We live in oppressive times. We have, as a nation, become our own thought police; but instead of calling the process by which we limit our expression of dissent and wonder “censorship,” we call it “concern for commercial viability”. – David Mamet
It has been said that every man has sexual fantasies which would horrify the average woman. And while I can’t deny that this is probably true, have you ever stopped to wonder how it could be true? Back in the days before printing, and for the roughly 400 years after it that most women were illiterate, this ignorance was unsurprising; a typical woman would only know about such things if a man chose to tell her, and if he did she was probably a whore. But after the sexual revolution, and especially since the invention of the internet, it seems as though Western women who were ignorant of the depth and breadth of men’s erotic thoughts should be a small and steadily-shrinking minority…and yet they’re not. Many women don’t have a clue about the more extreme (by female standards) male fantasies; these are the chicks whose idea of “kinky” is having sex in the living room or, if they’re real party animals, putting whipped cream on their tits and letting a man (*gasp*) lick it off! Others are fully aware of the variety of male fantasies, but convince themselves that only a small “pervert” minority think about them, and that most men’s interests are as non-threatening as theirs. A smaller fraction are either relatively kinky themselves or at least sexually literate enough to be accepting, but still believe the majority of men are vanilla (those who believe only 15% of men have ever paid for sex fall into this category). Just about the only ones who really get it are the whores and the few really adventurous and open-minded amateurs who have been around enough to learn.
But again, how could this possibly be true in the internet age? I think it’s partly because women have their own dichotomy, similar to the Madonna/whore dichotomy but less talked about; we’ll call it the Adonis/pervert dichotomy. Like its better-known sister, it is the fallacy that all members of the sex to whom it is applied are either sexually “pure” or “dirty”, and those who are “dirty” are social misfits to be shunned. But while men afflicted with Madonna/whore thinking still consider whores to be suitable bed partners, women laboring under the Adonis/pervert delusion think of men with earthy sexual desires as “creeps” to be avoided; neofeminists could be considered victims of an extreme form of this paradigm in which most or even all men are perverts and therefore dangerous monsters. As with all belief-systems, people mired in these fallacies about the opposite sex become emotionally invested in them and will generally reject information which threatens their mental status quo; furthermore, most of the popular media are bound and determined to perpetuate the ignorance of their readers. Take, for example, the experience of writer Chad Kultgen:
…My books [are]…sexually frank to a degree that some people think borders on pornography…[so] I was surprised [when]…a popular women’s website…wanted me to write a thousand words on what a man really wants from a woman in the bedroom. My first question for the editor was: “How honest do you want this to be?” She told me to make the article 100 percent honest — no punches pulled, no holds barred. I could be as vulgar as necessary in order to get down to the real dirty details. With those marching orders, I sat down and cranked out an article that outlined what I think most people already know. Guys are filthy. We like really dirty things — far beyond anal sex, swallowing, and threesomes with our significant others’ best friends, although those were all certainly included in the laundry list of “what guys really want in the bedroom.” The point of the article was, essentially, that guys want a sexual partner who is open to anything and enthusiastic about everything. The language was vulgar…to reflect the way guys actually think about these things.
