Porn Site Filters for the UK

[AlpsStranger]

What would you tell Nina Hartley about herself? That only you, the enlightened Borachio, and the great Cameron know what she really wants/needs?

So go on, Borachio, tell Nina Hartley how her entire life is a lie and she didn't really like what she was doing. Go find her online and explain how exploited she is to her, not me.

 

[AlpsStranger]

And if you get off by watching someone getting it off, then isn't that a little sad, don't you think? I mean, is that the most you can hope for from life?

And do you suppose you can continue this argument without constantly trying to personally attack me?

 

[Borachio]

Hey. Less of castigating me as enlightened, please.

If you think I'm really unenlightened it's entirely your own responsibility, oh light of my life!

Who is Nina Hartley?

And if you're keen on anecdotal one off accounts of women in pornography (if that's what Nina Hartley was or is), I'd suggest looking at the bigger wider social picture.

edit: certainly I can try to avoid personally attacking you.

 

[Danielion]

Then exists the question: Where does pornography start? Erotic softcore art? Or is the bar set at hardcore action? How about non-mainstream pornography and people who have problems getting their fantasies become reality?
As long as there's consent there's nothing destructive about either, what concerns me. Softcore photography is even something women have willingly shared me.

 

[Borachio]

Pornography, I think, is defined as something with the explicit aim of titillating.

There is quite a wide spectrum.

But all of it panders to prurience, doesn't it?

 

[AlpsStranger]

I just laugh that, in the age of Google Glass, someone is actually dumb enough to think he can keep videos of people f*cking off the internet. Only a bureaucrat or a politician could get so insulated from reality and yet get his guts so twisted up in it.

One day we'll look back on this entire century and laugh hysterically.

The bottom line is that, unless he's got a lot of room in prison for every young male in the UK, he's not going to manage it. I guarantee you I could find porn inside ten minutes behind all the filtering you care to set up, government or otherwise. Porn is the packing peanuts of the internet, and anyone who thinks they can control it is just flatly, 2+2=5 stupid. Dumb as a bag of particularly unintelligent rocks.

 

[Mise]

I think it's exceptionally hard to argue that porn films don't objectify women... I mean, even if all the actors involved are 100% willing and in no way coerced, this doesn't mean that the things those actors are portraying are all completely fine and dandy and in no way objectifying. Minstrel shows where black people were made the butts of jokes were clearly racist, and they would still be racist even if we did it today, with 100% consenting black actors, who sincerely believed that the films they were doing were not offensive to black people. The thing that they are depicting is racist, even if the practices used to hire actors or the process of acting itself isn't. I just don't see how pornography -- i.e. the film that you watch -- doesn't objectify women.

I don't think it should be illegal to objectify women, of course, but nobody is trying to make it illegal to objectify women. Not even David Cameron.

 

[Danielion]

Pornography, I think, is defined as something with the explicit aim of titillating.

There is quite a wide spectrum.

But all of it panders to prurience, doesn't it?

And what's bad about that? Do you see it as 'evil'? Are you a christian or muslim?

 

[Borachio]

No. I certainly don't see anything as evil.

Somethings are beneficial and somethings aren't.

I'm rather inclined, after some decades of casual (and not particularly frequent or heavy) pornography use, to think that pornography is rather firmly in the not beneficial camp.

The reasons why (I think that it isn't) have to do with respect for women as the subjects, and with self-respect of the users.

But this of course is only a gross generalization, and is, after all, only my opinion. And I certainly have no recommendations for anyone else's behaviour. That's entirely up to them.

 

[Danielion]

I think it's exceptionally hard to argue that porn films don't objectify women...

Most pornography does that indeed. However, there also exist female porn producers who make pornography that's less one dimensional and more catering to a female audience. Also, should one travel back in time, during the 1970s and 1980s (mainstream) pornography was also more feminist than it is today, generally speaking that is.

Selling people having sex, there are endless of possibilities, so nothing is binary here.

 

[Borachio]

I've no need to travel back in time. I remember the 70s and 80s quite distinctly. Well, parts of them, at any rate.

I have absolutely no recollection of this feminist pornography you mention. Except for one, rather singular, example. Which was Playgirl. The putative female oriented equivalent of Playboy. As far as I know, its circulation was about 1% that of Playboy. And I believe it sank without trace (though I could be wrong - not having any interest in finding out. Perhaps I'll search for it now.)

I did see a couple of editions. And it was dire. But perhaps not much worse than Playboy. (Whose reputation, incidentally, was quite high. I suppose it was OK, if your taste was for rather heavily air-brushed siliconed models and very softcore pornography. And some rather superficial magazine writing. But there's always been a lot of that about, I guess.)

Oh yes, and let's not forget the very down market Readers' Wives (also softporn) which did seem to genuinely feature readers' wives. And included, bizarrely, "and one for the ladies". I wonder if it's still going.

 

[AlpsStranger]

But this of course is only a gross generalization, and is, after all, only my opinion. And I certainly have no recommendations for anyone else's behaviour. That's entirely up to them.

We're talking about government interference specifically Borachio. I have no qualms with you airing your feelings about it more generally.

EDIT: And, for the 1000th time, I can do without porn indefinitely without hardship. It's not an important part of my life. This isn't about me at all.

 

[Danielion]

I've no need to travel back in time. I remember the 70s and 80s quite distinctly. Well, parts of them, at any rate.

I have absolutely no recollection of this feminist pornography you mention. Except for one, rather singular, example. Which was Playgirl. The putative female oriented equivalent of Playboy. As far as I know, its circulation was about 1% that of Playboy. And I believe it sank without trace (though I could be wrong - not having any interest in finding out. Perhaps I'll search for it now.)

