I'm doing a lot of flinching today. It started this afternoon, when I was reading an editorial by the Daily's token conservative columnist. He was suggesting that people save money by voting for Ken Griffey Jr for student president, thus forcing the ASUW to be disbanded. An interesting idea, I thought. So I keep reading. Then he says students can still lobby their legislators on their own, he says, without a specific lobbyist. And I flinch. And then he talks about saving us all $4.50 a quarter. And I flinch. And then he talks about how those commissions to represent minorities are unnecessary too. By the end of the article, spasmodically jerking as often as someone who just found out you aren't supposed to stick forks in electrical sockets. So that was the Daily.
I got the same reaction reading most of the articles. They'd start out fine. Then they'd say something, and I'd pause for a moment. Then something else, and I'd flinch. Then they'd be fine again. And then something bothersome again. And so on. Let's just say it took me a while to get through everything.
There's really way too much to talk about in a page, so I think I'll cover everything lightly. The first article was short and sweet. All good stuff. My favorite was definitely the admonition to "Seize the moral high ground" and "Be righteous in your indignation," which is, after all, good advice. When there's an issue, and you're in the right, don't back down. And don't let yourself get outflanked by people by allowing them to appeal to "tradition" and "the social code" and "that just isn't done."
The next article wasn't bad either. It was dealing with a subject that I'm almost totally unexperienced with, and unqualified to discuss. The only thing that's worth mentioning is the author was rather, um, injudicious in who he (?) chose to defend. I have no pity whatsoever for the poor pedophiles who can't find the sorts of pornography they enjoy, and for the author to lump them together with minorities who are unfairly or unreasonably oppressed/limited by society helps the deserving people not at all.
I don't know what to say about Queen For a Day, except that a gay male would probably have written something vastly different, and I would probably write something different from either of them. But she does bring up some valid points about differing views on love and sex and love-and-sex, and of course the essay resonates with the classic entanglement of fighting against being stereotyped while at the same time trying to keep what's valid in those stereotypes around: the author's speculation at the end of the essay as compared is probably the best example of this.
I thought the bit at the beginning of The Virtual Orgasm where the phone-sex operator was impersonating a theoretical woman was really interesting, and it's a pity the author went on into VR, because I felt she really knew much less about that subject and was not nearly as capable of discussing it. She dredged up old stereotypes about men and was determined to wedge all men into it, even when they plainly didn't fit. And at least to me, "Brenda apologized for making generalizations about men .. but her criticism obviously contained more than a grain of truth" holds about as much water as "I can't be a racist! I know lots of blacks!" All in all, I'd rather believe in the very first author's Brave New World where high technology facilitates, not inhibits, diversity and free expression. Also, I'm a little upset she used the word "teledildonics" and didn't make a single comment about it.
Porn in the USA was a relief, because it was all good stuff. Especially the bits at the end about more sexploitation in R-rated movies. The logic of movie ratings is inexplicable; violence is made acceptable, even encouraged and sex is not. And we wonder why we're so stressed. S/M is really one of the few things that I don't understand. Ok, I can see the attraction in "light" S/M. But I have no idea who would enjoy being either the giver or receiver of a whipping, for instance. At times it gets so extreme I'm not ever sure if S/M is really sex anymore. But then, there shouldn't really be a need to classify it as "sex" or "not sex." As long as everyone concerned is cool with it, we should be too. It's just that with this sort of play, especially if the participants are role-playing, it's often difficult to tell if everyone is having fun. Much like sex with children, actually, although in that case I believe there's no question that we should err on the side of safety, whereas it's much, much, murkier with S/M. Of course, it's possible that part of the attraction of S/M is precisely that it is forbidden. Would we be doing the "art" a disservice if we made it socially acceptable? I feel like I should be doing some sort of wrapping-up paragraph here, but I'm not really sure how to unite all these fairly diverse readings. I guess the only link is precisely that they are all "perverse pleasures," as it were, things that general society considers over-the-line. And so there's no better thing to do with these readings than to look them over and consider what that line actually is, and why it is where it is, and -- most importantly -- make sure it's where we really want it.