tronvillain

She's married to Nacho Vidal?

Viti

Not quite the exploited innocent luvluv has portrayed huh?

beastmaster

Absolutely. That's what I mean, short of writing a book on the subject.

luvluv

dangin:

I'm going to start another post on this issue.

I never said any of that. How much pleasure one can receive from a certain sex act is purely subjective. What we are talking about, however, is the morality of the sex irrespective of what pleasure it brings. Someone might find sex with an 11 year old more pleasurable than sex with a 21 year old. Does that make sex with the 11 year old more morally correct?

You might like sex with 3 partners more than monogamous sex. That's a nice thing to know about you, but that doesn't have anything to do with the subject.

Silent Acorns:

Let's be clear kids:

It is possible to disagree with a phenomenon, morally speaking, for many different reasons SIMELTANEOUSLY. I imagine that many of you have several different reasons for declining theistic belief, many of which operate independantly (insufficient evidence, the immorality of the church, etc). So I have purposely tried to make a case for the immorality of pornography in ways that I think we can all agree with (and I'm pretty sure I've said this before on this thread). That doesn't mean that this is the ONLY reason I think pornography is wrong. It is just one of the reasons that I think it is profitable to discuss here. Is it wrong to protest an issue for more than one reason? Is the fact that I am concerned with the exploitation of women somehow undermined by my religious beliefs? Could they not be independant but coterminus concerns?

To answer your question, yes on my religious views I think it would still be immoral, but I think it would be FAR, FAR less immoral than the industry as it is today. If pornography could be reduced to committed couples willingly sharing their sexual experiences with others, I'd be a very happy person. As I type this, I am realizing that I could even be convinced that there was nothing wrong with this at all. But, preliminarily, I would say that I would still be concerned that this activity could somehow cheapen the use of human sexuality, but if this was in fact what porn was, then I probably wouldn't advocate much against it at all. I would think it was a bit silly, but otherwise I wouldn't talk about it much. So I don't know, Acorn. Put the movie on the web and we'll see how it works...

coas:

What, in all actuality it isn't about me at all, despite how everyone on this thread has decided to treat the issue as a personal pathology of my own. As I said, I have more than one reason for disapproving of porn. So what?

We are discussing one of those issues, the exploitation of vulnerable women. How does the fact that I object to porn for more reasons than just that one invalidate the plain and simple fact that many young women are being exploited?

I fail to see the point of this whole line of questioning by you all.

It being the case that God does exist, and He is ultimate love and wisdom, this is a pretty good reason.

I do, however, use my brain a little bit to see whether or not God really says something when I am told He does. I am not a fundy or a biblical literalist, as my comments about homosexuality and pre-marital sex might have told you if you had any intention at all of giving me a fair hearing.

Silent Acorn (again):

There are good ministers who do incredible good in the world, and there are bad ministers who do incredible evil in the world. There are probably well-adjusted porn stars who are productive members of society, and there are porn stars who are in various degrees of distress. As a blanket statement, however, the above comment is ridiculous. You would rather your daughter be ANY pornstar rather than ANY minister?

You would rather your daughter be a gang-bang queen than a Martin Luther King Jr?

Barney Gumble:

Well, I don't think the church should be raising ANYBODY'S children. I think the church, as a social institution, is quite often backwards and inadequate. But the social institution "the church" is not the same as the spiritual institution of "Christianity" or "theism."

viscousmemories:

With all due respect, viscious, it wasn't just about what was good for you. That guy was a criminal and was liable to strike again. She should have called the police in conjunction with protecting your feelings and reassuring you, no doubt. But she absolutely did the right thing in calling the police.

What do you want from me? Would you think I was more sincere if I cursed you out? What would I help if I was being overly-emotional? You would probably then accuse me of being a hypocrite, no doubt. So I can't win either way, can I?

My Savior has instructed me to do good to those who curse me and who despitefully use me and persucute me. I learned from folks like Ghandi and MLK Jr. that pro-active love, acting in a loving fashion towards those who are not responding, is often a great way to diffuse tensions and make friendship. Love is brought into the world by the decision to love others, regardless of how others behave.

What is actually happening here is, I'm trying to be nice to you.

I don't hate anybody. I don't have to anymore.

See what I mean?

When I'm nice, it proves I'm a fake.

When I'm not nice, it proves I'm a fake.

Which is it?

(For the record, I believe I have been nice to coas, I just disagree with her. Have I said anything at all about her personal decision? Nope. Have I beat her over the head with a Bible? Nope. I probably did offend Lady Shea, but I did it in an honestly thought out decision with the best of intentions. I don't have a problem risking offending someone to help them to see their error. From your posts to me, I see that we share that trait. I don't think there is anything wrong with a willingness to offend in the service of what we think to be the truth, so I don't blame you for that. People will often be offended when their beliefs are attacked, but if their beliefs are immoral we are obligated to attack them. That's that.)

more in a minute...

luvluv

beastmaster:

Do you think that this whole thing is about maximizing my pleasure? Do you think this is the world is about?

Should I put my sexual desires above my spiritual concerns? Above my concern for human beings?

When I say you are deifying sex I am speaking in terms of priority of concern. For some of you, you talk as if sex was your First Cause, as if it has first dibs on your priorities and your decisions. I think sex is beautiful and important, but it is absolutely subordinate to my spiritual and moral concerns.

viscousmemories:

I think the reason you don't believe me is because I am a theist advocating against pornography, pure and simple. And it is atheist tactic number 1A to try to use ad hominem accusations of puritanicality to diffuse any attempt to place sexuality within any moral context whatsoever.

