I'm depressed - is pornography really so funny?

[RosieH]

Anna Arrowsmith is also known as Anna Span - award winning female porn director, feminist, and arbiter of adult films designed to appeal to, and not objectify, women.

Whether or not you find pornography acceptable in an adult world (and I will state that in the absence of coercion and objectification, I do) I find it utterly depressing that the very mention of the word pornography can reduce the so-called intelligent audience of Question Time to fits of prurient schoolgirl giggles. Titter ye not middle fricking England.

What depresses me even more is that Caroline Lucas, leader of the Green Party, should be so terribly Daily Mail in her response - a far cry from her unformed comments at the untelevised Eaves Women's Question Time I attended at the methodist central hall on Tuesday. I had thought better of her than to pander to the lowest common denominator and not address a serious and thoughtful question with anything other than the kneejerk, "sex isn't a commodity", WI answer she came out with tonight.

[Sue]

Yeh well they allowed sixty seconds at the end of the programme to discuss it, so not much time for anything other than a kneejerk reaction, but I agree with you in general.

[Mick Mac]

It demeans women, apparently. Even if they are made by women, with Women and for Women. All very strange.

[ruffers]

"the so-called intelligent audience of Question Time" - by who? (possibly whom, not sure)

[TonyQuinn]

I'm afraid you are off your rocker Rosie......the Question Time audience has always been like this! So what did you expect?

[RosieH]

Mick, there is no question that some pornography does demean women.

But I have seen some of Anna's stuff and it categorically doesn't. And I feel really really really cross about this

[RosieH]

TonyQuinn Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I'm afraid you are off your rocker Rosie......the

> Question Time audience has always been like this!

> So what did you expect?

Quite possibly Tony, quite possibly. I expected better of a groundbreaking female politician, I am merely depressed by the cretinous retarded fucking audience.

[Mick Mac]

RosieH Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Mick, there is no question that some pornography

> does demean women.

>

> But I have seen some of Anna's stuff and it

> categorically doesn't. And I feel really really

> really cross about this

Yes, its the irony of the whole thing - I agree with you. How can something be seen as demeaning women when its intended to be what women want.

[woofmarkthedog]

Mick Mac Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> It demeans women, apparently. Even if they are

> made by women, with Women and for Women. All very

> strange.

__________________________________________________________

Translation...

"You know you wan' it"

W**F

[ruffers]

Question Time's audience is self selected though, people who choose to be in an audience, on the telly, with a chance to express their views however moderate/extreme/emotional/bonkers and have their 15 seconds of fame to the great and the good.

On the specific question there's why the view of the producer and participants should tally with a viewer who has their own different views and never the twain shall meet... although I'm not sure we should be bringing Donald Sinden in at this point, never mind Windsor Davies.

I may have to resurrect my "shouting at the telly thread" as I did a lot of that tonight.

[Keef]

What depresses me even more is that Caroline Lucas, leader of the Green Party, should be so terribly Daily Mail in her response

Agreed

[reggie]

Who stands up for sex in this country?

[SeanMacGabhann]

Isn't it the case that sex itself demeans women ? If it's any good...

© Armando Iannuci/Steve Coogan

Which is of course another flippant joke on the subject. But it does come from an Alan Partridge interview with an "MP" on the subject which lampoons exactly the same attitudes described in Rosie's post - from the early 90s as well which just goes to show how far we (haven't) come

In general I'm in total agreement with you Rosie. Apart from the bit where you get home from Lucky 7's and switch on Question Time. That's just asking for trouble

[*Bob*]

Blame the QT production people, for opting to put the question in the 'if your political party was a hat, what kind of brim would it have' slot. The panel were only left with three options: the live n let live response (ie saying nothing), the upbeat amusing one-liner (to demonstrate wit and sense of humour) or unwisely trying to make some kind of vaguely serious comment which, given the time available, was never going to work.

Anyway, what kind of porn is women-friendly porn? Is there a lot of holding hands first, with the man cleaning-up after himself and possibly bleeding the radiators before he leaves?

[ImpetuousVrouw]

Rosie - can I borrow a copy please?

(Of the Anna Span film - not QT!)

[ImpetuousVrouw]

And I hate to say it, but Caroline Lucas is a sell-out.

[david_carnell]

Anyway, what kind of porn is women-friendly porn? Is there a lot of holding hands first, with the man cleaning-up after himself and possibly bleeding the radiators before he leaves?

You mean he might actually be a plumber?

[*Bob*]

If anybody has the March 1987 issue of Fiesta then I'd like borrow that too please.

[reggie]

I think that for any male or female politician to disclose an interest in sex,let alone porn,let alone right on porn,is rarely gonna happen...sadly.

Mind you with the election coming up maybe someone will see it as a vote winner..."SEX? Are you thinking what I'm thinking"

[Brendan]

You watched Question Time last night and this was the thing that pissed you off the most about it. Seriously?

What about the absolutely disgusting, we?re right because we?re right and we can shout louder and we have more money, approach to party funding that the conservatives displayed so proudly or the foul patronising shite Margaret Becket spouted while defending Gordon Brown?s misleading of the Iraq inquiry on defence spending. (Turn the sound down take a look at this woman?s body language and how contrary it is to the sentiment her voice is expressing)

The blatant aggression Andrew Lansley showed towards the Green Party as if they don?t even have a right to exist in a world that obviously belongs to him and his.

I won?t even get into David Starkey?s bombastic, blithering jingoism. It was just embarrassing.

I?m going to need a fucking long wall come the revolution.

[Brendan]

Oh yeah and, willy!

[Brendan]

See, sex is funny.

[woofmarkthedog]

Brendan Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I won?t even get into David Starkey?s bombastic,

> blithering jingoism. It was just embarrassing.

____________________________________________________

Come on....

Did you see that ring he was wearing on his clammy corpsey hand..?

Far creepier than anything he said

Anyway he's a token dinosaur they wheel out for effect, every now & then ( does anyone take him seriously )

I just groan & roll my eyes when he's on anything these days

W**F

[PeckhamRose]

I also have met Anna Span and am delighted she is wanting to become a politician. We need politicians to come from a very broad range of professions and lives and backgrounds and she is a very intelligent woman.

Is pornography so funny? The subject can be but the word has been highjacked and many people can't see beyond the word.

Women friendly porn is most brilliantly described by *Bob*! Female friendly porn is by its nature sexist because while you don't need to let us through the door in front of you, we do nevertheless want to come first or at the same time before you fall asleep.

It all boils down to what those crazy folk who believe all that nonsense written by men in the bible.

Those crazy religious folk see it as a sin and something to equate with 'power'. And they had the money and the education to order us all about. The rest of us didn't stand a chance!

The more that women write and produce 'porn' and show it as positive and non threatening, the less the problem will be.*

Hoorah for Anna Span. And I LOVED the film Secretary which showed the submissive woman having the power. AND it was funny!

* appalling sentence structure!

[ImpetuousVrouw]

The bible wasn't totally against sex:

1 Corinthians chapter 7

But because there is so much sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband. The husband should not deprive his wife of sexual intimacy, which is her right as a married woman, nor should the wife deprive her husband. The wife gives authority over her body to her husband, and the husband also gives authority over his body to his wife. So do not deprive each other of sexual relations.