters) involved with the sex industry are doing it 1) willingly or 2) because they really enjoy it, far more love their work than most folks posting to this thread appear willing to accept. Likewise, there's plenty of porn out there that doesn't feature the supposedly woman-hating behavior that so offends some. But apparently there's no reason to search for that other content when being offended and feeling victimized is the goal, however much one might choose to deny that fact.

Yeah, my mom was raised to believe that sex was dirty, too. She just didn't have the self-awareness to realize that she accepted and then chose to frame sex in that context in order to enjoy it. I decided to investigate all the opinions that were presented to me as fact -- and I found out that a lot of things I'd taken on faith were simply not true.

That so many women are so determined to simplify sexual dynamics by accusing men of being misogynistic or sadistic (which is only likely to put men on the silent defensive) is another sad thing and an accusation that I've found to simply not be true. What is true is that a lot of people want simple answers to complex questions -- and will ridicule anyone who refuses to provide them with what they want.

I want to thank Sooey for one of the biggest laughs of my day. Not content to sneer at the fact I've actually TALKED with women and men (and transsexuals) who work in porn, this person goes on to make the pig ignorant observation that I make "a lot of money exploiting Porn Industry workers." Alas, I don't make "a lot of money" unless one compares it to the majority of writers who can't make any money -- and I'm not exploiting anyone. In fact, I'm held in quite high regard within the adult industry and am seen as one of the few people who is really down-to-earth, honest, and both sees workers as humans and treats them that way. My hope is that by remaining in my integrity, I will eventually make "a lot of money" from my hard work, which includes defending the men and women who love sex work from those who choose not to understand why.

[sooey]

You should work for the C.I.A., Darklady: "It's not torture - it's sex work. Not to worry - the actors love it."

[Flashman]

"misogynist" = a man who hates women as much as some women hate other women.

And DarkLady: "pig ignorant observation" is her entire scthick. Don't take it away from her. She has nothing else.

[C Martin]

Some facts & observations from Australia:

The number of victims presented to the NSW Department of Health Sexual Assault Services in Australia has increased by over 30% since 1989. The incidence of child sexual assault has increased by 50%. The coordinator of the sexual assault department of Sydney 's Royal North Shore Hospital says,“My observation is that rapes are becoming more violent...The injuries are worse, they are increasingly horrific. As someone who works in the field day in and day out, I believe that pornography of any description inspires violence, whether actual or ideological.”

Victorian Crown Prosecutor Richard Read says, “The nature of rape has changed in recent years. Where 30 or 40 years ago most rapes were forced vaginal intercourse, today they often include anal or oral rape, or the insertion of bottles and other instruments into the vagina.”

[Christine]

Dear Antonia,

After reading your well written article it got me thinking about society today. You are so right to question. Everywhere you look, on every advertisement with close to no exception (except for diapers and the like); you will find an undercurrent of sex. Yes, sex sells y'all, no matter what you may need; it will bring you sexual gratification in whatever form you can come up with, which pins the gimme bigger, better, faster but cheaper community down pretty darn good.

Pornos have become mainstream and so "normal" that people no longer find them interesting. Anyone with a video camera can shot a sexual home video and place it on the web. The makers of porn have had to reach out further and further to appeal to the public's thrill seeking kick. As long as it was a basement/in the back alley/hush hush type thing, it was exciting and blood-tingling to watch. Now the weirder it is, the better the public reception. Sad to say, but have we come to the brink of Sodom and Gomorra?

Whatever happened to sex being fun and exciting? Whatever happened to enjoyment and sharing? Are women just blow-up dolls that walk and talk (maybe)? Did I slip through time and end up in the middle ages where men thought the world was flat and the sun revolved around the earth? Ladies, it is time to wake up and smell the coffee (or tea of you prefer), men have been telling us fibs to satisfy there own inadequacies for too long and it is time to stand up for our own rights! Yes, you heard me correctly.

This is a fight for respect. A man who has no respect for a woman will fall back on cruelty and abuse to sate the fear, ignorance and emptiness he feels inside. It was not intended for us to let respect, love and understanding to fall by the wayside. On this blue marble we call earth only humans are born with the power to love in which ever form we feel we need to express it, to give and take FREELY and unmutilated.