So I turned in the article, feeling confident that I delivered exactly what they asked for and excited to see the reaction — because, in tone and content, there was nothing like it on their site. A week passed. Then I got an email from the editor…[containing] an edited version of my article and a writer’s agreement that needed to be signed…I assumed the edit would be toned down a little, but not too much, based on the editor’s assurances that the site wanted a piece that was honest. My assumption was incorrect. Every instance of vulgar language was removed…any reference to a sexual act beyond missionary, doggy style, or girl-on-top was removed. Any reference to anal sex…was changed to “the back door.” Beyond the [removals]…there was another component…that astonished me. Someone had…inserted new writing — including puns like “Arma-get-it-on”…throughout the text…Needless to say, I wrote the editor back thanking her for her time and respectfully declining to sign the writer’s agreement on the grounds that the article in its edited form was not only stylistically incongruent with anything I would ever write before suffering from a stroke or undergoing a lobotomy, but also because its content was so dishonest. In fact, it had become the exact opposite of what was asked of me in the first place…Is it that people…don’t actually want the truth when it comes to sex? I can’t imagine that’s it…I think it’s that the media outlets who circulate these things, by their very nature, can’t deliver the truth when it comes to sex…giant media companies are beholden to their sponsors, and…have to uphold whatever standards those sponsors dictate…
I think Kultgen is right on the money there. It’s not that the owners of these companies are all a bunch of prudes; it’s that far too many of the people who buy their products are, and they can’t afford to take chances in a world where “offense” is as fetishized as it is today. So even though both the information and the means of disseminating it exist, the most prominent sources are controlled by people whose legal and marketing departments have informed them that a very large and vocal minority (most especially in America) don’t want other people (especially not young ones) to know the truth about sex, and are willing to lie, cheat and buy politicians to censor most sources and drown out the rest in a flood of disinformation.
So in a very real way people treat sex like they treat religion. They will accept anything as long as it does not upset their preconcieved notions.
Excellent piece! Unfortunately we’re still beset with religious hooks which stunt freer thought on the matter. Those hooks, though, are being retracted, and that can only be a healthy thing in the long run.
If the majority of women ever quote “got it” as to what men wanted, sexually, it would hurt the prostitution business. It’s no wonder that prostitution thrived during Victorian times.
My own opinion is that no one ought ever have to do what they are uncomfortable with, sexually. If a woman only wants missionary with the lights out, then that’s what she should do. But she needn’t be surprised, or angry, when her man seeks extra activity from professionals.
Yes it would. After a provider dumped me when I was 24, a girl from work ASKED ME out and I said … “Sure”. That girl was a FRAREEEK – way dirtier than I am and I’m sure she enjoyed a lot of it but I think a lot of her enthusiasm for it came from her belief that I enjoyed it immensely. Which is true. Then again – she knew my previous girlfriend had been a provider – as most of my friends did back then. So maybe she was trying to compete.
I would literally get terrified at some of the things she asked me if I wanted to do – and I said “No” to more than a few. Others, I tried, and in the middle of it she’d say … “Yeah I can see you’re not really into this so let’s do something else.”
Every weekend I was not at sea – was an adventure. She was into public sex – or maybe just sex in strange places in Hawaii. I’d ask her … “Where are we going this weekend?” And she’d say … “We’re fucking in Waikiki on the beach after sunset – are you up for it?”
One time we made out in a pineapple field close to the North Shore. After we were done – we were covered with red Hawaiian dirt and ate $2,000 worth of pineapples. Well – we only ate two pineapples but the fine for stealing them back then was $1,000 per pineapple. Hawaiians are serious about pineapple field pilferage.
Those are some expensive pineapples!
I wonder what the fine is for sticking coins in your ear?
My concern is that big aggregator sites like Gawker, Huffington Post, etc., are becoming the new mainstream media, squeezing out independent sites like yours where original thought flourishes. I have noticed that my Google news agents bring in virtually nothing but stories from the big aggregator sites. And of course, they filter the truth just like the site that censored the crap out of Kultgen’s piece. If they succeed, they might make the Internet as “safe” and bland as the print media have always been.
Some individuals seem to be frightened of the bare truth regardless of commercial interests.
Not only does the Huffington Post refuse to post articles or comments that dispute the mass hysteria over child sex abuse, even little blogs that plead for lynching the new witches and Monsters supposedly running around loose won’t acknowledge any opposing opinion.
When I challenge hysterical writers to document their claims that early sex play is always seriously harmful, and I provide documentation for the counter-evidence, they simply don’t reply and don’t even print my challenge.
“It has been said that every man has sexual fantasies which would horrify the average woman. ”
Hmm… part of the problem here is that I can’t tell you much about average women. I’ve only been with very sexual women who basically aren’t naive about the male agenda, but then I always follow Professor Henry Hill’s maxim of chasing the “sadder but wiser girl.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UWOfGDlNI0
However, if women want to be, “middle class respectable” they have to be “shocked, shocked” at the things men want to do with their bodies… or at least make a pretense of it. Unfortunately, since I have no way of knowing whether it’s a put on “for the cameras” or genuine prudery, I’m afraid once I grew up, I started going for women with reputations rather than innocent young virgins.
