Sex-positive vs. sex-negative feminism

When I sat down to write on being wrong a couple months ago, my first task was to go through my past posts for illustrations of how I have learned from being wrong. One of the first points that came to mind (which I hadn't really blogged about) is the divide between sex-positive vs. sex-negative feminism. No, I haven't switched camps -- it's that I've stopped believing that there's as sharp a divide on this issue and I've stopped believing that this divide is as central to feminist thought.

And this is a change of opinion that has come about in just the past couple of years, through reading other women's blogs and memoirs.

Here's an example of what I mean. Take Greta Christina's post on "elevatorgate". I agree with pretty much everything she said. Maybe everything. The issue she wrote about is male/female sexual interactions, and Greta Christina is pretty much as "sex-positive" as they come. But would a "sex-negative feminist" take on the incident be any different? Perhaps in tone, but in content? Probably not.

I've sort of grown into the conclusion that -- for a huge number of feminist issues, perhaps most -- the sex positive/negative distinction is irrelevant or doesn't make sense. And while some feminists can reasonably be divided into these camps, probably most can't.

To see my evolution on this issue, the best place to start is my post porn and me -- where I described how my outlook was shaped by some of my earliest encounters with feminist theory of sexuality. In a nutshell, I felt that women who enjoy having sex with men (including women who are aroused by the thought of arousing a man) should not be told that they're messed-up in the head or that they hate themselves or that they're tools of the patriarchy. And they should especially not be given this slut-shaming in the name of feminism.

While I was enjoying the pleasures of grad school, I once attended a talk given by Andrea Dworkin. My reaction? I was horrified. This was nearly twenty years ago, so my memory of the lecture is a tad vague. All I remember is that everything is rape. Everything. Even things that aren't sexual are rape. Naturally, I felt that expanding the definition in this way not only trivializes the experience of people who are actually raped, but (more importantly) it is counter-productive in the fight against rape. You don't solve a problem by obscuring it, you solve it by first understanding it. Of course, before I even walked into that room, I already felt that her stance on porn was totally counter-productive with respect to addressing the problem of rape. So who knows what she actually said that day...

My stance on porn hasn't changed. There exist images in the category of pornography that are offensive -- as there are in all media genres. But images of women that are created and used for the express purpose of male arousal are not a priori harmful or degrading to women. If anything, it's the opposite.

On the other hand, it's nearly impossible to draw a clear dividing line between explicitly erotic materials and other forms of entertainment. And, while I think it's A-OK for men to enjoy looking at depictions of sexy women, the overall entertainment industry has a bit of a problem with portrayal of women. Specifically, a piece intended for a general audience typically includes only one female character, and even for her to get a spot on the stage she has to be beautiful and she has to be the love interest who is peripheral to a main [i.e. male] character. (Even God's favorite musical suffers from this, as much as I love it overall.) Maybe this problem is related to erotica. It's certainly related to attitudes towards women and sexuality. After contemplating this for a number of years, all I can say is that I think it's not simple.

So I guess feminism ranks pretty high on my grand list of things that aren't that simple...

An erotic alternate universe!

"Most smut fans will tell you that they have a strong preference for either visual porn or written porn -- a preference for sexual images or sexual stories that's so deeply ingrained, many people think it's hard-wired. Adult comics give us both. And in giving us both images and stories, adult comics create a bridge between the two.

-- Greta Christina

That's definitely true for me. I like striking images, but I'm almost never aroused by visual images alone, no matter how beautiful or naked the subjects may be. There has to be a story -- or, specifically, a scenario that creates erotic tension. Yet, perversely, I get stuck on erotic stories because the words get in the way. Reading a verbal description isn't the same as seeing, no matter how good a writer wrote it. Erotic comics hit the sweet spot.

Best Erotic comics 2008 and Best Erotic Comics 2009 showcase an amazing range of different artistic and narrative forms, from beautiful and poignant to funny to earthy to grotesque.

These books would make a good starting point for couples who are looking to introduce shared erotica into their relationships, but are a little hesitant -- there's almost certainly something here that will appeal to you and help you explore what you like. (Though, be warned that there are things in here that will probably upset/offend more sensitive souls.)

