For those concerned with Free Speech (or Porn), it is time to get active.

This post is OT. Do not respond.I find my relationship with my wife stimulating enough.This message has been edited by AdminJar, 06-29-2005 02:39 PM

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"Some say freedom is free...but I beg to disagree. Some say freedom is won, through the barrel of a gun..."
-Army Cadence"A good plan executed today is better than a perfect plan executed at some indefinite point in the future."
- General George Patton Jr No webpage found at provided URL: www.1st-vets.us

There is a lot of speculation over whether porn is exploititive or not. Whether it ruins marriages, or not. It is rare the marriage that should have been, that was ruined by something as trivial as naked lady pics.The porn industry that is most under threat is not the side of things which can be viewed as explotitive, or objectifying. It is the porn that is made, produced and distributed by the very people that star in it. The increasingly popular amateur pornography. They are not exploiting themselves (they are exploiting their viewers by making them pay for it). If they choose to objectify themselves, if pornography is obectifying, where is the problem?Amateur porn is less easy to call objectifying anyway, since the point is the reality of the model, the mundaneness of the surroundings, the personal slant these things often take (weblogs, chats etc). They are often marketed as 'girl next doors' and so on. These women are not sex objects, they are the passionate desire you had when you saw the girl go past your window realized visually.The question of what is, and what is not healthy came up. What is more healthy, indulging in a little fantasy about a girl other than your wife (and letting your wife know that you do this, whilst letting her openly discuss her little fantasies), or repressing the sexual desire?I'm sure many fundamental Christians would say that the latter is more healthy (the whole looking at another woman with desire is infidelity gig), but psychiatrists might think otherwise of repressions. I'm inclinded to believe the latter group rather than the former.However, regardless of the morality of porn, it is legal. The government is stepping in to a legal industry, increasing the bureaucracy and making it almost impossible for the smaller business to keep up; ruining them.Should the government be able to do this? No!

This post is OT. Do not respondGood for you. So then why did you post the quote from the Bible?This message has been edited by AdminJar, 06-29-2005 02:38 PM

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However, regardless of the morality of porn, it is legal. The government is stepping in to a legal industry, increasing the bureaucracy and making it almost impossible for the smaller business to keep up; ruining them.

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This, of course, is the main point of holmes' OP. Those pushing the law are (cynically and hypocritically, in my opinion) saying that the laws are necessary to prevent the use of minors and illegal immigrants in the making of pornography. Yet, in all of this thread, no one has even claimed that child exploitation in pornography, or the use of illegal immigrants, is a huge problem that needs to be addressed, let alone that the specific laws mentioned in the OP are the correct way to go about them.And it was also mentioned before that these laws may end up having very little effect on the larger businesses that produce much of the porn that is claimed to be demeaning while shutting down smaller businesses and amateur outfits that could produce a healthier and more diverse form of erotica.

I see, now who or what was the "them" that make you sick?

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Females. It's part of my childhood nightmare... being swallowed by a mouth that doesn't belong to any face.This message has been edited by GAW-Snow, 06-29-2005 06:25 PM

Can't disagree with you there.Women's magazines are probably generally worse than porn for women's self esteem.I'll agree to that.

I in no way meant to imply that India is superior to any other nation.I was using India's long tradition of the Kama Sutra nad sexual religious imagery and iconography to specifically counter your claim that societies which have such factors have all crumbled.India hasn't crumbled. That's all I wanted to point out.

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I might also point out that you are speaking from the male point of view, about what's "healthy" for MEN, while a woman really might have a lot healthier sense of security and healthier self-esteem if she could count on a man's finding all his sexual pleasure with HER just as she is without the threat of his thinking of someone else or wishing she looked or acted different.

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But women think about other men and wish their men looked or acted different all the time, don't they?I do.That doesn't mean that I love my husband less or that I am interested in breaking my marriage vows.But come on, I am not threatened by my partner thinking that Angelina Joeli is hot if he's coming home with me, just as he isn't threatened by my thinking that Jude Law is hot if I'm going home with him.Both of those people ARE hot and it would be stupid to pretend that we don't notice that.

I've always had the filter off.

It's beautiful and it's certainly about sexual love but heaps of wheat, deer, towers, walls, flocks, banners? Whatever turns you on as they say.This message has been edited by Faith, 06-29-2005 09:37 PM

Did I say "ruins marriages?" Did anybody else? Who said anything about repression? I love the way people leap to enormous conclusions from a very few specific statements.

There are degrees of what I'm talking about. I didn't use the term "threatened." It may apply to some and not to others. It depends on the personalities and the degree of addiction to porn, which really is a big problem in some marriages these days.

Oh come on. Do we have to start from scratch at this late point in the conversation defining what porn is and how these things aren't it? Did that get an XXX rating? Let's be reasonable here.And my point was a good one if taken in context. If mere allusions to sexual scenarios suffice for erotic stimulation then why does the porn "industry" seek more and more creative explicitness?

You are strawmanning me all through the first part of your post, accusing me of ridiculous things and just carrying on with the same, so I don't see the point of endlessly trying to answer you. Look if it suffices as porn for you, that's your business. I find the imagery to be rather odd to be intended for erotic purposes. Oh come ON. An unrestrained market-driven society is only going to bring out the absolute worst in everybody. Uh huh, well that sure does take care of all the complaints, doesn't it, just relegate them to inferior people. Also, when discussing a TREND the information that not *all* fit the trend is a bit superfluous wouldn't you say? Um, no that is most certainly not the reason for the growth of popularity of porn. It's a lot more primitive than that, kinda like the opening of Pandora's box I'd say, or just more like the popularity of junk food -- it's certainly not desired for its supposed "helpfulness." That's a laugh. Just exactly WHO is being benefited and to what extent is the sense of benefit is shared by others or the partner? There are better routes to improvement than introducing sexual scenarios from outside the relationship. Again, it depends on whether the something is good, bad or neutral. For the sake of illustration would you say it is a good thing to "grow" in appreciation of the many ways to kill, copulate with, dismember, store, prepare, flavor and consume the body of a human being? Not everything people learn to like is good. By a long shot. We being fallen and all. I believe there's nothing inherently good about porn of any type, it's all exploitative. I believe that objectively speaking fantasizing is a form of infidelity whether the woman is insecure or not or even notices it, as it takes your mind away from your partner to something more attractive to you.