Whee, we're all hitting the computer at the same hour today ...

Shiva -- "If you are serious ..." Where do I claim to be serious? "... stop visiting the nude dancers ..." Haven't been to a nude or topless place in around 30 years. "Plug back into mainstream culture ..." I regularly write about ads, publishing, business, DVDs, politics, buildings, and travel. That's a lot of "mainstream." And if you think that porn and porn values haven't themselves become a part of mainstream experience, please review JV's comment above. "Demonstrate how normal people's sex lives are being influenced by porn." I'd happily read a study about that. But why would you ask an amateur blogger to conduct such a study? And anyway sex strikes me as one of those topics -- like food and politics -- on which we're all entitled to make observations and have opinions. Incidentally, I'm no more of a porn addict than I am a politics addict. There they are, and they're both big parts of contemporary life, for better or worse. You're gonna stumble across them whether you want to or not. It seems a little kooky not to find them vaguely interesting and to wonder what to make of them.

Moira -- That's a lot of impressively needling writing. But what's your point? That today's situation vis a vis porn isn't worth taking note of? If so, then that's a really peculiar contention. But maybe I'm not following. Care to clarify? Many of your smaller arguments -- for example, "Increased availability and access due to new technology might open up a form to input from more creative talent, but do not in themselves constitute something new under the sun" -- seem completely (and uncharacteristically) off-base to me. Phonograph records? Movable type? Movies? If we're going to shrug off developments like those as unworthy of notice, we aren't going to be left with a lot to say about culture.

ST - Your concerns about me (on the defensive, guilty, etc) are appreciated, tks, but unnecessary. I enjoy putting up these postings and I enjoy contending with the discussions that ensue. (Though the "is it good or bad?" side of them does bore me ...) I think the reason you go into brawling mode when I propose topics like this may have to do with a misapprehension. You seem to think that I'm a cheerleader for porn. I'm not. Taking note -- let alone linking -- doesn't automatically constitute endorsement.

But, hmm, you've got me wondering about what I might be said to be cheerleading for here ...

OK, I've got it. I'm cheerleading for a more nuanced appreciation of the erotic dimension of life. Moira seems to think, unless I'm reading her wrong, that American culture is fine with eroticism, and handles it well. I disagree with her totally there. My own opinion is that we tend to be pretty clueless and literal about it. (About many things, really.) We return to sex obsessively, almost angrily, and never get from it what we're hoping for. We also tend to exploit it and to use it to goad ourselves on. We dodge around it, we can't leave it alone, we can't let it be, and we have no gift for entering into it. Whatever it is that "finding the erotic frequency" may mean, we aren't very good at it. (Apologies for using the all-inclusive "we" here -- it makes making these points a whole lot easier. Many exceptions realistically allowed for, of course.)

So I like to imagine that I'm doing my small thing to promote a more contemplative attitude towards eroticism. In our current lives, porn-on-the-web is one of the main ways (certainly one of the main public ways) that eroticism manifests itself. So I use it as a starting point.

Saying that porn-on-the-web is plentiful if not overwhelming may seem obvious, and of course it is. But porn on the web also represents a big cultural shift -- and not just because the web is relatively new. In the old days, eroticism was generally a little hidden. Now it's thrust on us. In the old days, eroticism was a big part of the appeal of movies. These days mainstream movies have pretty much forsaken eroticism, except of the raunchy/jokey sort. Book-writing and book publishing used to be pretty sexy fields. They aren't any longer. These are developments that are worth noting, no?

Anyway, it seems to me that a decent first step for someone who's promoting a more contemplative and nuanced appreciation of the erotic dimension to take is to call attention to the ways that eroticism manifests itself in our lives as we're currently living them, and to open up a few discussions about these manifestations, and our experiences of and with them. Hence these postings.

I'm a little surprised by the number of people who shift instantly into "morality" mode. I'd have thought those arguments have been well-hashed-over elsewhere, and often. Besides, given that any such battle that we have here is going to have zilch impact on the world, why bother with it? And why not set the "morality" thing aside for a few minutes and explore a few other angles on the topic? But so be it.

Which isn't to minimize the role that pure mischief plays in putting up these postings either. But "mischief" and "eroticism" aren't exactly strangers to each other, are they? So I suppose it might also be said that with these postings (and commentsfests) I'm trying to embody a little of what I'm arguing for. I could be down with that.

Thursday -- Yeah. On the other hand, plenty of people have used Nabokov's writing as jerk-off material -- as porn -- and I've certainly read porn novels that displayed craft and aesthetic qualities. The waters do get muddy here and there.

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on February 22, 2009 12:39 PM

It's pretty obvious that most people commenting have such a strong and negative opinion of porn that any discussion of it other than "porn is bad" is impossible. That's fine, by the way, and for what it's worth, I'm of the opinion that the world is worse off for having hardcore porn in it. But it has permeated the culture in, what I think anyway, are new and interesting ways in the past 10 years, and any discussion around the hows of that is a valid and important one.

Moira, not sure what you found so tedious in my previous comment. Had you heard one too many times how porn had adopted the punk aesthetic and how once punk went mainstream in the 90s, it sort of brought porn along with it? Hmm, OK. I'm certainly not the first person in the world to bring it up, but it hadn't been said in this thread yet, and I believe that aspect of it is crucial to understanding porn's move into the mainstream.

A common criticism in the comments is that despite the new technologies that make distributing and access to porn ubiquitous, there really isn't anything new in the porn itself, so why even discuss it. I think that's a bit disingenuous, a way of avoiding the subject by denying its importance. For one thing, there absolutely are new things going on in porn, most of them disturbing in my opinion. Much of this is a direct result of new technologies like digital video cameras and editing software. Anybody can produce a fairly sophisticated looking movie now, and they are.