I'd like to mention a few highlights. I hate to narrow it down because there were so many great stories, but I'd like to give you an idea of what's in the books:

The first ones I caught myself coming back to re-read were some funny ones, like Dori Seda's story with the joke ending where something unpleasant breaks up the orgy. Then there was the excerpt from "Trucker Fags in Denial" -- which really is grotesque, but in an intriguing way. Actually, many of them are excerpts from larger works. I'd be curious to read the rest of Gilbert Hernandez's "Birdland," among others. I also liked some of the snapshots of the culture at large, such as the descriptions of strange porn films, and Ellen Forney's illustrations of personal ads.

While reading these books, I couldn't help but keep thinking of one other thing Greta Christina said:

"I am strongly of the opinion that truly first-rate erotica will excite you, even if it doesn't push your personal erotic buttons. First-rate erotica gets you excited about the sex the characters are having -- regardless of whether it's sex that you, personally, would enjoy having, or that pushes your personal fantasy buttons."

Naturally I kept asking myself, "how do these books measure up?" And, also, "how do I measure up?" On some level, I feel like it's wrong to pass judgment on my own sexual responses, yet it was such a tempting challenge!

I think we all (me and the two books) did pretty well. I'll admit that there were a few stories I didn't find that interesting (of the more than sixty short stories), but for the most part I found them exciting and compelling -- even the ones that didn't drive right up my erotic alley. And I feel I've expanded my horizons in directions that would never have occurred to me on my own.

A feminist response to the new "feminist" anti-porn theory

It's official! The anti-porn feminists (remember "Porn is the theory, rape is the practice"?) have finally realized that their "porn causes rape" theory was wrong. Dead wrong. Not even close. Unfortunately, without skipping a beat they've invented a brand new theory for why porn is still evil.

Now, I hate to call attention to this essay by Naomi Wolf (or even read it for that matter), but it's sadly been popping up around the Internet lately as a feminist theory, and I've had some requests for a feminist response to it.

So here goes:

1. If stopping rape had been their goal, then upon learning about the inverse correlation between porn and rape they'd have responded by saying "Wow, that's not what I expected. Let's analyze this to see if we can understand better what factors lead to rape." Instead they respond by saying "Damn, now we have to find a new excuse for hating porn!" They've made it quite clear which issue was their top priority.

2. In the past few decades, real sociological research has been performed regarding the effects of porn, yielding real data -- lots of it. Yet Wolf doesn't cite any of it. She hardly seems aware of its existence. Just like their earlier theory (porn causes rape), the Meese commission feminists have pulled this new and opposite theory straight out of the air with only anecdotal evidence to back it up. Why is anyone still listening to these clowns???

(Answer: Because there are a whole lot of people out there who passionately hate porn and desperately want to believe their bile is inspired by feminism.)

3. The thesis of Wolf's essay is that when men don't ever get to see naked women (in real life or pictures) they're just that much more desperate for the real thing.

My response: Probably true. Hell, it works in Iran and Afghanistan! I'm still trying to figure out what this has to do with feminism though...

For some real feminist analysis of porn, see Yes means yes, a feminist in favor of porn?, and Porn and me, and for some light related discussion, see Topless on the beach and An Immodest Proposal: sex on the first date?.

Porn and Me

At one point during the fabulous Paris Exmo Expo 2007, I gave my usual spiel on porn and feminism. I can't remember why the hell I brought up porn at the "Kingdom of Beer" (and the other ladies are probably also wondering). But since the subject came up in the meatspace version of Outer Blogness (and because we've been talking about people's biases here lately), I figured perhaps I'd share with you my history (hence bias) on this subject:

I was raised in a religion (I'll just let you guess which one) that is extremely patriarchal as well as repressive and negative towards sexuality.

Then, when I gave up that religion at the age of seventeen, I was free to embrace my sexuality and my feminism with equal abandon. (Obviously feminism and women's sexual freedom go hand-in-hand, right?) So I became more and more interested in reading books and articles about feminism. To show you just how ready I was to accept and embrace any and all of feminism, I stopped shaving and wearing a bra for a few months for no other reason than because I'd heard that that was some sort of feminist thing to do. And as I was reading along, I learned that the feminist movement is opposed to porn.

My first reaction was surprise and bewilderment. Agreeing with the church on any sex-and-gender issue seemed like a humongous red flag. Those shame-sodden lectures that taught me I was a deviant for fantasizing about sex and that I'd be as worthless as chewed gum if I acted on my desires: they also contained a message about how pornography leaves your mind permanently impure. Naturally I had filed all of these hate-your-sexuality messages in the same mental drawer -- and later moved them all together into my mental garbage can.

