On Art and Porn

Once again, I'm catching up on a few things that have been waiting around for me to write. This is something from last week's "ooh, I need to say something about that" pile...

As regular readers will know, I am a big fan of Renegade Evolution, whom I consider to be one of the most intelligent writers about alternative sexuality and sex work. Nevertheless, I am going to disagree with her in this post.

This is a response to a post that originally appeared as friends-only on her LJ blog, although she has now reposted it on her public "blogspot" blog too (this is why I have sparse quotations from the original piece). The post is part of a series about Ren's job(s) as a sex worker, and inasmuch as Ren writes about her experiences in those fields, I am not qualified to question what she says. What I do question is how she defines pornography, and its relationship to "art" and "erotica".

Ren writes:

Both art and erotica can have nudity…but if your shit is spread and you have a cock or other object shoved in you somewhere…it’s porn. It can be artistic, but it’s porn. Art and erotica can be suggestive, but if a work's sole or primary purpose is to make cocks hard or cunts wet? PORN.

Now, while I would certainly agree that everything where "your shit is spread and you have a cock or other object shoved in you" (where "you" is the person or persons appearing in the visual media) is indeed porn. But I would also say that there's quite a lot of porn out there that doesn't involve any of those things, and yet most people would want to draw a line between that and "erotica" or "art".

Secondly, while the legal definition of pornography is indeed "a work [whose] sole or primary purpose is to make cocks hard or cunts wet" (which admittedly is paraphrased slightly when it appears in legal precedents and Acts of Parliament, but the words mean the same thing), I am sure that there is plenty of "erotica" that fits this definition, that many people would regard as quite distinct from "pornography".

Now,to me, what all this comes down to is the conjugation of the verb "to look at pornographic materials":

I appreciate adult-themed art

You enjoy erotica

He/She/They use porn.

[NB Ren seems to reverse this in her own desires]

In other words, I think that porn, erotica and "adult art" are actually synonymous, and the only distinction is one of the language-user's personal prejudices concerning sophistication or acceptability of different types of pornographic themes or presentations. "Erotica" and "adult art" are just words that people use to avoid admitting that they like looking at pictures of naked folks, or folks fucking, and that they get turned on by it. It's a way of separaing themselves from the hoi polloi, the plebs, the "great Unwashed", and of saying "we are better than them!"

When Ren categorises "Art", "Erotica" and "Porn" (by personifying them as three brothers), she treats them as separate entities (which obviously, I don't), but she reveals the truth of what I say when she makes this remark:

Now see, I like Art, and I like Erotica…but I’d rather hang out with Porn. Because Porn is honest. He does not pretend to be anything he isn’t. He doesn’t play himself off as deep, or necessary, or culturally savvy or intellectual.

Obviously, I don't see porn that way, because to me porn and erotica are the same thing. But this "pretending to be deep, culturally savvy, intellectual" thing - that's what people are doing when they talk about erotica. You know what? You can do all sorts of intellectual, culturally-aware, deep, stuff with porn, both in analysing it, and in making it. If you feel the need to call it something else when you do so, that's fine, but it's about you, not about the type of porn that you choose to write/talk/think about - or the type of porn you choose to write, film or watch.

If "porn" and "erotica" are the same thing, what of art - and how does porn relate to art?

Ren says:

Art ... is a legend in the hallowed halls of academia, a cultural icon. He’s smooth, articulate, educated and thoughtful. He inspires, he makes people think, he believes that emotion, vision, passion and expression are absolute pillars of human existence. He can be shocking, or disturbing, or unsettling, but no matter what he is doing, there is a message.

I say, "phooey!" to most of that! While some art definitely does all of those things, other art is just there for entertainment. Some is for the simplest of pleasures. Some of it is poorly executed (i.e. not "articulate" or "educated") and some has no thought to it at all.

I steadfastly refuse to draw a distinction in kind between, say, Shakespeare and Tom Clancy - or Patricia Cornwell, or whoever the latest "summer holiday reading" thriller author might be (or romance author, for that matter - but I don't read those novels so I don't have as much to go on to mention names there). Or, between Mozart and Girls Aloud. It is all art as far as I am concerned, and while we may have views on the value of various artists' contributions relative to one another, to deny that some of it is art at all is to make "art" into an exclusive club that confers status and privilege to its members, while excluding anyone not seen as "highbrow" enough.

Everything, from the doodles in the margins of your notepad or newspaper right the way through to the Cistene Chapel, is art. And those doodles? Unless you intend to show them to somebody, they don't really have any "message", unless maybe to yourself. I suppose some people might derive meaning from them, but to my mind, so much of that kind of analysis is assigning meaning to everything regardless of more direct forms of communication - i.e. I think it is claiming special knowledge of people that really isn't warranted.

In a way, though, all art is either about emotion or expression - even if that emotion is just "hah, you fell over!" slapstick humour. Or that expression is just the random churnings of a mind at rest (like those doodles). Art can have one other purpose, which is "technical study" - musical exercises in scales and arpeggios, drawn studies of anatomy, simple compositions of photography or drawn objects... such things might be considered explorations into the nature of art itself, as opposed to art as communication - in the same way that some "pure maths" is exploring the nature of numebrs without any particular consideration of whether they have "real" meanings.

And if all art is "Art", regardless of how trivial or base we might consider its emotional or expressional content, then where does that leave porn?

Well, we said before that "porn is anything that is intended primarily to make cocks hard or cunts wet". I'm going to go out on a limb and say that that, right there, is an emotional content. Some people might not think of, "Phwoar, that's making me horny!" as a very important or groundbreaking emotional content or communication, but it is still an emotional reaction. Porn is (a part of) "Art". To illustrate the point, here's a Venn Diagram. Note that I've also demonstrated the elitist use of "porn" versus "erotica" when referring to sexual art:
In my opinion, of course, all "art about sex & sexuality" is porn - or all of it is erotica, if you prefer that term. In "Art" I am including visual arts, the written word, and song/music. I suspect that, while in the very broad definitions that I am using here it would be valid, to suggest that pole dancing and lap dancing are porn would be very contentious, and would skate far too close to treating sex work as a monolith. But I do what to point out that I believe treating them, by virtue of a "sleazy" reputation, as somehow separate from the performance art of dance (ballet, contemporary, whatever) is just as wrong as making the elitist distinction between erotica and porn.

It seems that, for at least a century, the boundaries of "art" as opposed to "that rubbish" have been being driven back in most areas, so that now, the power of the Blues is universally recognised as art, whereas once it was low, and base noise. Likewise, in another generation, the music of Kurt Cobain. I am sure that literary examples can be found for the same phenomenon, and also visual art. To be direct, and distilled, and forceful (that is to say, unsubtle or un-nuanced) is not always to be lesser in depth or meaning, and so it is with porn: much of porn is very direct in its expression of sexuality, having just one response as its goal - but that doesn't stop it having a deep and penetrating artistic effect (pun intended!) By "artistic effect" I do not mean that it influences people in a "monkey see, monkey do" way, but rather that it still can provoke thought, even deep consideration, about things both sexual and non-sexual in nature. And yet, always we see "porn" being divided from "proper art" in a way that has endured. Yes, it is true that the erotic art of the Victorian age is now a subject of academic study, giving it a slight air of acceptability, but it is still labelled "porn" in the most part, and treated as something "other", in a way that the popular music of those days is not. Only in sex has the line between "Art" and "That other stuff" not particularly shifted. As Ren says, "...but if your shit is spread and you have a cock or other object shoved in you somewhere…it’s porn." I think the line catches a little more than that as porn, but the principle remains across the decades.

I think we should reject that line, and insist that Porn is Art (how come the two brothers have never been seen in the same room at exactly the same time as each other? *smirk* ). Porn performers and producers, pole dancers and lap dancers, even (willing) prostitutes - yes, all sex workers - are artists and deserve to be recognised for it. Their individual arts are different from one another, just as a sculptor's art is different from a painter's, is different from a musician's, is different from a dancer's.

"Manage" friends?

I noticed that on my OpenID login, LiveJournal actually gives me a whole account, with a "Friends page" and all that stuff.

Which is cool.


Except...

It offers me the option to "manage friends". I find this darkly amusing:

So far, I only have two friends on LJ: Renegade Evolution and Trinity.

Something tells me these are not friends who would take kindly to being "managed". And trying? Probably not wise...

New Toy!

I've just discovered the "Bitstrips" tool for creating comic strips online, and I'm having some fun with it!

