Porno flicks and reads, for you, Rachael.

I did not blog yesterday because I couldn't think of anything worthwhile, but I've been thinking about this all afternoon, so I submit it now as a late Monday post. More bloggage to be enjoyed tomorrow! Woo!

Throughout the discussion today, and somewhat in the reading, I had trouble discerning what counted as pornography and what was merely erotic literature. It seemed like the argument was that pornography served only to pique one's arousal, but then Sontag talks about how pornography can be more than that and argues for its place as literature. Then she acknowledges "high" and "low" pornography, and I completely lost myself. However, I posed the question of what defines pornography to Rachael after class and she compared Hustler's "shaved and fucked" to Lolita's beautiful descriptions of the rape of this little girl--one is pornography and one is literature which excites the pornographic mind. I really liked how she put that, but I couldn't help but notice both of them involve some sort of exploitation of one of the parties involved (namely, the female) and I wondered to her about works that were pornographic but did not exploit anyone and how they might fit into this question.

Thinking back, I'm not even sure how exploitation fits into porn vs. erotic literature, but I think I've found another interesting place for it. While I was reading futher into "The Pornograpic Imagination" this afternoon (I admit to you all, I have not finished it quite yet), I came across a statement, talking of stereotype sex-object figures, Sontag felt appropriate to deem a mere parenthetical afterthought: "invariably female, since most pornography is written by men or from the stereotyped male point of view."

Whaaat?

This, to me, is critical to the identity of pornography itself, and therefore, also any analysis of it. Of course exceptions exist, but historically, pronography is for men. The fact that this is assumed speaks to women's role throughout history as the non-default gender, the sub gender. I haven't seen a ton of it and have read even less, but the pornography I have ingested was at least vaguely more about getting the man off, fulfilling that desire (except for this one Judy Blume adult novel). The woman's pleasure existed to excite him. (Probably why I haven't bothered to see more of it) She's been exploited then and there, even if no more obvious exploitation goes on, just by being a tool--albeit, perhaps a willing, pleasured one--in his satisfaction. The fact that pornography for women is a very recent phenomenon speaks to Edgar's post where talked about women and their sexuality and what they have to gain--or not--from being monogamous. That pornography designed to excite women was almost unheard of until recently is really good evidence of societial views of sex and how it belongs to men, at least in the past (and I would argue the present as well).

In her writing, Sontag admits her own cautionary feelings about pornography and its facillitation of depravity. At least, I am almost sure I remember that; I can't find it now. I cannot know what is meant by depravity, but I know almost all my cautionary feelings regarding porn relate directly to how women are portrayed in it. If we lived in a society where the sexual desires of both genders are an assumed force, and therefore pornography would come to exist in equal amounts for both genders, it would not seem so depraved, and social stigma would be so much less. The facts that most pornography is created with men in mind, even now, that the sex drives of women are portrayed but to excite men, and that these two things almost necessarily exploit women (as a gender, not the individual women/characters) should not be ignored in an analysis of pornography, including one about its validity as literature, and especially one regarding its place in society.