Well, with the exception of the woman I’m currently with who was always quite pure and finds the very concept of sex too horrifying to contemplate, obviously. (Great save, huh?)
On the other hand, I’ve known call girls who admire thigh high boots, but refuse to wear them because they are sadly considered, “too hookerish.”
So, I expect that the number of women who are actually horrified by the male sex drive is limited to…. well, how many women in America actually work in Women’s Studies departments at Liberal Arts Colleges anyway?
One of my favorite songs from one of my favorite musicals!
I hope that little girl was paying attention. She’ll be a happier woman for it.
I think that somewhere in here belongs the “Men don’t talk about their feelings” narrative. It’s been being flogged my entire adult life, and I have an observation I would like to put out there;
The women who complain that “Men don’t talk about their feeling” don’t want men to talk about men’s feelings. They want men to talk about women’s feelings, or about the feelings that women think men ought to have. When men DO talk about their feelings they are far too often met with scorn – “That’s just so much Macho bullshit” – or horror.
Talking about what men want sexually is really a subset. And for the most part women don’t WANT men to talk about what men want, they want to be reassured that they are sexually wonderful.
It’s the chivalrous thing – you protect the woman from your thinking. You’re exactly right. I think I pretty much know what my wife’s limits are by now – so what good does it do to talk to her about having sex outside or in some public place? She’s not gonna do it – and if she does, it’ll be her forcing it on herself.
Chivalry and gallantry are no such thing Krulak. Wtf
So, did Mr. Kultgen’s orginal article actually get published anywhere, since my curiosity has been piqued. I’ll be the first to admit I’ve led a rather sheltered life, but how much dirtier could a man’s mind be than most of the porn I’ve come across since hitting puberty?
Perhaps I’m not like most men, but a lot of the extreme stuff that apparently “real” men are into just turns me off, since I have a hard time seeing what the woman gets out of it, unless the man is prepared to see to her pleasure as well. That isn’t to say I deny the existence of girls like the one Krulac describes though.
They exist … but I don’t think there are many of them. That girl was a piece of work – I could write a book about her. She even had wet dreams – VERY WET dreams. She was very submissive too – and like to be tied up or handcuffed. Her sexual dreams were like this … “I was walking in a graveyard and a vampire forced himself on me.” And this was long before the “Twighlight” saga.
She had a patented “trick” she did with ice … she called it a “ham packed snow cone”. I won’t get into but it was EPIC!!
There is a lot of bad porn out there though, badly shot images of ugly people with bad personalities having uncomfortable looking sex. Frankly, some pornographers have absorbed the whole “sex is evil” message that our society has put out and it reflects in their dirty movies, which can have the opposite from intended effect on large portions of the male population.
They simply mirror the anti-sex ideas our society puts out, and probably their main customers are self-hating Evangelical Christians and neofeminists who want to feel defiled when they watch porn. They actually described it on an episode of the TV cartoon “King of the Hill, ” where a pornographer told Peggy, who he had tricked into doing some gross foot fetish shots, “No, your feet are hideous but that’s just what certain self-hating individuals want to see.”
(I wouldn’t agree that porn itself it bad, just that quality control in the porn industry tends to be spotty at best.)
The big bad, truth-squelching main-stream media seems to have no problem publishing all kinds of filth, including Rice’s Beauty Trilogy, Shades of Grey, and various other assays of smut & degradation (some of which were NYT best-sellers). To have asked a third-rate writer like Kultgen to submit a pull-no-punches article, then edit it into a feathery potpourri of fluff is definitely screwy, but I have a hunch there’s more to this story than Kultgen is telling. I’m just not buying his puffed up indignation.
Three words: Women wrote them.
“I have a hunch” you have a hidden agenda here.
