The distressing Mr. Flynt

[Andrew Dinn]

ckaratnytsky at nypl.org writes:

>      The film was thought-provoking in the sense that it created the 
>      impetus for me to have an extend discussion with a member of the 
>      opposite sex about the (stereotypical?) male interest in pornography  
>      -- to which, I, C-word user, swinger of chandeliers -- in other words, 
>      no prude, not faint-hearted -- must admit an almost absolute inability 
>      to fathom or accept.  (Help here, gentlemen?  I did my bit for the 
>      C-word.)

Two points on pornography. The obvious point is that most people enjoy
seeing naked bodies, particularly when they are in poses adopted when
indulging in sex or even in the act itself (I don't rule out hearing,
smelling etc but let's concentrate on seeing for now). Judging by the
emergence of my own interest in other bodies I find it hard to believe
that this is not something built into people's behaviour and suspect
that those who do not enjoy such sights have been conditioned to
dislike them. That said, the manner of the attraction, how it
manifests, seems to me to be up for grabs. Whether it is large female
breasts, narrow male hips, slender ankles, hard biceps bulging under
tight, smooth skin, the wiggle of an upturned button nose - whatever,
some of these things seem to jump out and mug you when you see them,
women as much as men.

The second is that pornography is all about ritual and fetish. Pynchon
knows this. All those stockings and whips, shit-eating and buggery etc
etc. They all feed an artificially constructed and imposed pattern of
actions rather like a religious ritual. And this is necessary to give
the pornigraphy any appeal since the original appeal, based on the
more simple enjoyment of bodies and sexual behaviour rapidly loses its
interest, becomes more of the same, unless the consumer can be
inveigled into lending the same old scene a significance which makes
it feel familiar, comfortable, even homely, part of one's
(fantasy-)sexual frame of reference.

And pornography is both a cause and an effect of this ritualization,
(ab)use of pornography being a vicious circle. Of course, the
pornographers know this and are expert at suckering in their customers
until they are addicted, until they cannot get the ritual imagery out
of their heads even when they are indulging in the real thing - to the
point that the real thing has to emulate the ritual for it to be truly
real. And you can notice this in the fact that the more sexually
explicit the porn becomes the less the ritual has to intercede to
spice up the action, the less the people involved have to conform to
the fetishistic notions of beauty. Porn is all about diversion and
where sex itself can still provide diversion porn has less room to
manoeuvre.

But don't forget there are equally as great if not greater
professional pornographers elsewhere in the media. Advertisers are the
obvious guilty party. Except everyone knows how advertisers seduce and
thinks they can handle adverts, just like a junkie always thinks he
can stop taking heroin. And maybe they can to some degree, just like
they can handle priests, salesmen, politicians, newspapers etc. to
some degree. But the class act is none of the above. The real
professional pornographers are all in TV. And everyone (yours truly
excepted, naturally) is an unsuspecting punter or a willing victim of
its sadistic acts of mental corrosion. Which is worse to fuck
someone's sexual response with sexual porn or to fuck their
intelligence with intellectual porn?

>      This being said, yes, Johnny M., I will drag, haul, tow, and otherwise 
>      pull for love.

Love is fine by me too. Although the hard question is what kind of
love? Personally, I think a more generous outflowing of compassion
would probably be the best direction to go in. But then maybe that's
just my (Buddhist) Sri Lankan hangover speaking.


Andrew Dinn
-----------
And though Earthliness forget you,
To the stilled Earth say:  I flow.
To the rushing water speak:  I am.