The most popular new variation seems to involve picking up "random" women on the street, then offering them money until they "consent" to performing sex acts on camera. Then laughing at them as them send them on their way. It's pretty awful, but important. Why? Well, these women obviously aren't random, they're pros. But boy, it sure does look like they could be just any average girl. And that's the gist of these movies, that any girl can (and should) be made to have sex on camera if given money and coerced. And so young people run with this assumption. In the past, porn and those who acted in it were separate, other things. No longer. That is important, in my opinion.

So, punk's DIY aestheitc, that anyone can do it, seeped into porn, and that seeped right back into mainstream culture. Now, anyone can be a porn star, or more specifically, anyone can be one and still have a normal life. That's the perception, anyway.

Posted by: JV on February 22, 2009 1:01 PM

Anyway, it seems to me that a decent first step someone who's promoting a more contemplative and nuanced appreciation of the erotic dimension of life might take is to call occasional attention to the ways that eroticism manifests itself in our lives as we're currently living them, and to open up a few discussions about these manifestations, and our experiences of and with them. Hence these postings.

There is nothing new in the world of human sexuality. We've been around for, what, 10,000 years? Everything that can be said or done has been said and done.

I don't have a clue why you think that ordinary Americans do not think about sexuality in a nuanced and contemplative way. If we are so naive and unsophisticated, then why does the American songbook dominate the entire world? Why has the American romantic vision, as expressed in the words of Cole Porter, Louis Armstrong, Bob Dylan, Frank Sinatra, etc., become the standard vision of the entire world?

I'll go back to my previous statement, and I invite you to think about this for a few moments before you respond. Here's the conversation that generations of French women had to have with their boyfriend or husband after the wars on their own soil:

Boyfriend: "Were you a whore?"

Girl: "Yes."

Boyfriend: "Did you enjoy it?"

Girl: "I hated it. But I screwed the goddamned Germans every way imagineable. I screwed them one at a time. I screwed them ten at a time. And when we went out I smiled and tried to be the best companion I could be."

Boyfriend: "Did you come?"

Girl: "I came like a fucking freight train. I hated myself for it, but my body betrayed me."

Boyfriend: "Does that mean that there's no way in hell that I can satisfy you?"

This is the difference, Michael. You are barking entirely up the wrong tree. American women haven't been forced to whore, whether or not they want to. American men haven't had to have this conversation with their women. This is the "sophistication" that you find missing in the U.S.

Posted by: Shouting Thomas on February 22, 2009 1:43 PM

ST -- Since the French line in eroticism and erotic appreciation goes back many centuries, I'm baffled by your "Sorrow and the Pity" angle. Your hero Henry Miller made many of the complaints about America and sex that I do, and he wound up in Paris well before WWII.

I agree that the popular-culture-world of Sinatra, Cary Grant, etc displayed a lot of erotic sophistication. But that world's gone now. Which is a shift. Which contradicts your claim that in the world of erotic appreciation and erotic experience nothing ever changes. Hmmm. In any case, what did that older, more sophisticated American popular-culture world have that our current one is missing? A good topic.

Hey, I've been watching a DVD of some drive-in exploitation movies from the '70s. Fascinating in many ways. Here are a few. 1) The guys, even the ones presented as studs, don't have bulked-up chests, six-packs, or big shoulders. 2) Even the cheesiest, most t&a of the movies don't focus much on the girls' asses. (And the girls' asses are mostly flat and untoned.) 3) The only g-string on display in the entire 8 movies isn't worn by a "college coed" or "dynamic career woman" character, it's worn by a "stripper" character.

These things represent changes of some sort, no? Of many sorts, really ...

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on February 22, 2009 1:58 PM

Michael – I am not mistaking you for Donald or squishing you together. I was trying to do you the courtesy of going along with your exercise by accepting, "Porn = RnR, Discuss" at face value. Rather than just say, "No." and be done with it, I found parallels between your fascination with the variety and vitality of cultural expressions of, by, and for the masses, in this case porn, that you find deserving of deeper discussion and Donald's occasional series attacking the cultural elite for dismissing too quickly the taste of the masses, especially in paintings.

You initiate a discussion on porn, but with the claim that the focus should be directed toward porn's aesthetic or "cultural" attributes. Given the emotional, moral, political, gender, and legal issues that porn carries this is a clever conceit ... or conceitedly clever I'm still unclear which, but I went along with it.

It doesn't really take much cultural examination to see that, when images of women in swimsuits with less fabric than a necktie can be shown in polite mixed company, the nature of porn will become, as ST notes, a window on war.

And, yes, I understood that my fictional ten year old might be ripping files from his downloaded porn stash for his homeboys at Lincoln Elementary.

Ultimately porn will always be mutating and transforming itself to accommodate the changes in society at large. It will also remain a form targeted toward individuals in private rather than groups in public. The enjoyment of porn will remain primarily clandestine. That is precisely its allure. Sharing it too widely, or sharing whatever one's own interest and tastes in it are, absolutely diminishes its effectiveness, give or take the exception of an exhibitionistic kink or two.

Rock is a group activity, tribal if you will. When you can point to a burgeoning social phenomenon where groups of scene makers are gathering in hip venues to enjoy the new release of an up and coming (sorry, I couldn't resist) pornographer, get back to us with the Porn=Rock idea, until then you haven't made a compelling case for the equation.

Posted by: Chris White on February 22, 2009 3:48 PM

Henry Miller's writing as an old man is seldom read, but I heartily recommend: "Book of Friends" and "My Bike and Other Friends."

Toward the end of his life, Miller admitted that the problems that he suffered throughout his life were, in fact, the result of his own ignorance, and not some societal problem. The most attractive thing about Miller was that he understood that his life was a journey from ignorance to self-awareness. He made no attempt to disguise his stupidity and brute clumsiness as a young man. He was breathtakingly honest. In his final years, he was especially chagrined by his failures as a father, and sought to find some restitution.

