emily

“For some, measuring porn’s real-world effects boils down to one extreme and ultimately misleading question: “Does it lead to rape?” What is overlooked here is the more subtle question of how porn shapes the culture and the men who use it. No anti-porn feminist I know has suggested that there is one image, or even a few, that could lead a nonrapist to rape; the argument, rather, is that taken together, pornographic images create a world that is at best inhospitable to women, and at worst dangerous to their physical and emotional well-being. In an unfair and inaccurate article that is emblematic of how anti-porn feminist work is misrepresented, Daniel Bernardi claims that Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon believed that “watching pornography leads men to rape women.”³ Neither Dworkin nor MacKinnon, pioneers in developing a radical feminist critique of pornography, saw porn in such simplistic terms. Rather, both argued that porn has a complicated and multilayered effect on male sexuality, and that rape, rather than simply being caused by porn, is a cultural practice that has been woven into the fabric of a male-dominated society. Pornography, they argued, is one important agent of such a society since it so perfectly encodes woman-hating ideology, but to see it as simplistically and unquestionably leading to rape is to ignore how porn operates within the wider context of a society that is brimming with sexist imagery and ideology.”
― Gail Dines, Pornland: How Porn Has Hijacked Our Sexuality

“I am trapped inside a part of me I hate. A hard, masculine part of myself that has surfaced to fight, after small memories and scars come out of me with a suddenness that is sobering as well as horrifying-and I fight to save the Laura I wish I could be again. The one everyone thinks is still around. Me in a sundress, hair in the wind, and a smile engraved into my cheeks by the sharp fear that a man may visit me at any moment this evening and try to kill me.”
― Jennifer Lynch, The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer

“In Sade, the authentic equation is revealed: the power of the pornographer is the power of the rapist/batterer is the power of the man.”
― Andrea Dworkin, Pornography: Men Possessing Women

“His death, of course, is unbearable. His death is intolerable, unspeakable, unfair, insufferable; I agree; I learned it since the day I was born; terrible; his death is terrible; are you crazy; are you stupid; are you cruel? It's absurd; it's silly; unjustified; uncivilized; crazed; another madwoman, where's the attic? He didn't mean it; or he didn't do it, not really, or not fully, or not knowing, or not intending; he didn't understand; or he couldn't help it; or he won't again; certainly he will try not to; unless; well; he just can't help it; be patient; he needs help; sympathy; over time. Yes, her ass is grass but you can't expect miracles, it takes time, she wasn't perfect either you know; he needs time, education, help, support; yeah, she's dead meat; but you can't expect someone to change right away, overnight, besides she wasn't perfect, was she, he needs time, help, support, education; well, yeah, he was out of control; listen, she's lucky it wasn't worse, I'm not covering it up or saying what he did was right, but she's not perfect, believe me, and he had a terrible mother; yeah, I know, you had to scrape her off the ground; but you know, she wasn't perfect either, he's got a problem; he's human, he's got a problem. Oh, darling, no; he didn't have a problem before; now he's got a problem. I am on this earth to see that now he has a problem. It is very important for women to kill men; he's got a problem now.”
― Andrea Dworkin, Mercy