My post-Mormon experience with porn started when I took a look at the magazine collections of various boyfriends. (Yes, they were physical, printed magazines. Yes, I'm that old.) I also watched some porn movies with another boyfriend. I didn't find any of it particularly objectionable. As a straight woman, I figured that being aroused by the sight of naked women was an appropriate quality in a boyfriend.

Naturally I also looked for materials that would be arousing for me. I found that stories did more for me than pictures, but even sex stories aimed at women left me going "meh" if they were really graphic. I liked the erotic scenario better than having the mechanics spelled out for me. And one of the main themes in my favorite erotic scenarios was the thought of a man being aroused by seeing and/or touching a woman (see here). I guess that makes me a rather unique type of pervert.

Anyway, I'd analyzed my own sexual responses, and found the anti-porn faction of feminism treating me every bit as much like a piece of chewed gum as the church had: they told me, in essence, that I should feel ashamed of turning men on with my body; of letting a man "use me for his pleasure." It was a harsh blow to see feminists -- the people I hoped would counter shame I learned from the church -- were giving me the same "poor, fallen woman" crap in new words.

But I was determined to be a feminist, so I was determined to figure this one out. Then I learned the slogan "Porn is the theory, rape is the practice."

"Aha," I thought. "Pornography is bad because it causes rape. Well, if porn has been shown to cause rape, then I certainly agree that it's bad." The next natural question was "So does it lead to rape? Is there some hard evidence to back that up?"

Um, no.

Reading along in various feminist publications, I discovered a curious excuse as to why it was okay for feminists to fight to suppress porn -- on the grounds that it leads to rape -- despite the lack of real-world evidence to that effect: Women can see intuitively that porn inspires men to harm them, and we women need to value women's type of reasoning (intuition) more highly than we value masculine reasoning (logic and evidence).

Let me tell you that I was about to breathe fire when I saw that argued as a feminist position!!!

Now, I really hope that I misinterpreted that feminist article I read so many years ago and/or that it was just in some student publication or something. Because if any serious, respected feminist intellectual argues anything even remotely like that I really, really, really don't want to know about it. There I was -- a female Mathematics major -- fighting with all my heart and soul to demonstrate that reason and logic aren't something unique to men, and that girls can do math too if they're encouraged to try.

So I fundamentally disagreed with the anti-porn squad on practically every level right from the beginning. (Did I mention censorship? And how obscenity laws often get used first against gay materials and women's health information? And how a Dworkin-inspired anti-porn law has been ironically used to censor Dworkin's own anti-porn book?)

Yet I've never really been an activist about this subject. I read a few books (like Defending Pornography: Free Speech, Sex, and the Fight for Women's Rights). I canceled my subscription to Ms. when I got fed up with its Dworkin-MacKinnonite stance and what a waste of feminist energy it was: a bunch of privileged white women navel-gazing about whether they feel "degraded" because some schlub is masturbating in the privacy of his own bedroom. Then I figured I was being a hypocrite since what am I on this issue but a privileged white woman navel-gazing about my sexuality? So I decided social justice was more important, and kind of put this issue on the shelf for a bit and focused on other issues.

I still think social justice issues are more important, particularly as they pertain to building a sustainable future for our species.

So why am I bringing this up now?

Hell, this is a blog -- I can talk about whatever I want. Navel-gazing about porn is no more a waste of my time than posting pictures of whale genitals... ;^)

meme of eight

I've been tagged by Greta Christina to tell you eight wonderfully random tidbits about my tiny self!!! It's an honor to have been tagged by a real pornographer (just one step removed from Susie Bright herself!) since -- as you know -- we love to talk about porn here at "Letters from a Broad..." but really it's all just talk. ;^)

Here are the rules:

1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
5. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they're tagged, and to read your blog.

(Actually, the rules seem very similar to the rules of most memes, except for the fact that the rules must be explicitly posted first. Maybe it's just stricter than the average meme...?)