How are my comments about Miller at odds with his work? I told you what was different about French society. I've been there, too. What is missing in the U.S. is the fatalism that is the result of absolute defeat and humiliation. You're history is wrong. France was founded as a conquered colony of Rome, and has been invaded and conquered repeatedly through its history. And, what did Henry go to France for, except to luxuriate in French whores? He lived solely to drink, write and visit the whores. He was completely charmed by their devotion to their profession and their matter of fact method of doing business.

Miller was the son of German immigrants. As he became aware in his later years, it was the cold, drudging and loveless family life of German culture that he was struggling against. And who conquered and occupied France... but those very same Germans.

I've always identified quite closely with Miller, not in some celebratory sense, but because I come from the same cold, loveless German background on my mother's side. In other words, I share in many ways his journey from ignorance to some sort of happiness. I don't attribute what's wrong to America. My German family is a nightmare. Nazi-ism didn't come out of nowhere. It emerged from the insane wretchedness of the German family.

The Philippines is to me what France was to Miller. Not surprisingly, German men flood into the Philippines in search of a Filipina wife. They are seeking relief from the harshness and coldness of German society. German women are the bane of existence. In their postwar incarnation, they have rebelled completely against marriage, family and childrearing. No sensible man wants them.

The same fatalism is at work in the Philippines, which has been invaded and conquered hundreds of times. What is missing here in the U.S. is the humility and fatalism that comes with licking the boots of a conquering army. That is the difference. It is a very real difference. You find the same phenomenon in Poland, where I've also spent some time.

Posted by: Shouting Thomas on February 22, 2009 3:51 PM

Well, Michael, I'll accept the Most Chivalrous Award in the spirit in which it was handed out...enjoy the sensation of the award (I imagine it being a big, crooked bronze dildo) being, uh, returned to you in reciprocal fashion.

You still have not bothered addressing the point that porn has been around long enough for its acceptance, if acceptance it be, to have occurred already. Why say that another 25 or 50 years will accomplish what more than 30 years hasn't already? Rock n roll may have been seen as rude, then as art, but it sure didn't take decades for that to happen. You sound like those defenders of atonal music still waiting for Webern's prediction that mailmen will be whistling atonal "tunes" sometime in the near future, which future was predicted some 70 years ago or so.

Ain't gonna happen.

Oh, and Madison Young is an entrepreneur who sells "queer" porn to straight men and makes a good buck doing it. Her shtick is utterly commercial bullshit. Empowerment of women? Queer activism? Sure. Pardon me for being unchivalrous, however, when I say that she's just a whore marketing her body and those of her girls to men for jerk off material.

Femina potens? More like femina meretrix. These things go way back, no matter how digital they are, and whores (and their madams) have always been practitioners of DIY.

Posted by: PatrickH on February 22, 2009 4:07 PM

Chris -- "You initiate a discussion on porn, but with the claim that the focus should be directed toward porn's aesthetic or 'cultural' attributes." Close but not quite: I'm hoping people can focus on a practical question -- namely on the question of whether today's porn might some day be seen in something like the way we see rock 'n' roll from 1954. "Cultural attributes" got nothing to do with it. Time passes, attitudes change. Where are they likely to wind up? Well, at least for a while.

I think your points about private and social are good ones, but I think you're overlooking the fact that the digital life is poking skillions of holes in that traditional distinction. Facebook anyone? Partypix of coeds lip-locking? They're everywhere. And influenced by porn.

"When you can point to a burgeoning social phenomenon where groups of scene makers are gathering in hip venues to enjoy the new release of an up and coming (sorry, I couldn't resist) pornographer ..." I did point to one: Joanna Angel. Suicide Girls is another example. They've toured rock clubs. The neo-burlesque scene in NYC is one of the liveliest art scenes I'm aware of.

I don't know what life is like up in Maine but in NYC kids are pretty open about growing up with porn, having preferences in porn, having friends who've done porn ... Everyone has taken digital sexpix of each other ... Etc etc. These things aren't secrets. And there's another generation coming up behind the kids in their mid-20s who I sometimes hang out with who are even more open about all this.

ST -- That's a nice passage about German families. I've got one strand of German in my background and it corresponds pretty exactly to what you describe: Cold, harsh, ponderous, unforgiving, melodramatic, and unappealing. And I think you're really onto something where fatalism goes. A certain amount of fatalism in a culture often seems to enhance its sexiness. Italy vs. Germany, for example. America's "anything's possible, always!" ethos is great in some ways but often seems to leave a lot of people feeling frantic and a little disconnected. But maybe in 20 years I'll look at this comment and think, Hmmm, maybe I was just talking about myself. Hard to know.

PatrickH -- Rhythmic sex-enhancing dance music was around for thousands of years before rock 'n' roll broke out. And soooooo ....? Anyway, the art/sex/porn thing in fact did reach a kind of peak in the '70s with people like Bertolucci, Ferreri, Kubrick, Radley Metzger. Then, for whatever reason, the culture kind of closed up (may have been a good or a bad thing, beats me), and porn and the mainstream split again. (Though weren't some of those '80s movies pretty sexy too?) As JV explains, what's new now is that anyone can now access porn easily, and can even make their own porn and distribute it -- and the culture can't close up over it. It's out there for good. And, needless to say, we have a whole lot of kids coming along who have grown up with easy access to porn and mucho facility with digital tools.

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on February 22, 2009 4:41 PM

I haven't read the entire thread yet, but regarding museums: an article about the pornographic art of Pompeii can be read here - they call it The Secret Museum, "Gabinetto Segretto" - and a BBC radio spot about it can be listened to here. Pictures of the good stuff can be found in this book.

Posted by: Brian on February 22, 2009 4:49 PM

That's a lot of impressively needling writing. But what's your point? That today's situation vis a vis porn isn't worth taking note of? If so, then that's a really peculiar contention. But maybe I'm not following. Care to clarify?