Here's my first attempt:


(NB: I'm 'SnowdropTop" because it limits you to a 13 character nick on that site, so SnowdropExplodes wouldn't fit...)

Natalie Dylan: I Raise Many Questions, And Offer Few Answers

A rare event for me - offering few answers. But this is one of those times where I really don't have many clear views on the subject matter, and prefer to spark debate.

The subject matter is Natalie Dylan's article at Daily Beast explaining, "Why I'm Selling My Virginity". She writes:

When I put my virginity up for auction in September, it was in part a sociological experiment—I wanted to study the public's response.

...

Like most little girls, I was raised to believe that virginity is a sacred gift a woman should reserve for just the right man. But college taught me that this concept is just a tool to keep the status quo intact. Deflowering is historically oppressive—early European marriages began with a dowry, in which a father would sell his virginal daughter to the man whose family could offer the most agricultural wealth. Dads were basically their daughters’ pimps.

When I learned this, it became apparent to me that idealized virginity is just a tool to keep women in their place. But then I realized something else: if virginity is considered that valuable, what’s to stop me from benefiting from that? It is mine, after all. And the value of my chastity is one level on which men cannot compete with me. I decided to flip the equation, and turn my virginity into something that allows me to gain power and opportunity from men. I took the ancient notion that a woman’s virginity is priceless and used it as a vehicle for capitalism.

Read the whole article to make sense of what follows!

At Feministe, the question was raised, "just how subversive is this really?"

I posted the following thoughts and questions in the comments thread over there, but I feel they deserve a post of their own - I would love for readers to discuss, debate, etc in the comments thread!

1/. The fetishisation of virginity and the value put on it by men is one of the driving forces of sex trafficking, and in particular the traffickers’ choice of underage girls as their victims.

2/. What happens if the winner decides to resell her virginity without using it (in other words, decides to pimp her out)? If virginity is treated as a market commodity, why shouldn’t the winner seek to profit from the transaction in some way other than by having the “honour” of being the first dude to fuck her?

3/. (Inspired by freedomgirl’s comment) What if a lesbian wins the bidding?

4/. It’s not actually an auction if the highest bid is not guaranteed victory. It is more like a tender for bids from service providers, or for buyers of a company (where the winning bid is the best offer for shareholders but also takes into account other issues).

5/. It’s not subversive because of the symbolic value placed on a woman’s virginity, and the fact that this is being presented as a one-off (that is, she is not setting herself up as a prostitute/callgirl/escort). These combine to make it reinforce the patriarchal “gatekeeper” role of women, who are expected to wait for a man to prove himself “worthy” (in this instance, by having the best bid).

6/. In light of points 4 and 5, what will the reactions be of men whose higher bids are rejected in favour of a lower but “better” bid? In what ways will this reaction reflect on and reveal the nature of male privilege and entitlement?

7/. Her virginity is currently valued at $3.8M - does that mean that she would have been underselling herself if she had opted for marriage to a partner who hadn’t spent that much on her? Given that a man making median earnings and working for 40 years will make less than $2M in his working life (working 40 years multiplied by $45k p.a. = $1.8M - even corrected for inflation along the way it won’t reach $3.8M) what conclusions can we draw about the relative value placed on Natalie Dylan’s virginity?

8/. Considering market forces and the laws of supply and demand: if, as she says, she may be at the start of a new trend, how far might the market value of a woman’s virginity fall? What would it take for it to fall to zero (or as near to zero as makes no odds)?

9/. Again, if this is the start of a new trend, and returning to the point about age, ethnicity, attractiveness and other factors - would there be a role for “sexual estate agents” (I think “estate agent” is “realtor” in US English?) who assess the likely selling value of a woman’s virginity before she chooses to put it on the market? Would those same agents provide a service to women seeking to sell their virginity and helping her to advertise it in the best way possible - and collect a commission fee at the end? In what ways would these differ from/be similar to, escort agencies that operate now?

***

Note that the only definite answer I give is point 5: it definitely isn't subversive in my opinion, because it is wrapped up so heavily in the idea of virginity as special, and because it reinforces the "worthiness trap" by which women are set up to be at once the reward for a man's success, but also must adjudicate based on rules that men generate (for example, the rules of an auction). The fact that she states that the winning bid is not necessarily the highest bid, does go a little way to assuage this, but again, as my point 6 elaborates, what would the reaction be from someone finding out that a lower bid than his had won? In fact, in more mundane, everyday interactions, anger, violence, and hatred towards women in general, and the woman who picked the "less worthy" guy in particular, are common themes - and common themes in literature and Hollywood when they deal with such storylines.

That's all I'm going to write: please, people, give me some feedback on the questions I've posed!

Seeking a Feminist Critique of the Midnight Isles

As regular readers may be aware, I started posting a series of fantasy-fiction stories that are based on a mixture of folk tales, the Bible and Tolkien, telling a parallel universe "history" of Britain. These are called "Tales of the Midnight Isles". (Although eachstory is meant to stand more or less on its own, I would advise readers to start at the very bottom of the archives and work your way forward - they form a structured chronological narrative from the Creation of the universe until whatever point I've reached).

Because I've spent some time creating not just the stories, but the story of how the tales would have developed within the culture, I have been trying to see them not as "my" stories, but as though they were the traditional tales of an indigenous people, recorded by them for posterity and then studied and analysed by later historians in their society. The notes along the way, and the "academia" list in the sidebar give some of the background through that process.

Which is all leading up to the point that I feel as though my female characters may not be all that I might hope them to be from a feminist perspective. And I don't, personally, feel able to play the role of "feminist academic" in studying the Midnight Isles' cultural heritage, the way I am doing with other roles of that "academic" side of the creation of these stories. While culturally, the Isleswomen have a reputation for being hardy and capable of looking after themselves (to which the Storyteller voice refers occasionally), how well does this translate into the Tales, and does it represent a feminist aspect or is it more of the Hollywood style of "strong female characters"?

So, would anyone out there like to have a crack at studying the feminist or otherwise meanings within the Midnight Isles?

In particular, I would greatly appreciate (a) feminist appraisal(s) of the character, Queen LaYasa ElizabeTh, in the two stories Rebuilding the Great isle and Zhinyoor and ElizabeTh's Reign. (For the curious, the odd capitalization in LaYasa ElizabeTh indicates pronunciation: "La-Yassa" as opposed to "Lay-assa", and a "th" as in "thing" rather then a sharp 'T' followed by a brief puff of air for a separate 'H'. The 'Zh' at the front of 'Zhinyoor' is pronounced as the 's' in 'leisure' - there is a full pronunciation guide linked in the "Academia" sidebar at the Midnight Isles blog).

As the footnote in the first story explains, in the Midnight Isles, "ElizabeTh" is a name that originally translated as "(feminine) Axe of the (river) BeTh" - literally, it would be the equivalent of calling someone a "battleaxe"! So obviously, not a particularly feminist statement right there. But what I'm interested in reading about from other people is how the character fits her name in a positive or negative way (for instance, what does it say that Zhnyoor and LaYasa's dynasty becomes known as "The house of Eliz"?), how her relationship with the King develops, what her role is in the stories, and so on.

Oh yeah, and Ren - I'd really love your input on - well, lots of things about it really, but in particular, the parts that the Wild Hunt and werewolves play in the mythology so far.

Implicit, Prior, "consent"

In the whole "no means no" and "yes means yes" ethos, the necessity of clear consent to sex is made, well, clear. But that leaves us with the sad truth that it needs to be made clear because it isn't already. In 2005 the shocking results were revealed that around 1/3 of British people believed that a woman was at least partially responsible for being raped if she was drunk, wearing revealing/"sexy" clothes, or acting in a flirtatious manner.

I am going to call this type of belief, which is clearly a large part of how rape happens and how rape culture is perpetuated, "Implicit Prior Consent".

Breaking down "Implicit Prior Consent" into the component words, and how they relate to rape, we have: "implicit" consent is consent that is perceived through induction based on another person's "signals". That is, one person implies that zie is consenting, but does not make that consent explicit by stating clearly, "I wish to have sex with you". The word "prior" means "coming before", and in the terminology I am going to use in this post, "prior" refers not to the beginning of sexually intimate contact, but to the point at which such contact is declared likely, either explicitly between the participants, or as a suggestion only in one participant's mind. Thus, we can have "explicit posterior consent", which is consent given after the likelihood of sexual contact has been raised, and which is given clearly (as in, "yes, I'd love to fuck you!" or "I'll gladly lick your cunt!"). Explicit Posterior Consent (I'll leave you to do your own buttsex jokes with that terminology...) is what we talk about when we say "yes means yes!"

