Article College Men Try to Ban Porn from Campus WiFi, Saying 'Pornography is Prostitution'
Article College Men Try to Ban Porn from Campus WiFi, Saying 'Pornography is Prostitution'
Dec 29 2024, 3:57 PM
(Dec 29 2024, 1:56 AM)wormwood Cynicism aside - and I don’t disagree with being suspicious of the men’s motives here - might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?Agreed. Also it blows my mind how many instances I've read of degenerate old men going to public libraries to watch porn and jack off and apparently the librarians "can't do anything about it because free speech" or something..? Uhhh I think there's a reasonable line to be made and enforced there... Like there's a difference between being nude and indecent exposure (actually being inappropriate about being nude). Pretty sure we can figure that out without impinging on access to knowledge/research.
Could it, I’m saying, help shift the discussion and encourage porn filters in other educational institutions and workplaces?
Kozlik's regular member account. 🍀🐐
(Dec 29 2024, 1:56 AM)wormwood Cynicism aside - and I don’t disagree with being suspicious of the men’s motives here - might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?Agreed. Also it blows my mind how many instances I've read of degenerate old men going to public libraries to watch porn and jack off and apparently the librarians "can't do anything about it because free speech" or something..? Uhhh I think there's a reasonable line to be made and enforced there... Like there's a difference between being nude and indecent exposure (actually being inappropriate about being nude). Pretty sure we can figure that out without impinging on access to knowledge/research.
Could it, I’m saying, help shift the discussion and encourage porn filters in other educational institutions and workplaces?
Kozlik's regular member account. 🍀🐐
Dec 30 2024, 9:51 AM
(Dec 29 2024, 1:56 AM)wormwood Cynicism aside - and I don’t disagree with being suspicious of the men’s motives here - might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?
Could it, I’m saying, help shift the discussion and encourage porn filters in other educational institutions and workplaces?
But the fact that it's religious institutions makes it easy to dismiss as widely-applicable. Most people just shrug and write it off as different rules applying to an inherently irrational or prudeish belief system.
I don't think it's enough to merely criticise, but also to provide an alternative that people can latch onto. Religious people tend to think that the antidote to the current culture of normalised sexual exploitation of women by men (both in prostitution and relationships in general) is purity culture and tradwife nuclear families, and that's not really something most people are interested in. So banning porn from one religious campus isn't really gonna solve the issue because it'll reaffirm the purity culture baggage that primarily targets women, and also not catch on outside of religious contexts.
I guess if this was about, idk, saving prostituted women, I might be more understanding because of the real measurable benefits, but as it is, it's just one niche religious group taking issue with normalised porn consumption, which is something religious groups have taken issue with for a long time, either on the basis of "sinful Eve corrupting Adam" or "Poor woman is forced into sin and cannot play the Madonna like she is supposed to". Like, the impact is kinda negligible in comparison to similarly misogynistic ideas potentially being packaged in.
Quote:might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?
While people recognise that porn is inappropriate in public, they also love to portray is as essentially necessary for men to live. So I think making a case for banning porn on the basis of it being inappropriate is even less likely to work than making an argument on the basis of porn being abusive. Because then they'll just write it off as "Well that's just a few bad apples who can't control themselves, but it shouldn't stop any of the other decent men from accessing it"
Edited Dec 30 2024, 9:57 AM by YesYourNigel.
YesYourNigel
Dec 30 2024, 9:51 AM #12(Dec 29 2024, 1:56 AM)wormwood Cynicism aside - and I don’t disagree with being suspicious of the men’s motives here - might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?
Could it, I’m saying, help shift the discussion and encourage porn filters in other educational institutions and workplaces?
But the fact that it's religious institutions makes it easy to dismiss as widely-applicable. Most people just shrug and write it off as different rules applying to an inherently irrational or prudeish belief system.
I don't think it's enough to merely criticise, but also to provide an alternative that people can latch onto. Religious people tend to think that the antidote to the current culture of normalised sexual exploitation of women by men (both in prostitution and relationships in general) is purity culture and tradwife nuclear families, and that's not really something most people are interested in. So banning porn from one religious campus isn't really gonna solve the issue because it'll reaffirm the purity culture baggage that primarily targets women, and also not catch on outside of religious contexts.
I guess if this was about, idk, saving prostituted women, I might be more understanding because of the real measurable benefits, but as it is, it's just one niche religious group taking issue with normalised porn consumption, which is something religious groups have taken issue with for a long time, either on the basis of "sinful Eve corrupting Adam" or "Poor woman is forced into sin and cannot play the Madonna like she is supposed to". Like, the impact is kinda negligible in comparison to similarly misogynistic ideas potentially being packaged in.