Anyway, here are eight random things about me:

1. I'm under an absolutely insane deadline for a project at work, and it's really, really cutting into my blogging time. I keep saying I'm going to cut back on blogging, and lately it has become a sad reality. Because I hate it when my real job cuts into my hobby of following a hundred million blogs. Normally just because you don't see hits from me on your stats, it doesn't mean I'm not reading your blog -- think RSS -- but lately I haven't been doing even that. On the other hand, when my project at work is done, it's going to be amazingly cool.
2. My cousin is going to be visiting me in a couple of days. (Not Aerin, a different cousin. In fact we have a lot of cousins.) I'm psyched to have the opportunity to get to know my cousin better. I'm not sure I've ever met this cousin except during one family reunion fifteen years ago when she was a baby. But her family is cool.
3. I'm madly cleaning my house this weekend so that my cousin won't think that we live like cave-people. ("But we do live like cave-people!" protested my husband when I told him that.) I'm hoping to get the house up to the level that normal people's houses look like at their worst. From there I can apologize for the mess. I wish I were exaggerating, but anyone who knows me knows that tragically I am not exaggerating at all. Not even a little bit.
4. Okay, maybe a little bit. But not very much.
5. The charm on my keychain is a 1 gig USB memory stick. I'm not really a gadget person, but this thing is really convenient -- I use it all the time!
6. When I was in grad school, I used to keep a copy of Susie Sexpert's Lesbian Sex World in my office on the shelf with my math books. I'm not a lesbian or anything, but it was a great conversation starter.
7. I used to go by "Carrie" until I was 21 years old. Now it's weird for me to think of myself as Carrie. I still like the name, but it make me think of "me as a kid" -- someone who isn't quite the same as "me, now." On the other hand, I'm perfectly happy to answer to chanson.
8. I've only see two movies on the big screen (in the theater) within the past 5+ years. Those movies are Cars and Shrek the Third. The next one will be Ratatouille.

OK, now for the tagging part. Unlike Greta -- who politely asked people's permission before tagging them -- I'm just going to pick eight random people off the top of my head right now. Let's shoot this one into Outer Blogness:

Floating in the Milk, From the Ashes, Lemon Blossom, Todd, Sister Mary Lisa, Equality, Aerin, and -- while we're nepoting, my BIL Mike.

More whale naughty bits!!!

Ever since I posted about the birds and the bees and the whales I've gotten a whole bunch of search queries by people looking for pictures of whale genitals.

Why? I have no idea.

Some bloggers get annoyed when their blogs attract search queries that look like they may be from weirdos. But I'm not like that. Whenever I get those weirdo queries, I like to see it as just more free data for my inner anthropologist. Plus only cool people read my blog, so I'm willing to give these people the benefit of the doubt!

If they're looking for such an image, I'm sure they have some legitimate scientific and/or whale fetish purpose for wanting to see whales getting it on.

So without further ado, here's the picture you're looking for:

a whale of a big zizi

(I've linked to the image instead of inlining it to protect those with more delicate sensibilities.)

See that big pointy white thing in the picture? Yes, that is what you think it is.

(I bet you thought I was going to link to some entirely different picture just to be funny. Nah, the real thing is funny enough.)

Poor whale!!! He probably had no idea that he was going to become a porn star!!!

Actually it's possible that this may be the largest penis ever filmed in a sex scene. According to the documentary the testicles alone weigh more than a full ton!!! Mere human porn stars -- eat your hearts out!!! ;-)

Questioning Objectification

If there's one thesis I'd like to nail to the church door of feminism, it would be this:

Desire does not equal objectification.

Many women believe that when a man is aroused by the sight of a woman -- particularly by seeing and touching her face, hair, and body -- he reduces her in his mind to a "sex object."

Probably the most serious problem with this theory is that -- like the concept of sin -- the doctrine of objectification clouds the real issue: consent. Weighing sexual expression in terms of objectification encourages people to lump consensual and non-consensual sex acts together as being both harmful to women. It discourages people from using consent (or lack thereof) as a good measure of whether harm has been done.

Unfortunately it's difficult to debate the concept of objectification on its merits because the term "objectification" is not well-defined. There's no clear-cut criteria for determining what is objectification and what isn't. Even the notoriously ill-defined term "porn" is easier to pin down. I've seen the term "objectification" applied to any instance of a man deriving pleasure from seeing or touching a woman's body, especially if specific body parts act as a trigger for arousal. So the charge of objectification can be used to condemn a huge range of sexual expression. Yet when it comes time to demonstrate the harm, the term "objectification" contracts to cover only the most flagrant examples. Thus it becomes nearly impossible to discuss or debate the concept in any reasonable manner.

Nonetheless, I'd like to try to hold up the concept of objectification to scrutiny based on what seems to be the popular definition.

The problem with the concept of objectification is that it is not consistent with reality. Feeling aroused when presented with certain sexual cues is an involuntary biological response that has nothing whatsoever to do with a man's capacity to see women as whole people, as equals, as partners, as colleagues, etc.