A brief note should be made here that, while it is possible to have "implicit posterior consent" (perhaps the scene in Brassed Off where the exchange happens, Her: "Would you like to come in for coffee?" Him: "No, I don't drink coffee." Her: "I haven't got any."), by the very nature of the phrase "fuck me please!" (or more romantic invitation if you prefer), there can be no such thing as prior explicit consent, given the way in which I am using the term "prior" here.

For clarity, I wish also to say that my use of "prior" is not the same as "she gave prior consent" in the legal sense, and a sit might appear in, say, a court case regarding rape. In that context, "prior consent" refers to the sex act itself, and not to the negotiation of sex acts.

The tricky part of implicit prior consent is that it is not a complete myth. Sometimes a person really does want to have sex with someone else, but does not (for whatever reason) say so openly, but uses coded signals to imply and invite a move by that other person. However, "implicit prior" necessarily means that there is no knowledge that two people will use the same set of codes to communicate their desire, or to read their desire of others.

Significantly, also, many of the ways in which "implicit prior consent" leads to rape are based on what may be termed "untargeted signals". That is, in order to arrive at the view that a woman has given implicit prior consent, it is necessary to assume that before she even left her home that evening, that she decided to give consent to have sex with anyone who saw her.

Similarly, getting drunk at a party must somehow be assumed to be a blanket prior consent to have sex with anyone at the party or afterwards. This belief has two strands: first, since alcohol lowers inhibitions, the reasoning goes, then she wants her inhibitions lower, which in turn means she doesn't care who she has sex with. Secondly, there is the assumption that "everyone knows" that parties are a way of picking up a date. This latter argument is, of course, the same flaw as with any implicit prior consent - that of not using the same code books. The first argument is based on a deeper presumption which is the sex-class/no-sex class dilemma that women face in the dominant paradigm. The assumption is that a woman is both "there to provide sex for men", and also that she doesn't enjoy sex in its own right and for her own pleasure (that is, her choice of male partner is not based on her own preference of person-as-partner, but on how well potential partners match up to some undisclosed value measurement). This value measurement is deemed to be lower when she is intoxicated, which is why her "lowered inhibitions" are read by many as being a form of "blanket consent". If she should pass out, effectively, the assumption is that the value requirement is set at zero.

We should be clear here: I believe that without explicit consent being given, then it is rape. Explicit consent can be communicated after the event (in the case of "implicit posterior consent") but anyone having sex with someone without having already received their explicit consent, cannot know that consent will be communicated, and so the deed is ethically the same as if there was no consent communicated before or after. Obviously, if a woman passes out from too much alcohol then not only is it rape if someone decides to use her unconscious body as a sex toy, but it's also hugely irresponsible not to call an ambulance to get her the medcal assistance she urgently needs!

For balance, I want to make it clear that I believe that if a girl gets drunk at a party, and starts flirting with a guy who then invites her to a secluded spot for the purposes of having sex, and she slurs "yeah, baby, let's fuck" (or words to that effect) then that counts as explicit posterior consent. While she may regret the decision the next day (due to lowered inhibitions) I believe that it would be infantilising to say that a drunk woman's yes doesn't mean yes. Of course, her "no" always means "no". I believe that all adult human beings have the right to make their own mistakes, and getting drunk and choosing to fuck someone we wouldn't otherwise falls into that category.

The problems with "implicit prior consent" (i.e. the factors that mean it is not in fact consent at all) are therefore that

1. by its implicit nature, it cannot be known that the person supposedly giving consent (PSGC), realises that this is what zie is doing
2. by its prior nature, the PSGC cannot know to whom zie is giving consent (which in turn, dehumanises the PSGC by denying that zie has a free will of hir own in hir choice of sexual partner)
3. by its prior nature, the PSGC cannot know to what zie is giving consent.

These are the factors that the dominant paradigm and the rape culture, ignore and in some cases, actively suppress consideration or awareness of them. For this reason, I am willing to believe that at least some rapists genuinely (but wrongly) do not believe that they have committed rape (and in turn, that is why the law in Britain eventually changed the allowable defence from "Genuine belief that she was consenting" to "Reasonable belief..." I still find the wording problematic, and think that "realistic belief", or "well-founded belief" might be better). Marcella Chester @ Abyss2Hope touches on these issues in a recent post:

This view sets up people (mostly boys and men) to commit rape which if it is rightfully reported will be claimed to have been a false report.

For sex to be consensual and legal there needs to be a clear presence of freely and legally given consent. This is a far different standard than Kittywampus has defined for "real" rape.

If you go to a car dealership and test drive a car, say wonderful things about that car, you have not consented to buy that car simply because you didn't say, "No, I'm not buying this car." It would be absurd to demand that all car shoppers' absence of consent must be clear.

Which is what "implicit prior consent" would look like.

I don't feel I need to talk any more about explicit posterior consent as the ideal, but I do have a little bit more to say about implicit posterior consent, and how it relates to the concept of safewords and the like in BDSM.

At first glance, the concept of a safeword (which allows consent to be assumed until the safeword is uttered - because in BDSM play, sometimes "no, please don't" is actually, "Oh god, please, more!") looks like a form of implicit consent. Because BDSM sex can't really take place safely unless both partners have agreed on what sort of activities they both enjoy, it must also be posterior consent.

However, it only looks like implicit consent because it is implicit at the time of the sex acts taking place. During the negotiation of activities, consent is always explicitly sought for any and all activities that might take place, and it is also negotiated whether a safeword will be used, and whether "no" really means "no". This consent is definite and explicit. While consent is implicit for the "scene" to continue while it is in progress, the overall consent to sex is explicit, and in particular, the consent to the later implicit signalling of consent is also explicit.

I will close by simply repeating my assertion: the only type of consent that matters is explicit, posterior, consent; without this, any sex act could be rape, and anyone taking an active role in a sex act is ethically a rapist (even if it turned out that the other person did want it, because you couldn't know that at the time, it is still rape).

Objectifying

I objectify women.

However, I think that everyone does, and I think that includes feminists and everyone else, too.

As near as I can figure, objectification occurs when we view a person as a physical entity but not as a feeling and thinking person or an end in themselves. I believe, on that definition, nobody is free of the taint of objectifying or being objectified.

The simplest example I can think of is walking down the street. Most of the time, walking down a busy street, we are intent only on our own objective, which is getting to our destination (on time). In that situation, everyone else on the pavement (that would be "sidewalk" in American English) ceases to be a person in their own right, but become obstacles to our own progress - we objectify them, and they objectify us. Our responses are based not on any acceptance of those others as people, but only on what we think will advance our progress most rapidly. Often, we may make assessments of where we think those other people might be going so that we can avoid collisions that would delay us further, but these assessments are entirely internal to ourselves and not based on any interaction with the other person's consciousness - nor any attempt to make our own consciousness known. Indeed, in the realm of pedestrian traffic in a busy street, there simply is not the capacity to process the vast amount of information that would have to be absorbed if we were to treat all those people as being people. We objectify them. Anyone who remembers the film Crocodile Dundee will remember Mick Dundee taking the time to greet everyone who passed him on a busy New York street, and how incongruous it seemed - along with his assertion "millions of people all wanting to live together - New York must be the friendliest place on Earth!"

In the above example, I think it becomes clear that objectification is not always a negative thing. There can be situations where attitudes like "pavement objectification" can become harmful and negative (a heightened example would be "road rage"), but in general it's just what we need to do to avoid spending the whole day talking to people instead of going where we're going.

I don't, however, think that objectification is a good thing, ever. I am sure that people can relate to the feeling of being lost in a sea of humans, and to the stress that sometimes just walking down a busy street (or driving in a busy road system) can generate, and I believe that at least some of that is caused by the simultaneous facts of objectifying and being objectified. It is a price we pay for "efficiency", but one that most of us are very able to bear.

From this example, we can see that effectively, objectification occurs whenever we have an interaction with someone that does not involve an exchange of conscious awareness.

At which point, we get to the point of this post, which is to attempt to look again at how objectification fits into sexuality (which appears for the most part to be the use that feminists have for the word).

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus of Nazareth said that "if you look at a woman with lust, you have have already committed adultery with her in your heart." Encompassed in this is the idea that sin is inescapable, because it happens in the mind and not just in the deed. Objectification of others also happens in the mind, and we could easily rewrite Jesus' statement as "If you look at someone with lust, you have already objectified hir in your heart."