Quote:might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?
While people recognise that porn is inappropriate in public, they also love to portray is as essentially necessary for men to live. So I think making a case for banning porn on the basis of it being inappropriate is even less likely to work than making an argument on the basis of porn being abusive. Because then they'll just write it off as "Well that's just a few bad apples who can't control themselves, but it shouldn't stop any of the other decent men from accessing it"
Dec 30 2024, 12:07 PM
(Dec 30 2024, 9:51 AM)YesYourNigelQuote:might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?
While people recognise that porn is inappropriate in public, they also love to portray is as essentially necessary for men to live. So I think making a case for banning porn on the basis of it being inappropriate is even less likely to work than making an argument on the basis of porn being abusive. Because then they'll just write it off as "Well that's just a few bad apples who can't control themselves, but it shouldn't stop any of the other decent men from accessing it"
I think you absolutely nailed it here. Banning porn from a religious perspective doesn't do anything that hasn't already been done before, clearly to no avail when it comes to benefitting women.
The solution to the abuse of porn and the porn industry isn't relegating women to be private commodities instead of public ones. It's liberating women from being commodities for male consumption at all.
ShameMustChangeSides
Dec 30 2024, 12:07 PM #13(Dec 30 2024, 9:51 AM)YesYourNigelQuote:might it not be good to establish that porn is a thing that can and should be banned from public institutions?
While people recognise that porn is inappropriate in public, they also love to portray is as essentially necessary for men to live. So I think making a case for banning porn on the basis of it being inappropriate is even less likely to work than making an argument on the basis of porn being abusive. Because then they'll just write it off as "Well that's just a few bad apples who can't control themselves, but it shouldn't stop any of the other decent men from accessing it"
I think you absolutely nailed it here. Banning porn from a religious perspective doesn't do anything that hasn't already been done before, clearly to no avail when it comes to benefitting women.
The solution to the abuse of porn and the porn industry isn't relegating women to be private commodities instead of public ones. It's liberating women from being commodities for male consumption at all.
komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
103
Dec 30 2024, 2:02 PM
(Dec 30 2024, 12:07 PM)ShameMustChangeSides I think you absolutely nailed it here. Banning porn from a religious perspective doesn't do anything that hasn't already been done before, clearly to no avail when it comes to benefitting women.
The solution to the abuse of porn and the porn industry isn't relegating women to be private commodities instead of public ones. It's liberating women from being commodities for male consumption at all.
Let me preface this by saying that I hesitated to reply to this post at all, because I've been burned too many times on Ovarit... 😔 If you're posting here, you probably understand what I'm talking about. But I decided to write something anyway, because I'm choosing to believe that CH is not that kind of forum, and that radfem women can share our views here in good faith. :)
Disclaimers first:
1. I both understand and agree with the view that right-wingers see women as private property while left-wingers see women as public property.
2. I tend towards practical vs strictly ideological, and I think that perfection is the enemy of the good, but I understand that this can also be a slippery slope to working with woman-hating conservatives for outcomes that ultimately don't benefit us.
3. Speaking in a general sense, I am not pro censorship. The free exchange of ideas is a cornerstone of liberal democracy.
That all being said... I just see the silver lining in banning porn on school WiFi. I'm fine with filtering this stuff on school campuses, public libraries, workplaces...any public business network. I get that in an ideal world we'd have a government that cares about women's liberation and would be doing something about it, but we don't. (well actually, in an ideal world we wouldn't have porn at all lmao 💀)
One of the things I'm very concerned about is the incredibly young age that boys are being exposed to pornography now, on the iPhones that none of them should have. One researcher in the UK found that kids as young as six commonly see porn online. I have no doubt that the mainstream-ification pornography is contributing to the rise of the manosphere; that seeing a constant stream of videos that depict women as little more than meat from such a young age shapes views of women in general. Coming from that POV, I do think such a thing is worth celebrating*. 🤷 Even if the person who enacted the policy thinks it's better for women to be private property, the positive effect of their actions might inadvertently outweigh the negative consequences of their views. They definitely wouldn't intend to be doing something positive for women, but they unintentionally would be.
* By "worth celebrating," I mean the effects of the action, and not the misogynists who did it for the wrong reasons.
Edited Dec 30 2024, 2:06 PM by komorebi.
Edit Reason: edited for lil bit o clarity
(Dec 30 2024, 12:07 PM)ShameMustChangeSides I think you absolutely nailed it here. Banning porn from a religious perspective doesn't do anything that hasn't already been done before, clearly to no avail when it comes to benefitting women.
