William & Mary- the real wrap up post

Okay, as you know, yesterday I headed down to W&M for the porn debate. My friend D, who is much like the older sister I never had, drove. The weather was horrible…very, very rainy. We made it though.
William and Mary, the building across the courtyard from where the debate was happening...woo...pretty!

I’ve never been to Williamsburg, aside from Busch Gardens. It’s really pretty. As is the W&M campus. Anyhoo, after a wrong turn and a couple of calls to Constance, we arrived, parked, and then were led by our host to Andrews Hall. There I met Karla, who is a very nice and personable woman, the moderators, and was given a list of the questions we’d be asked. I snuck out for a smoke and to review the questions and look for Jill, who was apparently finding sheep…

After a brief delay, things got underway. We were introduced, and managed to cover the following questions…(which I am gonna put here as well as a bit about our answers to the best of my recollection).

1: Briefly, how do you define feminism?
2: What is your personal relationship to feminism? What are your experiences working with explicitly feminist activism, or in women’s movements?

Karla answered this one first, basically saying that she tended to value and view the overall picture, looking more at root and base inequalities than the choices of individuals within a society, and she had good experiences overall. Jill, who I didn’t know had joined me in expatria, discussed how while the basic needs and goals of feminism were still dear to her; the strife had become quite an annoyance. I said that while I agree that there are so many areas in which feminism is very necessary, I couldn’t get on board with mocking/belittling an individual's choices, even if I disagreed with them, and that my experiences had truly been a mixed bag.

I did agree with Karla on the theory that not every choice a woman makes is feminist merely because a woman makes it…but I think I’ve said that before. We also all mentioned that working together on issues where such things are possible would be a good thing.

3: How do you define pornography?
4: What are your experiences of activism related to sex work or pornography? How did you first get involved in these issues?

Jill went first on this one, and expressed she felt that porn was more or less a visual depiction of nudity or sexuality presented in a manner more graphic than artistic. She then discussed her experiences as both an unwilling and a willing sex worker, and how feminists helped her, which then led her to sex worker outreach and her position with SWOP. I defined pornography as any form of film, art, or writing which is primarily or solely intended to arouse people sexually. I mentioned my work with SWOP and writings on the continued mistreatment of sex workers under and by the law, as well as my writings and activism as related to free speech and content regulation. I’m a sex worker, so that’s why I got involved. Karla agreed with my definition of porn, spoke of her work with abused women, and how she felt the objectification and impersonal, superficial nature of porn was ill advised in informing people about human sexuality.

We skipped ahead a bit to…

7: Is there a link between pornography and sexual aggression? What information, if any, does mainstream porn provide us concerning sexual violence against and misogyny towards women?
8: What is your stance on the following statement?

“Pornography encourages people to disregard others’ pain for one’s own pleasure. Many people I’ve interviewed acknowledged that, based on their own experiences and knowledge of the human body, certain sex acts they’ve watched in films likely would have been painful for the female performers.” Dr. Chyng Sun

My turn to go first. I stated that even as a person who was in and digs porn, I think it makes crap sex education because all too often porn does not take into consideration things like mutual pleasure, safe sex, or …well…all that stuff I’ve ranted about in my porn is crap sex ed posts. I also said while I don’t believe porn makes anyone do anything, if one is already predisposed to various attitudes, it, like other things, can aggravate that. My response to the Dr. Chyng Sun question earned more than a few laughs from the audience. I compared some of the acts done in porn by porn performers to Yoga…if you know what you’re doing, have some practice, and have done it before, it doesn’t hurt, but to other folk who don’t have that experience or knowledge, it looks agonizing. To some people, yoga is no big deal, to others, anal sex is no big deal, and either can look painful to someone (referred to later as the anal sex and yoga bit). Karla expressed concern with the trend towards more objectifying, degrading and rough porn, and how because we are all influenced by society, and porn is becoming more mainstream, it certainly could, if not does, have an effect on how people view things and behave. Jill went with blaming society and porn for a persons violent or bad behavior is not putting the blame where it really belongs, which is on the person who did it. I sort of agreed with both those stances, because I do think society affects everyone-all media affects everyone- but blaming the music/movies/books/porn is a cop out. A DVD never raped anyone.

There was also a lot of free-form discussion mixed in with all this; choice versus coercion, and how any decision made out of desperation or poverty or under force is not a choice (head nodding all around). Jill made a great point that just because she watches “24”, she does not expect her boyfriend to be Jack Bauer, nor does she think watching the violence in “24” makes people torturers. Karla asked me my opinions on content regulation, and I stated I was against content regulation because I am very leery of having anyone say what others can find entertaining and erotic…utopia scares me because who’s version of utopia are we going to get? She asked what sort of things I objected to, and I pointed out really heavy and blatant racism as my main squick. She asked if I thought that sort of racism should be banned, and I said no, because even while I thought it was vile and wouldn’t watch anything that contained it, I don’t feel its my place to tell other people they can’t watch/say/make it. Jill mentioned she’d not seen any porn since back in the day when performers had pubic hair, and Karla even made me grin with her mocking/shocked face and “public hair, how horrible” comment. There was some talk of feminist porn, what might make porn feminist, and how it was different from mainstream porn (more diverse body types, more modes of sexuality presented, takes into account female desires and pleasure). Also talk of how porn may or may not cheapen or distort the actual “deepness” or intimacy of sex…and I think this is probably where Karla and I disagreed the most…though very civilly, because while many people do see sex as a deeper connection, an intimate thing, others (ahem, raises hand) do not. It was interesting.

A rather amusing moment happened in audience questions when we were asked if porn could be empowering to women, and I answered “absolutely”, and Jill answered “absolutely” and Karla answered “absolutely not”…I think even all three of us chuckled at that. We discussed how it could be or couldn’t be after another question asking us to elaborate…and I think all three of us had valid takes on the matter.

All in all, I thought it was a good forum, and sure enough, everyone was polite, kind, and listened to each other. No violence at all!

Oh, and be assured, when talking about things that can cause a partner to neglect their significant other? You mention "World of Warcraft" and someone in the audience will laugh, and someone will nod...




Karla, Jill and myself, Jill is making her GW Bush face! Oh, by the way, she's really tall. And look, no chaos!

Afterwards, the organizers invited us out to dinner, but Jill and Karla declined as they had a fair amount of driving to do. I accepted, and ended up eating burgers with the crew. Nice gals, all of them. It was really loud though! There was talk of their classes; their professor, finals, having to go outside to smoke, the anal sex/yoga bit, the SWAS, and how various events they’d organized had come to be. After dinner, it was back to the car and home again, through the rain.

So yeah, despite all the drama surrounding it, I thought the event itself was really cool, and Jill, Karla, and the organizers were all very kind, polite, and professional. I also have to give Karla credit for signing on to do it, all things considered and being outnumbered.

And yep, a big thank you to Constance and Crew for putting this together.

What do W&M feminist student organizers look like while having burgers? Now you know!

So, the burning question is…what happens when a Radical Feminist, A sexworkers’ rights advocate who has been on both sides of the issue, and an abrasive porn chick walk into a room?

Um, they talk, take notes, sometimes agree, sometimes disagree, and drink bottled water. But yep, sure enough, we agreed on some pretty basic things; such as sex workers need to be treated like humans in a variety of ways, helping those who are in and want out is important, and that GW Bush sucks. See? There are things we can agree on!

Also, you can see comments in my two previous posts to hear Jill's take on the whole deal, or go here. She and I will also be on XBN SWOP East Radio at 10 pm talking about it, so feel free to tune in and call in!