beandelphiki

THIS is absolutely revolting.

Edit: Bah-leeted. Original post is here in her journal. And yes, she says it's a joke.

I can only hope she's joking.

I don't know why I read anti_porn. I originally started because I wanted to get "the other side," but it was just a waste of my time. The articles and sites they tend to post are highly biased and use slippery logic, while the members themselves are also full of slippery logic and frequently hold views that are anti-poly, anti-kink, anti-sexworker...I could go on. (But not anti-sex! God forfend we suggest that!)

It's not that I think porn is all A-okay. I don't. (Or that there can never be a problem with kinky practices, but that's another argument.) I agree that porn is often degrading and exploitive. I don't believe that porn is inherently wrong; I think it might be possible to make porn that is not degrading to anyone. And I don't agree with very many restrictions on porn; I just have to look at what happened in Canada when Customs adopted Dworkin's definition of material that was "obscene" or "degrading to women" to take issue with banning or strict restriction. Personally, I think restricting the import of feminist/radical/GLBT/pro-choice/etc. material is much more "obscene" and "degrading to women" then porn is.

But while I'm interested in anti-porn perspectives, I do not want to be reading all about how there must be something wrong with me because I don't think that looking at someone else or fantasizing about someone else while in a relationship is WRONGANDBAD. "Gee," they sigh over in anti_porn, "Why can't other people put aside the fact that they find 'total monogamy' stifling to their relationships, and embrace it anyway? Gosh, so much of the rest of the world needs to realize they're doing it all wrong!"

Thanks, but no thanks. I'll keep going the "multi-partner"/"my thoughts are my own"/"appreciate beauty in all its forms" route when I feel like it, 'kay? Yeah, thanks. (See: clarification in comments.)

And then there's stuff like this. Trying to pass STDs? Fucking sick. At least the responses have been pretty negative so far. (Although the responses in HER journal are mixed. Boy, some people think this is great?)

A few days ago, though, there was a post about Perverted-Justice.com that got support. According to the articles linked in this post, Perverted-Justice.com is a site that tries to trick men into believing they're IMing with teenage girls, encourages them to discuss sex with these "girls" (hello, entrapment!) and then tracks them, their family, their friends, their bosses, their co-workers, and just about everyone else they know down and harasses them. Calls them continually on the phone, sends hate mail, informs everyone in their community that these men are pedophiles.

Because they were discussing sexual fantasy online with someone claiming to be a teenage girl.

Stupid? As fuck. But are they really pedophiles? Consider: if you were approached in IM by someone claiming to be a 14-year-old girl, and she told you that she wanted a "real man" because she was "really horny," would you believe she was really 14? Or would you think she was role-playing? I know what I'd be inclined to believe.

It's telling that both of these articles reported that Perverted-Justice has 690 "busts" (i.e. 690 harassed men and their families) but according to the site itself, only five criminal convictions.

And people in anti_porn think this is just a swell site. Sigh.

This community sickens me on a regular basis. So why do I keep reading it? It's positively morbid.

It's a little like my reaction to the dead bird I saw last week. I dropped by the mall to visit the bookstore, and I saw this dead seagull lying on the sidewalk a few feet from the doors. It had obviously crashed into a window - I could see the impact site above my head - and was killed. I stared at its dead white eyes and the sticky pool of still-liquid blood, very red around its little gray head, and I thought, "Gruesome," and I thought, "I wish I had my camera."