[myrmeleo]

In my understanding of liberal doctrine, economics is classified as a type of coercion, what I would call soft coercion. This position is found in various anti-freemarket maxims (e.g. "economic freedom is the freedom to choose between bosses"). This runs contrary to libertarian thought that would argue that all economic exchanges are voluntary. The arguments for such a view have been presented previously, though if necessary we may rehash them here (note that we are placed within the "liberalism" sub-forum to minimize such distractions). Let us table this thought momentarily.

Pornography, by many feminist and anti-sexist critiques, has been noted as (in the large majority of cases) degrading to women. Women, in much pornographic material, are humiliated, degraded, objectified and dehumanized. Though "pro-women" pornographic media exists, it would appear it is very much in the minority. Some liberal defenders of certain freedoms reject these criticisms, however, noting that 1) women are free to do what they want with their body and, in a related argument, 2) they are choosing to enter a contract with a pornographer by their own free will for economic exchange.

What I ask, is, how does one escape the contradiction that exists when simultaneously arguing that soft coercion is a political force worthy of state action while promoting a woman's choice to be paid for sex acts as simply a form of women's liberation?

[peterm1988]

I'm not sure how much I buy into this line of thought, but if I had to provide a simple answer it is that a conscious effort has to be made to get into porn, that isn't the case with working at Wal Mart. People don't aim to end up at Wal Mart, so they need protection, but people that deliberately end up in potentially bad situations don't deserve that same protection.

If I had to answer personally, though, I think you're making the mistake of conflating two different opinions. I don't think many people who say that Wal Mart is exploitative and the state needs to take action about that are also going to turn around and bang on about the sanctity of porn contracts and free will. I find them both exploitative and whilst I don't want to ban porn or anything like that, I do think that steps to prevent exploitation would be as useful there as anywhere.

Oh, I also think when you say 'simply' an act of women's liberation, you're getting the wrong end of the stick. Even though people do say that, they're wrong. From my perspective I just don't like the sudden concern for exploitation that arises when women do sex work at the same time as explicitly not caring about the endless opportunities for exploitation which exist that don't involve sucking cock.

[myrmeleo]

a conscious effort has to be made to get into porn, that isn't the case with working at Wal Mart. People don't aim to end up at Wal Mart, so they need protection, but people that deliberately end up in potentially bad situations don't deserve that same protection.

Are low-income women more likely to get into the pornography business? I am actively looking for a source for such information — I wanted it for the OP but figured it might turn up from someone else while I continue to look. My hunch is yes, but, of course, that is only a hunch.

I don't think many people who say that Wal Mart is exploitative and the state needs to take action about that are also going to turn around and bang on about the sanctity of porn contracts and free will.

Anecdotally, I have found the opposite to be true. But perhaps you are right.

[Genghis Khan]

Women, in much pornographic material, are humiliated, degraded, objectified and dehumanized.

I think liberals, men or women, take issue with that statement, which is why the rest of what you wrote doesn't apply.

Plus - Porn isn't a monolithic entity. Some movies present it more gracefully than others.

I personally think that all sexual activity entails some level of objectification. It's unavoidable. If I pick up a woman in a bar and fuck her at her place, I really don't care about her personality at that moment, and I think that as we're doing it, she wouldn't want me to think about that. She would prefer I think about the matter at hand, as it is likely to produce more pleasurable results for both of us.

I don't think women in Porn are dehumanized or humiliated, and as I said, some objectification does take place, but it's unavoidable.

Plus, many porn movies are done with the girl's best interests at heart. She is constantly looked out for and her every whim is catered to. They're not all done is smoke filled rooms where the girls are deprived water until they finish the scene. It doesn't work like that almost at all.

If that were the case, liberals, I suspect, would have a serious problem. I know I would.

[Fasces]

If you want to talk about true dehumanization in porn, look no further than the prop with the cock. Women are at least still human, not a glorified sex toy.

[Donna]

myrmeleo, which feminists are you talking about? It has been years since I have encountered criticism of pornography from mainstream sources. The sex-negative feminists (characteristically anti-pornography) were basically annihilated when the internet came onto the scene.

[grassroots1]

I do buy into this line of argument, and it's one reason I believe prostitution should remain illegal in the current economic, political, and social situation.