"That today's situation vis a vis porn isn't worth taking note of?" Huh? No, nothing I wrote remotely implies any such view. Could I clarify? Hmmm. Probably not, as I think my original comment was really quite clear and straightforward, and I must admit I don't feel equal to providing any manner of clarifying remedy in the face of the virtuoso display of obtuseness you're putting on here today.

Maybe I should put the needling at the end, not the beginning, of the comment. It seems to throw a spanner into your neurons. Or maybe it has nothing to do with the needling. JV, like yourself, seems to be having real difficulty grasping that nobody is disputing either the ubiquity of porn or the social and cultural importance of that ubiquity. (OK, maybe Shiva, but Shiva is only one chicken here.) Maybe the topic makes some people go all squirrely in the head. I seem to recall engaging with you on this topic in the past and being equally bemused by the disjoint between the content of people's comments and that of your responses.

True, I am needling you (in addition to providing perfectly straightforward and pertinent responses to your original query), because I do find your self-labeling as a sophisticate of the erotic, well, funny.

OK, I've got it. I'm cheerleading for a more nuanced appreciation of the erotic dimension of life. Moira seems to think, unless I'm reading her wrong, that American culture is fine with eroticism, and handles it well. I disagree with her totally there. My own opinion is that we tend to be pretty clueless and literal about it.

Uh, no, Michael. I said that you discussed the "erotic dimension of life" in precisely the "un-nuanced" way that is stereotypically attributed to Americans. You have met the rube and he is you. I mean, I'm engaging in some plain, direct ribbing here, so your obdurate misinterpretations must have some other source than the muddiness of what I wrote.

Many of your smaller arguments -- for example, "Increased availability and access due to new technology might open up a form to input from more creative talent, but do not in themselves constitute something new under the sun" -- seem completely (and uncharacteristically) off-base to me. Phonograph records? Movable type? Movies? If we're going to shrug off developments like those as unworthy of notice, we aren't going to be left with a lot to say about culture.

I don't understand your confusion about the distinction between content and transmission. In what way do the statements "there is no real original content in porn" and "the pornographic saturation that was effected by changes in technology is culturally important" contradict one another?

Anyway, it seems to me that a decent first step someone who's promoting a more contemplative and nuanced appreciation of the erotic dimension of life might take is to call occasional attention to the ways that eroticism manifests itself in our lives as we're currently living them, and to open up a few discussions about these manifestations, and our experiences of and with them. Hence these postings.

Now, I read when I can, and I may have missed any number of posts on this subject, but as far as I've seen, your "promoting a more contemplative and nuanced appreciation of the erotic dimension of life" by "call[ing] attention to the ways that eroticism manifests itself in our lives as we're currently living them" consists entirely of linking to your basic internet porn-hound stuff. Nothing objectionable in that per se, I just think it's a bit comical that someone with apparently so restricted an understanding of the "erotic dimension of life" believes he's some kind of conduit of wisdom and enlightenment on the topic.

I'm a little surprised by the number of people who shift instantly into "morality" mode.

Why would that surprise you in the least? Porn is about sex and for most human beings sex has an ineluctable moral dimension.

And why not set the "morality" thing aside for a few minutes and explore a few other angles on the topic?

I assume because most of your interlocutors don't find those other angles as interesting as you do. So they talk about those aspects that do interest them.

Btw, as long as I'm needling: there are certain adjectives that should never be used as self-descriptors. "Mischievous" is one of them. Being mischievous is OK. But no grown man should be poncing about informing others that he's "mischievous". Good God, man, next thing you know you'll be telling us that you're "kicky", or "sassy".

Posted by: Moira Breen on February 22, 2009 4:50 PM

Brian -- Nice links, tks. And, speaking of museums, there's always New York's Museum of Sex.

Moira -- Ah, so it really was just a lot of raillery and unease. I suspected as much.

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on February 22, 2009 5:09 PM

Neo-burlesque is NOT porn, whatever similarities they may share. I already granted the "exhibitionist" exception that proves the rule. The purpose of porn is arousal, either alone or in very intimate company. It is not a public entertainment event that serves to create a sense of inclusion like that which Rock provides.

As the parent of a Millenial I interact with plenty of youngsters. Maybe as a hip NYC dude without kids your interaction with them is dramatically different, but I doubt it. I've known twenty-sumpin'coffee shop barristas who appear in the local neo-burlesque Christmas Show. These same barristas willingly chat about music and art and politics amongst themselves and with customers. I don't recall porn tastes ever becoming a topic of discussion.

Posted by: Chris White on February 22, 2009 5:11 PM

Chris -- "Neo-burlesque is NOT porn, whatever similarities they may share." Another example of how definitions change. Neoburlesque performers (and Suicide Girls) often put as much on display as the girls in Playboy up to the '70s did ... And plenty of people considered Playboy to be porn. I suspect that your other wannabe hard-and-fast definitions will prove to have a little give in 'em too. Is a movie watched at home on DVD no longer a movie? Because, y'know, movies were originally meant to be social events ... ? By the way, "arousal" was a big part of the point of early rock. So, arousal is apparently OK as a part of an art thing, even a big part of an art thing (think Bo Diddley) ... And the rock arousal-thing can occur in a public setting ... Or enjoyed at home in privacy ... Hmmm.

By the way, since I've nowhere tried to argue that porn IS rock, let's not get hung up on quibbling over one-to-one comparisons. I'm asking the question: might people in the future look back on today's porn thang and conclude that it was an art and/or culture event comparable to early rock?

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on February 22, 2009 5:33 PM

What is missing here in the U.S. is the humility and fatalism that comes with licking the boots of a conquering army.

Southerners know a thing or two about that. Civil War through Reconstruction, through Little Rock, through the anti-Confederate flag kulturkampfs of today.