Being irrational, the doctrine of objectification is counterproductive. It alienates potential allies. There are many men who respect the abilities of their female colleagues and would like to stand up for women's equality. However they are made to feel that if an image of a nude woman turns them on, then they are the enemy and not welcome to call themselves feminists. For many men, feeling aroused by the female form is a fundamental component of their sexuality that no amount of "education" can possibly change any more than prayer will change a gay person into a straight person. Feminists should be educating these men that their arousal response is normal, but that there's a time and a place for it, and they need to be careful to treat they the women they interact with in the way the women would like to be treated. Feminists should not be saying "If you masturbate in the privacy of your own home while thinking about women and/or looking at consensually produced images, then you're a misogynist!"

As much of a shame as it is to alienate potential male allies however, the real tragedy is that the doctrine of objectification also alienates many women. It is not possible to condemn male sexuality without (as a side effect) condemning the sexuality of many straight women who like to have sex with men. If a woman is aroused by showing off her own body -- and in particular is aroused by seeing the effect she has on men -- then the doctrine of objectification tells her that she's disrespecting herself by turning herself into a sex object. The problem again is that this is a perfectly ordinary arousal cue, well within the range of normal arousal cues for women. The feminist movement should be encouraging women to explore their sexuality openly, not limiting what female sexuality is allowed.

As you might guess, this issue is important to me personally because I fall into that class of women who are sometimes made to feel unwelcome at the feminist table. I've spent quite a lot of time analyzing my own sexuality, and being honest with my own desires, I have come to the realization that I am far more aroused by turning a man on -- by the thought of male desire -- than I am by looking at an image of a beautiful man. Patriarchal religionists as well as feminists who preach the doctrine of objectification would tell me that this is because I have internalized "man as subject" in my personal sexual narrative and/or that I must want to be an object and therefore don't respect myself. But in reality it doesn't mean that at all. It doesn't mean anything. It is a random arousal cue. Period.

Now I would like to quote my favorite columnist, Dan Savage:

Not all men into BDSM are chauvinist pigs. There are tons of misogynist males out there into strictly vanilla sex.[...] There's no rhyme or reason to most people's fantasies;

[Note that Dan Savage's column is adult, however I encourage people who are not offended by it to go read the whole thing because I've taken this quote way out of context: here]

As I said in my feminist sexuality post I don't think that it's possible for anyone who is following my blog to seriously argue that I lack self-confidence, self-respect, or self-esteem. It pisses me off that the feminist movement would make me feel like I need to defend myself against such charges.

Personally, in my own relationships, I have never once had a problem with the question "Does he like me as a whole person? Or does he see me as just a means to get off?"

Do you want to know why?

Because "Does he find me interesting to talk to?" is absolutely the wrong question for a feminist to be asking herself. The right question is "Do I find him interesting to talk to?"

It turns out that the people I am interested in talking to are interested in talking to me.

It is because of my own self-confidence that there is no danger I will be mistaken for an object by anyone whose opinion matters.

Why? Why? Why??? II

This is part 2 (continued from here) of my wacky theories about why some people oppose gay marriage. Today's half leans far more into the realm of armchair speculation, so don't feel pressured to agree with me on this one just because you agreed with my previous post. ;-)

Today's question is the following: "Why worry about gay people's love lives? As opposed to, say, minding your own business about what goes on in other people's bedrooms?"

I think this question is related to the question of "Why do humans mate in private?"

Lots of other animals (dogs, chimpanzees, pigeons, rabbits, etc.,) have no problem at all with mating in full view of others of their same species. Not people though. Some people like group sex or acts that involve watching and being watched, but in such cases part of the draw is breaking the privacy taboo.

The "Garden of Eden" story explains this need for privacy as an obvious natural consequence of self-awareness: Since humans can think, they know they need to cover up -- animals don't because they don't know any better.

This explanation isn't terribly convincing to me. Just because you know what you're doing, it doesn't obviously follow that you should be ashamed of what you're doing and hide it.

I got a different explanation from reading Jared Diamond's Why Is Sex Fun?

I know, I know, all the rest of the exmos read Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel, but I go straight for Why Is Sex Fun? I gotta be me!!! ;-)

The idea I gleaned is that a species that is at once highly social and highly monogamous (like ours!) would naturally prefer to mate in private.

