Last week Newsweek published an article covering an extensive study on men who buy sex done by Melissa Farley, director of Prostitution Research and Education. The study revealed that which is known by many feminists, critics of the sex industry, abolitionists and even, I would go so far as to speculate, that which is known by most men (though whether or not they perceive this as problem is a whole other issue). That is, as one man put it, buying sex means: ‘you’re supporting a system of degradation.’
Because the many various forms of buying sex are so normalized in our culture, Farley noted that the researchers had trouble finding men to interview who actually didn’t buy sex. Activities like going to strip clubs and using pornography are simply seen as things that men do, not as activities that exist within a system that has married capitalism and patriarchy in a way that makes women and women’s bodies and sexualities products that are marketed, bought and sold.
Critiques of this study and the Newsweek article were indignant. How DARE we insult the male porn users of the world! Don’t you think their feelings will be hurt? Don’t you think they will be angered to be grouped in with other men who share their view of women as sexualized objects? What about their penises?! How will THEY feel? I can’t imagine that it is very comfortable to be confronted by the reality that your pleasure may not be as ethical as you would like to believe. I can imagine that, after having spent years telling yourself that degradation is hot and it is your right to access said degradation whenever the urge strikes you, it would indeed feel like an affront to your image of yourself as a ‘normal’ and decent man whose penis deserves respectdammit! if someone were to tell you that you too, like those poor, sad, lonely johns, were purchasing women’s bodies and, in that sense, you were buying sex from women.
In a piece written by Tracy Clark-Flory for Salon, she makes note of this, sure to point out the ways in which men are likely to be offended by such an insinuation, pointing us to a tweet from sex columnist Rachel Kramer Bussel, who wrote: “Dear @Newsweek — I wonder what would happen if everyone who’s watched porn, given/gotten a lap dance or erotic massage stopped reading you.” And you know, I think she was right to point this out. I mean, we don’t need to look very far to see why the sex industry is so massive and so normalized. What Clark-Flory made very clear was that, indeed, men hold power in this world and there is little we can do to challenge these industries because their power is vast. What if every man who had ever watched porn stopped reading Newsweek? Well, they’d lose a lot of readers, that’s for sure.
While Clark-Flory’s point was not, I don’t imagine, to point to the ways in which male power really does make the world go ’round and has an incredible impact on what we view as ‘perfectly natural’ in our society, she did. We are all, just has she and Bussel point out, under threat. I mean, if we suddenly told men that they couldn’t buy sex anymore and that women’s bodies were no longer for sale, not in any form, they would probably be pretty choked. They would probably wield their power as best they could. No one gives up privilege easily.
Are we really surprised to hear that “[T]he attitudes and habits of sex buyers reveal them as men who dehumanize and commodify women, view them with anger and contempt, lack empathy for their suffering, and relish their own ability to inflict pain and degradation.”? Are we surprised that men who treat women as objects don’t feel empathy for them or view them as human beings? Of course not. That is, after all, how this whole system works.
What is surprising, though, is that so many of these critiques of Farley’s study are aghast that 
this research would be “conducted by self-declared prostitution “abolitionist”. What! A feminist? Doing critical research on men who commodify women? Well, now I’ve seen everything. Clark-Flory writes about Farley’s abolitionist stance as though she has revealed some dark and hidden secret; pointing out that Newsweek doesn’t mention Farley’s ‘view that prostitution is inherently harmful and should be eradicated’ ‘until more than halfway through the article’.
She, and others, call this a ‘red flag’. A sex worker blog, Tits and Sass, also represents the discovery of this information (which is, in no way a secret, though these writers seem to think they are outing Farley in some way, as though being an abolitionist is something to be ashamed of) as though it has been discovered via some kind of incredible investigative reporting: ‘She’s a self professed “abolitionist”. Dun dun DUNNNN. Is there any particular reason why a feminist, who is critical of prostitution and pornography, who is working to end this form of normalized misogyny, would not do this particular kind of research? Why this research would or should be viewed as invalid because it was someone with a well developed feminist analysis of the sex industry who did the research? Who, exactly, should be doing this research? Who would be viewed as a credible source, a credible researcher? Maaaybe….This guy? For some reason I’m not hearing any great objections to a white man doing research on johns whose sole goal is to ‘prove’ that they are just regular guys, that they are not violent or abusive, just, you know, men who think they have the right to purchase sex from women? I mean, these are all just married, educated men! Which is, of course, exactly the point. It isn’t just freaks and losers who buy sex. It is men with privilege, men with families, men with wives, men with jobs and educations and social lives. Or not. The point is that the vast majority of men think that buying sex is ‘normal’ and that it should be their right.
Clark-Flory unintentionally points to a common assumption that contradicts Atchison’s study, quoting journalist Susanna Breslin who says that in her research she: “…found that most men seek out sex workers for one simple fact: they are lonely. They are looking for companionship, they crave intimacy, they are looking for some kind of a connection, and because they cannot find it any other way, they buy it.”
It would seem as though any research that normalizes the buying of sex is credible. Even if it is contradictory. Are these guys just friendly, normal, married men? Or are they lonely social outcasts? Who cares. The moral of the story is that buying sex is ‘normal’. It is ok. And any research that seeks to prove this point is credible. Feminist research on the other hand, done by a woman who has been involved in feminist activism challenging pornography, who *gasp* ‘enter[ed] stores that sell Penthouse and destroy[ed] copies of the magazine in protest.’ (again, how DARE she! Not the sacred pornography!), who is, according to some, ‘biased’ because she is a feminist, is without credibility. What does this mean for the future of feminist research? If feminism is a bias, who gets to do the studies? Let’s just leave it to those completely unbiased white men, right? Let’s just leave it all up to the, as Charlotte Shane writes, in her post on Tits and Sass, the ‘real academics’ [one can only assume Shane did some serious detective work to figure out who the 'real' vs the 'fake' academics are (hint: they are 'like scientists')]. Essentially, what I’m picking up here is that anyone who doesn’t give men the respect they demand deserve have worked very hard to have earned (hey, they can’t help it if women are saddled with oppressive vaginas) and challenges dominant ideology and who doesn’t base their research on a patriarchal mode of thinking that tells us men have an uncontrollable, biological urge to objectify women, is without credibility. Anyone who dares to point out the obvious, that is “that sex buyers were more likely to view sex as divorced from personal relationships than nonbuyers, and they enjoyed the absence of emotional involvement with prostitutes, whom they saw as commodities,” that “Prostitution treats women as objects and not … humans,” is ‘biased’ and not to be trusted.
Whether it is pornography or a lap dance or the purchasing of an ‘erotic massage’, the underlying idea is the same. Women are for sale. And anyone who claims otherwise must be silenced. Whether it be under threat that those who publish or cover this kind of research will lose readers or by claiming that having credentials as a feminist activist deems a researcher untrustworthy and ‘not a real academic’, we can’t have this kind of talk.
What’s that feminism? Shhh…The men will hear you…
Tags: 'sex-positive' feminism, Chris Atchison, feminism, johns, male privilege, Melissa Farley, men who buy sex, Misogyny, Pornography, prostitution, Sex Work, Violence Against Women
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Ah, yes, the old shtick of how everyone who condones the system is a legitimate researcher but anyone who opposes it is suddenly “biased”.
So, we meet again… Postmodernism.
The fact that you use the term “outing” is interesting. As a queer lady and an abolitionist (identifying as the former much longer than the later) I’ve thought to myself many times that telling your feminist friends and colleagues that you’re an abolitionist can feel a lot like coming out: you have to screw up your courage to correct those who assume that, because you’re a feminist, you identify with sex-work advocacy and you wonder if it’ll change how they see you in a fundamental way. Just to be super clear: I’m not saying that “coming out” as an abolitionist is the same as coming out as queer, but that in my own personal experience, the anxiety I have relating to telling people I’m an abolitionist has similarities with the anxiety I felt when first coming out as queer.
