forum Debate. Debate. Debate.

Started March 14, 2019 by Deleted user

tune

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I have an entire threat dedicated to smut

Why do you think it's bad though?

Because it is the literary equivalent to porn and I think the porn industry is pushing the cultural view to men people that women are to be regarded as sexual objects with the purpose of existing to satisfy the desires of men.

_{I have a weak stomach so I'm definitely staying out of this one even for stalking purposes}

that's kind of a long stretch…

That smut = porn?

Oh no. That's fine. I meant smut = porn = men objectifying women

Lemme get something.

“It happens in stages, gradually. My experience with pornography generally, but with pornography that deals on a violent level of sexuality, is once you become addicted to it -and I look at this as a kind of addiction like other kinds of addiction- I would keep looking for more potent, more explicit, more graphic kinds of material. Until you reach a point where the pornography only goes so far, you reach that jumping off point where you begin to wonder if maybe actually doing it would give you that which is beyond just reading it or looking at it.”

~Ted Bundy

To be fair, at the beginning of what I think was that interview, he was saying that porn had nothing to do with it. The people interviewing him were trying to use him as an example of why it's bad (not saying it's good. Not at all), and he told them what they wanted to hear. Okay, I'm done. Back to stalking! (Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. I haven't done much research on him.)

Where’d you get that info?

It was Ina documentary I watched. But that was all they were talking about, so I got frustrated and only watched half or so.

“Okay, before we go any further, it is important to me that people… believe what I’m saying, and to tell you that I’m not blaming pornography. I’m not saying that it caused me to go out and do certain things. I take full responsibility for whatever I’ve done and all the things I’ve done. That’s not the question here. The question… and the issue is how this kind of literature contributed and helped mold and shape the kinds of violent behavior.”

(Interviewer) “It fueled your fantasies.”

“Fueled… Well in the beginning, it fuels this kind of… thought process. Then, at a certain time, it is instrumental in crystallizing it, making it into something which is… almost a separate entity inside. And that points you at the verge, I was at the verge of acting out this kind of fantasy.”

I kinda agree with you about the porn/smut thing. I think a lot of it does objectify women, or fetishize other underrepresented members of society. But that same argument can be argued for tons of media. Comic books often objectified women's bodies. Video games. Etc. So really I think the problem isn't the medium, but the audience with the taste for such things.

Female video game character: wears bikini
People: This is portraying women as sex objects to appeal to the male fantasy. Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.

Woman in real life: wears bikini
People: oH YASS QUEEN YOU ROCK THAT! DON'T TELL US WHAT TO WEAR, TELL THE GUYS NOT TO STARE! WOOO! FEMALE EMPOWERMENT FOR THE WIN!!!

It's because…it's the woman's…choice? A woman can wear what she pleases, and if a man objectifies her body, that's on him. If a woman is portrayed with unrealistically large boobs, a tiny waist, and an inhumanly sized ass in a video game, and she is canonicially just the "sexy" character, then…yeah, it's objectifying. Here's an example:
Scarlett Johansson poses nude for a shoot. People go crazy for it. That's fine, she's controlling her body and her narrative.
Joss Whedon writes in the script "Black Widow is standing there, looking sexy and gorgeous and her boobs look great." Before going on to say "Iron Man, the super intelligent hero" etc. Not fine.
See the difference?

Alright, yeah, I see that now. And really, it does really get on my nerves when I see characters whose main defining trait is "they're sexy", whether it's in TV, books, games, anything. Like can you please just… Make good characters? Instead of simply drawing boobs and calling it a day? Please???

Walking out of the helicopter is SHIELD AGENT MARIA HILL, SEXY, FIERCE AND DETERMINED.
TALL THUG is in the middle of a brutal beating on NATASHA ROMANOFF, a SLEWING, FOXY, UNBELIEVABLY SEXY SPY.
Check out the subreddit r/menwritingwomen, it's hilarious. A lot of men, especially in the past, were unbelievably sexist when they wrote women. It's tragic but leads to some funny stuff.

Oh. My. Stars.

SJSDJHSHJ I WILL NEVER NOT LAUGH AT BREASTED BOOBILY TO THE STAIRS

I REMEMBER SEEING THAT ONE

I kinda agree with you about the porn/smut thing. I think a lot of it does objectify women, or fetishize other underrepresented members of society. But that same argument can be argued for tons of media. Comic books often objectified women's bodies. Video games. Etc. So really I think the problem isn't the medium, but the audience with the taste for such things.

It is the same thing no matter what the media is. Porn is porn in pictures or videos or books.

It's because…it's the woman's…choice? A woman can wear what she pleases, and if a man objectifies her body, that's on him. If a woman is portrayed with unrealistically large boobs, a tiny waist, and an inhumanly sized ass in a video game, and she is canonicially just the "sexy" character, then…yeah, it's objectifying. Here's an example:
Scarlett Johansson poses nude for a shoot. People go crazy for it. That's fine, she's controlling her body and her narrative.
Joss Whedon writes in the script "Black Widow is standing there, looking sexy and gorgeous and her boobs look great." Before going on to say "Iron Man, the super intelligent hero" etc. Not fine.
See the difference?

Whether or not the woman chooses to be objectified it will still happen. So “being in control” (whatever that means in commercial industries where sex is the best selling thing) has nothing to do with whether or not it is objectification.
In a perfect world a woman could walk around naked and not be objectified. But we don’t live there. At least in a book it isn’t exploiting a living person, but it still helps fuel the narrative that women equal eyeball sex toys for men.

Alright, yeah, I see that now. And really, it does really get on my nerves when I see characters whose main defining trait is "they're sexy", whether it's in TV, books, games, anything. Like can you please just… Make good characters? Instead of simply drawing boobs and calling it a day? Please???

Oh my gosh yes.

It's because…it's the woman's…choice? A woman can wear what she pleases, and if a man objectifies her body, that's on him. If a woman is portrayed with unrealistically large boobs, a tiny waist, and an inhumanly sized ass in a video game, and she is canonicially just the "sexy" character, then…yeah, it's objectifying. Here's an example:
Scarlett Johansson poses nude for a shoot. People go crazy for it. That's fine, she's controlling her body and her narrative.
Joss Whedon writes in the script "Black Widow is standing there, looking sexy and gorgeous and her boobs look great." Before going on to say "Iron Man, the super intelligent hero" etc. Not fine.
See the difference?

Whether or not the woman chooses to be objectified it will still happen. So “being in control” (whatever that means in commercial industries where sex is the best selling thing) has nothing to do with whether or not it is objectification.
In a perfect world a woman could walk around naked and not be objectified. But we don’t live there. At least in a book it isn’t exploiting a living person, but it still helps fuel the narrative that women equal eyeball sex toys for men.

K, but there's still a difference between a woman feeling comfortable in her body and whatever she wants to wear, vs a man capitalizing off of an unrealistic representation of a woman as a sex object. If a man still objectifies a woman for wearing less clothing, that's on him, as I said, not a fault of her own.

Well of course. But men do that. And it is destructive to everyone involved. And purposefully creating porn, no matter what media, helps fuel the cultural narrative that women are sex objects for men. And I think that is hella messed.

So that’s my problem with smut.

But that's not what smut is ever in a book? It may be a version of porn, yes, but its not the shit you see on PornHub or whatever.
Its consensual, and echos reality not some weird shit about (insert icky porn expletive here), you know what I mean?

Most smut is also written by women so the smut is generally non-objectifying of any character. (I mean there ARE some that get a little cooky with the male…parts… but I mean every girl can dream)
In my years of reading smut, I've never once felt that women were objectified.