Closing Thoughts

As this course comes to a close, I look back and I will never look at pornography the same, all the fun is out of it now. I was happy being ignorant only considering that there was only erotica (the good kind) on the Internet! This course has forced me to take a more clinical look at what else is out there and I didn’t like it. I don’t like rape, bondage, torture – staged or not, I can’t see where it would turn anyone on, but that’s why we have freedom of speech, to protect it and I would never condemn any that enjoys it.

The most difficult piece was child pornography. I find it totally repulsive that any adult can look at a prepubescent child in a sexual manner. However, I did get some insight as to the profile, usually the person still looks and wants to interact with a child in the same manner that they did when they were the same age. They’re not necessarily looking for penetration, but want to interact the in the same way when they were that age. There are also people out there (not as rare as you would hope) that view the images but would never act on them, like the pictures in the museum. Not saying it’s right, wrong or indifferent, just some insight as to their thinking.

Another difficult piece to handle was the sex slave trade. How bad of a living situation does a person have to get to that their best option is to willingly leave their family and their country to earn money in what they thought was a maid, a waitress, etc., but end up on their back for a pimp. How bad does life have to get?

I found the information regarding mainstream businesses that provide service or distribution outlets to the adult industry amazing! I had no idea that GM, at one time, owned DirecTV, which includes pornographic movies. Mainstream companies also provide the infrastructure to pornographic sites on the Internet such as Cisco Systems, ECM, MCI, Qwest, Bell Atlantic, Sun Microsystems, etc. There are also all the hotels like Marriott, Westin and the Hilton that carry the movies into the guest hotel rooms at huge profits to them because they have no costs involved. Not to mention the internet service providers, DSL and broadband providers. Huge, huge, huge profits, although hard to tell what revenues are from the adult industry since they don’t separate.

I also found the laws that affect the industry to be a good thing to know. For example, zoning laws, the tests for obscenity, what constitutes community standards, what’s covered under the first amendment, time, place and manner restrictions. Information that is very helpful to know.

As you can tell from my blog volume, I hated the blog. A writer I am not, I don’t come across as very politically correct. Although some were very good, I didn’t like having to read the blogs of others either. I think tests/quizzes would have been a better barometer, just my opinion

Pictures on a Screen

Pornographic photographs, videos, magazines…they’re all just pictures on a screen/page, nothing more. When you go to a museum, do you take the paintings off the wall and take them home with you? No, you admire each painting, linger for a bit and look at the next. They’re there only to look at and you know that going in.

I’ve seen a few posts and the On Point program feel that viewing pornography and cybersex is cheating. I have to say that I don’t agree. That is like saying that you are cheating with a picture in a magazine or a painting in the museum that’s ludicrous.

In the program On Point, the matrimonial attorney said she has seen a marked increase in the number of couples filing for divorce because of their spouse’s on-line activities. Get a grip, what truly is the harm? If it’s interfering with everyday life like the job, family; then there might be a problem. However, spending 40 minutes a day on the Internet surfing porn, wouldn’t you consider that to be wind-down time? Like watching the 11:00 news, everything is done for the evening, its time to relax, so what, go surf the Internet for awhile. A person would throw away a marriage for that? A reflection of our society, we don’t understand something so throw it away; don’t bother to try to listen to the why, just get rid of it.

The Adult Industry

Throughout this course, I have been amazed at how the adult industry has continued to transform itself as its business environment has continued to change. The industry continuously has to reinvent itself to deal with changes in legal, political and technological areas of its business. It always finds new ways to deal with these issues.

I can’t think of another industry, besides the tobacco industry, that is so stifled in its ability to advertise to its market. The industry has very narrow marketing abilities. Granted, it is a billion-dollar industry with lots of cash that provides easier adaptability and they probably don’t even need to advertise, even still, there are so many obstacles!