I am not qualified to speak to the scientific rigour of this study. However, it is a perfectly common and reasonable reaction to question the validity of scientific research published by individuals with a clear bias on the subject, e.g. research conducted by big oil that casts doubt on global warming. This will especially be true if it is perceived that the individual publishing the study is seen to lack a scientific background in the specific field of science being studied. If an astronomer publishes a study in the field of agricultural science, it will raise eyebrows. I have no idea idea of this researcher’s background in statistical sciences. My point here is that one should not be shocked, and certainly not indignant, when the credibility of a research study published by someone with a clear bias is called into question. That’s perfectly normal. I am not saying it IS bad science, I am not qualified to judge, but bad science is bad science.
Totally. But how often are studies questioned, in terms of their credibility, based on the fact that the researcher is biased as a white man, for example? I mean, that could potentially create a bias, no? Let’s be honest. There is no single person in the world who isn’t biased. We all come from different places and have different lives and experiences. Of course research needs to be solid and transparent in this regard, but should abolitionists not do research on johns and prostitution? Who will do this research? And, as of yet, I haven’t read any indignant articles about this study, done by a privileged white man: http://www.johnsvoice.ca/ Why not? He and his supervisor both have the ‘bias’ of being de-crim advocates!
Studies are questioned in terms of their credibility, based on bias, all the time. Cognitive bias, especially confirmation bias, is something that has to be guarded against constantly. Scientists develop hypotheses, develop experiments to test them, and desperately want their results to prove what they believe. It doesn’t matter if it is a research study on prostitution, or a study of the mating habits of slugs. This is a major pitfall in conducting scientific studies. The principal way in which scientists guard against their own bias is by trying to prove themselves wrong, with all their might. They examine every conceivable way in which their study could be flawed, and every avenue by which bias could have crept into their findings. If they do a crappy job of doing that, you can be sure they will be absolutely torn apart in the peer review phase. I think it is fairly obvious that when the area of study has such a strong political component, the potential for bias to creep in is even greater, and the researcher really needs to guard against this – and do an absolutely stellar job of showing that they have defended against it. Any failure to do so is absolutely guaranteed to be met with a great deal of scepticism, on purely scientific grounds, regardless of ideology. If you want to wave a research study in the air and claim it proves what you say it does, it better do a good job of that, or it’s not worth the paper it is printed on. A study of the mating habits of slugs, or the sex buying habits of johns, it’s all the same.
Ok. But what I am critiquing is these articles which claim the study is not credible on the basis that Farley is an abolitionist AND because (in the case of the Clark-Flory article) they don’t agree with Farley’s definition of ‘buying sex’. I don’t think that Farley being an abolitionist means that her research isn’t valuable. Also, feminists are quite often accused of being ‘biased’ and therefore not credible. I simply don’t believe that feminism is a ‘bias.
Having a political agenda, in the context of scientific research, is most assuredly a bias* risk. If a scientist has a political agenda, and they produce scientific results that perfectly conform to their political agenda, it is to be expected that the question of bias is going to arise. The methodology is going to be called into question as a matter of course. That’s not a patriarchy/feminism fact of life, that’s a good science/bad science fact of life. It doesn’t mean her methodology IS flawed, or that her research isn’t valuable, it means it is going to come under a greater degree of scrutiny as a result of her political agenda. Scientific findings are questioned all the time when it becomes clear that research was produced by or for those with an evident political agenda. If I was going to be citing this research, I would certainly want to wait until it is peer reviewed, and if it isn’t going to be peer reviewed, I would be curious and suspicious as to why not. Anyone can produce a paper that says anything they want it to. The fact that it agrees with your ideology should actually make you want to see it come under a robust challenge, and see it stand up to it, rather than wish it wasn’t being challenged, or shouldn’t be challenged.
* To be clear, to use the word “bias” in a scientific context is a much less emotionally charged thing than when it is used in a personal sense. It is a pitfall that literally ALL scientists have to be aware of, and there’s an understanding of that. Being aware of it and trying to control for it is just considered correct practice.
Clark-Flory says absolutely nothing about ‘scientific research’. Just that Farley is an abolitionist (which should, apparently, shock us) and that she doesn’t agree with her definition of ‘buying sex’. So one could conclude that her anger at this research and the coverage by Newsweek has little to do with whether or not Farley’s research was or was not ‘bad science’ but rather that she felt Farley’s background in feminist activism was enough grounds upon which to decide Farley’s research is not credible.
Actually, Clark-Flory seems mostly frustrated that men who frequent strip-clubs or use pornography were lumped in with men who buy sex from prostituted women. Lest we offend the delicate sensibilities of porn users who like to see themselves in an entirely different light?
Clark-Flory does reference past criticism of Farley’s methodology, in the first paragraph.
Anyway, I guess what I am saying in response to the question that makes up the subject of this post is yes. Yes, absolutely we should take it as a red flag when individuals or organisations with a clear political agenda produce scientific research that conforms precisely to their ideology. If it is presented as sound scientific data with a solid methodology, it needs to meet a fairly high standard. If you expect public policy to be formed on the basis of research such as this, it needs to meet a very high standard. You yourself should be demanding that studies such as these meet those standards, and have their methodology and conclusions peer-reviewed, otherwise they risk being counter-productive to what the abolitionist movement is trying to achieve. If individuals in the movement are using poor research methodology and cherry-picking data to support their agenda, it is what you might call… problematic.
Anyway… who knows… certainly not me… perhaps Farley’s method and conclusions are utterly flawless. That is what peer-review is there for, to help us untangle fact from cognitive bias.
But I don’t think that the point of the article is to question whether or not this is ‘good science’. I think the point is that Clark-Flory doesn’t like the way in which Farley has conflated the various ways in which men buy sex from women. She doesn’t think porn counts as buying sex. She also thinks this study is not credible because of Farley’s position on prostitution.
I also think that the research produced in favour of de-crim doesn’t get the same kind of criticism because it perpetuates a patriarchal norm and treats prostitution as something that is natural and inevitable. Most of the articles that criticize the Newsweek piece criticize it based on the fact that Farley is an abolitionist and treat this fact as though it were somehow hidden, which it wasn’t. They also are highly defensive about the fact that anyone would dare say what is true, that men who buy sex objectify women, i.e. they see them as less than human. This is little to do with ‘good science’ and much more to do with the fact that, obviously, commodifying women will impact the way in which men see women. I mean, is this even something that we can ‘prove’ with science?? How do you ‘prove’ the male gaze? What is it even that we are trying to ‘prove’? Looking for some kind of data that shows exactly how the objectification of women hurts women and perpetuates inequality isn’t something that you’re going to be able to find via scientific data. Essentially this is an argument that says only male forms of research, only male ways of thinking can find the ‘truth’ and prove facts. As David pointed out: “The appeal that feminists should become more ‘objective’ draws on tropes of unscientific women and rational men.” Telling feminists that they aren’t ‘objective’ enough is always going to win in the fight for ‘good science’ because science has always and will always work against women and minorities. Pretending we are all objective and without bias is dangerous exactly for this reason. We aren’t. But we treat scientific data as though it is without bias even though it has, in large part, been produced by white men.
The fact that Farley is an abolitionist does not impact the credibility of her work, as is implied by Clark-Flory’s article. And the fact that people are so up in arms that a man who gets a lap dance at a strip club is being compared to a man is buys sex from a prostituted woman is telling.
The scientific method is not a “male” form of research, thinking, or pursuit of the truth. Doesn’t that kind of perpetuate the trope of unscientific women and rational men? Men and women are both equally capable of shoddy research and methods, both are equally capable of doing tremendous, epic, world-changing science.
Social sciences are tricky, especially when you are trying to quantify how one group of people differs from another group of people. It’s probably even more susceptible to bias that other areas of science, and literally ALL areas of science are susceptible to it. The results of the study itself do suggest it has proven some quantitative and qualitative facts about how sex buyers differ from non-sex buyers. (I don’t believe it was intending to prove all of the things you say can’t be proved.) The reliability of the study’s findings is going to hinge on the quality of the study’s methodology. I don’t think that’s a particularly crazy assertion. Good methodology = more reliable findings, crappy methodology = less reliable findings. I don’t really accept that it’s a white male bias to say so.