I am the last person to say that there is no place in our society for burlesque entertainment establishments or that ladies of questionable character should be banned, quite the contrary, prostitution should be legalised and regulated. These ladies perform a necessary service which should be entered into freely and of legal age. Burlesque entertainment means entertainment, looky looky no touchy touchy. No matter how tough this may be on you guys.

If it makes a woman feel sexy and alive to dance around a pole instead of doing tae-bo or aerobics, so what, let her express herself and get some exercise to boot. I don't care what anyone says, but every woman out there dreams of strutting her stuff and receiving affirmation that she is indeed a beautiful creature (let me tell you from personal experience, it is not as easy as it looks).Did you men really think we put on makeup, coif our hair with all sorts of sticky stuff and wear high heels for our own pleasure? Heck no, but do not mistake this to be an invitation to be vulgar and uncouth, just appreciative.

Oh and while we are on the subject, could someone please explain to me why gangster rappers and the like have to sing about putting women down? What is it about "'hoes" and "bitches" (please pardon the profanity) that gets these guys all in an up roar and in the last years the girls too? Do they even realise that these ladies, yes you heard me, LADIES, are someone's mother, sister or daughter? Now how would they feel about someone singing about their family and loved ones that way? Come on people, what is the matter with you?

I realise that I have mixed quite a few topics in to this letter, but I needed to vent a bit. Thanks for listening/reading; I can get off the soapbox now having been given the chance to blow off some steam.Next in line please stand up......

Punctilious from the Sidelines

[stephen.reeves]

Boycotting porn now that is funny, tell us another one Sooey.

[n a]

OK, i've just read more of your blogs and opinions Antonia...I can appreciate your perspectives on many things...just one heartfelt plea...please attempt not to generalize about the behaviour, character, genetics etc of 'men' in pejorative ways as it only spreads negative male stereotypes which reinforce the problems that plague certain elements of male culture in our society...you might even try affirming some elements of masculinity now and then, if there is anything that you see as worthy of affirming.

[Jeremy Swanson]

Interesting how the lady blogger asks for people to contribute to the blog but when she doesn't like the message she refuses to publish. Despite this: "And, because she can take it as well as dish it out, she wants to hear what you have to say. Fire away!" So we fire away and produce our pots but.. the lady won't publish. It seems to me she doesn't like the message. What a fraud

[Jeremy Swanson]

Antonia, you should see some of the stuff which passes my desk with this
tidal wave of violent porn which comes at us daily (pun not intended)
Horrible. Quite unreal. Some of it is just too brutal and some even you
would not believe. Some of the porn is in the form of invitations supposedly
from women although we know they are not. I am concerned also at how young
some of these girls seem to be and most also that they seem to be willing
and interested partners. Nope it's not pleasant. Many people, men included,
are not happy with what is out there. This is nothing more than ugly sex
where sex is supposed to be fun and entirely pleasurable.

Here's what I really want to know. When you and your partner saw those
boys
"kneeing" those girls in the crotch what was going on? How do you know that
was supposed to be sexual in nature? How can that be a "sexual probe"? That
is surely pure violence right? Nothing sexual in that? Is there? Am I behind
the times? What's that all about? Now I know all about "probing" and its
delights and the 'knee thing' is not it. That's just pure violence.''

[Jeremy Swanson]

What makes anyone think that men like the rap gendre with all the b...es and hoes and disgusting epithets. i don't know anyone who likes that at all. Men and women uncluded. In my circles especially men-and especially Fathers. We have been railing against this disgusting music as an insult to women for years.

[Kat]

Jeremy, if any guy were to make purposeful physical contact with my crotch using ANY part of his body, I would view his intentions as being sexual in nature. I also know that I am not the only woman who would feel this way. Perhaps this is why Antonia thought the way she did. If I saw some guys doing that to some other girls, I would come to the same conclusion that she did. Who says that a hand (or the more obvious male anatomy) must be involved in order for something like that to be sexual?

As for your thoughts on the rap genre. Believe it or not, there are quite a few people who do enjoy it, though I think they tend to be of the younger demographic. Keep in mind that when I say "younger", I do not necessarily mean just adolescents in high school, but also those who have graduated and even continued on into post-secondary school.