The industry has also always been there to either develop new technology or to exploit existing technology in order to enhance their business and business processes. While the adult industry developed and improved new technology, mainstream industries sat back and waited to incorporate this new technology into their business after it had been perfected by the industry. Some examples of technology enhanced or developed by the adult industry has been adult verification systems, bill pay systems, server capacity, etc. Other industries should follow their model.

I think what has irritated me the most throughout this course has been the hypocrisy displayed by other businesses that support the industry, consumers of the adult industry, politicians, etc. This industry makes billions of dollars annually, but no one goes on-line and downloads the photos or goes into the chat rooms, no one builds/maintain the servers that store the movies and photos, no one carries the satellite signals, etc. There is a ton of money being made, but no one likes to admit that they are involved. Remarkable how an industry can generate so much revenue but no one is using the products and profits are rarely attributed to this part of their business. Incredible.

IP – Copyright & Trademarks

When the music industry was struggling to figure out how to save themselves, I wrote it off as desperation to keep from following the way of the typewriter; natural product lifecycle, obsolescence. I never considered applying copyright and trademark laws to the Internet, just thought they needed to figure out new ways to distribute and protect their products. While all the time, copyrights most definitely carried over to the Internet.

I still think the music industry needs to come up with more creative ways to protect their products from piracy and peer-to-peer software over the Internet. I like the way that Playboy has handled their infringements. They put the photographs out there and when they are clicked on, the photos bring the person right back to Playboy’s website, how cool is that? They are actually generating subscriptions for the site!

Playboy is continuing to file suit against those who infringe on their trademarks and copyrights. They are using the laws that currently exist to protect their business. However, the music and movie industries are pushing to have new laws enacted to protect them from this new business environment. It’s time for the movie and music industries to do the same by working within and adapting existing laws to address their new business environment. They can no longer operate in the same manner as they’ve done before, they need to transform else they follow the way of the typewriter, telegraph, record player, 8-track tape player, etc.

Lucas Entertainment

Kudos to Lucas Entertainment’s efforts in providing young gay males with films that incorporate the reality of the use of a condom; condoms are always required; no drug/alcohol scenes; treatment of the actors. Lucas Entertainment gives viewers a feeling of belonging – somewhere to go when there is no where else real time where they can mingle with like-minded people. Lucas’ films also give their viewers a model to follow in their own lives.

I also wanted to address the sitcom Will and Grace mentioned in the Yale article. The article criticized the sitcom’s gay characters for being clownish. I would have to disagree. This show, along with Ellen were the first of their kind at their time to include gay characters. The last episodes of a very successful eight year run of Will and Grace aired on Thursday nights at 9:00 p.m., the show was meant to be light, it did address some touchy issues, but the majority of the show was very light.

The network seemed to flirt with Will and Jack’s ‘gayness’ never really showing anything, playing both sides. Here’s a thought, maybe the show’s popularity was with straight people rather than gay; or the network was testing the waters to see what viewers would accepts, if they were ready yet. Apparently, they were. These shows paved the way for other gay themed shows such as Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Queer as Folk and The Wire. Viewers accepted the shows and they were popular.

Since the Yale article considers the gay characters in Will and Grace as clownish In order to show a comparison between sitcoms that were in the same time slot prior to Will and Grace, I had to go back quite a few years given the sitcom is quickly becoming extinct. I came up with Cheers circa 1982 and Seinfeld circa 1990′s. Both heterosexual sitcoms were about nothing and there really wasn’t anything sexual about them, from what I recall. Pretty much all of the actors were clowns, not much difference from the characters portrayed in Will and Grace.

Questions for Michael Lucas

I have two questions for Mr. Lucas:

1.) Since the main intent of your movies is to educate gay young men, do you use ‘gay for pay’ male actors in your movies? I didn’t see the subject addressed in your website or in the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism.

