Porn ( . . . is bad?)

I have long been content with complacency regarding the Porn Debate. I have never considered porn a healthy expression of sexuality (no, it's not a sin; yes, I'm judgemental), but more like the Twinkie of sexuality. Zero nutritional value, but common and relatively harmless. Actually getting upset over it? That was for nuthouses like the Christian Coalition.

At least until I had it thrown in my face.

Now, I'm not the skinniest girl or the prettiest girl, or even the smartest girl. I don't expect men to fall all over themselves for me. Given that I was treated like the troll under the bridge by pretty much everyone until I went away to college, I think I've come a long way in developing any kind of real sexuality, and mapping out what I like, what I don't, what works, and what doesn't.

And one thing that rarely works for me is porn. It took a lot of neurotic suffering (dammit, this WILL turn me on!) before I figured out that 1) porn makes me feel inadequate in both looks and ability and 2) the porn that does work for me is so brutal and degrading that I don't respect myself for liking it. Yes, I like to see other women hurt. I think that says plenty.

All of this is preface to saying Something Happened this morning. I know a man, whom I'll call Headcase, and with whom I have recently started something of a friends-with-benefits type relationship. Except we're not quite friends (the headcase part) and I am still wondering about some of the benefits. Great cock, except he refuses to exploit all its potential. After not having sex last night (see the headcase part) he woke up with morning wood and I wanted to play. So what does Genius do? He gets up out of bed and starts looking at porn on his computer. Okaaayyy.

But I'm a Progressive Girl, right? Porn is Fine With Me, right? I talk to him about what he's looking at -- turns out he wants to show me some clips of girls squirting. Um, okay. (Personally, I think it's kind of gross and I'm glad my body doesn't do it ... but there I go being judgemental again). I noticed that nearly all the clips he was looking through had the odd tic of the girl bringing herself to the brink of orgasm, removing the dildo, and with no stimulation whatsoever continuing to have a full, screaming, body-convulsing orgasm. I commented in an offhanded hey-you-might-want-to-know-this-about-me way that I am not built like that. That my orgasms are facilitated only by continued stimulation, and the train stops dead without it.

And I nearly got my head bitten off for the trouble. Apparently, I am wired "weirdly". Apparently, any woman can "just learn" to squirt and to have these pseudo-spontaneous orgasms.

And while he was excoriating my sexual ability, he left playing a video of what was obviously a sorority girl and a frat boy getting it on in front of his entire frathouse. Nothing new, I'm sure. But the video still made me sad. Even though the girl was obviously mugging for the camera, I don't think she suspected it would go on the internet for the world to see. And I was thinking about this: let's say five years down the road both her boss and the boy's boss see the video. His status will probably be enhanced (sex god, and all); she, on the other hand, might lose her job (the slut!).

Headcase's words and this video, together, really made me think. What is up with this fucked up world that somehow an actress is "better" at being a woman than I am? For all the flak that people in porn take for their job, they are still called "porn actors" for a reason. The sex may be real, but the theatrics are just that. Theatrics. And the sorority girl? I don't even have the words.

And yet maybe getting upset over porn isn't the answer. In a way, it's like the old gun debate. Do guns kill people, or do people kill people? Does porn degrade women or do the people watching porn degrade women? Really, though, does the distinction even matter?!?