6 May
2013
6 May
'13
2:45 a.m.
Sonja & Yo's-
Uh - you're still stuck on superiority/inferiority, which is the nexus
of the problem, and generalizes far beyond one's choice of partners and
hands.
The latest example is the word "subpar," which means "less than
equal."
It may be that _for you_, a hand is "less than equal" compared to your
partner. But the way you've been wielding the language is ontological
with an imperative tone, rather than personal, starting right here:
"No, masturbation is not sex. In the same way that vitamin pills are not
food. Masturbation is a thing too thoroughly inferior to sex to be
classed with it."
That statement is radically different to the following: "For me,
masturbation is hardly as satisfying as sex with my partner."
The two statements are as different as "X isn't music, it's animal
noise!" vs. "X doesn't appeal to me, I like music that's more Y and
Z."
Sex and sexuality, along with religion, politics, and a few other
things, are intimately connected to peoples' identities. Saying "My
form of sex/sexuality is superior, and yours is inferior," has the same
effect as saying "My form of religion is superior, and yours is
inferior," and the immediate association, thus implication, is "I am
superior, and you are inferior." Whether that association and
implication is strictly logically justified is beside the point: it's
the natural human response.
Atheists in particular can relate to that example: often being subjected
to "if you don't believe in God, you don't have morality," from
religious fundamentalists. For that matter, Jewish children have (and
still are) often subjected to "if you don't believe in Jesus, you're
going to Hell!" from their nominally Christian classmates in school.
Admittedly, bringing the statement down from the level of ontology to
the level of personal preference, carries risks. Saying "I prefer my
partner to my hand," might get others speculating and gossiping, "does
this mean that so-and-so's partner is a super-duper sexual athlete?, or
does it mean that so-and-so's autoerotic technique is barely at
'beginner' level...?"
As with religion, saying "My moral code is based on my belief in God,"
might get others wondering, "does this mean that so-and-so's religiously
inspired morality is consistent and uncompromising?, or does this mean
that so-and-so only refrains from robbing & murdering because s/he's
afraid of going to hell?"
But if anything, those kinds of speculations are more likely when
someone proclaims the superiority of their own preferences by using
language that makes ontological statements of "what is," rather than
personal statements of "my preference."
A statement of personal preference is the more convincing mode of
expression: a report of an empirical fact of one's own experience, a
small nugget of one's own reality that nobody else can judge or deny.
But sweeping generalizations about others' experiences are at high risk
of easy refutation, and once skepticism takes hold, the rest of what
went along with those generalizations also becomes questionable.
-G.
=====
On 13-05-06-Mon 1:28 AM, Sonja Trauss wrote:
Uh - you're confusing an inferior experience to with an inferior
person. You should judge yourself however you like, but it wouldn't
have occurred to me to judge myself poorly for experencing something
subpar. Like, sometimes I eat mealy apples, I say, 'ew I hate this
apple, I will throw it away' it wouldn't have occurred to me to say,
'i am less of a person for having experienced that subpar apple.'
On May 6, 2013 1:19 AM, "GtwoG PublicOhOne" <g2g-public01(a)att.net
<mailto:g2g-public01@att.net>> wrote:
Sonja & Yo's-
Not absurd, it's in the language you used: "thoroughly inferior"
and "classed with it." Those are strong words, and unequivocal
words.
Translate to housing and it sounds like the way home-owners often
put down apartment-renters. Speaking of which:
"There are lots of reasons people in single-family homes don't
have gardens or don't have them much, and ways that
apartment-renters can have gardens, although having a garden is
easier if you have a house...."
In context, that sounds like an attempt to back out of a dead-end
in an arguement, but as long as the "thoroughly inferior"
statement is not repudiated, the subsequent statement also comes
across as condescending.
The problem here is with "superior/inferior" and "class." You
can
call this a class-struggle.
One thing we ought to do here is break out the subject matter:
porn and masturbation and relationship status ("status" in both
senses of the word, heh) are not the same things. It's good that
porn is starting to evolve in a direction that's more appealing to
women, and less engaged with sexual power-dynamics. It would also
be a good thing if there was a reasonable balance between genders
and sexualities in terms of percentage of people who play with
themselves (I don't have the numbers offhand). And it will be a
great day when "relationship status" isn't equivalent to
"status."
But the fact is that we live in a culture of sexual phocomelia.