It makes sense if you think about it. If a committed couple of people want to reproduce just with each other, they don't benefit by mating in view of other random individuals who may become interested and want to join in.

(That's the part I got from Diamond -- the rest of this crazy theory can be blamed on me.)

The way human society works, sexually mature adults are constantly interacting in a non-sexual way with other sexually mature adults. (Think of your colleagues, people you pass on the street, shop-keeps, etc.)

Very little reproduction would get done without sexual desire. However, if people felt only positive feelings towards sexuality, it would be a lot more difficult to stay faithful to one's partner. Therefore humans have strong natural inhibitions regarding sexuality -- often to the point of revulsion -- that counterbalance their feelings of sexual attraction and sexual desire.

Picture some person you see every day. Not your S.O., and not the hottie you have a secret crush on, but just some random person you interact with at work or something. Now picture that person having sex with his/her S.O. (Or worse -- picture your parents.) Yuck, right? I'm sure if you try you can think of someone where your reaction is "yuck," or at least "I'd rather not think about it." Yet you can picture the same person eating a sandwich and you feel total indifference, not revulsion.

Why?

Because of your natural aversion to other people's sexuality and sexual expression.

Even people who enjoy erotica typically have a limit; a point where an erotic image is "too graphic" and hence seems gross or vulgar (although exactly what constitutes "too graphic" varies widely from one person to the next).

For everyone -- even lusty people who like sex a lot -- there are sex acts that they don't find erotic, appealing, or arousing at all. When imagining such acts, one feels the usual aversion/repulsion without feeling the counterbalancing feelings of attraction and arousal. And so the unappealing sexual scenario seems nothing but distasteful and possibly disgusting.

Some potentially distasteful sex acts being performed by other people right now might include two men in bed together, a man masturbating while viewing consensually-produced pictures of naked people, very old people having sex, various fetishes, unusual uses of inanimate objects, etc.

The typical irrational response is to deliberately imagine the sex acts you don't like, to feel grossed-out by the image, and to say "This is horribly repugnant to me, therefore it is wrong and evil on principle -- for everyone -- and must be suppressed!!!"

A rational response is to say "Private sexual expression between other consenting adults does not concern me and is none of my business."

Keep in mind, people, that many gay people find straight sex disgusting. For every sexual expression that one person finds arousing, I can guarantee you 100% that there exists another human that finds the same exact scene repulsive and disgusting. The only reason the current debate is about straight people trying to repress gay sexuality rather than gay people trying to repress straight sexuality is just the fact of who is in the majority.

In closing, I'd like to wish each and every one of you a pleasurable and satisfying sex life according to your own tastes!!! I don't necessarily want to hear about all the graphic details, however you may rest assured that as long as it involves consenting adults only and appropriate safety precautions are followed, I'm rooting for you in spirit!!! :D

And that includes people who choose celibacy. My bias is to favor an attitude of "Sex is natural, sex is good!!! Not everybody does it, but everybody should!!!" ;-) However, I don't want to impose my personal sexual tastes on others, so to those of you whose pleasure is not to have sex, I wish you all happiness in that as well!!! :D

My friend, the Internet...

In a recent post I told you guys a bunch of abstract, idealistic reasons for why I love the Internet. But really, it's more than that -- it's personal.

Let's face it: making friends in real life typically requires planning and big blocks of free time either to go out or to clean up the house and invite people over. And if you have a job and/or kids (or even if you don't) you don't necessarily have oodles of free time to go out and socialize as much as you might like. Then you have the obstacle of finding someone else whose free time matches up with yours, who doesn't live too far away, and hopefully shares some sort of interests with you. Sheesh, it's a wonder people in tho olden days were able to make friends at all...

Today whenever you find yourself with ten minutes or an hour to spare, you can pull up your cup of coffee (or whatever refreshing beverage you enjoy with your friends) and see what all of your virtual amigos are up to on your favorite blogs and forums.

True it's not the same as going out for a drink with your friends for real. But I don't see it as a substitute for real life socializing as much as it is a supplement and a resource. I spend as much time on real-life socializing today as I did before I discovered the Internet. But back then (without all my cyberbuds) I just had that many fewer friends. Plus I've met people in person that I met first online, and my Internet antics have helped me reconnect and stay in touch with family members and old friends.

Now you're probably going "Yeah right, Chanson, fess up -- the real reason you love the Internet is because of all the porn!!"