The answer to bad science of the past, as it pertains to gender issues and social issues, is not less science, or no science, or more bad science. The answer to bad science is better science. No, not everything is available to dissection and quantification by science. However, some things are, and when we set out to understand those things through a scientific approach, and prove things through a scientific approach, it is in all our best interest when it is conducted with integrity and with adherence to our best understanding of how to achieve the most reliable findings possible.
I think you completely misunderstand both my point, and science, if you think it is considered “scientific” to assume we are objective and without bias. My point was rather exactly the opposite. It is extremely “scientific” to highlight bias where it exists. Science lives on verification, not trust.
And I think you misunderstood the point of my article. Which was not to argue that feminists should be able to ‘do bad science’ or that women are not capable of doing good research OR that they shouldn’t use good methodology. I was arguing that Farley was being attacked because she is an abolitionist and that this was being used as an excuse to accuse her of doing bad research. Whether or not she used bad methodology, I don’t know. I do know that she would not have been attacked in this way if her research was done in support of de-criminalization or legalization and, as Sam points out, she likely would not have been attacked in this way if she were a man.
“But I don’t think that the point of the article is to question whether or not this is ‘good science’. I think the point is that Clark-Flory doesn’t like the way in which Farley has conflated the various ways in which men buy sex from women. She doesn’t think porn counts as buying sex.”
With all due respect, the operationalization of “buying sex” is a massive methodological issue crucial to any judgment of the quality of the research.
Operationalization of concepts, especially fuzzy or less concrete ones, is an area most susceptible to the bias of the researcher. The rest of the research rests and is built on their definition of the concept.
Like Graham, I can’t comment on the quality of the study you refer to here, but as a professional social researcher, I can tell you that I would be very wary about uncritically accepting the results of a study where the author operationalizes a concept or measure in a manner that doesn’t immediately line up with widely held preconceptions.
“I can’t comment on the quality of the study you refer to here”
Well I certainly feel better knowing analytical heavyweights like you are around to spread your objectivity.
Wow, I’m not sure why what I said is so offensive to you, Cinema, but all it took was a little healthy skepticism for you to break out the snarkiness. Even though I don’t count that as ‘dialogue’, I’ll take a deep breath and pull myself away from paying work for a second to briefly review the methodology of the paper in question. If only to live up to my billing as an “analytical heavyweight”.
“Sex buyers were defined as men who in response to a question from a phone screener acknowledged that they have bought sex from a woman or man in prostitution, escort, sex worker, or massage parlor worker or have exchanged something of value (such as food, drugs, or shelter) for a sex act. We defined non-sex buyers as men who have not purchased phone sex or the services of a sex worker, escort, massage sex worker, or prostitute, have not been to a strip club more than one time in the past year, have not purchased a lap dance, and have not used pornography more than one time in the past week” (p. 10).
Alright, the first problem there is that the sampling: it leaves out an undefined and quite sizable group of men who have not engaged in the sex-buying behaviours identified above, but have viewed pornography more than once in the past week. They fall into some nether-zone that is not analyzed in the paper, and this calls into question the generalizability of the findings, since this un-analyzed group is quite likely a plurality of the overall population sampled.
The assumptions that the authors use to justify this sampling method are contentious. The authors use unpublished data to base their estimates of porn abstainers, and the second (published) study they cite actually states that 48% of college-student respondents used pornography once a week or more, I’m guessing because it implies that 52% don’t use porn at all (unlikely).
Either way, there is precious little discussion justifying the decision to operationalize the groups in that way, and to exclude the responses of non-sex buying men who use porn more than once a week. If the justification to include porn users as “sex-buyers” was so strong, why not simply include those that watched porn but did not visit prostitutes in the sex-buyer group?
Why does this all matter, and why is Tracy Clark-Flory’s critique fair comment? Because the authors themselves use the paper to generalize findings (“Sex buyers engaged in significantly more criminal activity than non-sex buyers,” “The sex buyers and non-sex buyers differed in their self-reported likelihood to rape,” (p.4).) using an operationalization of the study groups that is not face-valid.
They actively compare “sex-buyers” to “non-sex buyers” and make conclusions based on statistical differences between two groups, but that is a false dichotomy based on a cherry-picked operationalization of sex-buying and non-sex-buying that willfully compares two extreme groups (users of prostitutes, and non-porn users). With such a small sample size (n~100), and with such a large amount of error in the demonstrated samples in other published studies (see page 8 of study), I think there is plenty of room for criticism of this study that has nothing at all with the author’s identification as an abolitionist.
Pop quiz!
Q: You’re not the pimp and you’re not the prostitute, but you’re getting your rocks off sexually as a consumer of the sex industry. You are a
A:
1. duck
2. pirate
3. nonentity
4. john
You have the same problem Tracy Flory-Clark has accepting pornography use as a major part of prostitution industry systems. If you know and accept that people in porn are called “sex workers” just like strippers, sex phone operators, and street prostitutes, why exclude porn users from the word we have for men who purchase sex worker services for sexual gratification? The different levels of john needn’t be considered qualitatively the same to warrant consideration.
I can’t comment on what a defensive john you are, but if I could then I’d say your refusal to see the prostituted women being prostituted on the screen while you masturbate to viewing their acts of prostitution is clouding your judgment.
Not agreeing with a core assumption made in the original research is a perfectly valid challenge to it. The study searched for men who were deviant in their lack of use of pornography, and hid that as part of their definition of ‘doesn’t buy sex’. The fact that this selected group is the contrast group, rather than ‘people who did not buy sex’, indicates that the study was designed to provide the results that it did.
Shocking news: “The sex buyers masturbated to pornography more often than non-sex buyers” when one of the defining characteristics is “Frequency of use of pornography” Where
(emphasis added)
A conclusion listed in the summary is literally a restatement of the definition hidden 10 pages into the study. Other claims listed in the summary include a moral policy statement, restatements of conclusions made by studies that used a different definition of buyer, and quotes selected for their demonstration of the conclusions that seem to have been made in advance of the study. Many of the questions are clearly leading, and the spin on them is also clear: When sex buyers agree with the conclusions, it reinforces the conclusions and is stated as the straight declarative e.g. “40% of the men exchanged drugs for sex”; when the majority of sex buyers disagree with the intended conclusion, it is stated as a subjective opinion or erroneous reporting, e.g. “30% of the sex buyers told us”.
In short, the study is flawed because of the flaws in it, and the reason is presumed to be that the researcher is an abolitionist.
Would you accept the results of a competing study with similar flaws and opposed conclusions funded by prostitution advocates? What about a study comparing people who have participated in legal prostitution to people who have not?
Why is pornography use enough to exclude one from ‘non-sex buyer’ but not enough to include one in ‘sex buyer’?
@Decius
This research seems just fine for my purposes. The flaws seem small and do not detract from the overall findings.
Would you please give me a few citations of competing studies with opposed conclusions which are in peer reviewed journals without similar flaws and not funded by prostitution advocates?
Frequency of Sexual Activity among Men Who Visit Prostitutes
From the EJHS
This study doesn’t generalize any conclusions to men outside the convenience sample, and draws the boring conclusion that men who get caught patronizing have sex more often when they have more sexual partners; no other factor is statistically significant.
@Decius
Thank you for the EJHS article. It doesn’t contradict the Melissa Farley et all because of its limited sample but there are insights into the users of prostitutes.
Extract from PARTICIPANTS:
Given that a major aim of the current paper is to assesses the frequency of sexual activities with non-prostitute and prostitute partners among ‘johns’, the inclusion of men in the sample who were not recently sexually active with prostituted women seemed inconsistent; thus the final sample was comprised of only the 772 respondents who reported they had had sex in the past year with a prostitute.
Extracts from the DISCUSSION that caught my eye:
Care should be taken in interpreting and generalizing these results as the sample may not be fully representative of the population of clients of street prostitutes.
Examination of the demographic characteristics from the present sample suggest that a more financially stable segment of American men are engaged in sex with prostitutes (or at the very least being arrested for soliciting sex with prostitutes). Also of interest are the results suggesting that men patronizing prostitutes do not have excessively high rates of sexual activity as some have suggested (Wortley, et al., 2002)
Where the present research diverges from that of previous studies is in the educational levels of the sample. In the present sample more than one-third of the men have completed college, with an additional 35% having attended at least some college courses.
