Whipping boys: a post for International Fetish Day

Before I start, I'd like to say that this seems like such a small thing to write about compared with what's happening in Gaza right now. With blood and butchery and human grief being unleashed by the most hypocritical nation on the planet, whether or not a few Brit spank-fetishists get to enjoy their pornography of choice seems worse than trivial. Spoilt, even. But I'm going to write about it anyway, because right now the big things to care about are so big and heartbreaking that even considering that I might have anything to say makes me feel like a small and ignorant child. Until I'm good enough and strong enough to be reporting on the ground, I'm going to put my head down and keep on caring about the small losses, the small outrages, because hell knows somebody's got to, and because it's about responsibility, and choices, and how we deal with the violence of our own hearts. If you want to hear about the other thing, go and read Ewa's columns at Red Pepper, because they are wise and fantastic.

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On the 25th of January, a bill to outlaw certain types of violent pornography will finally come into force, and a batallion of British fetish-fanatics are going to demonstrate in parliament square. I will be there, but not for the reasons you might think, and no, not because I fancy my chances of being handcuffed to a fence by Ben Westwood.

I met Jane Longhurst, once. I grew up in Brighton, and Jane was a music teacher with my youth orchestra. I remember the sense of shock that infected everyone in the weeks after her body was discovered; I remember standing on Waterloo road with my friends who lived in the area, watching the police search Coutts' house; I remember the tribute concert, I remember her former pupils crying and clutching each other in the string section. Good kids, who couldn't understand why this lovely, bright young woman had been so foully murdered, just like I couldn't, just like I still can't.

But I can tell you one thing: a collection of dirty pictures can't explain the deep brutalities of the human psyche. I'm grown now, and I know the difference between desire and action, and I've read and watched and researched a great deal of feminist and criminologist thought on violent pornography and I'm still convinced that we're looking for the root of evil in the wrong place.

Just to make my own position clear here: I do not indulge in kinky photography and films, although some of my best friends are spankers I have a dear clutch of friends and adopted family who variously watch, make and model for the stuff. And they enjoy it. I know they enjoy it, because I share a bedroom wall with one of them. I've been to fetish clubs, and had an averagely agreeable time; I've done voluntary shifts at the (now sadly disbanded) Coffee, Cake and Kink establishment in central London. Some of this particular pornography turns me on; some of it I can appreciate on an artistic level; some of it makes me giggle, and some of it leaves me baffled. But I can understand why some people like it - why some people need it - and, in fact, I have much more respect for those people who explore their weird fetishes gently, who bring them out into the light where they are harmless, than I do for people who torture themselves and nurse their violent desires in darkness and in shame. For that reason if for no other, I'm going to be at the demo on the 25th.

The point is that, as human beings, we all have dark and violent fantasies - whether we admit them to ourselves or not. Have you ever woken from a wet dream, sticky and muggy and consumed with bewilderment at the violence of your own subconscious? Have you ever received a parking ticket at a particularly awkward moment and imagined - however briefly - beating the attendant's face to a bloody pulp? Maybe? Yes? But did you actually do it? No, because if you did you'd be rightly condemned as a violent thug,like this chap, and you'd probably go to prison. Have you ever become incredibly angry, or violently turned on, and wanted to do damage to somebody, or wanted someone to do damage to you? Then you should be able to understand that what makes us decent human beings, what makes us able to live in society, isn't the desires that we have but the way we respond to them.

And it's that aspect of the new law that worries me most. Are we really naive enough to think that Graham Coutts murdered Jane Longhurst and defiled her body because some pictures made him do it? Are we naive enough to think that it was violent pornography by itself that allowed him to realise his fantasies? If so, then we'd have an epidemic of murderers stalking the streets of this country. What makes the difference between someone who enjoys pain-play and someone who enjoys abusing and killing people is the capacity to distinguish between fantasy and reality, desire and action, that is one of the basic categories of adult humanity. We need to be adult about our own dark desires, if we are ever to overcome them. That's why I'm disgusted by the very idea of a law which tries to outlaw normal outlets for normal, horrible desires. I'm disgusted by the idea of a government which wants it to be illegal to have naughty thoughts. There's a word for that.

Of course, this is about sex, and we are weird about sex, particularly in the UK, so it's not ever ever ever going to be clear cut. And we need to pay very close attention to Andrea Dworkin's porn philosophy: specifically, to her reminder that filmed and photographed pornography happens in real time, to real people. It's not just fantasy: those whippings and beatings happened. What this moves us onto is the issue of consent, which is another thing that we haven't even approached being adult about as a society.

The fantastic Pandora Blake is one professional porn model with a very incisive outlook on the issue.

