Killing Your Sacred Cows since 1992

I do consider myself a feminist, and I have a lot of the same beliefs and the average "feminist on the street" as well as agreeing with much of the cultural analysis in academic/intellectual feminism. However, one area that I rarely ever agree with other feminists on is the area of sexuality, especially the public depiction of sexuality, from porn to stripping to prostitution, to how sexuality is used in advertising. Any topic on which the Christian Right and radical feminists agree, such as "porn is bad and degrading to women" is one which I tend to find myself clashing with other feminists.

It just seems to me that there can be no depiction of sexuality involving women, either in words, pictures, or video, that some feminists won't have a problem with. There's buzz-words like "objectification" and "the male gaze" and on and on. It can never be as simple as, "People like sex and are curious about depictions of sexuality." If you take this kind of criticism to an extreme, it seems like certain feminists are saying that sexuality and sexual desire are not appropriate topics for movies/photos/stories, or that there's no way to show women's sexuality in certain media that isn't degrading or demeaning to the women that do it.

With the Christian Right, there's this sense of paternalism and condescension, that women need to be saved from themselves, even if they don't feel degraded or demeaned by the sex work they do or the sexuality they are portraying.

Feminist theory uses different terminology, but there often feels like there's an ugly subtext that any woman who feels empowered by doing any kind of sex work is deluded, naive, or not very evolved. There's also the subtext that women who do sex work or who feel empowered by expressing their sexuality are somehow abetting the patriarchy or are letting the whole of the Sisterhood down. I also find myself offended by some of the assumptions about what men think and want as portrayed in many feminist critiques of sex work and sexual imagery.

I feel like I have more to say about this, and more examples and specifics I could detail, but I think I need to let this percolate a bit longer...

Since Sarah Michigan: My Life As An Amateur Porn Star is the place you come for a little something guaranteed to offend at least one person on my friend's list, here's a fab link I picked up from someone on the LJ birthcontrol community. It talks about how many Pro-Lifers end up having abortions, thinking that they are "special cases," all the while still believing that every abortion provider and every other abortion patient is still a murder.

http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/articles/anti-tales.shtml