Pornography and Pop Culture: Backlash And a Feminism that is Contrary to Feminism Author(s): Rebecca Whisnant and Karla

Mantilla Source: Off Our Backs, Vol. 37, No. 1 (2007), pp. 58-61 Published by: off our backs, inc. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20838776 . Accessed: 02/05/2013 13:53
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Pornography and Pop Culture:

Backlash And a Feminism that isContrary to Feminism

By Rebecca Whisnant Reported byKarla Mantilla
Whisnantbriefly covered a 30-year his toryof antipornography activism?she explained thatduring the late 1960s and was notmuch activism around early 1970s, there in themid-to-late 1970s, that Then pornography. changed, and the idea emerged thatpornography conveyed ideology ofmale dominance. This is the period when Robin Morgan wrote, "Pornog raphy is the theory,rape is the practice." The first feminist conference on pornography was held in theirpower to change and to not want what is near impossible to get. This accommodation is called "adaptive preferences." She said that this is one way thatoppressive systems have self-reproduc ing dynamics, which in the case of feminism, has resulted in "fuck-me feminism," a "feminism" in which women say they are empowered by reclaim

San Francisco in 1978, and inOctober 1979, 5,000 women, and a fewmen, marched against pornogra phy inTimes Square. Itwas during thisperiod also that Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon drafted their civil rights ordinance against pornog Minneapolis City raphy,which was passed by the Council in 1983.Whisnant explained that some

feminists, in open cooperation with pornographers, defeated the ordinance, mocking and discrediting antipornography feminists and that this occurred at the same time as and parallel with the general con
escalating.

mainstream culture continued servative backlash in

Whisnant explained that thebacklash ismeant to shut people up and to get them to go along with the dominant power structure,exacting penalties on thosewho don't go along. But since one of the ideas that feminists held was that feminism is about not "buckling under," the backlash resulted in a new kind of "feminism" inwhich women could both acquiesce tomale entitlementswhile telling themselves they are being "bold and liber when ated and rebellious." She explained that an are with confronted oppressive situation, people an adaptation can be to find a way to get them selves towant what is readily available or out of

an's control and so doesn't hurt her.A related idea is that feminism is not about what choices women make, but thatany choice a woman consciously and intentionally makes, that is, any choice she wants tomake, is feminist because she chose it. Whisnant next explained that the "wave" model wave consists of of feminism, inwhich thefirst women fighting for rights in marriage and the near turn to vote of the 19th century, the the right second wave being feminists during the late 1960s wave being feministswho and 1970s, and the third came of age in the 1990s and later. She said that

ing theirown sexual objectification or sexual use/exploitation. The idea is that ifa woman says she wants to be used, exploited or objectified, then sexual exploitation, which is inevitable forwomen under patriarchy, can feel like it is under thewom

significant differences in political perspectives, especially the recurringdifferences between liberal and radical feminist perspectives. She explained what she saw as three central tenets of radical feminism: (1) Women are a class that shares common conditions. She emphasized that this does not mean that all women face the same problems,

thewave model obscures genuine political differ ences between women during every wave, constru ing such differences as generational rather than

88 off our backs

vol 37 /no 1

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Rebecca Whisnant is assistant professor in thedepartment ofphilosophy at University ofDayton. She coedited, with Christine Stark, Not for Sale: Feminists Resisting Prostitution and Pornography. have the same beliefs or should make the
same choices, nor are women not also mem

function to uphold thepower and privilege of men while keeping women as a group down." This means that in order towork toward the liberation ofwomen, women must under take actions thatnot only benefit themselves in some way, but thatbenefitwomen's posi tion as a class. (2) The personal is thepolitical, which means that experience that women have are to themselves alone turn thought unique out to be common tomany women, that is, they reveal something about the common condition ofwomen. This means that femi nists recognized thatpersonal choices have

bers of other classes, but that "there exist pa triarchal forces and structures which, regard less of how any particular woman feels about them or chooses to relate to them, objectively

get "slapped down," that is, experience some negative sanc tions of some kind, or go along. This means that in any system of oppression, because there are at least limited rewards or

about what choice you make but the freedom tomake that choice." Whisnant explained that when women face oppres sion, they can either resist and

Whatever
a porn

culture is, it's not what feminists,

or women,

mitigated sanctions when the oppressed go along with the system, people have a stake in going along with the system. But because the reward system is so structured, the idea that individual women would will make ingly and intentionally choices thatgo along with

or anybody with a lick of sense

ever meant

political ramifications for otherwomen, which is contrary to the "thirdwave" idea, espoused by Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy that "feminism isn't Richards in Manifesto

Whisnant said, "if some role or practice harms women as a

patriarchal oppression should not be taken as evidence that their choices are liberatory.