Posted by: PA on February 22, 2009 6:26 PM

Moira, we're not just pointing out that "hey, porn is everywhere!" We're also discussing HOW it got to be that way. That's a valid discussion. Period. Your attempts to undermine its importance merely illuminates your queasiness with the subject matter in general. And that's fine. Doesn't change the fact that these things should be discussed, if only to understand them.

I'm a parent of three boys, one of them a teenager. I'm also a web designer who spends most of his life online. I see what's out there, I know the ease of access, the cavalier attitude young kids have towards the most extreme, disgusting porn imaginable. That attitude is borne out of that access. It worries me as a parent how that will affect the sex lives and the roles between the sexes of that generation.

To keep sticking your fingers in your ears and singing "lalalala, nothing has changed, I will say porn isn't interesting because I'm uncomfortable with the subject" does no good, IMO.

Posted by: JV on February 22, 2009 7:28 PM

Will people a hundred years from now view today's porn as art? I don't think so, mostly because people with a hard-on have a difficult time caring about art. You have to let your thing go down if you want to produce or enjoy art. Otherwise you just want to come.

But I think they will be pretty nostalgic about it, the way we may feel (I do) in relation to pornographic pictures from the early XXth century. They will probably be nostalgic even for things we now feel are horrible, like porn stars' hairdos and nails and plastic high-heels. They will preserve these movies and images and study it with care.

Posted by: Dino on February 22, 2009 8:56 PM

Southerners know a thing or two about that. Civil War through Reconstruction, through Little Rock, through the anti-Confederate flag kulturkampfs of today.

True. That's why the South is the soul of America. All good things in American music come from the South, from "Georgia" to "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" to "Sweet Home Alabama." Not to mention Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles, The Allman Brothers, Dr. John and George Jones.

Posted by: Shouting Thomas on February 22, 2009 9:14 PM

"I see what's out there, I know the ease of access, the cavalier attitude young kids have towards the most extreme, disgusting porn imaginable." - JV

At least you're concerned. MBs attitude is more, "Well the kiddos are gonna grow up to be whores and gigolos on account of the internet. Nothing we can do about it."

"Uh, no, Michael. I said that you discussed the "erotic dimension of life" in precisely the "un-nuanced" way that is stereotypically attributed to Americans. You have met the rube and he is you. "

Moira, there are many gems in that post but this is one of my favorites.

ST, I won't copy your comments about German women. You should be ashamed of yourself preferring a woman so desperate she will lick your boots to one who could buy you boots or give you the boot depending on your just desserts. I suspected MB was a weasel all along but your being one too has left me so disillusioned I don't think I can go on.

Posted by: shiva on February 22, 2009 9:29 PM

I would like to salute both shiva and Moira for their efforts in this comment thread. But why bother to debate someone who asserts that porn and politics are "big parts of contemporary life, for better or worse?" I'm living life, and porn plays no role in it at all. It's like me telling MB that shoe-shopping websites are a "big part of contemporary life", extrapolating that from my own obsession with shoes.

Regarding Lolita: People masturbate to it?!? Surely not. It's a love story, after all.

Posted by: Sister Wolf on February 23, 2009 2:29 AM

shiva, next time I'm planning on getting laid, I'll be sure to call you so that you can decide whether the girl is up to your specs.

Are you on call?

Posted by: Shouting Thomas on February 23, 2009 7:25 AM

"Dave Naz, Natascha Merritt, Eon McKoi, Blaise Christie, Joanna Angel... Madison Young... Peter Acworth"

I have no idea who any of these people are. In contrast, I think almost any teenager or young person in 1957, even if he disdained rock and roll and his rock-and-roll-loving peers, would have an acquaintance with the names Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, etc., and even the stodgiest adult knew of Elvis. Elvis and later the Beatles drew giant audiences on Ed Sullivan.

I guess I do know a few ex-porn-stars (Ron Jeremy, Jenna Jameson) by name, but while porn may be "omnipresent" in people's private times, it is not something that people sit around discussing the way they discuss any other art. I would put video games ahead of porn (and I don't really care for video games) as a new art that actually pervades people's lives instead of a few hours of it.

Posted by: James K. on February 23, 2009 9:43 AM

1. My only purpose in this posting is to take note of a little of what surrounds us, culturally speaking, and to wonder out loud about how this may play out.

2. Let's try for a sec to move past how we feel about it, and ask instead: What do we make of it?

3. By the way, since I've nowhere tried to argue that porn IS rock, let's not get hung up on quibbling over one-to-one comparisons. I'm asking the question: might people in the future look back on today's porn thang and conclude that it was an art and/or culture event comparable to early rock?

You've made at least three attempts to ask your question in both the post and the comments, yet for the life of me I don't see how it's possible to answer it without going into those aspects of its cultural impact that don't interest you. You also aren't especially interested in asking whether porn will morph into a fine art, or be regarded as one, so far as I can tell. You've declared that to be irrelevant, so that's another aspect of the issue that's off the table. You aren't asking about the techniques of porn-making. What's left?

From your reference to the way some private porn-makers keep porn diaries that they post in public venues on the internet, and other similar phenomena, I have to conclude that you're most interested in the way porn shapes these people's sensibilities, and what it means to them. Does it occur to you that you're asking the wrong people? Most of your readers are probably over 35; a good many, I suspect, are over 50. We didn't grow up with porn in the same way as today's youth have. By the time the stuff became ubiquitous, our attitudes towards our bodies and sexuality had already been formed. If I'm right about the kind of answers you want to hear, then you may just have to accept that we really can't answer your questions.

p.s. ST and Moira were a good deal sharper with you than I was, yet you were rather sharper with me than with them. Why? Begging Moira's pardon, was I really more school-marmy than she was?

