“Dirty” Porn: The Flip Side of Puritanism
August 28, 2008
Today's post, which we hope makes it through your spam filter, is from Carmine Sarracino, co-author of The Porning of America: The Rise of Porn Culture, What It Means, and Where We Go from Here. Sarracino is a professor of English and the author of three books of poetry. He has also published widely on Walt Whitman and was twice a Fulbright Scholar.
I spent the better part of academic year 1989-90 in Kathmandu, Nepal, on a Fulbright research grant. My project was to explore connections between the poetry of Walt Whitman and ancient Vedic literature, especially on the topic of consciousness. I also agreed to supervise the doctoral dissertations of several students at Tribhuvan University, one of which was entitled, "Walt Whitman as a Tantrika Yogi."
Fascinating.
I knew little about tantra, which was then just beginning its faddish popularity in the United States, but I felt okay about supervising the dissertation. After all, Whitman's sexuality—his own personal sexuality as well as his views of human sexuality—was so enormous and complexly layered a subject as to invite a myriad of approaches— the more unconventional the better. And I was in the perfect spot to learn about tantra, since many scholars regard Nepal as its historical home. So, working on the dissertation should be interesting.
Indeed, I came to see Whitman in a revealing new light. But beyond that, what I learned about tantra was often on my mind fifteen years later when my co-author, Kevin Scott, and I began work on The Porning of America. As we studied definitions of pornography, distinctions between porn and erotica, and so on, it became clear that porn in America has its roots in Puritanism. And that tantra provided an example of a completely different—and much healthier—orientation toward sexuality. The porn websites we surfed could have been written by characters right out of Hawthorne. Sex is "filthy," "nasty," "dirty." The women are "sluts," and "whores." Puritanism and porn share the same view of the human body and sexuality. The only difference is that porn transgressively revels in what the Puritans righteously ran away from.
A fundamental negativity—Puritanical guilt and anger—underlies what is most objectionable in porn: humiliation and torture. In a lot of porn, both Internet and DVD, we see a male need to dominate and manipulate, often with an element—a tinge, at least—of humiliation. But on some websites, the humiliation and physical abuse are extreme and real—that is, there is no element of fantasy or consensual play. Women are badly injured physically, emotionally, and psychologically. Bones are broken. And, very likely, minds and spirits as well.
Is it possible to have a sexuality of uninhibited sensuality without shame and anger, and all the attendant baggage, dragged in their wake? Yes, it is possible. And tantra is one such example.
Tantra is a huge subject, but one that most readers here are probably at least somewhat familiar with.
The male plays the role of a powerful god, Lord Shiva, and the female takes on the role of an equally powerful goddess, Uma (also called Shakti). The rituals of body painting and scenting are elaborate, accompanied by a recitation (often quite explicit and graphic) of erotic praise of the other, as the "foreplay" of touching, fondling, kissing, begins. But the main point I'd like to bring out here is how playful, celebratory and joyful tantric sex is—as opposed to the "sluts" engaged in the "dirt" of porn.
The Joy of Sex, edited by Alex Comfort, an immensely popular sex manual of the early seventies, had much of the tantric flavor of respect, play and celebration. And these qualities are not absent altogether from contemporary porn. We find them most often in true amateur porn—that is, porn created by non-professionals, usually in front of a simple computer cam or digital camera on a tripod, and posted as clips (ranging from less than a minute to as much as an hour) online. It is not always the case (there are amateur sites called "Slut Housewives" and the like) but often the partners seem affectionate, as evidenced by exchanged smiles and eye gazing (rare in professional porn), and are sometimes in committed relationships, given the clip descriptions, "Me and my girlfriend" or even, "Me and my husband."
Why should this be important?
That is, why should affection, playfulness, and respect be important in sexuality? Certainly, emotionless, "no strings" sex with total strangers can be exciting. In fact, that is a very common sexual fantasy for both men and women, and literally describes the widespread practice of "hooking up."
The problem is that such sex sexualizes the other. Sexualization means that someone is regarded as having no value—no value—except for the sexual pleasure they can provide. Last year the American Psychological Association released a landmark study of the sexualization of girls, which we refer to repeatedly in The Porning of America, in which they documented in detail the attendant problems: depression, low self-esteem, negative body image, a range of eating disorders, academic failure. Although it was not part of their study, boys too are increasingly sexualized in our culture—along with just about everyone else. In our book we coin the term "universal sexualization."
Is it necessary to regard one's sex partner as a god or goddess? Probably not. But should we recognize and respect our partners as people, as individuals like ourselves? Yes, because if they have no value except for the sexual pleasure they can provide, it becomes frighteningly easy—history is full of examples, as is some contemporary porn—to do anything at all to "them."
And besides, sex is better with real people than with the polished surfaces of the Paris Hilton ideal. Not many of us have the perfect nineteen-year-old body. And even those who do, have them only on a short –term loan. One of the things that is attractive about true amateur porn is that the sex partners rarely look like porn stars, but they are passionate, uninhibited, and enjoy great sex.
You might also want to read The Porning of America co-author Kevin Scott's analysis of the Miley Cyrus Vanity Fair spread.