In addition to increasing numbers of sex partners, six additional candidate variables significantly contributed to an understanding of the frequency of sex, generally, among this sample of men who patronize prostitutes: race/ethnicity; having a regular sex partner; greater frequency of sexual thoughts; frequency of pornography use; liking rough sex; and similarity of sexual interests with their partner.
And curiously when I checked:
Domain Name:EJHS.ORG
Admin Organization:InstituteforAdvanced Study of Human Sexuality
The Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality (est. 1976) is a NON-accredited degree-granting institution
In other words, that particular study doesn’t draw conclusions because it doesn’t have the data needed to draw conclusions. I count that as ‘opposed’ to Dr. Farley’s work.
And the Prostitution Research & Education (PRE) is a 501(c) 3 nonprofit organization, founded in 1995, that doesn’t provide any peer review services at all. (Per their published information.
And DNS lookups are easy, but don’t tell much:
Registrant:
PROSTITUTION RESEARCH EDUCATION
ATTN PROSTITUTIONRESEARCH.COM
care of Network Solutions
ADDRESS REDACTED
Domain Name: PROSTITUTIONRESEARCH.COM
Administrative Contact :
asdf, asdf [sic]
xq4yy26g45y@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com [sic]
ATTN PROSTITUTIONRESEARCH.COM
care of Network Solutions
ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER REDACTED
The EJHS article you sited is just not statistically up to the comparison with the Melissa Farley et all. The EJHS uses a sample that would be a contained in a subcell or sub-subcell of the statistical tests used in the Melissa Farley et all. You just cannot extrapolate the EJHS data in a meaningful way to use it in a comparison, period.
Analogy, you cannot compare men and women statistically if you only have men in your sample.
I should have been clearer. Electronic Journal of Human Sexuality is a publication of Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality which is a non-accredited school. “Students studying at an unaccredited institution are never eligible for financial aid, including student loans, through any government agency. Any degrees issued may or may not be valid for obtaining professional licenses or employment. Generally speaking, within academic and government circles, such degrees are rejected, but within the business world, it may be acceptable for certain purposes.[8][9] Using a diploma from an unrecognized institution to obtain employment or for any other purpose is illegal in some states.[9] Criminal penalties may apply should such a degree be fraudulently presented in lieu of one from an accredited school.”,Wikipedia
@stephen and @pisaquari – thanks for your efforts with @decius. I’d had to stop publishing his comments on my last post because the trolling got out of hand. Perhaps should have done the same thing here.
Really? Check the sample size on Farley et al. link for convenience.
I’ll also note that they generated and discussed “more than 15,000 pages of interviewer notes” in about two minutes of time each. (Based on the number of individuals interviewed and the average time given)
Don’t get me wrong, there’s three and a half man-months of interview time alone (23% of which is thrown out because they “were not matched by age, ethnicity and educational level.”)
@Decius
Disengaging now.
Hint: the issue isn’t sample size
Right… Farley had three groups, two of which were considered. The particular article I found first considered only individuals belonging to one of those groups, which I suppose could be called a subcell without being technically mathematically wrong.
I don’t consider that the Farley information is even representative of sex buyers and non-sex-buyers in the Boston area, due to the self-selecting factor involved with the recruitment process.
Although in this instance, prostitution advocates would be big oil. You can argue that feminists are biased, but they don’t have the conflict of interest the pro-crowd does.
I certainly wasn’t trying to imply any kind of moral equivalence. What I am saying is that science with an agenda is going to attract additional scrutiny, and I don’t think it is shocking or outrageous – nor particularly unreasonable – that people with an opposing point of view would call for that scrutiny. If the study is good, it will hold up to it.
A great post Meghan! Its depressing how often people criticise feminist research for being insufficiently academic when the results challenge ingrained behaviour. The appeal that feminists should become more ‘objective’ draws on tropes of unscientific women and rational men. An old approach to challenge, attack the person not the research method. The illusion of scientific objectivity in designing a research project is dangerous. Why would feminists start from an impartial position? It would be like beginning a research project on terrorism or the fascism without a predetermined position on whether more terrorism and authoritarianism is desirable. Feminist research will inevitably be coloured by women’s experiences of patriarchy, this enriches the feminist discourse and keeps it grounded.
Recently in my own town of Melbourne a piece was published in a news paper challenging the myth of brothel safety. Unsurprisingly the comments attacked the author with on a similar ground. The worn out idea that ‘ideology’ was clouding feminist’s ability to think clearly was trotted out. It is all very depressing really.
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/brothel-safety-a-dangerous-myth-20110714-1hfwh.html
“The appeal that feminists should become more ‘objective’ draws on tropes of unscientific women and rational men.”
This had never occurred to me before. Good call.
I think that a quick look at Melissa Farley’s CV shows that her research techniques are solid. I feel we should now take her findings to heart, NOT distract from the findings by trying to criticize her research something 99.9% of us are not equipped to do.
http://disability-abuse.com/txt/OnlineFacultyCVs/FarleyCV.txt
Meghan, Thanks for your excellent interpretation of these events.
So this researcher found it “difficult to find men who don’t buy sex” – and then it turns out that this includes using porn. Well obviously – even before the internet put it on everyone’s desks, there were only two types of men – those that use porn, and liars. I remember as a kid hearing the Christian boys saying they didn’t use porn, and it felt like they must be another species – how could they resist such a strong and intense drive? (to see naked women, or even men) – a drive that natural selection has put at our core, which stimulates ALL men VISUALLY above all else (perhaps some exceptions, like blind men?).
Later I found that the Christian boys used to share their porn magazines. I’m sure you guessed that was coming! Men often have reasons to pretend they don’t, because even now there are pockets of stigma against it. But that doesn’t help men avoid it – nothing will.
Having recently read and heard about the damage that prostitution can do to women, I’ve become much more worried about it. Easy to say that, as someone not tempted to prostitutes. But if I became convinced that women who are filmed for porn are always seriously hurt, would I give up porn? No, but I might limit myself to written porn, or OLD porn photos and films, if it could help reduce the hurt and exploitation. Or I might focus on gay porn, because I don’t believe it would often hurt men. But I wouldn’t give up my harmless sexuality, any more than I would expect a woman to give up hers.
****Before the internet put driveling bastards on everyone’s blog, there were only two types of radical feminists–those who were willing to hurt these driveling bastards, and liars. I remember as a young female hearing about these Nice Girls who said they didn’t want to hurt the fuckers and it felt like they must be another species–how could they resist such a strong and intense drive? (to see the end of their oppression, or even men)–a drive that the *will to survive* has put at our core, which stimulates ALL women to REVOLUTIONIZE above all else (perhaps some exceptions, like the dead women the men already killed?).
Later I found that the Nice Girls used to share their man beating secrets. I’m sure you guessed that was coming! Feminists often have reasons to pretend they don’t want to hurt men, because even now there are of oceans of stigma against it. But that doesn’t help radical feminists avoid it–nothing will.
Having recently heard about the harm radical feminism can do to driveling bastards, I’ve become much more worried about it. Easy to say that, as someone not taken to giving a shit about driveling bastards. But if I became convinced that driveling bastards online were always seriously in harm’s way, would I give up hurting them? No, but I might LIE ONLINE about the limitations I would impose on myself for said harming, if it would help reduce the “hurt” and “exploitation”.
But I wouldn’t give up my harmful ways, anymore than I would expect a driveling bastard to give up his.****
I hear you, Pisaquari, very wittily saying “stop trying to engage us radical feminists as though we take you seriously. We all hate you, and we would make you suffer and die (cease to exist?) if we could”. (Of course, it would be lovely if I’ve misundertood you, or taken your send-up too seriously!).
I thought I might try a response to my own post (above), to imagine, try out, and think through an anti-porn position. To imagine other people’s internal world is what its all about – this is a good way to gain insight, think clearly and care more. If any feminists read this, I’m hoping they won’t regard this as sarcastic, manipulative or cynical – I’m trying push the envelope to see what is possible here, in terms of honestly grappling with ideas, and conversing with curiosity, warmth and good faith.
