ecl@ahuta.UUCP (ecl) (01/02/85)
(The following was prompted by a section in the December 1984 FILM COMMENT about
movies, pornography, and "anti-porn" ordinances. It consist of various
excerpted quotes and my comments on them. Please go read the original article
if you're interested--I can't type the whole thing in, but it's all worth
reading.)
(I will give the same disclaimer that I gave on my posting of the Minneapolis
"anti-porn" ordinance: I will be up front about all this and say that I'm
against this sort of ordinance, so don't expect an unbiased set of comments.)
My criticisms of the ordinance are that it is:
1) an abridgement of free speech
2) an abrogation of due process
3) sex discriminating
4) based on very shaky evidence
5) directed at sex rather than the violence it supposedly is trying
to stamp out
6) vague
7) an affront to the English language
See the comments below for explication of these problems. (I have added
references to which of these criticisms is being discussed.)
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David Denby (film critic for NEW YORK magazine):
"Is it unimaginable that *men* might be exploited in pornographic
films or debased by the exhibition of the films--or are men already so
vicious, animalistic, and cruel that any further degradation is by
definition impossible? What do the anti-porn feminists make of gay
male pornography, which is now almost as plentiful as the straight
variety?"
I commented on this in my previous article; the ordinance attempts to define
pornography in such a way that gay male pornography is violence against women.
In their minds, the exploitation of men exists only because producers of porn
use men as stand-ins for women. (Hey, don't look at me. This wasn't *my*
idea.) (Sex discriminating) (Vague)
"...of those studies I've heard about the most damning suggest that
violent pornography causes an increased willingness to commit violence
in *some* men who have a *predisposition* to violence." [Italics
his.]
Actually, as Donnerstein's comments below show, it causes an increased
willingness to *say* that they *might* commit violence. (Based on very shaky
evidence)
"How is a human rights commission or court supposed to prove that an
act of sexual violence has been 'directly caused by a specific piece
of pornography'?"
How, indeed? Is the criminal going to say, "Yes, I did it because I read about
it in METER-MAIDS IN BONDAGE and it sounded like fun?" This all supposes that
you have actually apprehended the perpetrator of the violence to interview
him/her--a dubious assumption at best, given the pathetic arrest/conviction
statistics. (Abrogation of due process) (Based on very shaky evidence)
(Vague)
"The medieval peasants who thought it their husbandly right to beat
their wives never saw DEBBIE DOES DALLAS; the young men of the Red
Army who raped women in almost incredible numbers while 'liberating'
Eastern and Central Europe in 1944-45 probably saw little or no
pornography when growing up in the puritanical Soviet Union."
And how much pornography did the average (illiterate) Crusader read before
raping his way to the Holy Land? (Based on very shaky evidence)
"At the same time, of course, while DRESSED TO KILL and BELLE DE JOUR
become aesthetic desaparecidos, another theater could show gay S-M
movies (fistfucking, whips, chains, the works) with impunity."
Actually, this isn't clear. But if it's true, it shows that there's something
wrong with the ordinance if the intent is to decrease violence. If it isn't
then there's a perversion of the English language going on by the authors of
the ordinance, and I don't want works of literature judged by people who
don't know how to use English. (Directed at sex rather than violence) (Vague)
(An affront to the English language)
"People can easily become obsessed, and porn is a stupid thing to
become obsessed with. The anti-porn feminists have indeed been
degraded by pornography, though not in the way they think.
Pornography seems to have overwhelmed their sense of reality--I think
you could say they have a pornographic sense of reality. ... I have
already mentioned their tendency to generalize from extreme cases. In
addition, there is their amazing unwillingness to distinguish between
fantasy and act. After all, almost all of us fantasize doing things
or having things done to us that we would not do or have done to us in
life. We all have "pornographic" fantasies, but only a few of us
bridge the gap between fantasy and act. The anti-porn feminists show
not the slightest interest in the social and psychological conditions
that lead some mean and women across the bridge while a great many
others stay safely on the side of fantasy."
This is something I have commented on before. Fantasy is not reality.