Returning to our city street for a moment, when we see an attractive person walk past, most people will turn our heads a moment to follow them with our gaze. If they are sexually attractive to us, then even more so. And right at that moment, we have viewed that person as an object and not as a conscious being in their own right. For most of us, we do this because we know that we shall have no further contact with that person. We will never have an opportunity to view hir as anything other than eye-candy, because in the space of a few seconds, zie has gone about hir business elsewhere and we have gone about ours, and will never encounter hir again. The objectifying gaze is possible because there is no possibility of a relationship, and we admire instead something attractive in our environment, just the same way that we would admire a picture in a gallery.

This is the type of objectifying that I notice in myself most often, but I've given up worrying about it: admiring a sexy arse or beautiful bosom, or a wonderful figure, does no harm as long as I know what it is that I am doing, and as long as I do nothing with it except let the pleasing image lift my mood for a moment. (Things an objectifier might do/think that would be harmful objectification include "I want to have me some of that!" or "More women should look like that!")

In general, the "admiring the view" objectification is relatively harmless in itself, but when coupled with the patriarchal sense of "entitlement" it can be very dangerous. This is one reason why women do not like being looked at in the streets, guys! Because a woman can never know which one of those male gazes might belong to a potential rapist, who will assume "I want you, therefore I will have you". It is also the problem with various types of "street harassment", from the builder's wolf-whistle (or, "get yer tits out fer ver lads!" or whatever) to the gaze that is held long enough and obviously enough to catch the gazee's attention. The effect of this - indeed, quite often, the underlying intent of it - is not only to objectify the person (almost always female)
but to let her know that she has been objectified. It isn't very pleasant to feel as though people see you as nothing more than a picture in a gallery, even if their demeanour in other ways doesn't come across as a threat. However, being seen as an object instead of a person is threatening, when you have something the objectifier wants from you (for example, a cunt). Because if you are an object instead of a person, there is no barrier between them and their simply taking what they want without a thought for your feelings about it. That's a very scary thought.

As observed above, objectification occurs when we interact with people indirectly rather than involving a direct contact between two or more minds. Aspasia @ La Libertine's Salon, writes:

The actual problem with objectification is the othering of a human being and reducing them to a one-dimensional figure that almost becomes a caricature of their true selves. It doesn't matter if it is objectification of their sexuality, intelligence, humor, earning power, or whatever. No one wants to be seen in such a flat representation.

In the examples outlined above, this makes perfect sense: it is when a single aspect of a person becomes the only aspect of interest and everything else is denied or rejected as irrelevant that objectification occurs, and zie ceases to be a person in the eyes of the objectifier.

One last comment to make: I think in this aspect, that most women in sex work do get objectified, since in terms of their work only one dimension of their personality and body is seen as relevant. But then, this is the same for most other types of work (for example, an office assistant is only valued for one thing, namely, the ability to get through piles and piles of boring paperwork every day). However, I do not see this objectification as necessarily a problem as long as the boundaries of work are respected: as I said earlier, "I think it becomes clear that objectification is not always a negative thing." No harm is done in objectifying the woman in a porn movie - so long as we can feel confident she is there and doing all those things of her own volition and without coercion or desperation driving her (which indicates that, if we have that concern, then outside of the "watching her on the screen" bit, we do still identify her as a person in her own right).

Freedom & Autonomy part 2: the feminist sadist

In Part 1 I answered the questions, "Are there any particular stories you want to tell about gaining (or losing) your own sexual freedom or autonomy?" and "What does 'sexual autonomy' mean to you? What does 'sexual freedom' mean to you?"

However, in the call for submissions for the 15th Feminist Carnival of Sexual Freedom and Autonomy, two other questions were posed, and I would feel my work was incomplete until I had addressed those also.

They were:

How does your knowledge of feminism play into the concepts of sexual freedom and autonomy?

How does your sexual autonomy or freedom conflict, interact, or engage with your feminist beliefs?

To answer the first question is relatively simple, because in my thinking, sexual freedom and autonomy are natural results from the core principles that seem to characterise feminism. As explained in Part 1, I feel that "ownership" is a more appropriate term than "autonomy", since sexuality is often not an informed or unencumbered choice; instead, it is something innate within us. For that reason I shall substitute "ownership" (meaning, if you will, "self-ownership") where others might put "autonomy". Effectively, this self-ownership is the practical definition of "autonomy" when it comes to sexuality.

For women to be free (and the social equals of men), this freedom obviously must encompass all aspects of their lives. But if men do not own their own sexuality and thus experience sexual freedom of their own, this is impossible. As long as the meme persists of men as the rampaging, uncontrolled sexual beasts, then women must always fear sexuality on some level; and there will always be some men who choose to live down to the conception of themselves.

The question, "How does your sexual autonomy or freedom conflict, interact, or engage with your feminist beliefs?" is more tricky to answer directly. The shortest answer I can give is that until I had a much better understanding of feminism, I did not have sexual freedom and ownership.

I am a sadist and sexual Dominant, and someone who (as far as I can tell) is "orientationally" that way - i.e. "born" to be a sadist, the same way that many homosexuals are seemingly born to be that way (either through prenatal conditions in the womb, or genetics, or other factors). I am also largely heterosexual, which means that sexual sadism and Dominance tend to be directed towards hurting and controlling a woman. Yet I was brought up in a family with links to the feminist and Left movements of the 1970s and 1980s, and some of those values were certainly passed down to us kids in the family. It was also regularly taught in school, from a more patriarchal standpoint, "you never hit a lady". That's some serious conflict there! There was also all around me during my teens, media representations of sadism as unequivocally bad: the images of sexual sadists were only of psychopathic serial killers who had to be hunted down by the police. As a teen, I thought I was inevitably destined to be one of those serial killers, and I really didn't want to be.

What perhaps prevented me from becoming such a criminal is that I discovered the world of consensual BDSM, and with it more nuanced and in-depth theories of consent and of sexuality in general. This in turn tied in to my pre-existing feminist inclinations, which is how my own understanding of sexual freedom and ownership started to develop. Only with that understanding could I start to claim my own sexual freedom and own my own sexuality. Furthermore, the more I learned (and continue to learn) about feminism, the stronger my understanding became, and the more assured I was of my own sexual freedom.

I want to close these thoughts, including those in Part 1, with a slogan from a series of teen sci-fi novels: Time Rope by Robert Leeson

The basic overall plot was that scientists had created a way to travel through time to experience episodes in your past lives, and interact with the past world. The slogan of the scientific project was:

"Know your past. Understand your present. Choose your future."

In this, I feel the definition of what it is to have personal (and therefore, sexual) freedom and autonomy is captured. While to some extent, it is impossible to know what makes us have the sexuality we do, we do know what our lives have been since then, and we can certainly understand better from knowing that, how we fit into the world. And, in understanding that, we are better able to choose our own path, and not simply follow what is laid out for us.

Freedom & Autonomy part 1: All places are not alike

Sinclair @ Sugarbutch Chronicles is going to be the next host for the Feminist Carnival of Sexual Freedom and Autonomy, and has set contributors the questions:

What does “sexual autonomy” mean to you? What does “sexual freedom” mean to you?

Are there any particular stories you want to tell about gaining (or losing) your own sexual freedom or autonomy?

How does your knowledge of feminism play into the concepts of sexual freedom and autonomy?

How does your sexual autonomy or freedom conflict, interact, or engage with your feminist beliefs?

Any other questions or ideas you might have about these concepts?

One thing that struck me in particular was this passage from her call for submissions:

Google helps me out with the definition of “autonomy”: personal independence; the capacity to make an informed, un-coerced decision; a person’s ability to make independent choices.

I’ve thought a lot about autonomy and choice, especially in terms of gender roles, of butch/femme, and the ways that exploring these gender dynamics often appear to be reproducing a compulsory gender hierarchy. One particular thing about choice that I want to reiterate is that I believe that all options have to be empowered and equally valued in order for it to be a real choice. The consequences to both choices have to be comparable.

This had me puzzling about my own sexuality, in particular, this concept of "all options have to be... equally valued", and "the consequences to both choices have to be comparable". Because in this sense at least, I don't know that I can ever describe myself as sexually autonomous.

It will always make a BIG difference to me how I express myself sexually, and it is quite clear that all choices are not equal in value or comparable in consequence.