———————
“Dear Michael, I want to explain to you why I find your perspective on porn so offensive. You portray horny teenage boys getting turned on by porn as harmless and natural. But if they weren’t exposed to such things, and were instead taught to engage with women and girls in a three-dimensional way, then the relationships between boys and girls, men and women, could be much more equal and respectful. You talk of the possibility of ending the production of porn if it hurts women to participate. But can’t you see that even the consumption of OLD porn images, or stories and cartoons is, in itself, degrading to women and therefore worth fighting against? Even the way that men view sex as visual and disconnected from relationships is inherently disrespectful to women – your mental images of our bodies, and your fantasies, only contribute to regarding us disrespectfully. And therefore it contributes to women being powerless and hurt by men, who have learned to view women as an image for them to enjoy, rather than a whole person worthy of respect.
When you boys/men view a centrefold, porn flick or stripper, you don’t passively regard our beauty – your minds go to using us, exploring our bodies, licking, penetrating… yuck! And as for the sexual fetish about power (bondage, spanking, BDSM etc): that should be illegal, because it can drive men to want to hurt, abuse and rape women or even children. Even when your power kink is about women in control, it is still using women as fantasy-fodder, rather than real people.
Actually Michael, I’m not even JUST saying ‘keep your thoughts to yourself’, I’m going much further – I’m saying that I’m revolted and offended that you even think of us that way. And even if you regard other MEN that way, I suppose its good that you’re leaving women alone, but I still think that your male two-dimensional and exploitative view of sex is a vile travesty.
If you’re lucky enough to get a woman to love you, you should treasure her, and use sex as a way of expressing tenderness, intimacy, passion and love. This is all that sex is for, other than procreation.”
Did you write this yourself?
Of course I wrote it myself. I’m trying to use my imagination to understand the (radical?) feminist perspective. Having seen the response of Pisaquari (below), I still don’t think I’ve got it!
As you see, I’ve understood the point about the damage to women in making pornography (still not sure what proportion). It doesn’t make intuitive sense to me (perhaps because I’m a man), but I can believe what I read when it feels genuine and heartfelt.
But my note above (the first one), postulated porn which doesn’t need any women to create – either its already been made, or it doesn’t involve women. The response I got seemed to indicate that this wouldn’t solve the problem. So then I thought that it must be something else.
So in trying to imagine another factor causing some women to hate porn, I remembered the Christians saying that not only is adultery a sin, but so is the THINKING of adultery (ie lust). I put that together with Meghan’s references to “degradation”, and wondered if the key to it was revulsion for the whole way (many? all?) men internally view sex, and even structure our minds. Once I’d thought of that, then I thought I’d try it out, to imagine it from a feminist perspective, and hoping it wouldn’t offend.
My (male) perspective is simple: sex is fun, not that important, and quite seperate to love, which is much more important. If sex and love come together, that’s special. And all kinds of sex are fine, unless they really hurt someone.
Clearly this approach is different to most women. I’m not offended by women’s approaches to these things, but I want to understand why many feminists are offended by mine. So if its not simply the concern about hurting women in making porn, then what? The above is my hypothesis.
Call me oldfashioned (or naive), but I believe sex should never be separate from love. That’s where all our problems start.
Mary
I certainly don’t think you are old fashioned or naive – just very different to me. And my current theory is that your perspective is the dominant perspective on the female end of the spectrum, and mine is the dominant perspective on the male end of the spectrum (or I might be even more extreme than the average male). I actually like yours better than mine, even though I find it hard to imagine.
I’ve been like this since young childhood, although of course I didn’t know how to frame it. Very romantic, falling in love all over the place, but not particularly ‘turned on’ by the objects of my affection. Sex was different – like chess – I can play chess with friends, lovers, or by myself, and its great, but not deeply connected to my emotional life.
So you might despise me for this, or pity me. But if its true that I’m not dissimilar from many other men, perhaps you can try to imagine why its so hard for some of us to see why porn is seen as such a taboo, compared to (say) watching soap-operas, reading romance novels or watching football stars.
I know from reading this blog that you will find the following remark hard to believe, but please try. As an example, in looking today at the sexy and gorgeous photos on Lori Adorable’s blog, I have 1000 times greater respect and caring for her than any football star, even while I’m ogling her. To me, that’s obvious, but some on this site assume that I must be hating her. Or maybe they think that to ogle/lust is the same as hate. I just don’t get it.
No one asked for a description of your sex life.
Michael;
The issue is not that men are visually stimulated; women are too. That isn’t the problem. The issue is the context of power relations in which we all exist – men are powerful and in charge, and women are commodified as sexual objects for male gratification. If this power dynamic did not exist, there would not be harm in being in erotic photographs or videos because the women in them would have been treated with respect, as members of a just an equal society, and would not have been forced, cajoled, coerced, or enticed into an industry which harms them. If we can work to end the socio-economic disparity that leads women into sex work in the first place, and address the imbalance of power that defines our society, then we could also talk about ways to address the male or female sex drive. it’s not that looking at women is inherently degrading or sexist, but the context in which it exists is. This is why individual sex workers’ arguments of empowerment do not address the issue, either: aside from the position of privelege that an individualist defense speaks from, one woman’s empowerment in sex work does not alter the fact that she is part of a system that commodifies women and harms any genuine progress towards an equal society.
I think yours is a better response to me than my own “imaginary feminist response” to myself, above. If you are a feminist, and you can say that “its not that looking at women is inherently degrading or sexist”, then I feel on more solid ground.
If the power dynamic is the source of the problem, then the only logical course of action I see is to resolve the general power dynamic issues in society. One of the ways to/results of that is forcing people to decide for only themselves if they participate in prostitution, and to what degree. I think that is an exact opposite of blanket prohibitions on sex work. It is, however, the same as a prohibition on forced prostitution.
I wonder if prostitutes will continue to be degraded when they can get up and walk away from the john/jane at any time for any reason and still be legally entitled to at least a pro-rated portion of the agreed fee? Will it still be perceived as coercion after the first prosecution for rape when a customer goes beyond the contracted terms?
Decius, you are missing the point. The problem with the sex industry is that it is by nature involving the buying of objectified human bodies. That involves dehumanization. The entire POINT of the sex industry is objectified bodies on demand, selected off a menu according to physical characteristics and acts performed. It reduces sex to mechanics, and people to meat. It, by definition, normalizes the idea that it’s ok to have sex with someone who does not want to have sex with you.
It’s rather like arguing whether self harm is ok just because people freely enter into it. Sure, the people who do it don’t do it for anybody else. Just their own little hobby. Doesn’t make it ok. Suicide is not seen as a legitimate life choice.
***I hear you, Pisaquari, very wittily saying “stop trying to engage us radical feminists as though we take you seriously. We all hate you, and we would make you suffer and die (cease to exist?) if we could”.***
No, Michael, you don’t hear me.
In fact, you no more more hear me than understand the clarity of your own words.
My point was that YOU don’t take US seriously–because no matter the harm done to women via pornography or prostitution you said you will CONTINUE to use pornography. That is *callous*. That is a position that says no matter how SERIOUS the consequences to others, you will not take SERIOUSLY your own involvement in the harming process.
My point was that YOU HATE women, and are making us suffer and die/cease to exist. You have said that our suffering will, at best, mitigate your behavior in hurting us (but no completely!–”yaaaay”). You hate stated that no matter the cost to women’s lives, your ability to bust a nut still reigns. Our lives< your dick hole.
Fuck.That.
So really, I was just restating your position in a scenario I find more palatable: women resisting and defending themselves at any cost to their oppressors.
And why shouldn't we?
I’ve tried several different ways to respond to you, but nothing seems relevant – I think our paradigms are so different, we would be talking past each other. Obviously though, for me to be worrying about it, your words have upset me slightly, which I imagine you intended. I certainly DIDN’T intend to upset you or anyone here, but I love to rigorously work through ideas to first principles that make sense to me. I know its doubtful whether this is the right place for that. But I’d love it if you were to read my attempts to understand, above.