What I ask, is, how does one escape the contradiction that exists when simultaneously arguing that soft coercion is a political force worthy of state action while promoting a woman's choice to be paid for sex acts as simply a form of women's liberation?

In a society where a person's circumstances can force them to go to drastic measures to make money for their own survival, the question of the woman's "right to choose" becomes muddied. I believe that the solution to this problem is not in making prostitution or pornography legal or illegal, but striking at the heart of the problem, which is poverty, lack of sufficient education, and a lack of a basic foundation on which people can realize their own potential. In such a society, I think that to legalize prostitution and pornography fully makes sense, because we can rest assured that the woman is participating in the act because she chose to and not because she feels cornered economically. Of course there is always the question of people being manipulated in other ways, but this is a separate issue.

[SpaciousBox]

Interestingly enough, I want to make the same argument as Grassroots but from the other side. I see no reason why it can't be a two pronged attack – women’s rights to both be sex workers and free from abuse. If we accept the premise that women can be exploited through prostitution, or through porn, then we also accept the possibility that that won't change for the better when taking the law into account. The simple nature of exploitation leaves it legally dodgy, after all. The question then is if we're assisting with the exploitation, or fighting against it through our liberal legality. There is possibly a point to be made there, I will admit, but still see it as a minor one due to two issues:

1. Legalizing something will always give you more control over it. If porn was made illegal, exploitation wouldn’t go down, as the people who continued to participate would be the needy and vulnerable – the only ones who got exploited in the first place. Yet they would now be outside the protection of usual working law. Lets face it; if your in a position to be exploited in such a manner, the legality will not effect your ability to be exploited.
2. Exploitation is not linked solely to the item in question. It is equally possible for Women to be exploited within a normal workplace, or even at home. We wouldn't think of banning marriage because some end in divorce. The same rules apply to everything else. The difference here is we're talking about taboo subjects, so for some reason judge them in a different manner.

This would mean that either we believe the majority of sex workers are exploited, or we don’t accept that a two pronged attack is possible. I for one see no issue with having both anti-exploitation, and a Women’s right to earn cash as she chooses (or a man’s, lest we become sexist about exploitation now). If I saw some evidence that the vast majority of porn participants were being abused, then I could quite possibly see an argument against it. But from what I can tell, doing Porn is not the best situation, but it’s a situation that is at least controlled. Prostitution on the other hand is certainly a “business” that involves far more exploitation. But in that situation I feel legalization would help end that, providing a protective cover along with rights for those who end up in that situation.

This isn’t a debate about what we personally feel is acceptable. It’s a debate about protecting the weak. When protection and freedom go together so neatly, you’ll find most of us liberal types behind it.

[grassroots1]

My only concern is that if made legal, the industry could become a form of exploitation in and of itself, in the same way, say, Chinese sweatshop workers or the American working class during the Gilded Age could be said to be an exploited class of people. This was a form of legal exploitation. Because we have some degree of a welfare state in this country, this effect is curbed, but because this welfare system is flawed and incomplete in a number of ways, the potential could still exist even in our own society for exploitation. Especially given the path we're heading down as a nation -- cutting social spending, continously protecting the rich, and prioritizing "economic growth" over the well-being of our citizens. Of course I'm referring to America here Spacious, I'm not sure where you're from.

So I can understand the desire to legalize to bring the industry into the open, in a sense, but that HAS to come along with the second prong of that attack, as you call it, or else we could possibly see a form of exploitation on a scale that we previously didn't imagine possible. There's no neat solution to the problem except working to ensure that people are able to realize their potential as human beings through establishing, for example, universal systems of health care and education, etc. This means in America that we will need to reclaim a democratic system that's been basically hijacked by special interests.

[Wolfman]

In my understanding of liberal doctrine, economics is classified as a type of coercion, what I would call soft coercion.

It's not soft anything. If you don't like the rules society has put in place, get the fuck out. No one is stopping you, so, in what way is it coercion?

This position is found in various anti-freemarket maxims (e.g. "economic freedom is the freedom to choose between bosses")

So, under a "free market" approach, I would not be able to choose my boss? I would be stuck with the same company my whole life, no matter how stupid, or incompetent my boss is? Are you fucking insane?