For those who don't know the word, it refers to the
(otherwise-rare) congenital disability that was famously caused in
large numbers by thalidomide, whereby people were born with no
arms or legs, their hands and feet attached directly to their
trunks. Someone with phocomelia has a uniquely difficult time
eating, because they can't reach to pick up their own food and put
it in their own mouth. One way to solve this is with a partner,
where each person picks up the food for the other, and puts it in
the other's mouth.
Our sexual culture is like that: it starts from the assumption
that you require another person to meet a basic physical need.
From that assumption, applied to sexuality, comes all of the weird
power-dynamics around sex. And while it may be true for
reproduction (plus or minus cloning), it's not true for love
(which has avenues of expression other than sex), and for the
neurochemical benefits (read: pleasures) and other health benefits
(such as reduction of risk for prostate cancer in men) of sexual
stimulation and orgasm.
The Abrahamic religious traditions, originating in cultures that
were harshly oppressed at the hands of the powers-that-be of their
times, had to conflate reproduction, love, and pleasure, and seek
to control the latter to ensure the former, else they would not
have survived. That conflation persists in the mainstream culture
to this day, where it's the equivalent of a state of civil
emergency after the hurricane has long since passed.
-G.
=====
On 13-05-05-Sun 11:43 PM, Sonja Trauss wrote:
No that's absurd. There are lots of reasons ppl in relationships
don't have sex or don't have it much and ways single people can,
although it is easier if you have a partner.
Also, comparing options means you must have them - if you don't
have access to sex then you don't have access to it. Comparing it
to masturbation, or comparing it to camping, or to pie, or to
music, it's moot.
The whole conversation hinges on the notion that you have access
to both, which I think more people do than realize it.
On May 5, 2013 10:00 PM, "GtwoG PublicOhOne"
<g2g-public01(a)att.net <mailto:g2g-public01@att.net>> wrote:
Sonja, Andrew, Et. Al.-
So now the implicit assumption goes explicit:
"Masturbation is a thing too thoroughly inferior to sex to be
classed with it."
The necessary and inevitable corollary to that is, "Single
people are thoroughly inferior to coupled people." Care to
argue that point?
It wasn't long ago that us queerz were also subjected to
"Homosexual sex is a thing thoroughly inferior to
heterosexual sex."
Inferior by way of "immoral," and for the longest time (and
still, in many places), illegal. In a wide swath of the
world, I can go to prison for who I love, and in a slightly
less wide swath of the world, I can get beheaded in the
public square or hanged by the neck at the end of a crane
borrowed from the Public Works Department (as is the custom
in Iran, 16-year-old queer guys included, go search BBC.com
for that story).
Comparisons based on assertions of one's own superiority and
others' inferiority, are the last refuge of the will-to-power
mentality that is exploitative, oppressive, and ultimately
insecure of its own niche in the human social ecosystem.
In any ontological sense, arguements about the superiority
and inferiority of personal matters of taste among consenting
adults, are groundless, pointless, and ultimately meaningless.
Would anyone care to argue whether rock is better than rap or
vice-versa, or whether jazz is better than country & western
or vice-versa, or whether playing a piano, harmonica, guitar,
saxophone, or banjo is better? Any such assertion of
"better" (and its necessary corollary, "worse"), is nothing
more than a linguistic confound of the phrase "I prefer."
I prefer music X, sexuality Y, and pizza with Z on it.
I have no need to prove to anyone, that any of those things
are "better than" music Q, sexuality R, and pizza with S on
it. And I will fight for the right to full equality among
people who prefer music X or Q, sexuality Y or R, and pizza
with Z or S on it.
It will be a great day when people stop seeking to dominate
each other over matters of personal choice and personal
taste. It will be an even better day when people stop
seeking to dominate each other altogether, aside from
consenting adult dom/sub play;-)
-G.
=====
On 13-05-05-Sun 12:29 PM, Sonja Trauss wrote:
mmm according to conservative readings of
the bible, all
non-reproductive sex is sinful. masturbating and pulling out
are both sins, and in that way equivalent. So if you want to
throw around the 'puritanical' label, it would have to stick
to the idea that masturbation and sex are interchangeable,
and not the idea they they are two pretty different types of
activities.