Posted by: aliasclio on February 23, 2009 10:21 AM

"shiva, next time I'm planning on getting laid, I'll be sure to call you so that you can decide whether the girl is up to your specs." - ST

Hmmm. Will I have to make this assessment on a weekly basis, nightly?

In an effort to simulate STs dating life, the rest of us could modernize that old Mystery Date game to include the likes of:

Typhoid Teresa
Herpes Hannah
Gold digging Grace
Psycho-ex bf Sally

Do you really dare contemplate before you copulate? ; )

Posted by: shiva on February 23, 2009 1:38 PM

Pornography as it is today, and will be tomorrow, is unlike anything the world has ever seen. Ubiquitous, high-grade, stuff. It is far more powerful and influential than any kind of art. It is more like a universal drug, delivered through the eyes, that is stronger than an opiate, that suddenly is available virtually for free to everybody. The nearest equivalent may be the birth control pill, which demolished one civilization and built a radically new one in its place in the space of two generations. As new technologies are increasingly used to deliver stronger and more personally tailored porn, it is going to have a massive, society-changing impact on relations between men and women.

Saying porn is like rock'n'roll is like saying that the capacity to cause thermonuclear explosions will have an impact on popular culture. Well, sure. But that misses all the interesting stuff, or most of it.

I say the foregoing without moralizing, though I do have a moral view on it. I say it merely as an observation of the facts as I see them. We are at the very beginning of a massively significant process.

If a woman without a man is a fish without a bicycle, a man without a woman will in increasingly many cases ... a man who uses porn without the hassle of an actual human female. Porn itself will fragment from a totally passive experience. if you are a not particularly attractive person, you will interact and have sex "as" an attractive avatar in virtual reality, to pick one obvious application. Will that be "porn"? The word itself will be passe soon.

On this subject, Ray Kurzweil is probably more right than people want to give him credit for.

Posted by: Lexington Green on February 23, 2009 4:40 PM

Thank you, Lexington Green.

As I thought about it today, Michael, I realized that this was the answer.

Porn is, in fact, more like drug use than rock and roll.

And, I'm not saying that from a sanctimonious point of view. As I said, I've committed all possible sins.

Posted by: Shouting Thomas on February 23, 2009 8:32 PM

Gee, gone for a day and everyone's so testy!

Is porn the new Rock'n'Roll? No, unlike porn which has been with man since recorded history, Rock'n'Roll was a new form of expression within the tradition of music. Porn on the other hand an expression of what was traditionally repressed. Will future generations think of it as the New Rock'n'Roll. I doubt it. I think they will see it a cultural phenomena that was always there but gained prominence with the practical abandonment of Religion. It's not a new thing, it's an old thing that reared its' head in a moral vacuum. But I also think its reared its head as a result of the hedonism our society promotes in place of the transcendent that has been abandoned. Unhappy people are looking for happiness in novel hedonistic experiences be that travel, relationships and "personal development". Gangbangs, bukkake, threesomes etc are for many simple people a path to momentary happiness,something to escape the present dreariness of their lives and hence the interest. It's a similar phenomena with regard to "retail therapy", in one instance its shopping to make you happy, in the other sexual pleasure.

Is it an art form? Well I've made my arguments before but I would add this observation. If we consider porn as a legitimate form of artistic expression, then the more "artistic' the deception of the act, the less carnal and more erotic the act becomes. It appears what makes a sexual act erotic is the degree of control we have over its expression. Even the S+M crowd modify the basic sexual act through all sorts of rituals and costumes to make the act more pleasurable.

As to its mainstreaming and uptake by the young. Look, young men don't need much prompting to have sex, more importantly they are prone to doing impulsive and stupid things no wonder they're getting into it. The young sexualised girls that I see, seem to be into it not for the sex but for the social acceptance. Religion is soooo uncool, chastity a social disease. The internet on the other hand is the perfect medium for it's dissemination. Whereas before, someone you knew might see you coming out of an adult book store, no one really knows what you're doing on the internet. The internet allows you to indulge in the vice privately, something you couldn't do before. I imagine that the there are many conservative Christians checking out the porn sites who would have never dared to to go to an adult bookshop out of fear of being recognised.

Finally Michael, I do think you have a point with regard to American attitudes to sex. The same attitude is present here in Australia which makes me thing its more an Anglo/Protestant cultural attitude to sex and sexuality. A religious Protestant is more likely to be a sexual aesthete, a lapsed one a sexual glutton. The mean seems to escape them.

Posted by: slumlord on February 23, 2009 9:58 PM

Lex - I wonder how that Kurzweilian development evolves amid economic instability. In the days when I was an undiscriminating consumer of sci-fi, I was always struck by the way characters placed on dingy planets with really rat-bag, feudal, (completely closed) economic systems still had all this snappy technology. How was all the wealth to maintain that high-tech generated? Or, contrarywise, there were outwardly bright, gleaming high-tech planetary societies, where everybody spent most of their time accessing all that swank wank infrastructure, with occasional breaks for high-end intellectual work. Hopelessly nerdy, I kept wondering, "How do they pay for all that leisured high-tech masturbation? Who's producing? They never tell us about the slave-monkey mines, do they?" But anyway, we all know what metal fever can do to an economy!

Clio - Begging Moira's pardon, was I really more school-marmy than she was?

You were not the least bit school-marmy, Clio. It is used because you are stung at being labeled a school-marm, whereas I would just whip my hair into a bun, grab a ruler, and start rapping knuckles. You don't make enough allowance for basic human piss-antry in your evaluations.

JV - Comprehension errors and self-righteous indignation, always a winning combination! But I am sincerely pleased that you are a responsible father who is aware of "what's out there...the ease of access...the cavalier attitude young kids have towards the most extreme, disgusting porn imaginable", that "[t]hat attitude is borne out of that access", and that [i]t worries [you] as a parent how that will affect the sex lives and the roles between the sexes of that generation".