I describe myself as a "natural" or "orientational" Dominant in sexual terms. I also have the ability to submit, and enjoy doing that with someone I trust completely - but it certainly is not natural to me to do so. But "vanilla", non-D/s sex and sexual expression, is meaningless to me. It is alien, and the consequences of it are totally different in my mind and my body and my relationships from those of D/s sex. Whatever it is about me that is wired differently so that power exchange is such an important part of connecting intimately with another human being on a sexual level, it most definitely is not indifferent to how I express myself.

And the same goes for that part of me that drives my sadism: whatever it is is as near as makes no difference to being innate. It is not optional for me, it is not a free choice but who I am.

These musings lead me to the first of Sinclair's questions that I am going to attempt to answer in this post: "Are there any particular stories you want to tell about gaining (or losing) your own sexual freedom or autonomy?" In my answer, I will also start to build some ideas about another question: "What does 'sexual autonomy' mean to you? What does 'sexual freedom' mean to you?"

Regular readers will already know of the turmoil I went through as I grew up with my sadist Dominant sexuality in my bosom, and the conflict between that and my firm humanitarian beliefs. To recap briefly for those who are new here: as I grew through my teens I was surrounded with images and representations of sadist sexuality that were extremely negative: sadists were psychopaths and serial killers who had to be hunted down by the cops before they did any more sick and evil torture-murders. And I thought I was growing up to be one of those sick evil torturer-murderers, and I really really didn't want to be like that. I just didn't know I had a choice.

So my journey to sexual freedom (and autonomy?) is synonymous with my discovery of consensual and safe BDSM sex, and of consensual D/s relationships. This story is covered in such posts as "Porn and Me", and I have probably referenced it many times in comments threads around the sex-positive blogging world. Key moments in that journey were discovering online BDSM, reading The Story of O and finding BDSM porn.

Some thoughts that are relevant (and probably constitute a fairly comprehensive explanation of what sexual freedom and autonomy mean to me) can be found in "Owning your Sexuality".

With reference to my own past, it is clear that I had no freedom or autonomy as I grew up, and it was only when I came to understand other ways of seeing what was innately in me that I came to have any sense of having control over my own sexuality - that I could own it in every sense of the word. However, to my mind there is a clear distinction between the freedom this gave me, and the concept of autonomy. As I suggested earlier, the idea that I could view all options as equal seems not to apply, which puts some kind of limitation on my sense of autonomy. However, I am now (as I was not when I was growing up) free to be who I naturally am sexually. The fact that I know myself and how I relate to those around me means I can choose my own path through the maze of unequal options.

At this point, I think that it is proper to clarify that I do understand that the terms "consequences to both choices have to be comparable" and "all options have to be ... equally valued" refer more to social than personal values and consequences. With such things as the "extreme" porn law that comes into force on the 26th January, for example, is a clear way in which the social consequences of my sexuality are unequal to those of a vanilla person's sexuality. This curtails my sexual autonomy. In British law, sadomasochism is very risky because of such rulings as the Spanner judgement (if it leaves more than "trifling and transient" marks, then both the sadist and the consenting masochist are liable to a prison sentence). On a more social than legal level, I do not feel that I can go out as my crossdressed self - the fact that I know I cannot pass as "genuinely" female means that there will be consequences that are undoubtedly negative; depending on my luck, they could be pretty severe, too.

However, reflecting back to my initial comment, it is reasonable to point out again that my sexuality is NOT a choice, it is not something picked with free and autonomous decision-making. It is who I am. That is why such social curtailments of autonomy and freedom are so costly to so many.

I will close with a reference to Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories. I am particualrly fond of The Cat Who Walked By Himself, who represents a free and autonomous spirit (compared to the enslaved spirits of the other animals), and his repeated phrase is, "I am the cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me". Much as I admire that spirit, for me when it comes to sex and sexuality, all places are not alike.

Criminal-lovin' funsters

I'm not usually one for trawling around the radfem blogs looking for fights, and today would be no exception except for the fact that "Cows gone Wilde", the blog of Polly Styrene, turned up as a response in a google search for "Snowdrop explodes" that was a referring URL in my stats counter. So, I trundled over to see what the reference to lil' ole me might be. It looks as though whatever it was has been edited out since (which don't make no kinda sense to me, but hey), because when I searched the blog for "snowdrop", it came back "it looks like what you're looking for isn't here" (the existential irony of which I found quite amusing, both on a practical level and on a figurative or metaphorical level).

Normally when I end up picking a fight with a radfem post it's because some sex-positive blogger or another has posted a link, and the fight has already started without me.

All of which preamble leads to me finding a fight with Ms. Styrene. The fight is something that already started a few days ago now: namely, the fight over the Finnish Model/Jacqui Smith Model of prostitution control that New Labour are going to push through if they can. This post's title is a reference to my contention that the new law will work in favour of the criminally-minded - that is, those who are intent upon doing violence to sex workers.

Polly Styrene is of that family of radfems who love to talk about using "logic" to support their arguments, and suggesting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is lacking in logical and analytical skills.

I am of that family of feminists who studied logic as a part of my degree course, and who has a very strong background in rhetorical and logical debate. So let's have a look at Ms. Styrene's "logic".

...whenever a new piece of legislation is proposed, the likes of Benjie Westwood [campaigner against the extreme porn laws that come into force on 26th January], ... get the idea that the legal process operates like this.

1)Law is passed:

2)Immediately, by a magical process all people who break said law are immediately transported to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect £200. Where they languish in irons being fed bread and water

Now, my first remark to this is that this actually seems to be the way that New Labour think, and not those who campaign against their draconian measures.

But Ms. Styrene continues thus:

No of course that doesn’t happen. What happens is this. New law is passed. No one is prosecuted.

Which will come as a surprise to those who have been prosecuted under, for example, the anti-terror legislation.

Now, what follows is where logic really falls through the looking glass (or down the rabbit hole):

Ms Styrene quotes accurately the fact that the Finnish Model, in Finland, has thus far failed to result in a single conviction. She also quotes Jenny McCartney with the reasonable point that actually proving in a court of law that a sex worker was controlled for another's gain (i.e. was a prostituted woman) would be close to impossible.

I have no problem with this step in the logic chain. It starts to go a bit funny next, though, because Ms Styrene goes on to say:

In other words the legislation is designed to DETER clients of sex workers from going to places where women might be controlled in the first place.

Oddly enough, this is exactly what people opposed to the new laws are saying. The logic FAIL here isn't in the conclusion, it's in the supposed effects of that conclusion. Ms Styrene thinks that what will happen is:

...they lose their trade, and then stop operating.

As I pointed out in my essay "Sex Work into - What Work?" sex workers will tend to return to sex work as their only viable source of income unless there is very robust support for them getting out - which in Jacqui Smith's programme, there just isn't. Similarly, the evidence from Finland and Sweden is that punters don't stop seeking out prostitutes, it is just that they are more cautious about how they do so. And the more law-abiding, less violent punters are the ones who are deterred, while the violent and dangerous ones are not.

Ms Styrene acknowledges the truth of this, and the falseness of her previous statement, in the very next paragraph:

Now of course amateur social worker Douglas Fox is going to get upset about this. He will have to move to a less salubrious part of town than Gosforth. But you know what, it just might work.

The disconnect is only in Ms Styrene's mind. Because it follows from this that, if Mr. Fox has to move from Gosforth to "a less salubrious part of town", does it not also follow that streetwalker prostitutes will also have to move to even less salubrious parts of town than where they already operate? Opponents of the law say it will, and they say that this is because the crackdown will mean that prostitutes have to operate in darker, more dangerous areas, in order to pick up custom. Which, as explained above, they will continue to need to do. It doesn't matter whether it is the hooker or the john who is targeted by the law, whenever there is a crackdown by the police, it has this effect. This has been documented time and again, both in Sweden (where the johns are the target), and in Britain (where the hookers are).

But let's continue, and see what else Ms Styrene thinks is logical:

Now none of this will threaten street sex workers - the most ludicrous claim I have heard in this whole debate is that they will have less time to assess if a client is dangerous. Because the police might screech up and arrest them if they take two minutes instead of three. Behave. The police NEVER arrest kerb crawlers (kerb crawling is already illegal) in my considerable experience of living in a red light district. And how exactly is a women meant to judge if a man is dangerous anyway. Look for the ‘violent rapist’ tattoo all violent rapists have?

There are three points to be made here. Firstly, what is currently illegal is "persistent" kerb crawling - a car would have to go a few times around the block before an arrest would be proper. Ms. Smith's proposals are to change that and make any kerb crawling illegal. Ms Styrene, this is called "knowing one's facts". The second point is that it doesn't matter whether the police actually will act. As Ms Styrene herself already made clear, the purpose of the new laws is not to create arrests, but to create a fear of being arrested. That means that punters will feel as though they have less time to purchase the sexual services of a woman, and that if a woman takes too long to decide whether or not to accept his money, she will lose his custom.

