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My evolving feminism
September 09, 2004
In my sophomore year of high school, I was assigned to write an argumentative paper. I can’t remember the nuances of my argument (probably because it didn’t have any) but the paper was basically a teenage feminist rant against the media, advertising in particular. It was part essay, part collage. I remember one particular piece of it very well. I cut out a bunch of pictures from shoe ads and pasted them together on a sheet of paper. In the middle of the page, I wrote: “Are these ads for shoes or whores?”
I was very against the sexual objectification of women. Period. Magazines, TV, movies, and especially porn were things I considered evil tools of the patriarchy. And whoring? Don’t even get me started.
Something has changed over the past lump of years, in which I’ve begun to appreciate media that once would have made my stomach churn. In an email exchange with Kinky Librarian, we touched on feminism and sex work, and she said that more and more, porn has been striking her as overly derogatory towards women. And, while she’s right, I have to admit that sometimes I like to watch some rough sex where the girl gets thrown around and maybe even gets a scarcely lubed cock up her ass. Increasingly I find myself frustrated and bored with the softcore stuff on a lot of alternaporn sites even though I like the models and politics on them better. Is it okay if I support the concept of alternaporn intellectually but not with the response of my vulva?
I’m not sure what to do with this self-knowledge. It’s sort of unsettling, and difficult to think and write about. I feel like I’m being a traitor to feminist pornography by getting off to the stuff that feminist pornographers are trying to work against by creating alternative images and appreciations of different bodies/acts/etc. But at the same time, I know better than many people that erotic responses aren’t always logical and certainly aren’t controllable (though erotic actions are controllable, let’s not get away from that). So, on one hand, I could unpack the meaning of this erotic development until I’m blue in the face and maybe or maybe not get anywhere with that. On the other hand, I could just be self-aware about my desires and remember to separate fantasy from reality – ie: I won’t forcible be putting unlubed objects up girls’ asses. Well lubed silicone objects with a flared base are a different story altogether.
Posted by Dacia at September 9, 2004 01:02 PM
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