Another piece of evidence: John Norman’s extremely popular BDSM-fantasy Gor novels, published by a major publisher since the late ’60s, were dumped a few years ago when the company got a new head publisher; reprints and new installments are now privately printed and sold online. BDSM fantasy is only acceptable to big publishers if WOMEN write it, from a female POV.
This reminds me of one of the sadder tales, for me, in the history of american commercial art, the end of Margaret Brundages career at Weird Tales: ” After 1938, when the magazine’s editorial offices moved from Chicago to New York City, a new ‘decency’ standard was imposed (primarily through the efforts of then-mayor of New York Fiorello La Guardia) on pulp magazines sold at newsstands, and the nude or semi-nude young women that had been the primary subjects of Brundage’s covers were out. ” ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Brundage )
She went from being an artist that Weird Tales writers deliberately tried to write scenes for in order to raise their profile, and someone who was considered to sell magazines, to spending her later years in relative poverty. All because of Fiorello La Guardia’s ideas on how decency should be imposed by the government…
Okay, to be fair, Amazon is nothing if not a “big media company”. As I know you’re aware, his books are available on Kindle.
The idea that women can publish BDSM and men can’t is an interesting assertion, but one publisher’s decision to drop Norman’s books, for whatever reason, hardly makes the case. Evidence perhaps, but of *what* is unclear. Additionally, much of Rice’s Beauty Trilogy is from a male POV, and much of the sex is M/M. Did you know?
As I see it, big media is perfectly willing to publish BDSM if it’s well-written and/or if it makes them money. Rice’s novels are well-written and makes them money. 50 Shades makes them money. GOR is not well-written (I’m not the only reader to say so), and probably was not making them money. You say it was “extremely popular”. Well, yes, but they aren’t now. How many dismal soap operas were also extremely popular in their day? Whatever prompted readers to originally read Norman’s novels (probably the prurient novelty) hasn’t shown staying power.
So, I’m not saying there isn’t censorship (Paypal tried their hand at it), but I don’t agree with your reading of the tea leaves.
the Ereads Editorial comment on the Gor books backs up Maggie’s position:
http://ereads.com/2013/04/are-john-normans-gors-boy-books-2.html
By the way, you are joking that the M/M sex in Beauty Trilogy or that the male point of view is written for male readers, aren’t you?
If not, may I direct you to the slash/yaoi fiction genre which is written by women for other women, and might I suggest that Rice’s erotic fiction fits fairly firmly in that category?
(As to 50 Shades of Gray, my girl bought it for me and I keep trying to read it but…. I really think she should have just bought it for herself.)
Hi pws. I think you misunderstood. I neither agree nor disagree that the GOR books are “boy books” (as the author calls them). Probably? Maybe? But women read them too. What I disagreed with was the statement that it was *because of this* that they were dropped. A wikipedia article states that the reason they were dropped was because of flagging interest during the 80’s. Wikipedia could be wrong, but I suspect the entry would have been corrected by now if it *were* wrong (the series still has a cult following).
//By the way, you are joking that the M/M sex in Beauty Trilogy or that the male point of view is written for male readers, aren’t you? //
I never wrote that, What I was responding to was this: “BDSM fantasy is only acceptable to big publishers if WOMEN write it, from a female POV.”
A large portion of the Beauty Trilogy is written from a male POV. Whether it’s written for a male or female reader is a separate question — not one that I tried to answer.
Oh, I missed that. A subculture of female oriented porn is M/M and written from a male point of view. Slash in the US and Yaoi in Japan. They aren’t exactly the same, but they are pretty similar subcultures. (You run into them if you like anime, science fiction or comic books.)
Have you read the “Beauty” books? They’re not well-written; they’re terrible. And yes, I was painfully aware of the fact that the series has male on male BDSM, and female and female, and female on male…but, tellingly, very little male on female.