But in truth I'm not really interested in the porn. What I really like is talking about porn!!! The porn itself is okay -- I can take it or leave it -- but I can discuss porn theory all day long. Seriously. Try me. I think a lot of other feminists are the same way.

Considering how much I love the Internet, you may be wondering why I've essentially given up posting on forums (despite my recent visits to The Foyer and NOMs). It's really just a question of time. Blogging alone occupies more time than I ought to be wasting on the Internet, and if I added regular participation in a forum or two on top of that, I wouldn't have time to do anything else at all.

Now if it ever happens one day that there's nothing left of me but a disembodied brain in a jar hooked up to the Internet, then I'm sure I'll become a regular on several forums in addition to blogging. (Guys, please don't try to pretend that you never plan what you'll do if you're ever reduced to nothing but a disembodied brain in a jar.) But for the moment, my system is to focus on blogging only.

The main reason I ultimately chose blogging over forums is because I feel like it's easier to expand my social network outside of the boundaries of one particular forum.

The way I see it, a forum is a little like a town square (hence the name) where everyone has a megaphone and they're all talking to each other at once. A blog is more like a backyard barbecue where you go because you like the host, and maybe you'll see other people you know there, but maybe not.

The trouble is that it's incredibly time-consuming to live in even two or three towns to the point where you feel like you know the people there and understand what's going on. Then you may have friends you'd like to stay in touch with who aren't interested in moving to your favorite town, but who might be willing to occasionally stop by your backyard barbecue instead. Similarly, since I have interests besides exmormonism (hard to believe, but true!), it's easy for me to swing by non-LDS-related mathematician or other topic blogs on my blog-visiting rounds.

Another advantage to blogs is that they seem somewhat less prone to fighting and feuds than forums are. In blog space, if two people hate each other, they can just avoid visiting each other's blogs. But if they're on the same forum, they can't help but be constantly in each other's faces. A classic example is that unfortunate perpetual feud over on RfM between the religious and non-religious. I don't want to blame any individuals involved -- I really think that it's just a case where they've spent too much time disagreeing in a space where it's very hard to tune each other out. Then it escalates and ends up giving occasional visitors an inaccurate negative impression of both Christian and atheist exmos...

One advantage of a forum over a blog is that you tend to get more back-and-forth discussion among the participants. Plus you get more of a sense of community because you know that everybody there knows everybody else. But that isn't quite enough to tip the scale in favor of forums over blogging, so I probably won't be more than an occasional forum visitor again until I magically get a whole lot more free time (hopefully not through having my brain disembodied, but if it comes down to that, we'll see...).

Of course it looks like a lot of people participate on multiple forums and blogs in the great network of cultural Mormons. Once you participate somewhere in this network, you're likely to run into people you know and who know each other wherever you go. So even if it's only virtual, it's kind of like a community. :D

A feminist in favor of porn? Is that possible?

When I finished writing my earlier piece on porn (Yes means yes), I looked at the statement "I am in favor of porn" and thought: "Gosh, that's an awfully strong statement -- maybe I should change it to 'I am not opposed to porn.'"

After all, take a look at the "Playboy attitude" that tells men that the good life is to be part of a boys' club that doesn't treat women as equals. Isn't it obvious that that's degrading to women?

But not all porn has the same theme and style. If you don't like the attitude of Playboy for example, it's not as if Hugh Hefner invented porn.

Yet, if some porn promotes a negative attitude towards women, why favor porn? Why not just be indifferent towards it?

Because looking at the evidence, I am absolutely convinced that porn decreases hostility towards women, increases acceptance of women's sexual autonomy, and makes ordinary women safer.

Here's a simple example that you have seen in your own lifetime.

Since the appearance of the Internet, there has been a massive increase in porn consumption in the US. There has been a phenomenal explosion not only in the amount of porn consumed but also in the proportion of the population that consumes porn regularly. Now where is the corresponding increase in the number of rapes? There is none. Indeed, rape has decreased significantly in the US over the same period. So even though this isn't proof that porn prevents rape, it certainly demonstrates that porn does not cause rape. It shows that increased availability of pornography doesn't lead to more danger for the average woman on the street.

I lifted that example from this article where the author showed that rape decreased the most -- by a wide margin -- in places with the most Internet access. And we all know what's on the Internet. (Note that the Feminist Law Profs have provided a critique of this argument.)