Other women should pipe up here, but the only people who
have ever tried to tell me that "masturbation is a type of
sex" have been men. No, masturbation is not sex. In the same
way that vitamin pills are not food. Masturbation is a thing
too thoroughly inferior to sex to be classed with it. I
guess, from a male pleasure point of view, they are
equivalent, if you cum from sex or you cum from jerking off,
you cum, who cares, but they are not equivalent from your
gf's pov. I would 1000% prefer my partner to cum from
fucking me than from jerking off. I get nothing out of him
jerking off, if he fucks me I will almost surely cum.
The idea that we should make more porn (for women!) has
always struck me as an example of men thinking women should
be more like men. Maybe women aren't that into porn, not
because there's not that much porn that women like, but
because porn is lame and boring. Maybe instead of women
going against their natures and learning to enjoy passively
watching other people have sex, men should go against their
natures and learn to enjoy closing the laptop, picking up
the phone, waiting 15 minutes for your girl to come over,
and then fucking her.
On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 1:58 AM, GtwoG PublicOhOne
<g2g-public01(a)att.net <mailto:g2g-public01@att.net>> wrote:
Sonja, Andrew, and Yo's-
Whoa there! All this about "masturbation replacing sex"
reinforces an artificial duality that's ultimately
founded in puritanism, in which masturbation may not be
"sinful" but it's "not real sex."
To paraphrase an old Campbell's Soup ad, "It's Sex for
One and that one is you!"
What I personally find bizarre as hell, is the degree to
which our culture is so couple-normative, and the degree
to which sexual coupling is normalized and expected as
the primary axis on which lifetime relationships are
based. This when there's a near-infinite range of
potential upon which humans could base their relationships.
Have you ever seen a couple that appeared to you to be
either overtly dysfunctional or just plain weird in the
manner of "what the hell could s/he possibly see in
him/her?!" The answer usually turns out to be "in bed,"
as in: they may be totally incompatible in all other
ways, but they have some unique kink in common, or just
screw like mad weasels, and apparently that's enough to
keep them together.
Under all of this is the genetic competition algorithm,
that dates back to bacteria but seems remarkably
incapable of producing humans with the intelligence
needed to overcome war, climate change, and all the
other forces of our own making that threaten our
near-extinction. In an era where "the
cybernetically-enhanced human" is a common cultural
meme, surely we can do better!
Anyone who thinks that their precious genes are
something special (or that there is any such thing as a
superior race), is in for a rude awakening: we share
well over 99% of our genome with chimpanzees and
bonobos. Selfish genes helped us get from our birth as
a species to the point where our survival was assured.
Since that time we have overpopulated and overconsumed
the planet, threatening our own continued existence
within our lifetimes.
It's time to move beyond obedience to algorithms that no
longer serve us.
-G.
======
On 13-05-05-Sun 1:22 AM, Sonja Trauss wrote:
That study says nothing about whether masturbation does
or doesn't replace sex. It says that teens who
masturbate more have more sex, which makes perfect
sense. These are things that you expect to see
together, like umbrellas and rubber boots, but you
would never say that the umbrella caused the boots, or
vice versa. And this study says nothing about whether
sex causes masturbation or the other way around.
It also doesn't say anything about masturbation with or
without porn (although I wish it did).
Masturbation is all well and good, of course, but
that's not sufficient to explain why porn is well and
good.
I'm super curious. I can't experimentally not watch
porn and see what happens because I already don't, but
if any of you do, then you will be able to tell me what
you would be missing.
On May 5, 2013 12:43 AM, "Andrew"
<andrew(a)roshambomedia.com
<mailto:andrew@roshambomedia.com>> wrote:
Sonja,
I disagree with your views on masturbation. For
one, I don't think that masturbation causes people
to have less sex. Here's a study a found by
googling I'm sure there is more data to back up the
fact that masturbation does not reduce the amount
of sex someone is having.
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/womens-health/articles/2…
It is also just, in general a healthy practice.
second, I can masturbate without porn, and with
porn (as can most people).
I really believe that part of being sex positive is
also being accepting of masturbation as natural and
healthy.
--Andrew
On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 12:25 AM, Sonja Trauss
<sonja.trauss(a)gmail.com
<mailto:sonja.trauss@gmail.com>> wrote:
Yeah .... so what if you didn't have anything,
and you couldn't concentrate. Would you give
up? Maybe the first day. Maybe even the 2nd
day, but eventually you would be able to
masterbate on your own I bet.
