Study: Everyone loves feminists and environmentalists!

[lunarmoth]

Has anyone here read much of this AD?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Dworkin

I was never able to. I bailed out of the women's movement when she came along as I saw how certain women grabbed onto her like a life preserver. I never met her either. I did meet Phyllis Chesler (Jewish princess and author of Women and Madness). I also met Germaine Greer when she came to speak at McGill and visited our women's center -- she arrived early and walked straight into an abortion counselling session, becoming outraged when someone approached her with a file and asked for the date of her last menstrual period. "I came to give a workshop!!" I ended up spending the afternoon with her after she met with our "consciousness" group -- she was brilliant and never let down her guard.

I also knew Senator Anne Cools when she was young and one of the leaders of the Sir George Williams student occupation that ended in the Computer Center riot of 2/11/1969. She as well as the other Trinidadians who led that occupation - e.g. Rosie Douglas - were from elite Caribbean families, and were shocked to encounter racism in Canada. This was what radicalized them for a time. Then most gravitated into the positions they were born to fill.

Guruilla: there is nothing wrong with women studying Marxism. I found it very helpful for understanding How Stuff Works - at least the beginning levels. The trick is not to embrace it or believe in it. Dialectical Materialism has its place in our awareness because it makes the world go round: Marx was right in saying the economic base determines politics and culture

[slomo]

Who is being abused here? Please come out and admit you are attached to this topic for personal reasons: because you have experienced or are currently experiencing pain in relationships and are seeking answers through debating the "issues" that plague North America thanks to the Cointelpro program called Feminism.

... However, I think Wilhelm Reich was more our man.

This is a really insightful point.

[Luther Blissett]

I like a lot of Andrea Dworkin, but haven't read the majority of her bibliography. I knew there were some threads on her, but when I searched I found that forgotten "Mansplaining" thread and my heart sank.

[lunarmoth]

I like a lot of Andrea Dworkin, but haven't read the majority of her bibliography. I knew there were some threads on her, but when I searched I found that forgotten "Mansplaining" thread and my heart sank.

What do you like about her? I suspect I would find her work more meaningful now but when I was younger it looked like one long dark tunnel that once entered could take years to get out of.

Not that long ago I read something of hers (?) to indicate she was born into a Jewish Satanic cult. I thought, that would explain a lot. We all tend to view the world and its dramas through the lens of our childhood. I think that may be her appeal to some women: she triggers their own repressed trauma.




E

[Luther Blissett]

I like a lot of Andrea Dworkin, but haven't read the majority of her bibliography. I knew there were some threads on her, but when I searched I found that forgotten "Mansplaining" thread and my heart sank.

What do you like about her? I suspect I would find her work more meaningful now but when I was younger it looked like one long dark tunnel that once entered could take years to get out of.

Not that long ago I read something of hers (?) to indicate she was born into a Jewish Satanic cult. I thought, that would explain a lot. We all tend to view the world and its dramas through the lens of our childhood. I think that may be her appeal to some women: she triggers their own repressed trauma.

E

I used to date someone who worked as an adult model for a time and came out of that career inspired in part by Dworkin and then became an anti-pornography activist. I think her critiques of that industry are/were crucial even though today those arguments have become more nuanced. For instance, I know a lot of women in various forms of sex work and adult entertainment and don't think they're oppressing themselves. But without Dworkin I don't think a lot of those conversations would have been started.

[tapitsbo]

Did Dworkin start that conversation, though? She doesn't seem like the type to award women agency to me ("all sex is rape"). And if we're going to say agency is just a neoliberal buzzword, we can still ask whether it's wise to pathologize heterosexuality altogether (as is done to this day in many "communities" which repudiate Dworkin-tier ideas.)

[guruilla]

I used to date someone who worked as an adult model for a time and came out of that career inspired in part by Dworkin and then became an anti-pornography activist. I think her critiques of that industry are/were crucial even though today those arguments have become more nuanced. For instance, I know a lot of women in various forms of sex work and adult entertainment and don't think they're oppressing themselves. But without Dworkin I don't think a lot of those conversations would have been started.

What do you make of Dines' central point about how pornography workers can't fully process their experience until at least five years after they have been out of the industry?

The second part of the video talk is pretty disturbing, though not surprising. Creates a knot in my stomach to hear it.

Guruilla: there is nothing wrong with women studying Marxism. I found it very helpful for understanding How Stuff Works - at least the beginning levels. The trick is not to embrace it or believe in it. Dialectical Materialism has its place in our awareness because it makes the world go round: Marx was right in saying the economic base determines politics and culture

I never said there was anything wrong with women studying Marxism.

[Luther Blissett]

I used to date someone who worked as an adult model for a time and came out of that career inspired in part by Dworkin and then became an anti-pornography activist. I think her critiques of that industry are/were crucial even though today those arguments have become more nuanced. For instance, I know a lot of women in various forms of sex work and adult entertainment and don't think they're oppressing themselves. But without Dworkin I don't think a lot of those conversations would have been started.

What do you make of Dines' central point about how pornography workers can't fully process their experience until at least five years after they have been out of the industry?

The second part of the video talk is pretty disturbing, though not surprising. Creates a knot in my stomach to hear it.

Guruilla: there is nothing wrong with women studying Marxism. I found it very helpful for understanding How Stuff Works - at least the beginning levels. The trick is not to embrace it or believe in it. Dialectical Materialism has its place in our awareness because it makes the world go round: Marx was right in saying the economic base determines politics and culture

I never said there was anything wrong with women studying Marxism.

