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From: sophie@mnetor.UUCP (Sophie Quigley)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.politics
Subject: Re: A suggestion for a ground rule in any pornography debate
Message-ID: <2266@mnetor.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 25-Sep-85 23:08:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: mnetor.2266
Posted: Wed Sep 25 23:08:50 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 26-Sep-85 00:21:55 EDT
References: <5660@tekecs.UUCP> <1873@reed.UUCP> <10285@ucbvax.ARPA> <2061@mnetor.UUCP> <10429@ucbvax.ARPA>
Reply-To: sophie@mnetor.UUCP (Sophie Quigley)
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Xref: utcs net.women:7543 net.politics:10969
Summary: 

In article <10429@ucbvax.ARPA> mcgeer@ucbvax.UUCP (Rick McGeer) writes:
>In article <2061@mnetor.UUCP> sophie@mnetor.UUCP (Sophie Quigley) writes:
>>The "media" (another strange entity)
>>seems to have made up its mind recently to prematurely bury
>>feminism by defamation and assertions that it has passed away.
>
>Evidence?

Defamation: that all feminists are pro-censorship.
Assertions of death: well I don't know about you, but in the last few
years I have seen enough articles in magazines about the "death" of
feminism to believe that there is a trend in that kind of reporting.
>
>>i.e in this case, feminist writings.  Having read a lot of feminist
>>material myself, I have found basically that there is not one
>>single issue on which all feminists agree (or did I miss it?).
>
>Try the ERA?

Ok, good one.  Equal pay for equal work is another good one.  I can't
think of too many more.
>
>>>     I'm a liberal person, and I have always viewed 
>>>feminism as a liberal cause, which I have always supported
>>>except for the radical fringe.  Censorship of pornography
>>>is pretty much a right-wing, moral-majority type
>>>of thing.
>>
>>While I cannot agree with some frothing at the mouth that I have
>>seen coming from some anti-pornographers (?), I think that it is
>>too easy to dismiss the idea of censorship of pornography as you
>>did by calling it a "right-wing, moral majority type of thing".
>>A responsible society should be able to censor itself when not
>>doing so endangers the life of some of its members.  Pornography
>>does pause a real threat to women, and the solution to this threat
>>might just include some amount of censorship.
>
>Well, there may not be a standard position of feminists on the issue of
>pornography, but this comes pretty close.  And it's still wrong.  Nobody

Well, then you seem to *freely* believe what the media has told you. 
Feminists are divided on this issue: even though Andrea Dworkin and
Catharine MacKinnon are pro-censorship, Robin Morgan, Erica Jong, and
Carol Vance (the ones I can remember for sure) are against it.  An organisation
called FACT ( Feminist Anti-Censorship Task Force ) fought the Minneapolis
ordinance.  Many feminists (or at least those who express themselves by
writing) have had the opportunity to see the effect of censorship laws
on themselves and are thus very aware of the dangers of such laws.  For
a good collection of articles on the matter, I recommend the book "Women
against Censorship" edited by Varda Burstein.  You might be interested in
the april 1985 issue of Ms "Is one woman's sexuality another woman's
pornography" and the September 1978 issue of Ms: "How to run the
pornographers out of town and preserve the first amendment" by Robin Morgan.

>Either you have freedom of speech or you don't.  Personally, I think we
>oughta keep it.  Defend the First Amendment, while you still have the right to.
>
>							-- Rick.

Well, unlike you, I heven't moved to the state yet Rick.  No first amendment
for us.
-- 
Sophie Quigley
{allegra|decvax|ihnp4|linus|watmath}!utzoo!mnetor!sophie


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