jet@karazm.math.uh.EDU ("J. Eric Townsend") (11/18/90)
In article <45691@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> feit@acsu.buffalo.edu (Elissa Feit) writes: >Re: The Amendment to Minneapolis's Civil rights law: >(I quote from Dworkin's _Pornography_:) >[definition deleted] Dworkin defines pornography solely in terms of exploiting women. (12 mentions of women, no mention of men.) Does she consider only that which exploits women as harmfull to society? Has she ever said why she didn't include pornography that exploits men (or male children)? [I'm thinking of the text of the law that Dworkin drafted -- the last sentence or so says, basically, that the pornography as just defined (in terms of women) is still degrading when men, children, or transexxuals are substituted. I'm interpreting that as egalitarian -- is there a different interpretation of this? --CLT] I'm not ranking on her, I'm honestly curious. Her work isn't that easy to find, so I haven't read to much of it. (However, a friend just scored most of her works on interlibrary loan, so I might have a tough weekend ahead of me soon.) -- J. Eric Townsend Internet: jet@uh.edu Bitnet: jet@UHOU Systems Manager - University of Houston Dept. of Mathematics - (713) 749-2120 EastEnders list: eastender@karazm.math.uh.edu Skate UNIX(r)
gazit@cs.duke.EDU (Hillel Gazit) (11/19/90)
>[I'm thinking of the text of the law that Dworkin drafted -- the last >sentence or so says, basically, that the pornography as just defined >(in terms of women) is still degrading when men, children, or >transexxuals are substituted. I'm interpreting that as egalitarian -- >is there a different interpretation of this? --CLT] If it was egalitarian then the word "people" would be used instead of "women" in the definition of porno, and the claim that "pornography is a form of discrimination on the basis of sex would remain with no support. But claiming that in gay porno men are used instead of women she defended her claim. The Ordinance claimed only that porno "harms women", and never mentioned that it may harm men. By doing so it blocked men from suing for damages. That was important because: 1) Many of the feminist women-oriented erotic literature presents men in an unkind way. That literature will go down the drain. 2) Dworkin's books could be banned because she presents men in a dehumanized way. (And "as whores by nature"...) I don't think that Dworkin cared too much about 1), but she had no intention to let 2) to happen. Hillel gazit@cs.duke.edu "I've always argued that there's an inverse correlation between a country's degree of civilization and the restraints it put on its press." A New England voice from the back of the room cut in: "On *that* argument, Paris is a more civilized place than Boston." "Precisely," answered Purvis. For once, he waited for a reply. "O.K." said the New England voice mildly. "I'm not arguing. I just wanted to check." -- ("Patent Pending", Arthur C. Clarke)