Well, I only know some European (mostly French) productions of that era.

Anyway, I don't enjoy mainstream porn anyway, but I'd be a liar liar with my pants on fire if I told you I'm abstinent of alternative porn. I don't think it's a bad thing neither and that people shouldn't make a big deal of it.

 

[Borachio]

I agree. And I'm honestly not making any big deal out of it. (It certainly doesn't warrant it.)

We're talking about government interference specifically Borachio. I have no qualms with you airing your feelings about it more generally.

This interference is simply not implementable, though. As has been discussed to death earlier in the thread.

 

[Mise]

Most pornography does that indeed. However, there also exist female porn producers who make pornography that's less one dimensional and more catering to a female audience. Also, should one travel back in time, during the 1970s and 1980s (mainstream) pornography was also more feminist than it is today, generally speaking that is.

Selling people having sex, there are endless of possibilities, so nothing is binary here.

Well, a lot of the reason for that was because people had to go to cinemas to watch porn in the 1970s and 1980s. Porn was more tightly regulated, more costly to distribute, and more of a "public" affair, so it had to be more "vanilla" in order to get a wide enough audience to make production viable. Nowadays, with looser regulation, cheaper distribution via the internet, and being able to watch it in the privacy of your own bedroom, porn no longer has to be quite so vanilla in order to sell. So you can see that, to a certain extent, the internet has made porn more objectifying and worse for society as a whole. Therefore, to that extent and only to that extent, would you agree that Cameron's measures, which will go some way towards rolling back the clock, back to the 1970s and 1980s, have some merit?

 

[Borachio]

Oh right. By "feminist", Danielion means softer pornography?

Hmm. I wouldn't have called it "feminist" at all, myself.

Could someone who uses a knife to murder someone be described as more pacifist than someone wielding a machine gun? I suppose they might.

 

[Mise]

I wouldn't either, but I'll accept that "less objectifying" is at least a positive outcome for the sake of this discussion.

EDIT: For the record, I really don't mind if a particular solution isn't perfect, as long as it leaves us all in a better place than before. However, I don't believe that Cameron's plan leave us in a better place at all. Still, there is merit in reducing the amount of objectification that takes place.

 

[Commodore]

No. You're right. What do you think the proportion might be? 99%?

What is your porn viewing experience by the way? I ask because "bangbros" style porn really is far from being the dominant genre. I know this because me and my wife are very much into porn and have found that porn is just as varied and diverse as the regular film industry.

I will admit that many men do objectify women because of what they see in porn, but I can say that I personally do not think any less of women because of porn. I may crack a lot of dirty jokes because I am perv, but I certainly do not view women as being the lesser sex just because I see them getting railed on the internet.

Also, while porn is not beneficial to society, I don't see it as being particularly harmful either. I really do not see any social ills stemming from the industry. The women are not being forced to do it, it hasn't turned men into ravenous rape-crazy animals, and (although I'll admit this is a purely subjective opinion) it is not corrupting our society any more than any other legal vice.

I must say, it is also just a tad arrogant and condescending on your part to state those that watch porn are "sad". As others have stated, I enjoy porn but I do not need it. My wife and I just love exploring human sexuality and porn is actually a pretty useful tool to do that. And if exploring human sexuality is "sad" then I am happy to state that I have a very sad life.

 

[Rashiminos]

Except porn does not reduce freedom for females or disrespect them at all. I say this, because our society isn't dragging women from their homes and forcing them to participate in porn movies. It is a woman exercising her freedom of choice to have sex on camera and get paid for it. Of course some forms of porn could be considered exploitative, but all the actors in a porn are told ahead of time what they will be doing and they can either agree to do it or disagree.

So really, by trying to destroy the porn industry, the feminists are the ones taking away a woman's freedom of choice.

It's also competition in the sexual market.

What? More respect for women is a bad thing?

Depends on the women in question.

Hey. Less of castigating me as enlightened, please.

I thought you were doing swell in trying to instruct Alps. You may have to deal some recalcitrance.

I'd suggest looking at the bigger wider social picture.

Alright. Explain to me the reasons you're aware of that women find porn objectionable. Let's see how wide that picture is.

Oh right. By "feminist", Danielion means softer pornography?

Hmm. I wouldn't have called it "feminist" at all, myself.

Could someone who uses a knife to murder someone be described as more pacifist than someone wielding a machine gun? I suppose they might.

Clearly not acquainted with the sex-positive camp in any meaningful form.

 

[Kyriakos]

Maybe the point can be made that it is not always a good idea to ban things one personally dislikes or even finds extremely ugly and pathetic.

For example i have seen videos of people behaving in utterly stupid ways. I have also seen people in real life behaving in horrible manners. I would not want to act like them at all, and at times am almost disgusted upon observing such a person doing something vile (eg cursing with some hideous voice, or spitting on the ground or such stuff). However i would find it excessive to try to ban such videos from youtube or elsewhere on the net. I just don't watch them at all.

Most porn is something similar to that, in my view. Most porn i have come across is really lowly and violent-fantasy like. Women are treated in some pitiful manner by a few losers etc etc. I don't seek such content though in the few times i look at porn. Like i mentioned i like seeing videos of women i find very attractive, so such porn is fine in my view.

Then of course some types of porn are just about self-humiliation or humiliating others (while remaining, due to theoretical consent, legal) and some other types are even (rightly so) clearly illegal.