2.) Since you seem to run into the same issue as heterosexual pornographers; not referring to content similarity but to that line of the ‘bad pornographaphers’ and the ‘good television producers’ (verbiage to draw a contrast), have you thought of getting like-minded folks together to start up a network that would meld the content of the gay networks with more gay sexuality, how you truly believe it should be depicted but what’s acceptable for cable?

3.) Since I am seriously naive on the topic of gay rights, what do you feel are the most important rights that the gay community is lacking? I would assume the right to marry and same rights as a husband and wife, hate crimes shouldn’t even be an issue, but what else? Again, I said I was naive on the subject, please educate.

Thank you.

Congressional Hearings

More legislation and governmental restrictions are not going to solve this ‘problem’. I still do not see it as a problem. Parents need to monitor their kids internet activity, end of story. Too much trouble — too bad, you have to do what you have to do. You wouldn’t let your kid run around at night in a section of town known for drugs and pedophiles, why in heavens name would you let them run around on the internet by themselves? It’s the same thing. People have to realize that the virtual world does cross into reality right through their living rooms.

I do advocate the education of parents. One of the other blogs mentioned that some parents are clueless when it comes to the computer let alone to know enough to install blockers and filters, I find that very disturbing that kids are more computer literate than their parents. How can you keep someone safe if you’re behind him or her and not in front blocking for him or her? Parents need to educate themselves on the Internet and the use of a computer…knowledge is power.

Throwing more tax dollars and more regulations is not going to alleviate. Since when is the government a babysitter and why should I have to pay for it? All it is going to do is make it more difficult for law-abiding citizens of legal age to view what they want to view in the privacy of their own home.

I also noticed that there was only one person testifying for the industry; of course, that person was conveniently cut because of time constraints. However, there was plenty of time for the dribblings of Dr. James Weaver – communications and psych professor from Virginia Tech who insists that twenty years of research shows an increase in sexual callousness in men — the same results would be shown in viewing slasher films. He also said that kids rely on the Internet as sex educators, again, back to the parents. His testimony added absolutely no value.

My favorite was Tatiana Platt, SVP for AOL. She touted AOL’s parental control programs. She had said something about stopping the transfer of this trash to children, what a hypocrite! According to the text, AOL perfected the art of providing safe havens for pedophiles to exchange their wares in complete privacy. Dr. H.’s monitoring of one of the chat rooms saw them come in list themselves for pics and leave or they would instant message and soon the room would disappear. AOL’s instant messaging and chat rooms were its bread and butter when they first started out as an hourly rate. I’m sure they were shocked to find out that people were using their services in just this way, please, they did the research and they knew exactly what they were going for. The hypocrisy surrounding pornography is so pathetic.

Then there was Tim Lordan, he couldn’t utter a complete coherent sentence, had no idea what he had to say and didn’t much care.

Comment – The little county in Alabama that ruined my tv

In response to djxtone’s 4/21 post regarding the need for organizations conducting inter and intrastate business to know state laws in which they do business, it’s absurd that they wouldn’t. A business that doesn’t know the environment in which it operates is pretty much out of business. If they don’t know the laws and/or can’t operate within the boundaries of the laws, they deserve to be shut down.

Comment – Violence + Sex = ?

In reading Tooth’s April 22nd entry regarding violence and sex, I was nodding in agreement all the way down the post. I got to the last line and I was confused, “…if it is too violent in accordance to moral, ethical, state or federal laws than it should be banned, it’s that simple, yet controlling violence on the Internet is a whole different story.”

Why would controlling violence (obssenity/indecency) on the internet be any different from any other media types? If it violates a law, it’s punishable. Are you saying it is a different story because police agencies have not kept up with technology or because so far the Internet has been pretty much the wild west?

Thanks!

Congressional Hearings – Comment

I was very disappointed that the congressional hearings didn’t include Paul Cambria’s testimony, it cut out with Lordan’s rambling who was preceded by more dribble from Platt, the SVP from AOL. I would have much rather heard from Cambria!