Karl Carlile <[log in to unmask]> recently circulated an essay on The
Internet and pornography. I don't usually respond to these salvoes, and
don't want to get involved in a debate, but speaking from CSE/Capital and
Class office - and as a female socialist - I want respond to a few points
he made:
>.....The entire bourgeois strategy is to build up a bad press for the
>internet exaggerating the presence of pornography.
No, the amount of porn on the Net is growing all the time, as anyone who
uses the Net must know. As an example, CSE/Capital and Class (hardly a
prime target for pornographers) never used to receive 'invitations' to porn
sites, now we get about one a week. Recently on the web, while entering a
competition in a men's 'lifestyle' (non-porn) magazine, the page
disappeared and I found images floating across the screen, inviting me to
join the Voyeur's network and giving me a few samplers. Talking to people
this does happen on certain sites - they get 'bombed' from outside - so you
are offered stuff you never sought.
>Contained in the debate is the false suggestion that pornography can be
>eliminated through censorship.
>... the best means of encouraging pornography. Censorship drives
>pornography underground making it a
>less accessible commodity and consequently raising its price.
Nobody thinks censorship eliminates pornography. But mass availibilty
legitimises it as a means of employment (or low income subsidy, like casual
prostitution) for working class women, immigrants etc., while restricting
access means people who don't want to see it don't have to, and those who
do will have to work a little harder to find it. Raising its price? Good -
let them pay for their habit!
Deborah Knight
CSE/Capital & Class Business Manager
25 Horsell Road
London N5 1XL
(Tel/fax: 0207 607 9615
website: www.cseweb.org.uk)
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