Beyond that, again, the reasons that I, personally, disapprove of sex beyond the reason we are discussing is totally irrelavant. I do object to pornography for more than one reason. However, one of those reasons actually and sincerely is the explotation of young and defenseless women. The fact that I have other reasons is not at issue at all. I assume that we all care that people should not be exploited to their own hurt, and being that they are, I am asking you folks how you justify supporting the industry that does such a thing.

viscousmemories and Lady Shea:

Well, they had medical evidence of the suicide attempts and the nervous breakdowns. So one guy "who knows her" isn't really going to influence my opinion to any great degree.

I can't look at the page Lady Shea linked for obvious reasons. Can anyone post a more direct link to her interview?

I would also add: consider the source. Do these porn-supporting sites have any financial or personal interests which might influence their reporting?

tronvillian:

She had a tattoo, did she? I suppose, therefore, she had those suicide attempts and nervous breakdowns coming to her. She was asking for it.

dangin

Bullshit. As I have illustrated above, your whole existence has been formed by sex. The size of your body as a male (I assume you are male), the style of your personality, and obviously your physical appearence is a product of the mixed genes of your parents. Your psyche has also been formed by sexual and gender issues since before you were cognitively aware of genders. All this does not mean that one should deify sex. The only reason you think we are deifying it, is because we don't hold it in the same fearful, denying manner that you do. By simply accepting it as the important aspect of life it is, you perceive us to be making it god like.

As to your spiritual and moral concerns. Sex is spiritual. There can be spiritual things that are not sexual, but one cannot be completly spiritual without a healthy view of sex. (take that to mean what you wish about yourself) As to moral, you're whole argument here is about sex and morality. Sex is hugely important in your moral universe as is obvious in each post you make about it.

dangin

This is one trimmed down paragraph from earlier in this thread. luvluv can't even stay consistent within one paragraph. First it is claimed that casual sex can make men avoid relationships because they prefer casual sex. Then he says that sexual desires can be met in a committed relationship. Just what is he arguing?

Then later when he responded to my statement "I love hearing people talk about how great long term monogamous sex can be. How it is the greatest sex of all. What a load of shit. "

He says
luvluv, your own uncertainty of what you believe is becoming apparent. First you say men can enjoy loose sex to much to become monogamous, then you say monogamous sex is most fulfilling, then you say sexual pleasure is subjective and so your first two statements are rendered moot by the third.


I freely admit to editing down his paragraph, but I truly tried to remain true to his content as far as I could tell what he meant.

luvluv

dangin:

With all due respect, correcting rather obvious mistakes on this thread is getting to be a waste of my time. If you would stop trying to attack me and try to particpate meaningfully in the discussion, we might make some progress. I'll answer this one, but the next obvious logical fallacy produced against me I will just let slide:

What I said was this:

1) Promiscuous sex CAN make some people less able to commit.

2) That the pleasure derived from different sex acts is subjective.

3) I said that the sex drive CAN be satisfied in a monogamous relationship.

I NEVER said that monogamous sex was the most fulfilling, and the words CAN in statements one and three would quite obviously support statment two. Otherwise, I would have used the word WILL.

There goes 2 minutes of my life that I'm not going to get back.

We agree 100%.

No, MORALITY is hugely important in my SPIRITUAL universe, and sex, being a form of human behavior, falls under the heading of morality like every other human behavior. My spiritual and moral feelings DETERMINE my feelings about sex, whereas (it seems to me at any rate) that your sexual feelings DETERMINE your moral and spiritual outlook.

The difference is in priority, as I see it.

Silent Acorns

It seems we're keeping you very busy luvluv

Of course it's OK to have more than one reason to be against something. From your replies it seemed obvious that religious reasons were the real driving force of your argument and I just wanted you to come out and say it.

As per my question, I'm glad to see that you don't condemn it outright (although you come close). Several times in this thread you have said "but that's not what porn is ..." suggesting that porn is exploitation by definition. I have a problem with that since I can easily think of scenarios where porn is not exploitive (such as the example in my question). And you should know that that such a movie would be porn and that people do make such movies (although I sure won't ).

It seems clear to me though that, with the possible exception of married-couple-porn, you believe that porn is intrinsically wrong - irregardless of whether it is exploitive or not.



The "blanket statement" I made means that all-else-equal I would rather my daughter be in porn movies a la c-o-a-s than a minister or apologist. That means, if you take the same person and change nothing about them except their profession. Nothing that I wrote suggests the extreme interpretation you made. If I said "I'd rather have an orange than an apple" it does not follow that I believe that "all oranges are superior to all apples".

As per your "gang-bang" comment, I was talking to c-o-a-s about what she does now. Did she ever say she did gang-bangs? No! As for MLK jr, I would hold him in higher regard if he had chosen porn as a career rather than religion. But ,relative to the works he accomplished, the difference would be trivial.

P.S. hyperbole is not a virtue

Gurdur

What's even worse is that luvluv makes no distinction between hard-core and soft porn --- IMHO, there's quite a world of ethical, practical and aesthetic difference.

Still, this thread's too muddled for me to really get into any more.