Obviously it would be absurd for me to say, without having asked you, that you hate Chinese people. To me it seems just as ridiculous for you to tell me who I hate. I’m sure you aren’t really saying that I hate you, or the women that I care about in my life. I imagine you might be referring to feminist theory (eg misogyny). If so, that theory is clearly a bastardisation of the language, with the intention to deceive. In my use of the language, and my understanding of myself, I hate nobody, and certainly no women, porn stars or otherwise.
*******Notes on Hate*******
“To me it seems just as ridiculous for you to tell me who I hate.”
Hate very rarely confesses itself literally. RARELY.
Who goes around saying “I hate women” in such exact terms????
Rather, here is what women are told: that we are cherished, loved, revered, naturally beautiful (our *mystical aesthetic form*), are to be treated as princesses (or “pampered”), respected.
So how is it we get end up in the ER after a “domestic dispute”?
Or in the hard drives of men *across the world* being called “bitch” “cum dumpster” “slut fuck” “ho bang” all the while our cherished, mystical parts amounting to “pussies” to be “fucked” “banged” “hit” “pounded” “torn”?
How is it we end up poverty-stricken with only the folds of our labia majora to market?
How is is when we won’t market ourselves that way we are then forced to feel our “revered” bodies traumatized anyway?
How is it we end up with the emotional and financial debt of this “love”? via care-taking and child-bearing and self-hate and mind-numbness?
And how is it when a woman finally decides she will make it her purpose to identify the social cost of all these male-centered hateful actions (feminism) she is told she is “ridiculous” for concluding hate?
If women had to rely on literal affirmations of hate we’d never conclude a damn thing.
Pisaquari: thanks for giving me a glimpse of how porn appears through your eyes.
For me, this is the ‘treasure lode’ on a blog: when we push the discussion to the point where I get a new perspective to build on.
You’re certainly NOT ridiculous, and I’ve understood a bit of why you’ve come to conclusions around male hate. But of course, I’d like it if you were able to use ALL my comments above to conclude that I don’t hate you, even you find my way of thinking obnoxious.
Michael: you are seriously the most obnoxious poster in this discussion and if even you are able to recognize it, then you should do something to fix it (i.e. educate yourself instead of posting).
No one is here to educate you. It’s all very well for you to take a distant view of the subject but real women are being harmed by pornography and prostitution AS WE SPEAK. If you don’t want to be part of that problem, then stop using pornography and start talking to your male friends about their pornography use.
HEAR HEAR!
Dude, don’t pretend you not listening is both of you ‘talking past each other’. Pisaquari is very eloquently responding to the arguments you are making, but you are way off…
You are not pornography, and pornography is not you. You are also not prostitution, nor is prostitution you. You assert that the right for people to be free from the harm of pornography is more important than the right of people to create and view pornography.
I respect that position even though I disagree with the moral premise that originated it. A key element of my reasoning is that, in general, no person is directly harmed by the act of another viewing pornography.
If you can show me a direct causal path (one that does not require any additional action by an active agent) from viewing pornography to harming another person, I will reevaluate my position.
If, based only on my gender, you want to hurt me, and you are okay with that, I would like you to explain your moral and ethical basis.
Ah, you operate only in “direct” ways Decius. I can dig.
So, how about you show me all the porn you’ve done out of desperation to eat while someone calls you a “dumb bitch” and jams a baseball bat up your sphincter til it’s blown out. Not because I want to *hurt* you, no no! I only *want to watch someone else hurt you*. Don’t you see how different these things are?
Do you really think that images of actual sexual violence are typical of the pornography in circulation?
For that matter, do you think that a significant percentage of pornography is of malnourished or desperate women?
Images of actual violence are evidence both of the violent crime and of the additional crime and immoral act of ‘accessory to violent crime’. The use of an edge case does not invalidate the general case.
People can be harmed or even killed while making movies. Rather than try to make movies in a manner that kills fewer stuntmen, and ensure that stuntmen aren’t forced into that path, let’s ban the creation and watching of movies.
“I respect that position even though I disagree with the moral premise* that originated it.” lol.
“A key element of my reasoning is that, in general, no person is directly harmed by the act of another viewing pornography.”
Well, I hope you apply this standard to all ethical debates. The act of viewing child pornography does not directly harm another person. Calling a person a racist slur certainly doesn’t directly harm anyone. Promoting any sort of hate speech doesn’t directly harm anyone. If these actions influence someone’s behavior? Well, that sucks**, but it’s not a direct harm! And as they say, no harm no foul.
*compassion.
**but it really only sucks if it’s not women who have to bear the brunt of this behavior.
What is compassion as a moral premise?
Having possession of CP, or pornography which was made via coercion? Accessory to rape.
Calling someone a racial slur, to their face or with their knowledge, does have a direct link to harm. I’m surprised that you didn’t think so.
Promoting hateful speech? Deplorable. Deciding who gets to tell you what sppech is hateful and what speech isn’t? Unconscionable.
What other moral premise would there be that would lead one to believe that the suffering of women is more important than men’s pleasure?
And Decius, I’m making a point. Of COURSE I think those things are harmful and deplorable, but your logic allows perfectly well for hate speech. There is no DIRECT harm, right?
Many argue that children having sex with adults is not rape by default, thus pornography of them them is not a depiction of rape. If a child says yes, and orgasms from sex with an adult, it can’t be rape right? Rape is nonconsensual sex! Or is it rape because of the power imbalance? Power imbalances prevent true consent from happening? (Hint: yes, and this is the crux of many feminist arguments as well!)
How does calling someone a racial slur harm them? Does it injure them or otherwise rend them incapable of living their life? Or rather, the harm is psychological? If psychological harms do indeed count, then there’s no way you can claim with a straight face that porn doesn’t harm and contribute to harm of women directly and indirectly.
“Promoting hateful speech? Deplorable. Deciding who gets to tell you what sppech is hateful and what speech isn’t? Unconscionable.”
Why is promoting hate speech deplorable if you don’t even know what constitutes hate speech? How do we even know this hate speech exists if we refuse to identify it? You want cookies for condemning hate speech (or misogyny) in theory, but don’t want to make any tough decisions to actually DO SOMETHING about it.
Why do you think that the desires of a group that isn’t participating are more important than the desires of the groups that are participating?
My ethics only allow for speech in general between parties that have consented to speech. There is and must be a certain amount of implied consent to be addressed in most circumstances, but I cannot justify asserting that implied consent ever exists to speech which is intended to be hurtful. Hate speech, as measured by the intent of the speaker, is always immoral unless prior explicit consent exists.
People who are mature enough to make their own decisions are, by description, morally capable of consenting to sex. The ethics of guardianship of a passive agent are nontrivial.
Crimes are defined by law and not by ethics, and in my jurisdiction sex acts between people of described ages is a crime, and possession of pornography which meets certain descriptions is a crime, even though those descriptions include some acts which are legal to perform. Since this isn’t an ethics 101 space, I’m not going into the interactions of ethics, government, and law and why breaking a law of an accepted government is immoral in and of itself.
Using hate speech towards someone causes direct psychological harm to a party directly involved who did not consent to the interaction. To me, the lack of consent is more important than the harm, and if no harm is done the act is still immoral. The pornography is moral so far as all parties involve consent to all actions involved (including the distribution phase).
How is sex inherently different from other activities, such that images and descriptions of sex should be treated differently from images and descriptions of other activities?
I recognize most hate speech when I hear it; you recognize a slightly different set of hate speech when you hear it. I can’t use your ability to recognize hate speech because I must use mine, and I refuse to force you to use my understanding because you must use yours. If we both use a third party’s interpretation of an objective or subjective rule, then neither of our standards is represented, even in the absence of abuse or misuse of the role of censor.
To clarify:
Equality as a moral premise:
All people are metaphysically equal, there is nothing inherent about any person that grants privilege over any person. There do exist concrete inequalities: Some people are faster, smarter, smarter, or have better social skills, higher self-esteem, or other advantages.
Any interaction between people that is not mutually consensual violates equality.
Therefore, every ethically good interaction is mutually consensual.
Also, any interaction to which all of the parties involve consent is ethically good.
How coercion interacts with consent is debatable: The ACT of coercing somebody, however, is immoral except under very rare and specific edge cases.
