“*ahem* Eddie Izzard. That is all.”

*ahehem* Zinnia Jones. THAT is all. 😛

*ahem* Eddie Izzard. That is all.

Nothing spells well argued-essay like one where *the first line* gets basic facts wrong. Let’s see, um, Ellen Willis *1981* essay “Lust Horizons: Is the Women’s Movement Pro-Sex?”. How about early writing and activism from the 70s by Betty Dodson and Pat Califia? How about the 1986 Feminist Anti-Censorship Taskforce brief in Booksellers v. Hudnut that helped rule Catherine MacKinnon’s legislation unconstitutional? I think somebody needs to do their homework.

And all this misinformation and strawmanning to come to a conclusion that sex-positive feminism’s “crime” in fostering a sex-workers rights movement. (Such ingratitude toward feminists who are just trying to save them!) Of course, the same “feminists” who call this a “crime” of sexual liberalism say the same damn thing about the transgender movement. Just sayin’.

She has a lot of information to convey and it would be nice to see her points distilled down to its basics to be more understandable to the viewer. Also, if she would slow down a bit while speaking, she would be easier to follow.

I’m reminded of the recent kerfuffle written at Skepchic about the 15-year-old who was basically sexually harassed in extraordinarily creepy fashion on reddit after posting a picture of herself with a Carl Sagan book. The comment section on Watson’s site in response to her breakdown of this happening exploded, as it often does, and included at least one person who seemed to be arguing that the glory of the internet is that she can just change her username and be anonymous again, then nobody will know she’s a girl and will take her seriously again.

This is where the argument went off the rails. Why should she have to pretend not to be a girl in order to be taken seriously and not be the subject of really disgusting commentary? Similarly, I can’t get behind an argument that suggests that choosing to be aesthetically pleasing is automatically in support of a value system that demands as much from women.

There is no reason why a woman should not be able to wear whatever she pleases and be held in the same esteem as men would in comparable outfits. “Comparable” here is a little difficult as women and men’s fashion is vastly different, obviously, and you need a wide set of definitions, but let us use intended audience as a rough guide. A woman dressed as she would for a club, for example, would be roughly the aesthetic equivalent as a man dressed for the same club.

So, we have our hypothetical pair. Right now, one of the major problems is that if the woman is dressed for a business setting and the man is dressed for a casual gathering, the man will still be taken more seriously in a business setting, but not as seriously as a man dressed for that setting. This can stem from a lot of places, a fairly significant one being the perception of women as sex objects having to fulfill a mythical slot in the male consciousness in which they are attractive, but not too attractive, and their worth is measured by that. It’s sort of a sick game of aesthetic horseshoes.

The problem I see with your argument is that I don’t understand how the rejection of aesthetics addresses this problem, or the wider problems this example represents. How does rejecting the idea of being attractive in any sort of conventional sense change the idea that her worth is determined by her beauty? Moreover, this seems like a further constraint on women as they are now essentially brought into an embargo on traditional beauty. Like the women in Lysistrata, if you constrain too much their desires, it doesn’t actually work out for anybody.

I also think there is a bit of a false dichotomy set up there. I’m thinking of one of the running topics that happens over at What Would JT Do? in which they discuss atheist activism and the need for both firebrands (like JT or PZ Myers) and diplomats (like Hemant Mahta). PZ wrote a post related to this blasting Massimo Pigliucci for his casual arrogance in dismissing the New Atheists because he feels that that sort of in-your-face activism is inferior to achieving the goals of atheism. PZ’s point, in this case, is that it’s a different approach because it has different goals, and it is better to have both approaches than to suggest that one is superior to the other for the latter not achieving the former’s goals. His other point is that Pigliucci and Chris Steadman are idiots, but it’s PZ Myers, so you have to kinda expect that.

That being said, your argument seems predicated on the idea that the goals and especially the focus of sex-positive feminists and anti-pornography feminists are the same, and they clearly aren’t. The sex-positive feminist goals and priorities lie in creating an environment in which women are treated with the same esteem as men regardless of how they dress or present within a context. The woman above would be taken more seriously in a business suit than the guy in a polo shirt and jeans if they were at a meeting because she has chosen to present herself as appropriate for the setting, just as another man in a suit would receive the same treatment. That goal cannot be achieved by a rejection of current aesthetic ideals, and instead by reclaiming them, much like minority groups do with language.

Most importantly, though, these are not the same goals and priorities as the anti-pornography feminists and suggesting that they’re somehow working counter to feminist goals essentially says that one side of the schism is the only side with worthy objectives. Sex-positive feminists are doing it wrong because they’re not achieving the goals of anti-pornography feminists. But of course they aren’t; they have their own goals.

This was really well done and as much as I adore ZJ, I hope to see more of you in the future. Thank you for getting my brain working this morning and presenting something to talk about. Now to crawl back to my own blog and, theoretically, work as well.

and nowadays when a guy is going out (at least in Denmark) we wear clothes that, although comfortable. shows us from our best sides aestetically. A lot of us uses hair products as well. women can easily look attractive and still use less time in front of the mirror. men dont go after the super hot girls anyway. they are shallow and boring persons when it comes to relationships

when my former girlfriend or my sister didnt want to go out to buy stuff before they put on make-up, or dont want to go at all because of a huge zit then all the men in the house think that the women are being stupid. so yeah, those opressive ideals are not really benefiting anyone and it is simply a matter of seeing through the bullshit and getting some confidence and be more relaxed. to be comfortable about ones looks and having a good personality and only “standard” looks is way better than looking hot and be nothing else.

Regards.

Christian S.

The role of feminism in sexuality is a really interesting one, particularly when it comes to issues such as aesthetics and pornography. Discussion can go back and forth, and it’s impossible to get a clear picture of the end result. For example?

I want to wear high heels because they want to look attractive.
But it’s a male appeal you’re conforming to!
No, it’s my own, I think they’re nice.
But you only think they’re nice because you’ve been told by a male dominated aesthetic that they’re nice.
Who the hell are you to tell you what I’m allowed to think looks nice.

And so on. Pornography is another interesting issue. It’s something that a lot of women don’t “get”. As a male I’m not sure I really “get” it either. I do have to say, though, that pornography as an industry and as a social construct is a poor representation of gender roles. The female is (almost) always subservient to the male (or males) and the goal is male pleasure, usually in a way that could seem quite humiliating.

That said… I have known many women, maybe most, who enjoy and actively seek that same subservience, to be dominated and possessed. It doesn’t take a male dominated medium such as pornography to see this, either. Women’s erotic fiction covers as much as their contents convey the same view. The powerful man, the fragile woman melting beneath his dominance. In this respect is the pornography itself a cause or does it merely reflect an inherent, albeit exaggerated, inherent truth in human sexual dynamics?

I don’t have an answer to that, nor to the other questions this post raises. But I do know that the questions, and the conversations, are important.