I have no idea. It seemed to me like she was processing it while still working in the adult industry - maybe it's different in hardcore pornography though it would seem difficult to call a hard and fast rule. The queer and punk women here in my hood and in Baltimore who run their own adult film company seem to be in charge of their agency, though that might be my misogyny talking. I just really don't know how to answer. For some I would bet they can't ever fully process it.

[PufPuf93]

Our Bodies Ourselves was a landmark feminist-positive and sex-positive book that was published in 1971.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Bodies,_Ourselves

Our Bodies, Ourselves is a book about women's health and sexuality produced by the nonprofit organization Our Bodies Ourselves (originally called the Boston Women's Health Book Collective). First published in 1971, it contains information related to many aspects of women's health and sexuality, including sexual health, sexual orientation, gender identity, birth control, abortion, pregnancy and childbirth, violence and abuse and menopause. The most recent edition of the book was published in 2011. This informational book about women’s health advised women to claim their sexuality for their own pleasure, and included chapters about reproductive health and rights, and lesbian sexuality and independence. This was revolutionary because the move toward women’s active engagement with their actual sexual desires was contradicting the popular gendered myth of [1] “women as docile, and passive,” and “men as active and aggressive” in a sexual relationship.

The book has been translated and adapted by women's groups around the world and is available in 29 languages. Sales for all the books exceed four million copies.[2] The New York Times has called the seminal book "America's best-selling book on all aspects of women's health" and a "feminist classic".[3]

-----------

I became aware of Our Bodies, Ourselves when I lived with a woman 7 plus years older from late 1972 to 1976. Our Bodies, Ourselves taught me, a young heterosexual male, much practical about women. In 1977 when I met my ex wife to be, one of the first things I did when we got together seriously was buy her Our Bodies, Ourselves.

[Wombaticus Rex]

Our Bodies, Ourselves taught me, a young heterosexual male, much practical about women.

Agreed, it was an excellent book.

Grim but true, another valuable reference I have recommended and passed on to a lot of young men is "The Courage to Heal," Bass & Davis. Childhood sexual abuse, as near as I can tell, is statistically normal in the United States, and that book is very helpful for either gender.

[slomo]

I response to Dworkin, I was going to copypasta a bunch of Camille Paglia interviews or at least quotes. But I had the presence of mind to do a search first, and I see that she has already been well discussed on this forum. Suffice to say that Dr. Paglia is not a fan of Dworkin or a few others in the rad-fem camp. So maybe I'll just ask: what do you all think of Dr. Paglia? Because she's the kind of feminist I completely agree with (or about 95%), and she is one of the few semi-celebrities I would enjoy going out and having a drink with.

[JackRiddler]

Who is AD? Just curious.

Well I don't know who AD is, but for me he is an unconscious postmodernist artist who illustrates the absurdities of modern propaganda by flooding RI with articles that profess great righteousness and concern for elevating principles, yet seem to be sourced from Soros funded NGO's.

He goes by American Dream here at RI.

Well good thing no one else copy-pastes repeats all day and night as if volume beats quality!

[guruilla]

I response to Dworkin, I was going to copypasta a bunch of Camille Paglia interviews or at least quotes. But I had the presence of mind to do a search first, and I see that she has already been well discussed on this forum. Suffice to say that Dr. Paglia is not a fan of Dworkin or a few others in the rad-fem camp. So maybe I'll just ask: what do you all think of Dr. Paglia? Because she's the kind of feminist I completely agree with (or about 95%), and she is one of the few semi-celebrities I would enjoy going out and having a drink with.

I read some of one of her books earlier this year. I started out liking what she was saying but ended up not. I can't remember what it was that turned me now. I did try and contact her for a podcast; she has had an interesting site, all that's there is a question "Do you love me or hate me," something like that? Except, I just went there and it's no longer there: http://camillepaglia.com/

Weird....

[Luther Blissett]

Well, Paglia was one of my favorite professors, despite her brutal reputation and the difficulty of the material. I feel like recent years have seen me disagree with her more than agree though, not just on a philosophical level. Sometimes I just feel like she's coming from a purely emotional place with some of her beliefs, not grounded in facts or information.

[Sounder]

Sounder » Thu Dec 10, 2015 4:37 pm wrote:Who is AD? Just curious.

Well I don't know who AD is, but for me he is an unconscious postmodernist artist who illustrates the absurdities of modern propaganda by flooding RI with articles that profess great righteousness and concern for elevating principles, yet seem to be sourced from Soros funded NGO's.

He goes by American Dream here at RI.

Jack wrote...
Well good thing no one else copy-pastes repeats all day and night as if volume beats quality!

Yes, for one example but not done with such laser like focus, so its a bit easier to brush that material off and see it as part of the more generalized propaganda soup we live in.

For the most part though, here at RI folk use copy-paste to insert material supporting a particular point and within the flow of the thread. That is different than using a single source supplier of dodgy material to bump topics to the top of the list.

While it seems true that one mans propaganda is another mans fervently held belief, and vice versa, with AD the nature of the propaganda can be easily illustrated. It relies on repetition and use of triggers. Propaganda is successful when it merely takes up space, a lot like the dominant narrative itself, master to the propaganda. It promotes divisiveness because that is what makes for profit opportunities for the sponsors, buy when there is blood in the streets, as old Rocky would say.

As C2W? wrote, the one thing we all agree on is that we are inundated with propaganda 24/7.

OK then, so we are vectors of the virus also, right?