It's just a correlation, but this inverse correlation between porn and rape is strong enough that it's worth at least asking ourselves if maybe there's something to it. At the very least, it's compelling enough that -- if our real goal here is for women to be safer -- it warrants seriously re-analyzing the current feminist orthodoxy on the relationship between pornography and rape.

And really, I think it's perfectly reasonable to expect that porn consumption would decrease a man's inclination to commit rape for one big reason:

Positive erotic materials train males to make a strong distinction between wanted and unwanted sexual contact.

Traditional religious training teaches young men the following: that acting on their sexual impulses is bad in all circumstances (until marriage at some distant, indefinite point in the future). Indeed, even having such urges is a moral failing. No woman worth having wants to have sex -- those who consent are worthless trash.

The resulting sexual frustration can lead to feelings of shame, anger, and hostility, often directed at women in general as they are the focus of the thwarted desire. This mindset can lead to rape and other abuses.

(Note, I'm just talking about straight males here -- gay male sexuality is a completely different discussion.)

This model creates a climate where sexual release is always bad -- the woman's consent (or lack thereof) is irrelevant.

In theory, if males could be trained to completely suppress their sexual urges and feel aroused only on cue, that would solve the problem. However that is quite impossible. Aiming for that ideal creates a situation where occasionally the dam is going to break, and when it does, the stage is already set to interpret a lack of an explicit "no" as a "yes" and to see an explicit "no" as unimportant.

A constructive alternative is to provide a positive message about sex. Spread the word that sexual desires are not inherently bad or wrong. There exist harmless ways of enjoying your sexuality, in particular fantasy and masturbation, possibly in conjunction with published erotic materials.

Pornography (with masturbation) gives strong positive reinforcement for the idea that there exist women who consent to sexual expression and circumstances where sexual release is harmless and good.

And why be a monster when you're given the opportunity to be a lover instead?

Yes means yes

Because I'm such a dedicated blogger, I spent a good part of my Saturday googling things like "pornography rape correlate" so that I could write you all a blog entry about porn as promised.

Does porn cause rape?

This is a fundamental question to ask when deciding whether porn is good or bad.

My impression from reading the various articles I found is that there is a lot of very solid evidence that if any correlation between availability of porn and incidence of rape exists at all, it is a negative one (i.e. more porn = less rape).

Rather than give you a bunch of links and my reactions, I encourage you to consult your favorite search engine and see for yourself. You'll see plenty of articles arguing both sides (some saying pornography causes rape, some saying pornography prevents rape), and it's instructive to look at them side-by-side and compare them.

In the interest of full disclosure, I'll tell you my bias: I am a feminist, and I am in favor of porn. (Consenting adults only, and in an appropriate time and place.)

I am in favor of porn because I am a feminist. My right to my own body and to my sexuality is a huge part of feminism for me. It's not the only facet of my feminism, but the idea that I can feel good about myself as a woman and as a sexual person at the same time is one of the aspects of feminism that I feel most passionate about.

Because of the feminist claim that pornography causes rape, the correlation between these two items in particular gets a lot of attention (as opposed to a lot of other stray statistical differences one could explore between a more open society and a more repressive society).

It's not certain, but maybe there is a cause-and-effect relationship. The theory seems to be that the frustrated guy who might otherwise be out making trouble for all of the many women who don't want to have sex with him is instead sitting at home at his computer masturbating after having looked at a few nudie pics and having IM cybersex with an old granny far away who gets off on pretending to be a dirty-talking twenty-year-old online...

However, I think it's likely that the availibility of porn and the prevalence of rape are also both tied to something else, namely how permissive a culture is towards consensual sex. A huge factor a lot of porn/rape correlation articles neglected to mention is the ability to give meaningful consent and refusal.

I agree with most feminists that getting out the message that "No means no" is of vital importance for preventing sexual assault. And that's is why it's critical that both options exist -- yes as well as no -- in a meaningful way.

In a repressive society, some women want sex. Yet no women are allowed to want sex. So you get a situation where the women who really mean no say no and the women who don't mean no also say no.

See the problem here?

In a society where sexual expression is less stigmatized, men know that the women who want to have sex with them will feel perfectly comfortable and confident saying so. So when a guy meets up with a woman who says to him "No, I don't want to have sex with you," there is no confusion about it. The guy is less likely to doubt or try to second-guess her.

That's why it's so important to allow women to feel like it's okay for them to consent to sexual expression -- including producing and consuming erotic materials -- if that's what they actually want.

Do you really want no to mean no? Then don't force a yes to be a no.