Posted by: Moira Breen on February 24, 2009 9:25 AM

Porn as a drug...by gum, that's it! Drugs provide users with predictable, mechanically controllable self-gratification, a quick hit of neurotransmitter reward that would otherwise have to be gained by doing something. Drugs become addictive (I speak from personal experience here) because they give the reward without the effort, and do so in a way that is (at least at first) under the control of the user.

Porn is therefore almost identical to drug use in its appeal. Porn is a masturbation support that provides the same predictable, mechanically controllable self-gratification as a drug. The consequences of its ubiquity will be the consequences of widespread drug use. And more, since it substitutes for real sexual interaction between men and those pesky unpredictable mechanically uncontrollable women.

We don't wonder whether coke or heroin or dope or ecstasy equal art--we know what they're about, why people buy them. And sell them.

Same with porn. Never mind about rock n roll, or "art" or erotic appreciation. It's about habitual predictable mechanical self-gratification...and it has its defenders, just as drugs do.

Posted by: PatrickH on February 24, 2009 10:42 AM

Moira, I agree with you. I limited my statement about how correct I think Kurzweil to: "on this subject." I think that the "Singularity" is not going to happen. Instead we will just have more stuff faster and faster. That will be disruptive enough. I fear that the physical infrastructure of power generating capacity and transmission lines are going to rot out due to environmentalism and nimbyism, and also give way to attacks from global guerillas long before there will be an mass downloading of brains to cyberspace. Who is going to risk having their data corrupted by am electrical brown out -- if the data is the person him- or herself? You are also correct that if enough people spend enough of their time addicted to the many new ultra-powerful distractions that will become available, then civilization will collapse.

I recall a friend who was involved with high tech developments told me something over ten years ago. I recall it verbatim. He said "pretty soon, any nerdy guy will be able to plug a little wire into his head, and as far as he will be able to tell, he will be having sex with Cindy Crawford. That is going to make smoking crack look as about as addictive as Sanka." Absolutely.

The absolute all-pervasiveness of this increasingly powerful suite of drug-like sex substitutes is going to have a massively disruptive effect on society. I do not think the impact will be a good one.

Again, I make the foregoing negative predictions solely in terms of consequences, without regard to the morality of the conduct itself, which as a Roman Catholic, I consider to be sinful and hence bad and harmful for the user, without regard to consequences.

The struggle against these addictions is going to be very challenging and difficult, and require prayer, sacrifice and self-denial. And, of course, that struggle has already started.

Posted by: Lexington Green on February 24, 2009 11:58 AM

I take it Lex, that you think Vinge's non-singularity scenario is more plausible: "a glut of technological riches, never properly absorbed". It depends, I think, on whether Kurzweil's (IMO hopelessly "optimistic") predictions about the reverse-engineering of the human brain will ever be achieved, let alone on the schedule he envisages.

As for wirehead-ism, it's clear that those who can resist that addictive possibility will rule the world. Which means that societies that manage to keep its prevalence below a certain threshold will overpower, and easily, those that don't.

Which then raises the possibility of a massive anti-porn/drug/wirehead crackdown in our future, a crackdown justified by the rather pressing requirement of our society to survive.

Wonder what all the (amateur) kids and (professional) Madison Youngs who've posted vids of themselves getting it on are going to say when the New Blue Meanies come for them in the night?

"I was just being mischevious!" "I was empowering women!"

We'll see how that cuts it with the Big Bad Po-lice Man of the future.

Posted by: PatrickH on February 24, 2009 1:01 PM

I have not read Vinge. His statement sounds more accurate than what Kurzweil seems to think will happen.

As to any "crackdown", if the government tries to do it, it will be even more futile than the ongoing, and pointlessly destructive, War on Drugs.

People need to be free to make their own decisions and to suffer or enjoy the consequences, as both a moral and a practical matter.

If government prohibition of drugs cannot work, a government crackdown on downstream pornographic products, or similar things, will be even more futile.

James Fitzjames Stephen:

"... there is a sphere, none the less real because it is impossible to define its limits, within which law and public opinion are intruders likely to do more harm than good. To try to regulate the internal affairs of a family, the relations of love or friendship, or many other things of the same sort, by law or by the coercion of public opinion, is like trying to pull an eyelash out of a man’s eye with a pair of tongs. They may put out the eye, but they will never get hold of the eyelash."

People's private lives have public consequences. But that is no reason for the state to get involved unless someone is being unambiguously hurt or coerced or otherwise wronged. Private consensual behavior has proven to be virtually unregulable.

What people need most of all is to be realistic about the power of these products. They are not toys and they are not art.

Being realistic will help people deal with them, and deal with the consequences of their use.

Posted by: Lexington Green on February 24, 2009 2:47 PM

Lex, I'm surprised you haven't read Vinge. He's the guy who more or less coined the whole idea of the Singularity.

I don't sense any interest in you for pursuing this discussion, but I have to say that your point about the inability to regulate private consensual behaviour fails to grasp the nub of modern porn--the pornification of society. The pornification of society is precisely a public phenomenon, and porn is the essence of making what was private both public and ubiquitous.

The public pervasiveness of porn could easily be massively reduced by a government that had the will (and broad enough public support) to fine the cr*p out of any television outlet that dared to show it, any store that sold it, and even any domestic ISP that allowed it. Sure, the judiciary could interfere, but the judiciary follows the election returns, and broad-based public support for removing porn from public awareness would be very effective, and quickly.

This goes double for wireheading. If wireheading is as addictive as it seems to have the potential to be, it will produce such pathologies so quickly, cost society so much (far more than alcohol and drugs combined), that there would emerge with a speed and ferocity that would shock libertarians, a consensus both social and legal, on the need to make every effort to eradicate the activity.

Would it work completely? Of course not. But it would remove the activity from the public domain, and social stigma, an even more powerful form of social control, would do much of the rest.