The ethics creation, distribution, and consumption of porn is determined by weather every party involved has consented to their involvement. I believe that porn can be and in general currently is produced and distributed in an ethical manner.
“Also, any interaction to which all of the parties involve consent is ethically good.”
Wrong. Obviously wrong if you’d stop to think about it for ten seconds. A child consenting to sex with an adult? A man consenting to a friend’s request to chop his leg off? A poor woman who doesn’t have a high school education consenting to having a baseball bat shoved up her ass and getting gangbanged by ten men while being filmed?
“How coercion interacts with consent is debatable: The ACT of coercing somebody, however, is immoral except under very rare and specific edge cases.”
???? What specific cases would coercion be okay?!
“I believe that porn can be and in general currently is produced and distributed in an ethical manner.”
Well, you’re either naïve or have the ethical standards of a virulent misogynist if you truly believe that.
One moral agent consenting to sex with another is sometimes wrong? And you get to decide when it is wrong and when it isn’t, even when you are not involved? OPPOSITE of equality. Also, opposite of self-determination.
Coercion is allowed when the coercion is consensual, same as any other action. Case: A requests that B slap A if A performs a certain action X. B agrees. A performs precursors to action X, and B threatens to slap A. Like I said, rare edge case of consensual coercion.
Which half of ‘can be and is’ are you disputing? Also, I wasn’t aware that virulent misogyny (a pattern of behavior) was necessarily tied to a set of ethics. What ethical standards are necessarily held for virulent misogyny to exist?
“If you can show me a direct causal path (one that does not require any additional action by an active agent) from viewing pornography to harming another person, I will reevaluate my position.”
p.s. I think she cares even less about your opinion than I do. Why should she waste her time?
“If, based only on my gender, you want to hurt me, and you are okay with that, I would like you to explain your moral and ethical basis.”
p.p.s. She doesn’t hate you because you have a penis, she hates you because of who you are as a person. It’s the inside that counts!
That’s a pretty clear-cut ‘I think all feminists want to hurt men’.
I’m trying to dig deep enough to find the point at which our thoughts radically differ. I’ve found one: I don’t think anyone, especially me, is qualified to be general censor for anybody, or to determine what mutually consensual actions are wrong; therefore I am opposed to prohibition.
I understand the position that ‘the greater good of many’ outweighs self-determination. I just don’t subscribe to it.
She was mocking Michael’s assertion that any men who says they don’t watch pornography are liars.
I still think that (almost) all men are natural wankers and porn watchers. But actually, I took it that she (Pisaquari) was more upset about my suggestion that porn could be harmless if we could give up using women to produce new porn, because then women would not be hurt by it. Because then I implied that men could continue using porn, with no harm done.
I concede that the subsequent conversation enlightened me somewhat. But isn’t that what conversation is for?
By explicitly claiming that all feminists want to hurt men.
Satire is not visible; parallel structure is not satire.
Decius, I’m glad you minored in philosophy as an undergrad. Plus 10 points
for resisting the urge to spell out “correlation does not equal causation”
yet…
-100, though, for reading comprehension. Seriously.
Sugarcoating, you have more patience than I have at the moment. These boys
want their porn. Wah, wah! Your feminist->misogynist translating skills are spot on as I see it.
Michael, I don’t imagine I’ll get through to you. I usually only engage
these threads for the lurkers who have a chance in hell of getting it.
So, for the last time, quoting *you*:
“But if I became convinced that women who are filmed for porn are always seriously hurt, would I give up porn? No, but I might limit myself…”
You state here that, AT BEST, you MIGHT change your behavior in the face
of SERIOUS HARM. And in that acknowledgement of SERIOUS HARM you will merely go to archived media (old photos, videos, etc) of the SAME SERIOUS HARM.(yes, I know you offered other possible alternatives—doesn’t negate the problems with what I’ve just mentioned).
Michael: that is fucked up. That is bullshit. That.Is.Wrong.
Hate this argument but here goes: does this same mentality go for the women in your life whom claim to “care” for? Were someone enjoying the footage of their choking would you be cool with the viewer saying: “You know, just MAYBE I’ll stop watching these videos because now I know they are being hurt. But do you have any choking footage of them circa 2004?”
And now I must disengage. Radical feminist energy is not a commodity and you wankers must be stopped. !
Responding to remark from Pisaquari BELOW:
Pisaquari, I don’t understand you. Since my original post above, I have in two places acknowledged that you had a perspective that I hadn’t thought of, and I that I learned from what you had to say.
First I said this:
“Pisaquari: thanks for giving me a glimpse of how porn appears through your eyes.
“For me, this is the ‘treasure lode’ on a blog: when we push the discussion to the point where I get a new perspective to build on.
“You’re certainly NOT ridiculous, and I’ve understood a bit of why you’ve come to conclusions around male hate.”
And then, further down, I said this:
“I concede that the subsequent conversation enlightened me somewhat. But isn’t that what conversation is for?”
I wonder if you often get such a good response to your arguments? Once I had understood what you were getting at, I took it on board, learned from it, and twice fed back to you and any readers that I felt enlightened by what you have said. I am focussed on honest communication and genuine exploration of ideas – and begin with the assumption that we all have goodwill to one another, even if we start from different standpoints.
I’m not too disappointed that you don’t have have the patience to express your opinions. My summary of your point is very well supported by the text, yet apparently inaccurate. You use words that I use to refer to emotions to refer to different emotions, using the word ‘hate’ to describe a situation where I think the word ‘apathy’ applies.
But I don’t think that definition mismatch is the major thing differentiating us. I think the major thing differentiating us is what we think goes on in the production of pornography..
What you describe as typical is neither typical nor readily available. A large amount of pornography is produced by individuals in such a manner that it is impossible for any person participating to be victimized. Porn produced for-profit takes specific safeguards, to protect people from harm, to protect the studio from allegations related to a genuine miscommunication or maliciously false report., and to comply with legal requirements.
If you are encountering pornography of the type you describe, I’m more
than willing to explain to dozen people moral philosophy, accountability, and the concept of jury nullification on the basis of ‘they had it coming’.
Sweets? Stop trying to tell radfems how to do radical feminism. Thx.
Oh, pisaquari, that was brilliant and oh so called for. I haven’t laughed so hard in ages – thank you a million times over.
pisaquari, you just made my night! That was great!
I’ve been an active abolitionist for a decade. In that time I’ve seen reports and articles released by abolitionist women get dismissed in ways that similar writings written by abolitionist men are not.
There’s a real lack of pointed criticisms aimed at abolitionist men like Siddhartha Kara, Victor Malarek, or Kevin Bales. The pro-pornstitution crowd has given men a wide berth to say in their books the same things Melissa Farley, Julie Bindel, and Donna Hughes get personally ripped apart for saying. The only partial exception I can think of is the shit Robert Jensen gets for being anti-pornography, but his books still get balanced reviews by libfem bloggers who refuse to review Farley’s books and Tracy Clark-Flory & Co. didn’t make a peep when he published an article calling men who use pornography johns.
“Just A John? Pornography And Men’s Choices”
http://thirdcoastactivist.org/justajohn.html
The name Melissa Farley cannot be mentioned in any debate without someone trashing her, but I have not seen Victor Malarek academically disemboweled that way by the usual detractors. Ariel Levy’s book meekly questioned how imitating prostitutes might not be good for women and it garnered two negative articles in Alternet and negative mentions in pro-industry chapters of recent pheminist books about how wrong and anti-sexy she is, but I haven’t seen any liberal blog dissect abolitionist Kevin Bales’ book. If they did, I’m certain it would not be done with the intensity and personal invective Levy got.
Professor John Foubert told me he was canceling a deceptively rigged anti-porn debate we were to do together at William and Mary College and he suggested I do the same. When I took his recommendation and cancelled, I became the target of a dozen blogs hurling nastiness and calling me an evil hater of women while John escaped the fracas unscathed and almost entirely forgotten in the frenzied zeal to fire into me.