by "sexual
liberation."
vol 37 /no 1 off our backs 89

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conference

Both the leftand right support male sexual ownership and control of women...

group in that it sustains and reinforces patriar chy, it is utterly predictable that some women will choose it." Whisnant said that, therefore, an act is feminist cannot whether determining be based on whether some individual women like,willingly choose or derive benefit from

their choices, but whether the overall effect of those choices keep women as a group subor dinated tomen. (3) Sex is an arena of politics, that is, it is a place where power hierarchies are enacted and reinforced. Radical feminist ideology thereforebelieves that these power hierar chies should be challenged, resisted and, ultimately, transformed.Challenging these hierarchies requires challenging the very notions ofmanhood and womanhood to the extent that these roles enact dominance and

may have piercings and tattoos. She cited Joanna Angel, a self-described feminist pornographer, as saying that "you could do a porn where a girl is getting choked and hit and spit on, the guy's ... that can calling her a dirty slut and stuffand still be feminist as long as everybody there is in

women should make our own alternative is that feminist pornography.Whisnant commented that none of the alternative "feminist" pornography differs in a significantway from mainstream por women involved nography in content, except that

aggression (male) and submission (female). Therefore, tomerely switch actors while maintaining the problematic roles themselves, that is, for a woman to be sexually dominant or a man submissive, does not constitute resistance or liberation, since the roles them selves are the problem, not the restrictions as towho enacts them.

is the religious right, which progressive people and feminists shy away from, it is important to see how the differences between the apparently divergent views of the leftand the right are really superficial ones. Both the leftand right support male sexual ownership and control ofwomen: the right as private male ownership of one woman at a time as a wife, in the private domain of the home and traditional family; and the leftdefends men's collective sexual ownership ofwomen in the pub women and girls chafing lic domain. She said that

control ofwhat they're doing." Whisnant suggests several strategies to over come the silencing of radical feminist views on pornography and "to take back our culture from the pornographers." First, since the only visible alternative to pornography in mainstream culture

"Third wave" feminist ideology asserts instead that what challenges hierarchy iswhen the usual order is reversed, so for example, when a woman rather than a man plays the dominant role or uses pornography, orwhen a woman uses the power of sexual appeal through say, lap dancing or strip ping, to her own advantage, as long as she has the "right attitude" about it.Third wave ideology, then,holds that a women can enact a "feminist" sexuality by either adopting a typically feminine role, but intentionally choosing to do so, or by

under either the leftor the rightare driven into the women who object to be other's domain?so that at in ing pornified society large find relief against and objectification ofwomen among pornography the right,but only by allowing themselves to fall under private male control; and women who see the trap of "traditional family values," are encour will aged to show rebellion against that through

adopting a typicallymasculine sexual role. So wave stance when it comes to pornography, a third 60 off our backs vol 37 /no 1

ingly objectifying and commodifying themselves by, say, learning to lapdance. Whisnant said that "this surface conflict in sexual ideology between rightand left serves male power by masking a deeper agreement." She said that,for both camps,

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conference tfljHBMjH

sexmakes women dirty,cheap and less valu able, so women and girls are systematically made to sufferfor having sex. She explained, "In the world of pornography, the sex itself?aggres sive, hostile, humiliating?is the punishment, the mechanism by which men viscerally experience

their manhood by puttingwomen in our place. In theworld of "traditional family values," the sufferingof shame, stigma, unwanted pregnancy (or at least the fear of it), and forced childbirth is a woman's just punishment for having had sex that she shouldn't have had." Whisnant's second suggestion is to connect a critique of pornography to the critique of the commodification of everyday life. She said that we need to find "ways to challenge the naive and regressive conceptions of freedom as the freedom to enter the marketplace and/or to choose among

at a time as a wife, in the private domain of the home and traditional family...

...the right as private male ownership of one woman

the options that the marketplace offers us." The idea that sexual "freedom" can be found through increasingly commodifying sexuality through ob jectification in advertising, pornography and pros titution should be challenged in the same way that other human endeavors are notmade more "free" by turning them into commodities for purchase in the economic marketplace. we need Her thirdand final suggestion is that to develop and articulate a more clear alternative we vision. In order to do that, she suggested that need to "detox," to remove ourselves from the pornification around us and its "cynical, manipu lative and hatefulmessages," in order to start thinkingour own thoughts and drawing "our own experiences of love and sex as joy and commu nion." She said we need to encourage people to tap into theirown experiences to discover what

sexual freedom is and not to swallow the market

driven pornified propaganda about sexual freedom being the commodification and objectification of our own or others' sexuality. #

of women
domain.

...and the leftdefends men s collective sexual ownership in thepublic

vol 37 /no 1 off our backs

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