I'm a girl and never encountered very much porn
I liked at all. I *guess* a solution could be
to make porn a girl would like, but my solution
was to have sex instead, which has been overall
great. It's forced me to get in contact, and
stay in contact, with people I otherwise
wouldn't have. Making porn that girls like, so
they can join men in having an activity that
allows them to have less sex, seems antisocial
and a step backwards.
Yeah the more I think about this the more
absurd it seems that a crowd that is interested
in expanding the audience for porn would
overlap with a 'do-acracy' hackerspace crowd.
Watching porn is watching, not doing.
On May 4, 2013 7:53 PM, "Andrew"
<andrew(a)roshambomedia.com
<mailto:andrew@roshambomedia.com>> wrote:
People want porn for somthing easy to focus
on while masturbating. Masturbating being a
natural part of life. I also dont think
that all people who can have sex with
others, but don't , are doing so because
they don't have the "skills"
On May 4, 2013 7:20 PM, "Sonja Trauss"
<sonja.trauss(a)gmail.com
<mailto:sonja.trauss@gmail.com>> wrote:
Or less representation of sex
altogether. What does anyone need porn for?
On May 4, 2013 7:10 PM, "Andrew"
<andrew(a)vagabondballroom.com
<mailto:andrew@vagabondballroom.com>>
wrote:
When i ran an erotic event in
oakland our crew made it a point to
balence genders as much as
possible. We had male and female
co-hosts and male and female strippers.
Also. Somthing to keep in mind is
that there are more than two
genders. In my mind objectification
is not the issue. Representation
is. Porn is mostly filmed from a
hetero-cis-male perspective and
because of that, taken as a whole,
is exploitive. There is porn that
fights this perspective and
representation of sex and there
needs to be more.
On May 4, 2013 6:55 PM, "Sonja
Trauss" <sonja.trauss(a)gmail.com
<mailto:sonja.trauss@gmail.com>> wrote:
Can I get a link for this
gonorreah story?
On May 4, 2013 6:42 PM, "GtwoG
PublicOhOne"
<g2g-public01(a)att.net
<mailto:g2g-public01@att.net>>
wrote:
Romy & Yo's-
Re. "womens' bodies with
their faces cut off."
Wow. Thanks for pointing
that out. I never noticed
that before (OTOH
attempts to do "sexy" in
advertising generally don't
get my attention),
but I vaguely recall seeing
ads like that somewhere.
I agree, a torso minus a
face is depersonalizing and
objectifying as
hell, unless there's a very
good reason for taking a
photo that way
(e.g. medical contexts).
Being looked at "that way"
produces the creepy
feeling that the looker's
intentions are non-consensual.
The only borderline-legit
reason I could see for
doing it in clothing
ads is, "we want you to
imagine yourself wearing
this, and we don't want
to risk putting you off by
showing a face that's
substantially different
to yours, so imagine your
face on this person's
body." But it would be
foolish to think that's
what's intended every time
that photographic
method is used.
This brings up the question
of what people find sexy in
photography.
For me (gay male), a photo
minus a face is a
non-starter: there's no cue
for communication with the
person. Nudes in general
don't do it either:
all the usual contextual
cues as to someone's
personality are missing,
so why would I even begin
to imagine being in an
intimate context with
someone I don't really
know? I've always felt
that way but now we have
the HIV pandemic to
reinforce it: in general
it's not a good idea to get
intimate with someone you
don't know very well,
because the outcome
could be a life-threatening
illness.
For that matter, now that
massively-drug-resistant
gonorrhea is loose in
the USA, which is hella'
easier to catch than HIV
and can kill you in a
matter of days through a
raging bacterial infection,
it's probably a
darn good idea for everyone
to "get smart & play safe"
ALL the time,
zero exceptions, even more
so than with HIV. In which
case photography
that portrays an
objectified sexuality
without communications
isn't just
gross and exploitative,
it's a public health hazard
that reinforces
attitudes that put people
at risk for their lives.
-G.
=====
On 13-05-04-Sat 10:34 AM,
Romy Snowyla wrote:
> It's interesting to me
how porn a
> Nd erotica always
advertise with women's
bodies with their faces cut off
> American apparel digs
this etc
> Lots of art theory
discusses this
>
> I would love for any Sudo
room event to break the
mold and show men's bodies
in any erotic theme as well
... Also would love to see
the male body as the focus
of any erotic film or dance
to balance out the
Imbalance and unnatural
obsession with t and a we
see on the porn industry
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
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