What I ask, is, how does one escape the contradiction that exists when simultaneously arguing that soft coercion is a political force worthy of state action while promoting a woman's choice to be paid for sex acts as simply a form of women's liberation?

Because women who go into degrading porn generally like it. That's why they do it. Just like the men who go into porn that degrades them, they like it.

[myrmeleo]

myrmeleo, which feminists are you talking about? It has been years since I have encountered criticism of pornography from mainstream sources. The sex-negative feminists (characteristically anti-pornography) were basically annihilated when the internet came onto the scene.

/me shrugs. Just anecdotal talks with people who consider themselves "feminists." I know very little of the history of feminism, or what's hot and what's not at the moment. The consensus seems to be I was off the mark in my original assumptions, which is perfectly fine.

Legalizing something will always give you more control over it.

From a pragmatic perspective, this seems to be the best reasoning I've seen here.

So, under a "free market" approach, I would not be able to choose my boss? I would be stuck with the same company my whole life, no matter how stupid, or incompetent my boss is? Are you fucking insane?

I'm fairly sure I didn't make this phrase up, but maybe I did. The point of the two things you address first is that liberals feel that there is such a thing as economic coercion. A poor individual taking a job is not, as many libertarians would argue, a "voluntary decision" but is rather influenced by money and capitalism and so on. All I did was paraphrase that concept. I think you just misread what I was saying. Or is that not part of modern liberalism?

[Wolfman]

I'm fairly sure I didn't make this phrase up, but maybe I did.

You're not. But I don't think I've ever seen someone say that it contradicts their world view.

The point of the two things you address first is that liberals feel that there is such a thing as economic coercion. A poor individual taking a job is not, as many libertarians would argue, a "voluntary decision" but is rather influenced by money and capitalism and so on. All I did was paraphrase that concept.

And you did an ok job of that. You seem to largely misunderstand how most Liberals want to deal with that (min wage and work place safety, both are used in the sex industry where legal).

I think you just misread what I was saying. Or is that not part of modern liberalism?

Modern Liberalism is a such vague term that it really has no meaning.

[grassroots1]

So, under a "free market" approach, I would not be able to choose my boss? I would be stuck with the same company my whole life, no matter how stupid, or incompetent my boss is? Are you fucking insane?

Wolfman, myrmeleo is suggesting that in a libertarian society, because of the effects of concentration of wealth and soft coercion, a person would not be able to choose their boss because they would have to work to survive. In that sense it would not be a voluntary decision. Most libertarians on PoFo, because of their ideological and dogmatic mindset, are unwilling to even consider this concept that economic wealth is a form of power in and of itself. You guys seem to be misunderstanding each other...

[Negotiator]

I view commercial pornography as a form of prostitution and thus violating §4 (slavery) and §5 (torture) of human rights.

I do not have an argument (and thus cant oppose) private, non-commercial pornography, because the non-commercial aspect makes sure that the people in the material arent getting financially exploited.

I am utterly at loss why pornography (or even just nudity) would be any form of "liberation".

Some movies present it more gracefully than others.

And some slave owners treat their slaves better than others. Why would that matter ?

[...] The sex-negative feminists (characteristically anti-pornography) were basically annihilated when the internet came onto the scene.

I havent mentioned any change in this area. Women in general and feminists in special still oppose prostitution and pornography.

In a society where a person's circumstances can force them to go to drastic measures to make money for their own survival, the question of the woman's "right to choose" becomes muddied. I believe that the solution to this problem is not in making prostitution or pornography legal or illegal, but striking at the heart of the problem, which is poverty, lack of sufficient education, and a lack of a basic foundation on which people can realize their own potential. In such a society, I think that to legalize prostitution and pornography fully makes sense, because we can rest assured that the woman is participating in the act because she chose to and not because she feels cornered economically. Of course there is always the question of people being manipulated in other ways, but this is a separate issue.

I fully agree with this posting, though I strongly doubt many women will do prostitution in such circumstances.

If you don't like the rules society has put in place, get the fuck out.

You cannot leave society.

[Rei Murasame]

myrmeleo, which feminists are you talking about? It has been years since I have encountered criticism of pornography from mainstream sources. The sex-negative feminists (characteristically anti-pornography) were basically annihilated when the internet came onto the scene.