"The existing statutes against rape, assault, kidnapping, and the like
should be turned against porn lords. But certainly if those statutes
can't be made to work, some vague application of civil-rights law
isn't going to work either."
I would think this is obvious. Apparently it isn't. (Of course, to be fair, I
should point out that people like Al Capone ended up behind bars on charges of
income tax evasion. Just wanted to be fair.) (Based on very shaky evidence)
###############################################################################
Alan M. Dershowitz (Professor of Law, Harvard Law School):
"By focusing their censorial wrath on 'pornography,' these feminists
have made their Faustian pact with the devil--the Reverend Jerry
Falwell and his gang of Moral Majoritians. The pact is this: although
there is little reliable evidence that non-violent pornography--
couples explicitly making love--causes violence against women, the
only way of putting together an effective censorship coalition is to
agree that pornography is the villain. ... Reverend Falwell has been
keeping his end of the pact; he now condemns pornography not only as
immorality and godlessness, but also as 'violence against women' (an
issue he was never very big on before the dirty deal was struck). ...
If the feminist censors were candid, they would come out directly and
say that they want to censor sexist films (and other forms of
expression) that are demeaning and dangerous to women.
"De Palma's films would be high on any such list. But then the
feminist censors would risk their unholy alliance with those
fundamentalists who care no a damn about sexism or violence against
women, but who oppose explicit sexuality and deviance on moralistic
grounds.
"The hard facts of life are that only a small percentage of Americans
would be in favor of censoring violence or sexism. But a large
percentage favor censoring explicit sexuality. So in order to
construct a winning poker hand, the censorial feminists are willing to
use the wild cards of the Moral Majority to fill in their open
straight. The upshot is a brand of moral and political opportunism
that would make Machiavelli's Prince proud.
"The truth is that there is no legitimate basis for an alliance
between feminists and fundamentalists. Feminist censors claim they do
not want to ban good clean sex--only sexism and violence against
women. ... Fundamentalist banners want to ban good clean sex,
nudity, and all forms of deviance. All the two diverse groups can
agree on is a common *word*, 'pornography,' as the evil to be
exorcised. But even that common word is used very differently by
feminists and fundamentalists."
I think this speaks for itself. (Directed at sex rather than violence) (An
affront to the English language)
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Edward Donnerstein and Daniel Linz (authors of PORNOGRAPHY AND SEXUAL
AGGRESSION):
"Studies in this area ... have indicated that after exposure to
aggressive pornography *some* men show (1) less sensitivity toward
rape victims; (2) an increase in willingness to say they would commit
rape if not caught; (3) an increase in the acceptance of certain myths
about rape; and (4) increased aggressive behavior against women in a
laboratory experiment." [Italics theirs.]
Note that this refers only to "aggressive" pornography, to an increased
willingness for *some* men to *say* that they would commit rape, and increased
aggressive behavior *in a laboratory experiment*. Bear this in mind next time
someone quotes Donnerstein as saying that "pornography promotes violence."
(Based on very shaky evidence)
"... which is the major contributor--the explicit sexual activity or
the violence? Studies have indicated that if you take out the
explicit sexual content from aggressive pornographic films, leaving
just the violence ... you find desensitization to violent acts in some
subjects. However, if you take out the aggressive component and leave
just the sexual, you do not seem to observe negative effects of
desensitization to violence against women. Thus, violence is at issue
here."
But you wouldn't know it to hear the anti-porn feminists talk. (Directed at
sex rather than violence)
"Sexist attitudes, callous attitudes about rape, and other misogynist
values are just as likely to be re-enforced by non-sexualized violent
symbols as they are by violent pornography."
I LOVE LUCY probably does as much, if not more, damage to women than DEEP
THROAT (as someone observed). I say "if not more" because I LOVE LUCY makes
much more pretense of being reality than DEEP THROAT, and may actually convince
people that women are bat-brained. (Directed at sex rather than violence)
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Al Goldstein (editor and publisher of SCREW):
"Another similarity I have noted in all the enemies of porn is a moral
certainty, a we-know-what's-good-for-you superiority that always calls
up images of the Nazis. ... Feminists are the new Nazis, and
pornographers are their Jews."
