The Boston Globe declares the end of times upon "The Pornification of America." As it turns out, actors are having sex in art-house films, girls just want to be porn stars, and porn--porn, people!--is everywhere. As part of the impending X-rated apocalypse, the Globe interviews anti-porn, porn-obsessed porn pundit Pamela Paul, author of the porny titled: Pornified. For her book, Paul interviewed a whopping 100 porn watchers on their pornographic feelings and came to the conclusion that porn is bad. Then, another author steps forward to blame it all on Madonna, feminists, and the religious right.

In the view of Cynthia Eller, author of ''Am I a Woman? A Skeptic's Guide to Gender," Madonna was ''a pivotal figure" in this transformation of popular entertainment into something that often resembles soft-core porn. ''I remember at the time being confused by this idea that acting like a porn star, acting out porn fantasies, was somehow empowering for women," says Eller.

She speculates that the current climate is partly ''a backlash to feminism, a way of protecting male egos, and men insisting on retaining a power structure sexually if they can't retain it in areas of employment and parenting and so forth. It's a way to hang on to a male-dominated paradigm."

But Eller says there is plenty of blame to go around. She and Pamela Paul point also to a schism in the women's movement several decades ago. Some feminists campaigned against pornography, but others viewed that as tantamount to censorship, or did not want to be perceived as anti-men. It divided the women's movement, they say, at a moment when it could have decisively changed the national dialogue on pornography.

Porn in the USA?

Eller also contends that the ''conservative right, in its eagerness to keep sexuality forbidden, is really just stoking the fire of an appetite for porn, for naughtiness, for the whole lust for sexual transgression." She maintains that if conservative forces were to ''give up their repressive game where sex is concerned," the mainstream manifestations of porn will lose their appeal to a lot of people.

Telltale

USA

May 2004

JAN 24, 2006 05:36 PM

Eller also contends that the ''conservative right, in its eagerness to keep sexuality forbidden, is really just stoking the fire of an appetite for porn, for naughtiness, for the whole lust for sexual transgression." She maintains that if conservative forces were to ''give up their repressive game where sex is concerned," the mainstream manifestations of porn will lose their appeal to a lot of people.

So fucking true.

Would you still have snuck out of the house late at night if your parents gave you a late enough curfew and were cool with you hanging out with your friends?

Benhamin

Grayslake, IL

December 2005

JAN 24, 2006 06:03 PM

Definitely read the original article off the website. It paints a more accurate picture of the different viewpoints and the reasons behind a percieved 'pornification'.
Personally, I'm not that worried. If people begin to look more objectively(and honestly) at sexuality, free from irrational fears created out of ignorance, there are a lot of positives that can come from this.

shacolwal

Saint Cloud, MN

February 2004

JAN 24, 2006 06:08 PM

I love porn.

hadees

Austin, TX

December 2003

JAN 24, 2006 06:16 PM

SmilesAndWarmth said:
I concluded a long time ago that porn is good.
I guess Pamela Paul and I will just have to agree to disagree.

Porn is good, Prostitution is even better. Why can't it be like in the past, it always was happening, people just didn't really talk about it.