Finally, I get sick and tired of this argument: "how exactly is a women meant to judge if a man is dangerous anyway. Look for the ‘violent rapist’ tattoo all violent rapists have?" No. One might instead imagine (I don't know, not having done sex work, and not having read any detailed explanation by anyone who has been a streetwalker) that the assessment of the threat level represented by a client is performed based on such things as: body language, tone of voice, language use, behaviour. Of course a dangerous person (especially an accomplished psychopath) may well be able to disguise any "tells" in those points, but the more time a prostitute has to observe the potential client, the more data she has on which to build an assessment of whether he is likely to be dangerous. Furthermore, reports from sex workers in Sweden suggest that the possibility of being arrested tends to put extra anxiety on the would-be client which can throw off the "read" of his demeanour and make it harder to decide whether a person is likely to be a threat.

Oh you’re saying it will drive sex workers ONTO the street. Well here’s an idea for the Marxists of the ECP and IUSW. Encourage women to work collectively. You heard. Draw up a proper agreement as a collective. Douglas Fox’s lawyers might help. Then there’s no question of being controlled for gain.

Welcome to epic logic FAIL #2. Earlier we had Ms Styrene proclaiming, "the legislation is designed to DETER clients of sex workers..." and that nobody was likely to be arrested over it. But now, apparently, it can all be made good just by some fancy legal twists, and the clients will presumably just come flooding back in. The problem being that for the clients, no amount of "legal" paperwork is ever going to be enough to make the certain that they can visit the establishment without breaking the law. That is the whole point of the "deterrent" aspect of this legislation, as Ms Styrene and Ms McCartney pointed out. Incidentally, as far as I am aware, operating as a collective (i.e. forming a brothel) is actually illegal in the UK (I have heard no news that this will be changed by Ms Smith's proposed legislation), and the legal document would form an "immoral contract" that had no legal weight. On the other hand, there is at least one country in the world where it is explicitly legal to create such a collective. That country is, of course, New Zealand - where sex work has been completely decriminalised.

Ms Styrene continues:

Running brothels is already illegal. But they exist in every town and are usually advertised in the local newspaper - they’re called saunas! Soliciting and kerb crawling are already illegal, but in every town you see street sex workers. So the ‘underground’ that apparently sex work is going to be driven into - are we talking like - tunnels? - already exists. And everyone knows about it.

The "underground" referred to is the dangerous, dark, hidden areas. Figuratively, yes - we are talking like tunnels. We are talking about driving sex workers into the areas inhabited only by dangerous, vicious, deadly rats. As I explained above, sex workers in the UK are familiar with this danger from countless "crackdowns" by police forces around the country. While ever sex work is a subject of criminal investigation just because it's sex work then sex workers will have to hide in places where nobody sees their potential attackers except them. And that favours only the attackers.

Now, I do not feel that this piece would be complete until I dealt with a couple of the canards put forward in the comments thread at Polly Styrene's post, so let's have at them:

From 'v':

i see this legislation as a first step - if they acknowledge the punters as criminals in these limited situations, they have to acknowledge the victims of the crime too.

Lovely idea, but whom are you defining as the victim of kerb crawling, for example? And, if you're talking about the trafficked women who are supposedly going to be protected by this law, most of the time they end up getting deported - where they end up back in the hands of the traffickers (at least, this is the evidence of the Swedish Model).

From pisaquaririse:

There’s also that Logic Gem that suggests *fully criminalized* areas will only go FURTHER underground with a swedish-style DEcriminalization policy.

Not quite sure to what this is referring here. I don't recall anyone suggesting anything quite of this ilk, but anyway, let's recap my point from earlier: "The crackdown will mean that prostitutes have to operate in darker, more dangerous areas, in order to pick up custom... It doesn't matter whether it is the hooker or the john who is targeted by the law, whenever there is a crackdown by the police, it has this effect." And this is exactly what we hear from Swedish sex workers about the effect of the Swedish Model on their safety.

We can also follow the logic back to Ms Styrene's own arguments: "Despite the fact that Douglas Fox ... was charged with living off immoral earnings" ... "Douglas Fox is going to get upset about this. He will have to move to a less salubrious part of town than Gosforth." One example of a criminalised area going further underground? Let's see what else Ms Styrene has to say: "Running brothels is already illegal. But they exist in every town and are usually advertised in the local newspaper - they’re called saunas! Soliciting and kerb crawling are already illegal, but in every town you see street sex workers." Now, I don't know about you, dear reader, but to me that says that there is indeed a "further underground" to which these illegal activities might be driven. But Ms Styrene and pisaquaririse ridicule the idea that that might happen, or that it might be harmful to sex workers.

But my conclusions is this: there is no evidence at all that these proposed laws will do anything to help the most vulnerable and most exploited among sex workers and prostituted women. And there is strong evidence from Swedish sex workers' experiences, and from the experiences of British sex workers whenever the police decide to crack down on prostitution, that it will make their lives more dangerous and more difficult.

New Sidebar Stuffs

I've recently added a couple more things to the sidebar here.

Most recent is "Songs in the Key of Snowdrop", which is making use of a new feature that Blogger have added. which enables snippets of songs to be played on my blog, and you can follow a link to find out more about the songs (and hear the full track). I've compiled a list of ten songs that I feel say something about me (though I shall leave the astute reader/listener to decipher what exactly in each song I feel is relevant to my life). Click, listen, enjoy, ponder!

Slightly less recent, and discovered via Trinity, is "Crush on Me". I am slightly disappointed that so far, nobody has a crush on me at all - I thought at the very least that troll from my moobz post would have signed up on it! So come on ladies (and gents, and genderqueers, and anyone else, really!) you know you find me devastatingly sexy and attractive really, so let me know all about it, eh?

I mean, while ever it says "0 people like me", I might as well go in the garden and eat worms...

UPDATE:

I am no longer eating worms in the garden. Somebody likes me!

The Fear Imperative

I was originally going to call this post "Androphobia", because I want to talk a bit about how the Patriarchal memetic organism self-replicates through fear of men, both by women and by other men. However, I decided to google the term before I went ahead and used it as a personal coinage, and what came back was the official definition is, "abnormal fear of men". And obviously, my whole point was going to be that fear of men isn't "abnormal", but instead is endemic and a part of how the current social order is upheld - it is so "normal" that it is almost invisible in the way that it works until you start to stop working with it and go against what is ingrained.

In one of those incredible dual processes (like the way that women are at one the sex-class and the no-sex-class), boys are conditioned for their role in two almost diametrically opposed ways, both of which will be very familiar.

First, there is the "boys will be boys" approach, which is a licence to young males to be uncontrolled in certain forms of expression.

Second, there is "Toughen him up", which teaches them to fear other males.

Falling between these and incorporating elements of both, there is the whole process of male gender indoctrination. For example, "toughen him up" not only teaches fear of other males, but often explicitly teaches by aversion the avoidance of "feminine" traits. "Boys will be boys", in later life, excuses and encourages sexual predatory attitudes and forms a basis for what is termed "rape culture". The toxic mix of "you may act unfettered" combined with deeply scored furrows that define exactly where and how one may act in an unfettered fashion is what builds the male "enforcer" role in the Patriarchy. Those furrows ae carved so deeply because they are reinforced by the licence to act without concern for the consequences that one's fellow males enjoy: the moment you express gender non-conformity, you become fair game for them to prove their own adherence. It is this fear of other men that prevents men being able to step out of the norms of performative masculinity.

It would be inappropriate for me personally to comment on the many reasons that women have to fear men. I shall suffice to observe that by the physiological differences of men and women in terms of musculature, height and weight, men tend to have a force advantage over women.

It is on this difference that the "androphobia" that operates to the benefit only of the grand memetic organism (and the detriment of everyone who forms a part of its habitat) is based. The only other observation that needs to be made to complete the picture of its operation in performative masculinity is that, while men are more even by comparison with one another, a very strong man who loses the fear of the men around him will still be vulnerable to the cumulative action of a small number of weaker men: the very conditions that Hobbes described in Leviathan as defining the State of Nature. The "State of Nature" is not a natural state, and Karl Marx demonstrated that all the theories of political economy that in one way or another posited a state of nature were in fact arguing from a purely theoretical case, and not based on reality. Nevertheless, the Hobbesian State of Nature has been produced, or reproduced, in human society!