I think an analogy to the Inquisition would be more appropriate. Nazism didn't
try to reform the Jews; it tried to kill them. The Inquisition (or the Moral
Majority or any of the early religious colonies) just wanted to control all
your actions. But the danger is real, however you look at it. (Abridgement of
free speech)
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Dorchen Leidholdt (founding member of WAP):
"Pornography begins with real women. We see them--usually no one but
them--with their breasts bared and legs spread wide apart, sometimes
with their wrists and ankles manacled and their mouths gagged,
sometimes being broken into over and over by a penis or a dildo or a
fist."
Well, I don't know what *she's* been watching/reading (though it's obvious that
she is not talking about literary images here), but this sort of pornography is
a very small percentage of all pornography. You don't believe me? Then go to
your local suburban video store, which is the main source of pornographic
movies these days for most people, and see what they have in stock. In our
area (central New Jersey) there is one store that I know of (out of about fifty
that I have checked out) that even has enough B&D material to warrant a
separate shelf--and that only because it has a *lot* of porn in general. The
B&D stuff is less than 5% of their total porn (Based on very shaky evidence)
Most porn that I've seen has men (so much for the "no one but them" argument
above), no manacles, no dildos, and unless Leidholdt considers sexual
intercourse as "being broken into over and over by a penis," she's wrong about
that too. (If that is what she means, she's right in what she says, but then
it's obvious that it's *sex* she's against, not violence or anything like it.)
(Sex discriminating) (Directed at sex rather than violence)
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Neil M. Malamuth (editor of PORNOGRAPHY AND SEXUAL AGGRESSIVENESS) and Jan
Lindstrom:
"Studies to date have not supported the view that exposure to
pornography causes long-term changes in adults' sexual response
patterns."
Bear this in mind when you see everyone quoting all these studies. (Based on
very shaky evidence)
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Janella Miller (attorney with the Legislative Action Committee of the
Pornography Resource Center):
"The ordinance says that women have a right to possess their bodies and
their lives."
That is, unless they decide to rent them out for making pornographic movies or
some such, in which case they have no rights. (Abridgement of free speech)
And don't men have these rights also? (Sex discriminating)
"The ordinance provides no mechanism for telling people that they
*cannot* publish what they want. What it *does* do is tell
pornographers that if they print material in which women or children
are harmed, or material that *leads* to harm or discrimination, they
must be responsible for the harm that they cause. In that regard, the
ordinance works much like libel laws which hold the media accountable
for false information that harms an individual if the individual can
prove that he or she was injured." [Italics hers.]
No censorship law tells people what they *cannot* publish--the mere fact that
such laws are broken indicates that you *can* (as opposed to *may*) publish
anything you want. Censorship laws tell you that if you publish thus and so,
you will be punished. So does this ordinance. (Abridgement of free speech)
The use of "or children" is a blatant attempt to gain support by appealing to
one's [mp]aternal instincts. The ordinance itself refers to children only in
the phrase "men, children, or transsexuals," yet I don't see any emotional
appeal on behalf of transsexuals--that would not work nearly as well. (Sex
discriminating)
There is very little pornography "in which women or children are harmed," if
by this they mean that the actors were physically injured. Just as De Palma
doesn't actually kill the actors, but uses special effects to simulate it, so
do porn producers "fake it." Watch a porn film closely. Do you ever see any
lash marks from that ferocious-looking whip? No. Does the sound of the whip
even match the picture? No. It is obvious that even mild spanking scenes are
faked--and not very well. (Based on very shaky evidence)
The comparison to libel laws is bogus--in a case of libel, the plaintiff must
prove 1) that the facts stated were false, 2) harm was caused the plaintiff,
and 3) prove that the defendant was either malicious in intent or negligent in
checking his facts. This ordinance 1) doesn't deal with facts, but with
fictions, 2) *pre-supposes* that harm was caused, and 3) specifically excludes
intent or knowledge as defenses. Zero out of three is a pretty rotten
percentage for comparison. (Abrogation of due process)
###############################################################################
Marcia Pally (writer):
"If preventing violence against women is WAP's goal, and assuming that
people imitate films and books, why is the target of WAP's effort
*sexual* imagery, violent and nonviolent, rather than violent imagery,
sexual and nonsexual; and who would be entrusted to judge which images
violate women's civil rights?"