'The actual wording of the legislation is dangerously vague. Spanking and CP material isn't necessarily illegal, but given an unsympathetic judge armed with waffly, imprecise language, it could be... If I'm arrested, I'll defend my sexuality in court.'

In fact, the spanking and fetish porn industry has, in general, much better safeguards against industry abuse than any other branch of the porn world, partly because it needs to. Thomas Cameron, another fetish porn actor, told me that 'yes, there have been a couple of cases where producers have been abusive. And you wouldn't believe how quickly they've been run out of town. There are measures in place to protect our own.'

I have written before on the fact that the nastiest, most misogynistic pornography out there isn't even addressed by the act. I will repeat: the really nasty scenes, the sick low-level fetishisation of male dominance isn't going to be banned, not now, not soon, probably not ever. Not only is banning ordinary misogynistic porn not the answer, it isn't even the question yet. As I said one year ago:

The question of whether pornography directly causes or does not cause sexual violence somewhat evades the real issue. The reason that pornography is such a sticky problem, the reason that many feminists hate and fear pornography, is the same reason that many in the pro-patriarchal sphere are willing to go to the wire to defend it: mainstream, heterosexual pornography as it is mass-produced by western society holds up an accurate mirror to the violently misogynist world in which we are living.

Let me repeat that for the confused or post-orgasmic: the fact of pornography itself, however ‘extreme’, is not socially harmful, but the messages inherent in most western pornography, never mind the ‘extreme’ end, re-enforce social paradigms of sexual inequality, male sexual subjectivity and violence against women. When I say that ‘the quality of most porn is dreadful’, this is what I’m talking about.

By contrast, I have never encountered an erotic culture with as much respect for women, with as much respect for humanity in general, as the fetish industry and scene. Because the true nature of the perversion is accepted for what it is, the necessity of drawing a distinction between fantasy and reality, the importance of empowering and looking after the models and actors, is very much insisted upon. That's what gets me about this bill. I'm against censorship, but if I had to pick one type of pornography to ban, I would come to the fetish and BDSM scene last of all. Because we are what we jerk off to: fetishists are merely honest about it.

The BDSM scene is the only erotic scene I have ever encountered where I have ever felt that if I said the word 'no', it would be respected. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the BDSM scene is the only forum in the country where people are actually adult about sex and aware of what does and doesn't imply consent. And this is why I find the upcoming bill baffling - particularly as amendments which would have put in place a defence if the consent of the performers is provable (say, if they are willing to provide personal or written statements) was rejected out of hand. This proves that the point of the bill isn't to protect the women involved, but to police the sexual habits of the nation.

Liz Longhurst is a perfect public face for the anti-kink campaign, as her legitimate grief for her daughter makes it incredibly hard to put forward counter-arguments without seeming callous. The fact remains, however, that the linking of violent pornography to violent sex crime is a logical fallacy - and legislation against the former is an extremely fucking worrying move indeed.

Porn: what is it good for?

If you just threw up a little bit in your mouth, you're not the only one. Go and swill out, then keep reading. Images like the one on the left use the conceits of violent pornography - in this case, gang rape - to sell everything from clothes to cars to washing powder. Violent pornography has become part of our cultural language.
But is censorship the answer?A recent article of mine on The F Word in response to the new UK porn laws laid down by the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill 2008 generated a surprising amount of controversy. In brief, the government wants to ban various forms of 'extreme' pornography, including bestiality, necrophilia and some 'snuff' porn. I argued that censorship is not the answer, nor will it do anything to reduce the harm violent and extreme pornography does to some individuals' sexual and personal development; I argued that censorship will drive the industry further underground, making it more racy and enticing and generating an unsafe working environment for those involved in producing 'extreme' pornography. I mentioned that there is little extant evidence to suggest that 'extreme' pornography leads directly to extreme sexual violence. I was declared naive and gullible by 'Radical' feminists and anti-porn sexists alike, claiming that pornography is harmful, hateful and extremely socially damaging. I must protest at this, and not merely because noone who has read the synopsis briefs for SlutBus 4 and A Filthy Little Cocksucking Whore Named Marilyn for research purposes will ever ever be quite so naive again. I never claimed that violent pornography was not damaging. Violent pornography is unquestionably, incontrovertibly damaging, and as a feminist against censorship I am achingly aware of that fact. I merely happen to believe that porn censorship is not the answer, and that the Bill currently on the Commons table will do fat, shiny nothing in a bag for women's liberation.

Do I believe that violent porn directly causes sexual violence? No. Do I believe that banning it and driving it underground will do any good to anyone? Absolutely not. Do I believe that physically and emotionally violent pornography is symptomatic of an endemic social paradigm wherein masculine power and cruelty is eroticised, and that this paradigm leads to sexual violence amongst many, many other atrocities? Hell yes. Yes, I do.