Is there any way for any of us to read the actual study? The original article says, “In a new study released exclusively to NEWSWEEK…”–and I can’t find a link to the actual study anywhere. Now, I’m not a social scientist (or any kind of scientist), so my reading of it might not help, but “new study” implies it’s a scientific study, while “released exclusively to NEWSWEEK” seems on the face of it to imply the opposite (e.g. no peer review, etc.). I’m down with feminist critiques of traditional science, but I’d still like to see the study for myself, instead of reading what a Newsweek reporter thinks about a study that nobody but that reporter gets to read.
I believe you can read it here: http://www.prostitutionresearch.com/men_who_buy_sex/000311.html
Thanks so much! I feel like a dolt that I couldn’t find it, but I couldn’t!
I love you, Meghan Murphy, whoever you are.
Why thank you! I so rarely get declarations of love here.
I love you, too! (sends love from afar) :3
I love you too Meghan Murphy. Thank you for the link to the research.
Boy, twisty faster’s Elk Theory really holds true here!
Michael and Decius are the johns next door. One is all hurt that pisaquari isn’t licking his boots now that he has deigned to thank her for the “glimpse of how porn appears through her eyes”. Hint: it appears that way, Michael, because it is that way. He is amazed that pisaquari isn’t more grateful of his “good response” to her arguments. He has resisted calling her a hysterical cunt and everything! He is even “somewhat enlightened”. The condescension. It drips. Another hint: we are talking about you smashing women’s lives with your fapping, here. To us it is not some interesting theoretical discussion. We are merely observing you not giving a toss about our well-being as long as you can get off to our degradation. So don’t tell anyone you are “somewhat enlightened”; you are not at all enlightened and most likely never will be. What you are, is a consumer of women’s degradation. A john.
The other john is fine with pisaquari disengaging, since he was never listening anyway. He can manage perfectly well by himself, just projecting whatever onto his no longer present opponent. His fantasy of her, in other words, is the only version he will acknowledge. Well, knock me over with a feather.
Thank you, Sugarcoating and pisaquari, for actually taking the time to engage, not because there is any hope for either of those johns, but because it can be positive for some of the silent readers out there.
And thank you, brilliant Meghan Murphy, for a great post!
Oh my god I love this blog. So glad I found it, via Twisty. Meghan, pisaquari and friends, you are my kind of people.
“Before the internet put driveling bastards on everyone’s blog, there were only two types of radical feminists–those who were willing to hurt these driveling bastards, and liars. ” I am going to be quoting that from now till the day I die.
I think that Fede is on to something, despite the sneering rage. My role is to be the priveledged enemy who is somewhere else. I think I’m supposed to understand that many (or most?) people come here to share their anger, not to show good-will, and certainly not try to imagine and engage as an equal.
So no, Fede, angry people like you and Pisaquari cannot ‘hurt’ people, when you’ve got no interest in engaging in a civil way in the first place. But obviously, someone like me would be well advised to spend time in blogs where behaviour like yours is regarded as disgraceful, and people are safe to engage with each other in meaningful ways.
An observation: there always seems to be this kind of obstacle to engagement in relation to issues where one group of people is more priveledged than others, such as class, gender, wealth, beauty, race, age, disability, bodyweight, mental health, sexuality, indiginous/coloniser, and first world/third world. In “real life” I can find ways around this to achieve communication, but I haven’t yet found a way to do this on the web without compromising my integrity and acting obsequiously.
I’ve clearly worn out my welcome, and I’m hearing the message loud and clear: “Michael, take your priveledged bat and ball and go home”.
Oh Michael, what a fool you are. Are you getting paid to waste your time on wilfully missing the point? Or are you really that lacking in comprehension?
‘I think I’m supposed to understand that many (or most?) people come here to share their anger, not to show good-will, and certainly not try to imagine and engage as an equal.’
Once again, diverge from the fact that your very own offensive comments have provoked this entirely legitimate anger and write it off as ‘wrong time, wrong place, nothing to do with me.’ Take some damn responsibility for yourself and what you have said.
‘you’ve got no interest in engaging in a civil way in the first place’
Do you really have no conception of how your politely worded assertion that you might just stop thinking about looking at porn if there was direct harm you suppose maybe, is about ten thousand times more uncivil than anything anyone has said to you here?
Pisaquari has already elaborated just how offensive that is so I have no need to repeat.
Privileged groups just LOVE going on about how politely they argue the most shocking, disgusting and oppressive of ideas so they can paint themselves as all superior when a member of the oppressed group in question gets mad about it.
Their notion of politeness, which prioritizes form over content, rigs the argument in their favour. It is easy to argue calmly when you are denigrating someone else’s humanity. It is less easy, or even desirable, to be polite, when it is your own humanity at stake.
It also means you get act superior despite not listening, despite missing the point, despite being either fucking dumb or wilfully blind (I reckon the latter) just because you said it all in a nice tone and carried on talking.
Surprise surprise, when a well made argument is responded to by wilfully blind idiocy, this can be frustrating. Said member of privileged group takes this as further evidence that it must be the listener’s inherent angriness that is the problem rather than their own pigheadedness, and smugly wanders off faux-pologising for the fact that they misread the situation, while in fact the problem was their refusal or inability to listen.
Michael – of course these are the situations in which it happens. Because privileged people are so fucking DENSE – they do not SEE their own privilege and they cannot understand what oppression feels like. They cannot understand the abject pain attached to the little pleasures they refuse to give up, because they just don’t care enough. That such little pleasures are considered by you as less important than the oppression it causes, and to hear that said with such polite indifference, is gross, it is disgusting.
It adds insult to injury that you think we should be grateful to you for having the conversation in the first place, and for saying it in such a polite tone.
This is what is causing the angry reactions to you Michael. Your attitudes. Not that this is an angry ranting space you should have kept out of. Not because you are a man. It is your attitudes, your ideas.
Once you start taking some damn responsibility for that instead of trying to deflect the conversation on to other things, you might actually start getting somewhere in such conversations. Otherwise, yes, take your privileged bat and ball and go home. And preferably ram it up your ass, film it, sell it, and then listen to the guys who watch it (because they WILL be guys) talk about how they loved it and why. Consider it research.
Wow, people have a lot of very strong views here. I just stumbled across this post and I’m unfamiliar with a lot of the background, but perhaps someone could answer this question for me.
One of the things that I think is really key here is the power shift; society as a whole favors the John, the white male who feels that the objectification of women is his ‘right.’ It seems to me that there are actually two ways to equalize this. One is to point out the inherent ‘wrongness’ and unethicality of the actions of men. The other however does not seem to have been brought up, but would also be a power equalizer; why cannot women claim those ‘rights’ for themselves as well?
I know; why even dabble in that when you can take the high road, and point out that objectification in any form is wrong? Because a lot of men might be quick to point out that while they objectify women, they ENJOY it. It’s like trying to convince a five-year old to not eat candy. Does that make them monsters? Maybe, but it also means the most feasible path might be to make them see the actual consequences of their actions. When men have been objectified maybe they might get a better understanding of why their actions are wrong.
-Beisenheimer
P.S.Obviously I am a guy, and while I’ve tried to make this post as objective as possible, it clearly shows bias. I actually agree with a lot of what you’ve said here, but I also know many men would simply say, “yep, I participate in this. Nope, I’m not interested in stopping. I do it because that’s where my tastes lie, and I have a constitutional right to it. No one is stopping you from doing the same thing right back to men either.” The ‘to each their own’ point is a pretty tough argument to counter…
The other however does not seem to have been brought up, but would also be a power equalizer; why cannot women claim those ‘rights’ for themselves as well?
Because the game is set up from its inception to work one way. Women are the sex class. Women are socially sanctioned for acting “like men” in this respect.
Furthermore, if the game were equal THERE WOULD BE NO GAME IN THE FIRST PLACE. The game is rigged.
The POINT of the game is its inequality; the fun for men lies in the fact that women are FORCED to display themselves or be abused for men’s wanking pleasure. The men who use porn and think it’s their right do it BECAUSE THEY LIKE THE FACT THAT THE WOMEN CAN’T SAY NO.
Use your head. You already said that men won’t quit it because they like it. But they DON’T really have a right to do it. Did plantation owners really have a RIGHT to own human beings? No. They just thought it was a right because the status quo told them so.
Amazing article. Thank you.