The response to the androphobic meme-structure can only be for men to act as though we are not afraid of other men. To dare to stand apart from the performative masculinity and the accepted attitudes. Already I think that there are male voices that have made it easier to do this by going there first; with gay rights, especially, gender normativity and performative maleness have been challenged to some degree of success; and in certain circles at least it is now possible to be male and openly feminist (or at least, pro-feminist) without running too great a risk (although I think a certain level of exclusion and othering still invariably occurs from other men for those who do not hide their ethical stance).

But being different still brings with it a real threat of serious violence, whether it's via transphobia, homophobia, or more subtle things (like hatred of goth culture, or targeting the "wimp" who won't go along with rape-culture attitudes). And that is how androphobia is used to reinforce the Patriarchy.

*Snarl-Growl-Gnash-Hiss*

I am feeling generally vicious and fierce and ferocious tonight; my last post, "Moral Outage" describes some of the reasons for that snarly-growliness, but not all. I'm not sure if I even know all the reasons why (maybe it's my time of the month?)

But right now, I want to be put face-to-face with a misogynist, or a slut-shaming feminist, or an MRA rape-apologist, or a fundie Christian homophobe, or... well, you get the idea. I want them there, and I want to take my katana, and lay into them as they try to defend themselves with no wapon to hand but their own weak flesh. I have a fierce hatred and consuming fire burning in my heart tonight, and if any of those groups whom I hate were near, I would be sorely tempted to unleash my fury and violence upon them.

What follows is not exactly a poem, but I wouldn't call it "blank verse" either. It is perhaps a solliloquy from a play that hasn't been written...

*****

I want there to be fire, I want there to be pain, I want there to be blood. I want howling winds, rain like a thousand whips lashing the scene, lightning that threatens to destroy the very heavens and tear the earth to shreds, thunder like the last sound that will ever be heard.

I want my victims' cries to howl like the wind, their tears to flow like the rain, their backs to show the marks of the whip. I want their pain to threaten to tear their worlds to shreds; I want my voice, distorted in might and power, to be the last sound they hear.

But I would give all that and more, if they could just understand.

And in the meantime, I am a sadist, and I know that there are masochists out there who gladly give their bodies to a sadist, to experience the fierce storm, the raging voice, the vicious whip; who will embrace and offer the fire and the pain and the blood. Who will live through it all, and say only, "more!" even as their bodies sag and slump from the strain. Who will survive and grow and thrill to it, and when the dawn comes, when the rain has doused the fires, and the thunder has passed, will still be there, still breathing, and still warm, and say "thank you!"

Moral Outage!

One "Laurelin" of the Radical Feminist persuasion, wrote a piece about "moral outrage".

Strange as it may sound, I agree with the main premise of her argument, namely that there is a place for moral outrage in this world, and that progressives and liberals who use the term as a dismissal or insult are actually making it easier for the Bad Guys to get away with being Bad.

As a feminist, I have long ago signed up in my heart and soul and mind to a principle similar to the one she espouses, although I don't put women's dignity above anyone else's dignity in the way that Laurelin sees fit to do:

an attitude that insists nothing is more important than the dignity of women humanity, of the integrity of their our bodies and minds, with the behaviour to match. The refusal to put anything before that. The refusal to harm others except in defence. The refusal to sell one’s soul.

With the alterations I've made, this is an exposition of Christ's highest commandments: "Love God" and "Love your neighbour". Indeed, Christ would have us no raise a fist or sword in defence on our own behalf, but only on the behalf of our neighbour. It is these commandments above all that characterise my Christian faith and my Christian witness in the world.

At this point, we reach the end of where I agree with Laurelin. I would like to make the obervation here, inspired by Infra's comment @ Renegade Evolution's blog, that "moral outrage" is inherently a privileged position to take. If you don't have privilege, then moral outrage is out of reach, and purely academic to your continued need to survive and make ends meet. While you're busy feeling outraged, someone is out there struggling to survive, maybe even struggling to survive those very deeds that make you "outraged".

But the online radfem community has not been as firm in adhering to the commandment to uphold and defend, "the dignity of women" or the "integrity of their bodies and minds". They have avowedly put ideology before these, and before "refusal to harm others except in defence".

Whenever it comes to sex work (whether it's pornography, prostitution, stripping or whatever other branch you care to mention) suddenly the voices of those who are in those industries are meaningless. For example, in the recent debates about Jacqui Smith's plan to bring the "Finnish Model" (which is a modification of the Swedish Model) into British law, the lives and experience of actual sex workers, both male and female, have been routinely dismissed and disparaged by those in favour of the laws. This is even in cases where the evidence of those same women, in Scotland, in Sweden, and presumably in Finland (where the law has been in place for a few years, and has yet to result in a single conviction, so it clearly isn't helping anyone), is that these laws harm women. The radfem crowd would gladly push through laws that will harm women (and have been proven to do so) just because those laws suit their ideological viewpoint.

The shit with which stripper and porn performer Renegade Evolution has had to put up over the past few years from these people has been incredible. She has had threats made against her, abuse hurled at her, had her reports of her experiences and life denied, or twisted beyond all recognition, in the hands of radfem bloggers. She is a woman, but whatever happened to her "dignity", her "integrity of body and mind", and "doing no harm"? Our Lord Jesus Christ had some advice for situations like this, too: "take the plank out of your own eye before you seek to remove the mote from your brother's[sister's] eye." Indeed, it sometimes seems as though anyone (and somehow, especially if she's a woman!) who expresses a positive attitude towards performing any form of sex work is instantly regarded as sub-human and worthy only of contempt by these people.

I blame Laurelin and her ilk, not for their "moral outrage" (which I feel too), but for their total moral outage whenever these discussions arise. Indeed, whenever they bring their dismissive, slut-shaming, woman-hating comments to the sex work debates, I feel something towards them. I feel...

Moral outrage.

MP's reply re: Jacqui Smith's plans

The New Labour government's recently unveiled plans to change the laws concerning prostitution have been tackled at length in the feminist blogosphere (the link leads to Caroline's collection of resources on the matter).

In response to Caroline's call for UK residents to contact their MP, I wrote an email to my MP asking him to oppose the proposed changes.

The substance of his reply was as follows:

...The acts of buying or selling sex will remain legal but new measures aimed to deter people from paying for sex, in order to reduce demand will be brought forward. The Government plans to create a new offence of paying for sex with someone who is under the control of another person who will profit financially. New measures would also allow kerb-crawlers to be prosecuted for a first-time offence. My concern, however, is that new legislation is not the answer and that the Government’s proposals will not protect the most vulnerable victims. I believe that the Government has a duty to uphold existing legislation more thoroughly, before it introduces yet more legislation.

The number of people convicted or cautioned for the existing offence of kerb crawling has dropped from 1,998 in 2002 to 1,431 in 2006 whilst convictions for trafficking for sexual exploitation fell by 40 per cent last year, from 30 in 2006 to 17 in 2007. Indeed, former Home Office Minister, Fiona Mactaggart, warned that the new offence will be unworkable in practice.

In particular, we [the Conservative Party] would introduce a number of practical measures to deal with the problem of women trafficked into prostitution:

• Establishing separate interviews at all airports for women and children travelling alone with an adult who is not a parent, guardian or husband, to identify potential victims;
• Ensuring that each police force and local authority has a strategy for dealing with suspected victims of trafficking;
• Focusing on maximising the use of places in safe houses for trafficking victims, and revising the regulatory framework so that 16-18 year olds can be admitted to the Poppy Project.

I think there have been very few times in my life where I could say that I think the Tories are onto something. I despise the Conservative Party and just about everything they stand for, but I do respect my MP as someone who takes seriously his job as a representative of the people in his constituency. It is certainly encouraging to see that the wrong-headedness of the New Labour policy is understood by MPs.

Lament of the Streetwalker

This is just to flag up a fabulous poem by Alexa @ The Real Princess Diaries:

Lament of the Streetwalker

Contrary to what the abolitionists (and those favouring the Swedish Model) would have people believe, it is the people whose experiences are described in that poem (based on evidence collected directly from street sex workers) about whom the sex-positive, pro-decriminalisation are concerned.