The question of whether pornography directly causes or does not cause sexual violence somewhat evades the real issue. The reason that pornography is such a sticky problem, the reason that many feminists hate and fear pornography, is the same reason that many in the pro-patriarchal sphere are willing to go to the wire to defend it: mainstream, heterosexual pornography as it is mass-produced by western society holds up an accurate mirror to the violently misogynist world in which we are living.

Let me repeat that for the confused or post-orgasmic: the fact of pornography itself, however ‘extreme’, is not socially harmful, but the messages inherent in most western pornography, never mind the ‘extreme’ end, re-enforce social paradigms of sexual inequality, male sexual subjectivity and violence against women. When I say that ‘the quality of most porn is dreadful’, this is what I’m talking about.


You are what you jerk off to.

In this pornographic world, inequality and injustice are eroticised. Power and dominance, for the most part of men over women, are eroticised. The exercise of that dominance in cruel, violent or humiliating ways is eroticised, and when something is eroticised in the mainstream to this extent, it becomes normalised.

What isn't extant in porn is almost as critical as what is - to whit, respect, tenderness, human emotion, sensitivity. I'm with Jensen in conceding that there are economic as well as ideological reasons for this, namely that most pornography is bought by men as aids to masturbation, and on-screen emotion tends, it is posited, to detract from the salient pleasures of self-stroking. Some form of psychological kick has to replace that tenderness or affection as a narrative hook - hence the introduction of cruelty and violence into the remit of Joe Average Mustachioed Porn Director. I’m not yet proposing radical tenderness as a social strategy, not least because it would put paid to my favourite hobby of sitting in smoking rooms, drinking vile coffee and hating things. But I'm behind the radfems in noting that its total erasure from pornography is worrying, to say the least: pornography leached of mature emotional responsiveness is often (indeed, usually) the first illicit means of educating young men about sex. For almost half the population, violent or objectifying pornography is now the cultural blueprint for sexual relations. What does that mean for gender politics, and what are our options other than to lash out at the offending material?

If patriarchal culture, where rape and gender-fascism are facts of life, is the disease, then the many forms of porn are the oozing, blood-crusted pustules that cluster in the tenderest crevices of the diseased body. Like children, we attack the sores with nails and teeth, ignoring the fact that the body itself is sick to death. By scratching at the pustules, we will only drive the rot deeper.


Corpse-fucking and the state...

So what is the government's response? How are our politicians working to root out the infection from our feverish, sickening gender paradigms? Let's let’s look again at that government bill. One of the first types of pornography that’s forbidden is ‘[images of any] act which involves or appears to involve sexual interference with a human corpse’ – that is, necrophilia. Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but necrophiliacs are a very small and specialised sect of the fetish community. There will never be enough necrophiliac porn, just as there will never be a large enough necrophiliac culture, to normalise corpse-fucking as a social paradigm. And frankly, if that’s your kink and you can excise it by watching badly made-up zombies shag each other on telly, then fair enough. So why is it that pornography that appears to show necrophilia – a very rare and totally illegal practice that doesn’t really have much of a social discourse – is NOT okay, whereas pornography that shows live women appearing to be raped, humiliated and beaten to within an inch or their lives is totally fine?

Let’s grit our teeth and face this one: it’s fine on television because it’s normalised in society. Maggoty, squelchy grave-diving turns the stomachs of our politicians, and yes, I’m a kink-friendly, accommodating anarcho-buddhist with not much sympathy for the meat of the body, but I can see why that might be. The bill covers necrophilia, bestiality, 'snuff' movies and severe injury to the sexual organs. Rape, all other sexual violence, extreme female submission, double- and triple-penetration, humiliation, sexual cruelty – all of this fails even to make it into the draft bill, because it’s been normalised in western society. Not only that, but in a neo-liberal capitalist system there could be no question of banning this type pornography, because such an action would by now mean outlawing nearly all heterosexual porn. And porn generates more revenue than the entire British film industry, minus many of the overheads. Not only is banning violent porn not the answer – it’s not even the question yet.

Censorship of 'extreme' pornography will not solve the problem of sexual violence and gender fascism eating away at the bones of progressive western culture. Instead, we need the courage to look into that mirror and respond appropriately to what we see there. Whether disgust, direct action or bland acceptance, our reaction to these images determines who we are, and who we will become as a society.