//Have you read the “Beauty” books? //
Yes, Maggie. They’re sitting next to me. And apparently, whilst suffering your pain, you forget that they were written from a male POV. Stylistically, they may not withstand comparison to Nabokov or Henry Miller, but if you think her books aren’t well-written, then you’re a poor judge of writing (or haven’t read a whole lot of erotica to compare them to). But in that matter, at least, you’re entitled to your opinion. Your statement that there is “very little” male on female is, however, demonstrably wrong.
You’re right, I’m a poor judge of writing. Woe is me. I read them over 20 years ago and found them utterly forgettable.
In fairness to you, Maggie, one can mean different things by “writing well”. I’m speaking strictly in terms of style. She’s heads and shoulders above 90% of the gruel that’s out there (as far as the strictly *erotic genre* goes). John Norman didn’t even have *this* going for him. If by “writing well”, you also include the content and themes of her writing, then yes; her stories are utterly forgettable — cotton candy.
“Better than crap” is not the same thing as “good”. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
The Big Media outlet known as Penguin Books and their financial lawyers, Gyvme, Munny, & Moore, respectfully disagree with your literary critique.
Maggie,
Based on my personal experience, I think there’s something missing about men and “perverted” sexual fantasies. I used to have a lot of BDSM fantasies and polyamorous fantasies. Not that there is anything wrong with “perverted” sexual fantasies, but since I have regularly seen a whore I really like, I now prefer monogamy and vanilla sex. I know, it’s funny, I’m content with being faithful to a whore.
By contrast, my brother’s sexual strategy is “show off to the amateurs, and hope one of them goes to bed with you!” It works for him, but it’s unreliable and very expensive. As a result, he has a lot of partners, but he also has sex infrequently. Coincidentally, he loves the Gorean novels and has admitted to having “perverse” sexual preferences.
I’m probably an extreme example of how sex tames men’s “perverted” fantasies, but I think you made an excellent point in “Capricious Lusts.” Men’s sexual fantasies seem to become increasingly “perverted” when we are sexually frustrated.
At the same time, it seems plausible to me that men have more extreme sexual fantasies today than they had in the past. For example, communication is key to sexual fulfillment, and a lot of relationships today seem to have a problem with honest communication.
Censorship is a word that gets misused. A lot. And although I dispair of ever recovering its original meaning, I feel some clarification is still in order.
Governments practice censorship. They impose legal penalties for publishing/distributing material they disapprove of. (e.g the F.C.C. is a government organization which imposes censorship, and imposes fines on those who violate its rules.)
Private companies do NOT practice censorship. If the writer had sent his article to another magazine, and that magazine had printed the original writing, ‘warts and all’…the original magazine could not attempt to criminally sanction the writer. (They could file suit, but anyone can do that, and it’s unlikely such a suit would succeed.) If the writer had simply written another article on the same topic, and sent it to another magazine…the first magazine would lack options.
Refusing to publish an article, or produce a movie, is the right of a private entity. You may complain that the company is failing its customers (and you may well be correct), but exercising a right in a foolish manner is not a crime. Saying that private companies ‘censor’ people by refusing to buy a creative product is incorrect. If there’s truly a market for this material, then perhaps someone should step up and start making it available for purchase. I can assure you that if such material DOES start making money, other companies will swiftly jump on that bandwagon.
If I refused to buy such magazines, would that make me a censor by extension; or merely a customer expressing a preference?
Censorship is about suppression of expression, not the consequences of expressing something displeasing. As such, it can be practiced by private entities and even by individuals (usually in the form of self-censorship – refraining from expressing something you know will be displeasing).
And while the media do not have the power to inflict criminal sanctions, they do have a huge influence on people. They do not just reflect people’s opinions, they try to shape them.
If you boil ‘censorship’ down to that level, it ceases to have any meaning. I don’t read romance novels. Does that mean I am censoring them because those publishers lack a customer in me? If the right of free expression is to have any meaning, it MUST include the right NOT to say anything. Let’s be clear: censorship is the use of force to supress expression. No force = no censorship.
//Private companies do NOT practice censorship.//
Hey Bruce, not sure you’re right about that. From what I can gather, “censorship” was never specifically limited to government. Censorship is a general term referring to the “suppression of speech or other public communication which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient”. A government’s power to censor is absolute; but a private entity’s power can, in effect, also be near-absolute.