The War on Drugs is unnecessary as a form of control for middle-class whites. Social stigma has made drug use beyond certain limits and at certain times of life unacceptable in mainstream white society. But the social stigma is precisely the reason for the support among middle class whites for unnecessary regulation of drug use. Just makes the consensus even harder to mess with.

But as I say, I don't get the impression you're interested in this discussion. Still, porn is a drug, and ain't that the truth.

P.S. I am opposed to regulating porn. I like porn. I just think it's a commercial product for guys to jack off to. Not art. Not personal expression. And definitely not rock n roll.

Posted by: PatrickH on February 24, 2009 5:24 PM

If anyone's still paying attention or cares ... MBlowhard got slammed by a sadistic cold/flu and for 36 hours has been unable to face a glowing computer screen. Back on duty, delivering postings for visitors to dump on and pick apart, in a day or two.

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on February 24, 2009 7:03 PM

I don't doubt that if there were a major public outcry, that draconian measures could have an impact, particularly on the public display of pornographic images. "Time, place and manner" regulations may have some effectiveness. Recapturing the public sphere and making the use of pornography more of a strictly private activity would, in my view, be good

But restoring the Austro-Hungarian Empire would also, in my view, be good. No lie. This only shows that what I think would be good is no guide to anything. Most of what I think would be good simply aint gonna happen, ever.

I see no particularly serious public demand to regulate let alone outlaw pornography, for better or for worse.

Until there is some such political groundswell, things will chug along as they have been, at an accelerating rate ... toward wireheads, etc.

Even if there were some political outcry, I don't think illegalizing the stuff will do much good. I am assuming that pornography is such a powerful drug even as it is, and that the products coming along that will take pornography much farther than just looking at images, will be so compelling for their addicted users, that government attempts to ban it will pretty much be futile, and create very profitable black markets if prohibition were attempted.

Attacking the supply side of products that cause people immediate pleasure -- pornography, tobacco, alcohol, opiates, marijuana, sweet snacks, salty snacks -- does not work. People decry the effect on others, and claim do hate what it does to them. But they look for the stuff and pay for it and consume it. Sometimes people come to regret the lost time and money and the effect it has on their bodies and their relationships.

The only serious hope is forming people --children -- to help them to avoid things that are bad for them, and to help those who get mixed up with addictions and want to break them.

Right now, the commercial and political and personal cultures are all pushing the other way. That may change, but don't count on it. Follow the money. Not a happy time to be a parent. Still, it beats living under Stalin or Kim Jong Il, or in the Congo. Nothing and no place and no time can be perfect.

I agree that White middle class people who are themselves current and former drug users want it illegal as a way to keep it at arms length from their neighborhoods and from their kids, to "cabin it off" and make it a sort of clandestine pleasure that is to be indulged discretely. This is, strictly speaking, hypocrisy. As I see it, the blowback from this half-baked prohibition system is very bad, including a huge and expensive and destructive Prison Industrial Complex. But, since the direct costs (beside tax revenue) are mostly borne by people other than White middle class voters, they don't care about the misery they impose on ghettos ruled by gangs whose livelihood is selling drugs to their children and neighbors, or to them.

I could tell you I would add Vinge to my list of books to read, but I would be lying. I have hundreds of books I have not read yet. I know I will not get to Vernor Vinge in this lifetime.

I am giving up, inter alia, blogs (with a few specific exceptions where I have committed to write some things) for Lent, which starts tomorrow, anyway.

So for that reason, if for no other, I have indeed pursued this discussion as far as I am going to.

The Blowhard blog is often a place where contentious things are discussed civilly. That is one of its great charms.

Posted by: Lexington Green on February 24, 2009 8:43 PM

I personally don't have anything against good p0*n. You know the type that doesn't objectify women and treat us like trash. ATM, face screwing , money shots and the like are disgusting and sad to watch. How any woman can allow herself to be subjected to such horrible treatment I will never understand.

I notice that there is very little of the same type of hatred of women in gay male movies. Rocco, a gorgeous dark Italian, is sick. I can't stand to watch his movies, he has a tendency to get violent with his female costars. Mandingo is another actor whose movies I hate to watch. For one thing, he is circus tent huge so his costars are always in pain. Two, he is verbally abusive to his costars. I personally enjoy anything with Slayer, Mr.Marcus and Cuba. Funny enough, many women in the industry like(ed) to work with Cuba because he treated his costars with care.

Posted by: chic noir on February 24, 2009 8:56 PM

"Back on duty, delivering postings for visitors to dump on and pick apart, in a day or two."

Is this a plea for sympathy?

Just think of yourself as a child's favorite bear wagged around to the point of having tattered ears, missing an eye or a nose with some stuffing peaking out of a ripped seam.

Your visitors will kick up a fuss if they don't find you in your usual place soon.

Take care : )

Posted by: shiva on February 24, 2009 9:40 PM

As a professional author of pornography, I hope not. Who wants the sociological tourists and pop-culture regurgitators?

Posted by: Joe S. Walker on February 25, 2009 8:15 AM

I got nothing to say about p0rn and rocknroll beyond "they have their place" but as this has gone far afield already I'll add my fearless forecasts: in the next 3-6 months, as it sinks in just how screwed we are, both will see a resurgence; in the next 6-12 months, as it sinks in just how massively and profoundly screwed we are, suicide advice and supplies will be growth areas.

Narr

Posted by: Narr on February 25, 2009 11:49 AM

ST, hardly a country in the world has had more invaders over the centuries than the Philippines.

I imagine you've been there. Do you see the same attitudes among the women there as ascribe to French women?

Posted by: Brutus on February 25, 2009 8:31 PM

ST-ignore that post. I hadn't gotten down to the subsequent comment.

Posted by: Brutus on February 25, 2009 8:33 PM






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