Why? Because they have made their "Faustian pact with the devil" and they have
to keep it. If violence is the evil, why not attack violence in all its forms?
Like organized sports (football, boxing, etc.). But then the Moral Majority
backing that WAP needs/wants would melt away like snow in July. What? Give up
their Monday night football because it might encourage violence? Never! And
besides, those cheerleaders are so sexy! (Directed at sex rather than
violence) (Vague)
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Thomas Radecki, M.D. (Chairperson, National Coalition on Television Violence):
"Ed Donnerstein's research at the University of Wisconsin found that
[FRIDAY THE 13TH] strongly promotes rape values to healthy college
males."
If this is true, it's a surprise to Donnerstein. He said *some* men showed an
increased willingness to *say* that they might commit rape. (See full comments
above.) Never trust quotes you can't verify. (Based on very shaky evidence)
"The U.S. government can and should actively assist the production of
pro-social and non-violent movies by providing a $500 million fund for
this purpose."
Terrific. So when Joe Film-maker gets his $500,000 grant from the government
to make a pro-social, non-violent film, what does he do when the government
tells him, "We really wish you would change this gay doctor to be a straight
doctor. And the line 'Being gay is another way of life' needs to be changed."
Does he change his film to match what the government thinks we should see or
does he give back his grant and watch the whole film go down the tubes because
he doesn't have enough of his own money to finish it, even though he's invested
all his savings in it already? To have *my* tax money being given to
"politically correct" film-makers based on the whim of the government in power.
Welcome to the Ministry of Propaganda! (Abridgement of free speech)
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Lois P. Sheinfeld (attorney):
"As for the recent rash of laboratory research done under artificial
conditions (conducted by academic psychologists on student subjects who
received extra credit in their psychology courses), suffice it to say
here that Professors Edward Donnerstein and Neil Malamuth, whose
studies are most often cited by would-be pornography censors, admit
that the research data does not establish a direct causal connection
between pornography and sexual violence. They do not advocate
censorship legislation.
"Anti-pornography censors are simply unable to meet the evidentiary
burden imposed by the First Amendment upon those who seek to
suppress expression on the ground that it causes serious harm.
They should not be permitted to sidestep this profound failure of proof
by the legerdemain of declaring that pornography is *per se* a
violation of women's civil rights."
Exactly what I said above. (Abridgement of free speech) (Abrogation of due
process) (Based on very shaky evidence)
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Ann Snitow (member of the Feminist Anti-Censorship Taskforce):
"Instead of giving women what we need to reduce our vulnerability ...,
they propose a moralism, an absolute boundary for expression, a sense
of disgust or horror about the sexually explicit. It's all too
hideously familiar: These laws throw us back onto traditional
definitions of women as victims, men as lusty marauders. Instead of
broadening the possibilities of the culture of sexual imagery,
allowing women's subjectivity to emerge at last, such laws close down
what is in fact already a wide range of expression, relatively little
of it explicitly violent."
(Sex discriminating) (Directed at sex rather than violence)
###############################################################################
As I said before (months ago), I won't accept stereotypes from anyone--not from
the "male chauvinists" and not from the "anti-porn feminists." I refuse to
abrogate my right to decide for myself what I wish to see and what I wish to
read. In their attempt to rid the media of the image of the subservient
female who doesn't have a mind of her own, they are replacing it with the
reality of the subservient person of either sex who is not *allowed* to have a
mind of his/her own. They are replacing a bad fantasy with a worse reality,
and they feel that this is the right approach. They, not their opponents, are
sticking their heads in the sand.
Evelyn C. Leeper
...{ihnp4, houxm, hocsj}!ahuta!ecl