A private entity cannot issue sanctions or punishments (at least, not on its own) against another private entity. Publisher A turns down a book. Publisher B publishes it, makes a lot of money. Publisher A can’t enforce a demand that Publisher B not publish that work. So, no, that’s not censorship. Are you suggesting that some one FORCE publishers, movie-makers, ISP hosts, etc. to print/distribute material they do not wish to? That strikes me as a far greater injustice.
I agree with you but …
Westborro Baptist Church – or however you spell it. They ever show up to protest a soldier’s funeral in my town – I’ll be one of the “human shields” keeping them from the ceremony and … if I can – I’m gonna get me a piece of at least one of them.
For that “piece” I’ll gladly suffer the consequences from law enforcement.
That would make me a “censor” I suppose – guilty as charged and, I’m using FORCE to do it.
//A private entity cannot issue sanctions or punishments (at least, not on its own) against another private entity.//
The word blackball stems from just his behavior: “ostracizing someone socially, e.g. prevention of finding local or field-specific employment, blacklisting from a club or other organization, etc.”
//Are you suggesting that some one FORCE publishers, movie-makers, ISP hosts, etc. to print/distribute material they do not wish to?//
Yes. Absolutely. The whole movie rating system is predicated on just his power – that’s why you have “director’s cuts”, because a private entity effectively FORCED a movie maker or director to release a film they did not wish to. You can split hairs and say that they didn’t have to go through the rating system, but they would have been blackballed (and have been in the past). If you ever read the back of director’s cuts, you will frequently read the director complaining about just this injustice. Another example: Paypal has a near monopoly. When they recently revised their terms of use, effectively threating to freeze and hold the assets of anyone or any business who sold BDSM (along with a variety of other kinks) several publishers were forced out of business and another publisher was effectively FORCED to remove his catalog of “offending” books. The cost to find a merchant other Paypal would have proved prohibitively expensive (according to the publisher). I think it was SMASHWORDS. There are many examples of corporate censorship — often enforced by the threat of a bankrupting nuisance suit. This technique successfully prevented thousands of Texans from complaining about pollution. If they spoke, they were sued for libel whether the case had merit or not. Even if the respective corporations “lost” the case, they bankrupted their targets.
Every day, private entities issue sanctions or punishments against other private entities.
Private entities that sanction other private entities rely on an external source of power: the government. Yes, the government often cooperates with those sanctions, but the real power doesn’t lie in the private company, but the people with guns and training.
And if you force to make people do things you approve of, then what’s the real difference between you and those who use force to ensure moral dealings; like, say, outlawing prostituion?
//but the real power doesn’t lie in the private company, but the people with guns and training…//
? Bruce, it’s a distinction without a difference. If there were no government (as has been the case, historically, in the USA — think of the South and slavery — and elsewhere in the world) then it would be the corporations (or monied ineterests) with the guns and training. I’m not sure why you’re so intent on nailing “the government” when you yourself admit that the distinction between government and private entity can blur: “Yes, the government often cooperates with those sanctions” Why? Because “government” *is* the private entity in some cases. The same people can be found in both.
I couldn’t understand your last question?
No, private entities are NOT the government (nor do they wish to be, really). They rely on the government to supply force, because force is really expensive to maintain, and they don’t want to pay those bills. Nor is government a private entity; they have different functions and obligations in society.
It’s very simple. As Weng Shu observed, ‘If you have to become the enemy to defeat him, what was the point of the conflict in the first place?” You’re objecting to private entities using force to supress the right of expression in others (even though that’s not what they’re doing), so you’re proposing the use of force to supress the right of private companies to make financial decisions you disapprove of.
Bruce, I’m done engaging in all these ancillary issues. I also never “proposed” that government “use force to suppress the right of private companies to make financial decisions you disapprove of.” You will have to find someone else to take that bait. Like it or not, I gave examples of “private entities” engaged in censorship. That’s the reality of the world we live in. Get over it.