The solution to the abuse of porn and the porn industry isn't relegating women to be private commodities instead of public ones. It's liberating women from being commodities for male consumption at all.
Let me preface this by saying that I hesitated to reply to this post at all, because I've been burned too many times on Ovarit... 😔 If you're posting here, you probably understand what I'm talking about. But I decided to write something anyway, because I'm choosing to believe that CH is not that kind of forum, and that radfem women can share our views here in good faith. :)
Disclaimers first:
1. I both understand and agree with the view that right-wingers see women as private property while left-wingers see women as public property.
2. I tend towards practical vs strictly ideological, and I think that perfection is the enemy of the good, but I understand that this can also be a slippery slope to working with woman-hating conservatives for outcomes that ultimately don't benefit us.
3. Speaking in a general sense, I am not pro censorship. The free exchange of ideas is a cornerstone of liberal democracy.
That all being said... I just see the silver lining in banning porn on school WiFi. I'm fine with filtering this stuff on school campuses, public libraries, workplaces...any public business network. I get that in an ideal world we'd have a government that cares about women's liberation and would be doing something about it, but we don't. (well actually, in an ideal world we wouldn't have porn at all lmao 💀)
One of the things I'm very concerned about is the incredibly young age that boys are being exposed to pornography now, on the iPhones that none of them should have. One researcher in the UK found that kids as young as six commonly see porn online. I have no doubt that the mainstream-ification pornography is contributing to the rise of the manosphere; that seeing a constant stream of videos that depict women as little more than meat from such a young age shapes views of women in general. Coming from that POV, I do think such a thing is worth celebrating*. 🤷 Even if the person who enacted the policy thinks it's better for women to be private property, the positive effect of their actions might inadvertently outweigh the negative consequences of their views. They definitely wouldn't intend to be doing something positive for women, but they unintentionally would be.
* By "worth celebrating," I mean the effects of the action, and not the misogynists who did it for the wrong reasons.
Jan 2 2025, 10:07 AM
Edited Jan 2 2025, 10:11 AM by YesYourNigel.
YesYourNigel
Jan 2 2025, 10:07 AM #15I think rather than "Any progress with women's rights is irrelevant when not done by feminists", the concern is more whether this group's actions will make enough of a difference in women's lives to offset the related misogynistic ideas that might come packaged in with their ideology (which also makes them easier to dismiss and harder for said ideas to catch on). I think it won't because some religious groups already dislike and try to get rid of porn, and what we see happen is that they don't make much of an impact because their reasoning and the alternatives provided tend to be rooted in purity culture. Sure, banning porn is good overall but if it's only done by possessive religious men on one religious campus, is it really making that much of an impact to women's rights?
komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
103
Jan 2 2025, 10:54 AM
(Jan 2 2025, 10:07 AM)YesYourNigel I think rather than "Any progress with women's rights is irrelevant when not done by feminists", the concern is more whether this group's actions will make enough of a difference in women's lives to offset the related misogynistic ideas that might come packaged in with their ideology (which also makes them easier to dismiss and harder for said ideas to catch on). I think it won't because some religious groups already dislike and try to get rid of porn, and what we see happen is that they don't make much of an impact because their reasoning and the alternatives provided tend to be rooted in purity culture. Sure, banning porn is good overall but if it's only done by possessive religious men on one religious campus, is it really making that much of an impact to women's rights?
No, yeah, I completely agree with you there. I said this earlier - that it's unfortunate that this is coming out of a religious college, because even on the tiniest off chance that they were actually sincere, this is too easy to be lumped in with the other anti-porn stuff that comes from a woman-hating, religious perspective.
(Jan 2 2025, 10:07 AM)YesYourNigel I think rather than "Any progress with women's rights is irrelevant when not done by feminists", the concern is more whether this group's actions will make enough of a difference in women's lives to offset the related misogynistic ideas that might come packaged in with their ideology (which also makes them easier to dismiss and harder for said ideas to catch on). I think it won't because some religious groups already dislike and try to get rid of porn, and what we see happen is that they don't make much of an impact because their reasoning and the alternatives provided tend to be rooted in purity culture. Sure, banning porn is good overall but if it's only done by possessive religious men on one religious campus, is it really making that much of an impact to women's rights?
No, yeah, I completely agree with you there. I said this earlier - that it's unfortunate that this is coming out of a religious college, because even on the tiniest off chance that they were actually sincere, this is too easy to be lumped in with the other anti-porn stuff that comes from a woman-hating, religious perspective.
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