This was what I think has happened as well. I have never met an actual sex-negative feminist, it's like they are some sort of dinosaur that existed before I was born.

[Wolfman]

You cannot leave society.

Bullshit.

[Suska]

This was what I think has happened as well. I have never met an actual sex-negative feminist, it's like they are some sort of dinosaur that existed before I was born.

They just aren't called feminists, but "parents with girls"

I don't think it degrades people to show off sexuality, it demonstrates a condition of being already degraded - it does degrade commerce and culture though.

I can't believe people still say, "If you don't like it you can leave." or "If you don't like your job get another." But maybe I've been living on planet poor too long...

[Daktoria]

I don't think it degrades people to show off sexuality, it demonstrates a condition of being already degraded - it does degrade commerce and culture though.

How can you not see a problem with exhibition, but then believe it degrades culture?

"being already degraded"

This is iffy. The people who watch porn are not necessarily the people who objectified those into creating porn.

If anything, the people who watch porn are just as objectified because they're too pathetic to be sexually competitive. Furthermore, for people who pay for porn, it's even worse because it's as if you're paying other people to have sex, tease you, and mock you for being pathetic.

The solution is society needs to get rid of the passive-aggression of exhibition only. There's a huge dissociation that gets reinforced more and more because exhibitionists know they can get away with drawing attention to themselves without being attentive back. They know they can behave like brats because by exhibiting themselves, they're spurring competition and excitement on the other side such that alphas are willing to corral betas into a pecking order without giving them information as to how to escape it.

Without this solution...

I can't believe people still say, "If you don't like it you can leave." or "If you don't like your job get another."

...will go on forever. People will claim porn is an adequate satisfaction for social rejects rather than caring about organic relations.

[Suska]

I don't think we disagree very much on this Dak, though sexual objectification seems sort of silly to me next to economic objectification. It's not hard to die with your dignity even when you're poor. It is hard to show people that our society needn't glamorize lies and domination, and that there is a better way.

[Daktoria]

I don't think we disagree very much on this Dak, though sexual objectification seems sort of silly to me next to economic objectification. It's not hard to die with your dignity even when you're poor. It is hard to show people that our society needn't glamorize lies and domination, and that there is a better way.

I hope I don't confuse you here, Sus.

Which way are you talking in the bolded - sexually or economically? It's the same thing in both fields really. After all, you can't have a right to privacy without private property, property which requires abolishing lies and domination. Legal drama and political economy are glamorized the same way as sexual exhibition.

Also, I disagree with what you're saying about poverty. Poverty doesn't necessarily coincide with lies, but in a society with social hierarchy, it definitely does because social hierarchs will believe they're entitled to lie to you for being inferior. In turn, those lies yield information asymmetry, and that asymmetry makes it more difficult for one person to become wealthy compared to the next.

Lies are the basis of degrading someone's dignity because information is who we are, yet evolutionary biology kind of fixes the game towards deception and domination. An ecosystem will economically involve self-reinforcing successful adaptations.

The problem is how alphas hypocritically insist on treating people merely as animals and not also as people. They do this by asserting national interest pragmatism via taxes, subsidies, and social programs such that individual identities don't deserve to be heard for being weak. Instead, professional bureaucrats intermediate rather than allowing people to conduct transactions based on personal relationships.

(To be clear, I'm not denying the potential for state capitalism in the case of massively industrialized monopolies (God help us if pornography becomes one, especially if it connects with the Department of Education), but this potential happens because of labor market hypercompetition which is likewise animalistic, and revealing that people don't deserve to be treated as people due to a lack of self-control.)

In contrast, when an animal flaunts itself in the jungle, that flaunting is taken as a clear cut signal. In society though, when a person flaunts him or herself, that flaunting is expected to be endured as a sort of teasing. Furthermore, if you don't merely endure it, you're labeled as an aggressor despite how the flaunter was the one draining your attention in the first place.

Freedom of speech is a two edged sword. I guess it was introduced because 1) law enforcers didn't want to have to deal with unprovable claims, and 2) establishment alphas wanted to encourage populace alphas to compete rather than having to put up with establishment betas.