Sorry, refusing to buy something isn’t censorship. Requiring someone that you are paying money to, to do something your way isn’t censorship. Even saying you aren’t going to transmit money for a good or service you don’t approve of isn’t censorship (unless it’s the government). And punitive lawsuits wouldn’t work if the government didn’t permit them. You seem to be fine with using force to deprive some people/entities of rights, as long as they are entities taking actions you don’t approve of. So, you are what you are fighting; you just have a different set of standards.
You’re off in la-la land. Items:
//Sorry, refusing to buy something isn’t censorship.//
Sorry, never said it was.
//Requiring someone that you are paying money to, to do something your way isn’t censorship.//
Never said it was.
//…saying you aren’t going to transmit money for a good or service you don’t approve of isn’t censorship…//
Encyclopedia Britannica begs to differ: The changing or the suppression or prohibition of speech or writing that is deemed subversive of the common good. It occurs in all manifestations of authority to some degree… But I guess the Britannica should defer to your personal definition of censorship.
//…punitive lawsuits wouldn’t work if the government didn’t permit them…//
No, without government, private entities could simply hire goons to accomplish the same thing — example: China.
//You seem to be fine with using force to deprive some people/entities of rights, as long as they are entities taking actions you don’t approve of.//
Never said that.
//So, you are what you are fighting; you just have a different set of standards.//
Well, I guess so. My standards can be found in such misleading and clearly uninformed sources as the Encyclopedia Britannica. Golly, you got me there, Sparky.
Sometimes there’s a threat of legislation behind it (“clean up your act or we’ll clean it up for you”), lawsuits (“do you really want to spend years fighting for this when the courts might find it obscene in the end?”), collective action (from “millions of Evangelical Christians will not visit your theme parks” to “you have defiled the image of the Prophet, you will be killed!”) or cartel action (“We own all the printing presses in this town, and anyone who tries to open another… will find it rather difficult.”)
In fact, QUANGOs are often the preferred method of achieving suppressive government policy goals in the United States because they allow the government to censor without getting it proverbial hands dirty. Your industry gets dragged before a Senate subcommittee, vague threats are made, you are sweated under the lights, and if the government goon squad does it’s job really well you get to X-Ray your mail for a few months. Suddenly there is a “completely voluntary” censorship system put into place. (See movies, music, comic books and video games). A totally voluntary, co-operative organization for collective action obviously can’t violate the First Amendment, even if the threat “you’ll never work in this town again,” hangs over it like a lead balloon.
With neofeminists, it’s a constant struggle to determine just how much actual political power they really have (they get an awful lot of their policy goals accomplished legislatively) and how much is just a bluff to scare you into submission. We have plenty of Ellsworth Tooheys out there, but not too many Gail Wynands (and even Wynand went along with Toohey at first).
The important thing is:
1. The art is strangled in its crib before the public is given a chance to like it or not.
2. It is not done because of what Mr. Market thinks, but because some collective decides they have the power to suppress it.
I really expected better from you than this craven demonizing of male sexuality.
“It has been said that every man has sexual fantasies which would horrify the average woman. And while I can’t deny that this is probably true, have you ever stopped to wonder how it could be true?”
Given that an incredible amount of female erotica is basically book-length rape fantasies, how about let’s say “people” have sexual fantasies which would horrify other “people.” Speaking personally, I read stuff in relatively mainstream female erotica that is more violent and “degrading” than my most wild fantasies.
I normally appreciate your perspective but that was vile.
Sorry, no sale. I don’t self-censor to pander to feminist political correctness, and I’m not going to do it to pander to MRA political correctness, either.
Also, I suggest you look up the word “craven”; as Inigo Montoya said, “I do not think it means what you think it means.” Pandering to political correctness could indeed be craven; saying exactly what I mean regardless of whose delicate little feelings might be hurt is not.
I’ve always said that if women could jump into a man’s mind for just five seconds (likely all they could stand of it) they’d run away from the experience horrified.
If they could stand it for 10 seconds – then they might see things in there that would enlighten them.