We can't save people we can't see. While ever these people have to hide from the law in order to do their business, they are at risk, vulnerable to the abusive clients from whom they need protecting, harder to contact and harder to help out of poverty, addiction and worse. And as long as the clients are criminalised (Swedish Model) or the prostitutes themselves are criminalised (traditional model) they still have to hide in order to do their business. And they will continue to do their trade however dangerous you make it, and however hard you make it to make enough to make ends meet, because the alternative is starvation, homelessness, violence from an unsatisfied pimp, hideous withdrawal symptoms, or any combination of these. To these women, the abolitionist/Swedish Model position as as useful as an un-inflated rubber ring thrown to a drowning person at sea.

Get your (rugby) tackle out!

This is a couple of weeks behind the times, but I have just come across (oo-er, missus!) the following story from the local region's newspaper:

Crowborough sportsmen in cheeky fundraiser

I encourage all my regular readers to order a copy - I'm sure if you send an email to the chairman (their contact details are found at their website, Crowborough Rugby) and offer to pay the overseas postage in addition to the asking price, they'd be happy to send one to you! (At a rough guess, $18-$20 US ought to cover it)

I like it because it is also something that is out of the ordinary for men to do - that is, pose naked for the camera. Nudity, by its associations with sexuality, tends to be seen within the patriarchal framework as the preserve of the female form - especially when you're thinking of nude calendars. In the indoors picture featured in the newspaper (it's the second picture in the online version, you need to click to see it), I also love that one of the guys in the picture is wearing what looks like a little frilly "French maid" pinny as he serves the wine!

More Manefist Manifesto

Penny Red has written as fine an exposition of what I'm about with my blog, as anyone has. Go read it now!

More manefist manifesto

"Leadership" and whatnot

This is a little late, but inspired by a post by Trinity about the word "leader", and also how concepts of leadership relate to D/s.

I think people have a tendency to decide that dominant folks in the BDSM sense are "natural leaders" and that's never made sense to me.

I think I probably agree with this statement, in that there is nothing about one's BDSM orientation (or lack thereof) that is either sufficient or necessary for one's role in the rest of society at large. Some of the most Dominant folks can be the most timid in any other situation.

Trinity then offers some suggestions for what the term "leader" means:

A leader can be any number of things: an effective military commander, a gifted teacher, a loving parent, a charismatic inciter of protests (hell, if all we're looking at is "can get people to follow her", a charismatic inciter of RIOTS works too), a disciplined trainer, a manager skilled at organizing and delegating tasks, a person who sticks to her principles and in so doing inspires others, a role model, a person with "command presence," a person skilled at winning in direct confrontations

However, I think I need to pick this list apart a bit.

For example, "an effective military commander" need not be a particularly good leader; battles and wars are won by good tactics and an overall strategy, which are then implemented by one's troops. How one gets those troops to do as they are told is immaterial. While Alexander the Great may have inspired his troops by his own example, other successful ancient civilisations were successful by far more brutal methods.

"A gifted teacher" does not strike me as "leading", but only as communicating. While she may very well be inspirational, and cause her pupils to go on to greater things, she herself does not lead.

"A loving parent" is also not a role that sits well with my conception of a "leader", and once again I see the role as potentially inspirational, but it is one that inspires someone else to be potentially a leader themselves, but does not actually involve being a leader.

It seems to me that "a disciplined trainer" is again someone who puts others in the place to be leaders. I can think of counter-examples, whereby through disciplined training people can end up feeling a sense of loyalty for the trainer, and be willing to follow them (the Are You Tough Enough for the SAS? television programme on the BBC demonstrated this when a collectyion of civilian volunteers were tested by an SAS sergeant to see if they might come close to passing the selection trials that SAS candidates must endure - by the end of the course, the civilians were saying that they would follow him and his orders no matter what they were). However, I do not think that it is necessary that "a disciplined trainer" will also be a good leader.

When it comes to being "a manager skilled at organizing and delegating tasks", I think that the defining feature is in fact manager and not "leader". To my mind, the leader is the one who decides where you're going, and the manager described here is the one who sets the course. I recently re-watched the episode of West Wing, "Let Bartlet be Bartlet" and this distinction is made very clear in the conclusion there: Bartlet (President) is the leader, and McGarry (Chief of Staff) is the manager. Those are their jobs, and the roles that those jobs encompass.

I think that "a person skilled at winning in direct confrontations" is unlikely to fit my idea of a leader. If the confrontations are physical, then it makes them a good fighter. If they are verbal, then she is either a good debater or else simply stubborn.

That leaves the following as people whom I think might fit the term "leader":

• a person who sticks to her principles and in so doing inspires others,
• a role model,
• a person with "command presence,"
• a charismatic inciter of protests (hell, if all we're looking at is "can get people to follow her", a charismatic inciter of RIOTS works too)

It's worth looking again at the concepts that seem to be common to these ideas, and also at the concepts that are encapsulated in the suggestions that I rejected.

I frequently mentioned "inspiration" as a quality possessed by some of the types of people rejected, and that term also appears explicitly in the above list as well.

Managers and military commanders, and perhaps "command presence", all involve being in charge, and making decisions. This sense of being "in charge" I think is for some people sufficient to describe someone as being a "leader". To my mind it is not sufficient, but it is I think a necessary component of the term.

In fact, looking at the rejections, it appears that some (like the military commander) I rejected for not "inspiring", and others (like the teacher) I rejected for not "being in charge" in the sense of making the decisions for others.

Two quotations from popular culture:

In 2010, the sequel to 2001: A Space Odyssey, Arthur C. Clark had a character remark that, "A leader can be right, or can be wrong, but must never be uncertain" - i.e a leader must be able to make decisions and act upon them. I should add at this point that this does not preclude a leader canvassing opinions from her followers, but having heard those opinions, she makes the decision firmly.

In West Wing, Vice-President Bob Russell says, "A leader with no followers is just a guy taking a walk." That is, a leader is someone whose decisions carry the respect of others so that they go along with them (by choice and not by coercion).

The thing common to all the things I marked as possibly being "leadership", is that they are all active roles - the principled person who inspires others is someone who is leading by example, and remains a figure in the events, as does the role model. The inciter of protest participates in the protest herself, or else quickly loses the inspirational role.

Therefore, my conception of a leader is someone who is actively involved, is taking charge (or making decisions) and who inspires others to follow those decisions.

Now, I personally think that making decisions is a central part of being a Dominant. Others disagree, and while I suspect some of that may come down to different conceptions of the words, it also suggests different conceptions of Dominance also, and so to declare it an essential, or necessary, part of Dominance would be premature. I don't think there can be much controversy over a Dominant being actively involved (even where not being physically involved, I believe a Dominant's mind must always be at the forefront and actively engaged with what is going on). However, I think "inspires others" is definitely not an essential part of being a Dominant.

At first glance, in the romanticised version of Domhood, "inspiring" obedience is heavily stressed and idolised. And there are certainly D/s relationships where the Submissive partner feels inspired by hir love for hir Dominant to test hir limits and push beyond what zie might otherwise have believed hirself capable or willing to experience. However, I think we need to draw away from these romanticised views.

As implied above, I think that "inspiration" in the sense that is being used here carries at least a small connotation of "motivating to pushing oneself further", wither for 'the cause" or out of Submission, or some other reason. To me, it implies "what I was once unwilling to do, I now feel gladly willing to do". Again, while this plays a large role in the romanticised "erotic literature" surrounding BDSM, and while many long-term couples do report such inspiration occurring, I do not feel that it is in any way central or required of D/s, and in fact in some ways it might seem questionable in terms of the relationship with informed consent.

To my mind, whereas a leader inspires hir followers to some new action, and thus draws followers to herself, in a D/s setting it is the Submissive partner who seeks out a Dominant and agrees willingly and eagerly to accept the obedient role. The Submissive is inspired by no one to do this, except perhaps by her own sexuality (and that is perhaps a different usage of "inspiration" anyway). A Dominant clearly does not need the qualities of a leader to "inspire".

I have one other thought on this, to explain why, if Dominants need not be leaders, equally, a leader need not make a good Dominant:

It seems to me that leadership is inherently an impersonal relationship, however close people may feel to their leader. A leader is someone who projects her talent as a leader to many others, and who inevitably has a hierarchical relationship to those others. Also, it is all about shaping interactions with the outside world.

D/s on the other hand is inherently a personal relationship: it is about the interaction of two (or possibly more) people on a personal level, about their personal desires and how those mesh together within the relationship itself. It need not have any external dimension at all, and while the roles are different within the relationship, in order for it to be stable the partners must recognise one another as being equal and not hierarchical.

Therefore, the skills that make one a good leader are not necessarily going to be any use in making one a good Dominant.