Porn, Prudery and the Law: The Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

Since the first caveperson picked up a flint to hack an enormously bosomed gnome out of granite, pornography has been a fact of life. In July this year, in one of his first acts as prime minister, Gordon Brown tabled the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill, 2007. I'm going to be covering the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill that's due to come into force in 2008 in more detail. Here, though, is a separate little dip into one of the issues that needs a whole separate debate: the new anti-porn legislation.

Now, this new bill included legislation banning the downloading and possession of violent or ‘extreme’ pornography, in response to a large scale media reaction to the sexually-motivated killing of Jane Longhurst in 2004. Ignoring the widely accepted fact that there is little to no evidence to support a direct link between violent sexual crime and ‘extreme’ pornography, the state has leapt upon the opportunity to further police and to criminalise the sexual mores of its citizens.

Handing control of pornography to the state is never going to end well. Conveniently, since the legislation was introduced to the Bill in 2004, the government’s definition of ‘extreme’ pornography has been expanded to include some kinds of homosexual porn. Giving the state license to say what is and is not criminal pornography gives it license to suddenly decide that the tastes and interests of any non-mainstream group should be penalised – to decide, for example, that whilst it’s no longer a crime to be gay, it is a crime to download certain pictures of men having intercourse with other men.

How old were you when you took your first illicit peek at an older kind’s dirty pictures – 13, 14? Quite possibly younger if you’re male, since ogling forbidden filth remains practically a rite of passage in schoolboy culture. Censoring pornography does not work. Even in the UK, arguably the most restrictive of English-speaking cultures in terms of anti-porn legislation, pornography is everywhere. It’s on the top shelves of newsagents, splashed across the front pages of Nuts, Zoo and Loaded. It’s widely available on most high-streets, in adult shops up and down the land, in the ‘explicit’ sections of every bookshop and print-store, and, most of all, it’s on the internet.

Censorship of pornography is also illogical. Since when did forbidding something fun do anything other than increase its illicit appeal, make it more enticing to the public, and cause an explosion in rates of crime associated with the new contraband? . During Prohibition in America, for example, not only did national alcohol consumption actually increase between 1920 and Repeal in 1933, but the result was a massive upsurge in violent and organised crime in connection with alcohol. Stricter legislation on pornography is likely, moreover, to drive the producers of ‘extreme’ pornography underground, depriving participants of legal safeguards and making working conditions considerably more unsafe for porn models, actors and actresses. Legislation to increase pornographic censorship would be immeasurably socially damaging.


Fundamentally, porn itself – the explicit representation of the human body or sexual activity with the goal of sexual arousal and/or sexual relief –is not harmful. What grates is that so much of the porn that is being produced and disseminated is so very, very dire.
Much of the contemporary porn available is tacky, limited, demeaning, badly executed, badly scripted and – often, but by no means always – exploitative to those that participate in its production and consumption. It is the type of pornography that is saturating our culture that is harmful, not porn itself.
Supply dictates demand, and if what is being supplied is countless images of women being demeaned, humiliated and, most of all, made voiceless sex objects, then this will be taken as the baseline for desirable sexual activity by young men and women who – despite legislation that is already in place – grow up watching this abominable, tragically limited trite. Our cultural sex-narrative has gone wrong. Our response to this should not be to criminalise sexual images, but to radically re-think the way in which we explore sexual desire.
What I’d like to see is pornography with a plot: pornography in which grown men and women are equal players, in which sex is joyful, playful, soulful, awkward even, and never abusive. I’d like to put that most dangerous and illicit of things, tenderness, back into scripts, screenplays and directives. I’d like pornography to be beautiful. I’d like it to be made by producers, models and actresses who are enjoying what they are doing and who are union-protected. I’d like my porn to be artistic, I’d like it to play with fantasy and desire whilst keeping within the boundaries of non-harmful sexual and emotional exploration. Then, I’d like this kind of pornography to be government-subsidised, and to be distributed freely online and in schools as part of a validated PHSE curriculum, so that growing children and teenagers can explore enriching, non-abusive sexual desire in an open, positive manner.

Finally, in this sexual utopia, I would restrict so-called ‘extreme’ pornography – pornography that includes, for example, violent BDSM games, rape and abuse fantasy or necrophilia – to over eighteens, who would hopefully be adult enough to explore valid kinks in a mature way that would ensure that they remain fantasy. A pornographic market overflowing with widely available, quality, joyfully explicit plot- and character-driven, sexually equal pornography would both benefit the sexual and emotional health of the next generation and reduce people’s drive to indulge abusive kinks at vulnerable, impressionable ages.
If we really want to reduce violent and sexual crime against women, only a radical re-think of our attitude to pornography, encompassing a long, hard look at our social and sexual mores, will cut it. A warped, limited and misogynist cultural sex-narrative is the problem, but censorship is definitively not the answer.