I don’t think Maggie is suggesting that the male mind is one of one-dimensional perversion.
And I don’t buy Chad Hultgen either …
He does not speak for me – and my fantasies aren’t “vulgar” … they are very explicit and carnal – and many women have told me even “comical” but they aren’t “vulgar”. For instance – I’ve never fantasized about hurting a woman in any way. I’ve never fantasized about degrading a woman. All the damsels in my fantasies are willing participants who delight in whatever I ask of them.
But … “vulgarity” aside – there is much about MY mind that would disturb women. The utter lack of sexual control. The disregard for monogamy. The urge to mate with as many as possible without even thinking too hard about how “intelligent” they are or whether or not it’s even appropriate for me to advance on them. The “zero tolerance” for anything but complete dominance over women.
Prolly a lot of women would have problems with those thoughts. 😉
Which explains the perfect fit with the Navy
I’m not even sure Maggie even demonizes male sexuality. Given her history and what she writes here, I even find that very unlikely.
I would agree with this statement with the clarification that this doesn’t necessarily mean every man wants a sexual Olympiad of swinging from the chandeliers and dressing up like my little ponies. I think the part that would horrify most women is not that; it’s the extent of the desire. There’s a line from the Talented Mr. Ripley: “Don’t you want to sleep with every woman you see just once?” and I think, for most men, the answer is “At least once.” But I doubt that most women are as much horrified that their man would like a threesome than they are amused, no?
I am not surprised by Kultgen’s experience — male writers for Cosmo have said their article are basically dictated to them. But I think he misdiagnoses the issue. I don’t think it’s corporate vanilla whatever. Cosmo regularly runs articles that advice women to stick coins up their man’s ass or play with his penis like an organ grinder. I think it’s that magazines that aim at women want sex articles that are dumbed down, girly giggly things that suggest weird but inconsequential things that few man would want (“Pour honey all over yourself and have him dress up as a bear! Tee hee hee!”) Honestly, they are aimed at the intellectual of a 13-year-old. Almost every woman I know — granted I move in educated circles — reads it for laughs. If Cosmo were ever honest (“Help him pick up that hot chick down at the doughnut shop!”) their readership would evaporate.
No, I think you hit the nail on the head above when you talked about how they like things written by women. Somehow, a female voice is safer for writing things like that. In fact, at erotic fiction sites, the most popular writers (and most of the readers) are women. One of these days, someone will write a book like 50 Shades, have it sell like hotcakes and then reveal that they are actually a man. It will be hilarious to watch popular smut suddenly turn into dirty smut.
[…] recent article caught my attention that was titled: They Don’t Want to Know. In this article, Maggie deals with the attitude that society has and women in particular toward […]
i have felt this way for years. lots of women think that “if they could get rid of that porn… women and chrildren would be safe again”. of course women and chrildren are quiet safe and as for porn it just scares women becouse they can now “see” what men have been fant about of ages.
When I put Anzu James out there, typos and all, I got one truly negative e-mail and several positive. However, I suspect that people who find my story stupid or perverted or boring or whatever simply quit reading it and don’t send me e-mail.
One woman wrote to me to say that my story made her panties wet, but the story that did that wasn’t Anzu James, written from the POV of a teenage girl who at first suffers through but then makes her own the social engineering Program. No, what got her panties wet was my unfinished Future Sex Coach Michaels, which is told from the POV of a a man in his thirties who holds authority over the sixteen teenaged girls he’s paid to, among other things, have sex with.
What does this show? Nothing, probably, but I thought of it reading this post and the comments. Now I’ve got to go write about the man married to two women, one of whom has another husband who himself has a boyfriend with whom the one wife is friends (with occasional benefits) and the other wife is the boss of a sixteen year old girl who helps her care for sick dinosaurs and…
Dear Sailor B, I look forward to your new 1!
I’ll bring the chart I had to draw to keep all the relationships straight.
I enjoyed the chart. Thank you! Make sure there’s at least 1 cat in there…LOL.
I’m thinking a smilodon, or dinofelis.