Since porn v. government seems to be the topic of the day I thought I’d throw a question out there. I always hate bringing up morality in the context of porn because the first response is to question whether it can exist there. I’m not talking about the puritan-christian-fundamentalist-enternal fire kind of morality. Just the basic tenets of right and wrong.
I’ve recently become very attached to the fight that our industry is continually making to stay in business as one political organization or another tries to suppress it. A few days ago one of the main people opposing the tax bill in CA called me and asked if I could get a couple of girls or anyone in the industry at all to donate $1,000 each to a charity event for hepatitis patients. Here’s why this event was more worthy of donations than the thousands of other events out there: it was the pet project of the political swing vote on the tax bill. I am not at all trying to discredit the person who called me. I have a ton of respect for him and he is very good at what he does and I know that this is how the game is played. I just don’t like how the game is played and it makes my stomach turn to think that this politician will care more about the rights of her constituents if those of us directly affected by her decision donate money to a project that will make her look good come re-election time. So the question is, is the lesser evil to play the game in the name of fighting for a cause that you genuinely believe in, or to not play the game and hope reason wins… Luckily I didn’t have to take a side because he got the funding he needed within an hour of that phone call.
This same question can be applied to the Max Hardcore case. Yes, this is a shitty case to bring to the supreme court in the hope of defeating the miller test if the appeals take it that far. From what I’ve heard he has plenty of grounds to appeal on. So does the industry support him even if we don’t agree with his specific content because we are aiming at the greater cause (being the freedom to shoot without worrying about whether we are complying with a gray and outdated way of meeting community standards), or do we beat his case up and hold out for one that we truly believe is worth fighting for? Which is the lesser evil while trying to preserve something we shouldn’t even be forced to fight for in the first place?
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Sun Tzu, in The Art of War, observed that there were essentially two, equally effective, ways of defeating an enemy. Either to confront him directly with superior strength or to draw him in, spread thin, away from his base of support, and thus allowed to defeat himself. If you feel uncomfortable using dishonest tactics to defeat a dishonest opponent, if the efficacy of your deception is weaker than his, then your only alternative is to reformulate the order of battle.
If there is something wrong, in and of itself, with using dishonest means to induce someone to side with you, then it must be consistently avoided. It must be a tactic left to the losing side. The government of California is out of control and it is overstepping it’s proper boundaries with this tax bill. The role and value of government has grown entirely out of proportion with it’s costs and we are witnessing the results. That a public official’s principles can be bought at as cheap of a price as a few donations of charity is a stark example of how low it has sunk. But it is merely an example, a symptom of something much deeper. The deeper illness of a culture which regards personal boundaries, principles, and values as not only relative, but often unnecessary.
The hugely, endemically successful, modern pornography industry is testament to that. It is an industry built upon the exploitation of irrational, out of proportion lusts. It maintains itself by continuously finding new and innovative ways of inducing people caught up in this lust to part with their money. True, it is a personally motivated sexual lust instead of a politically motivated power lust, but it is a lust just the same. A lust is not the same as a desire; and it is not teneable. Not for a man, not for a government.
No, there is nothing intrinsically wrong with porn. Neither human sexuality, nor the pornography which, in certain very limited contexts, that maintains it are “necessary evils” as religious morality claims. But neither is government. It’s wrong to think of government is a necessary evil. Certainly government can behave in an evil manner – as this tax bill is testament to – but government, as such, is a supreme and necessary good. It’s good because it is necessary just as sex is good because man is without original sin.
If you wish to see a government which wouldn’t dream of entertaining such a tax bill, which would consider the impeachment of such a public official as you describe, then first you must work towards a culture which is capable of consistently, and forcefully, demanding it. This means an economy which rewards, primarily, the creation, not the redistribution, of objectively valuable goods and services. It means a psychological and philosophical atmosphere passionately devoted to these things and their attainment here, now, on earth.
This would be culture profoundly different from the one we have now; which is content to suffer every type of petty injustice and irrationality for the sake of social harmony, unearthly redemption, or personal fantasy.
Max Hardcore doesn’t care about you or anyone else but himself. He knew the law and he still did what he wanted. It’s people like Max that gives all porn a bad name. I wouldn’t even call what he does porn. Would you ever be in any of his movies? Most women wouldn’t. The ones that do are either high on coke or there’s something really wrong with her. I’m all for hardcore, extreme, rough kinky sex. But what he does goes beyond that, and he knows it.
No one in your industry should help him at all because I doubt he would help any of you unless he got something in return. We don’t live in China or a country like that where people have little rights to do anything and the government dictates everything. Max couldn’t be happy with hardcore or extreme porn. He had to do what he did and then have the audacity to say he’s fighting for freedom of expression.
Wow I agree with Darrah in pricipal. But then again I know Paul Little and hes been looking for this fight for a few years.
Wonder if they will let him ear his cowboy hat in prison?
Darrah,
Max wouldn’t help anyone else in the industry unless he got something in return? And this is bad because…?
Why is it moral to serve the happiness of others, but not your own? If enjoyment is a value, why is it moral when experienced by others, but immoral when experienced by you? If the sensation of eating a cake is a value, why is it an immoral indulgence in your stomach, but a moral goal for you to achieve in the stomach of others? Why is it immoral for you to desire, but moral for others to do so? Why is it immoral to produce a value and keep it, but moral to give it away? And if it is not moral for you to keep a value, why is it moral for others to accept it? If you are selfless and virtuous when you give it, are they not selfish and vicious when they take it?
Don’t blame the victim. If you want to condemn Max (as you should, his pedophelia and love of violence deserve it), do so. But don’t blame the government’s actions – it’s refusal to distinguish between fantasy and reality – on him.
>>> Max wouldn’t help anyone else in the industry unless he got something in return? And this is bad because…?
Well if you ever want anyone to help you in life, you should help others around you because you might need help in the future. We can’t go on with life being selfish bastards.
>>>> Don’t blame the victim. If you want to condemn Max (as you should, his pedophelia and love of violence deserve it), do so. But don’t blame the government’s actions – it’s refusal to distinguish between fantasy and reality – on him.
My comment came as anti victim and anti government? I get heat on this site and other sites for labeling people as victims and saying we should feel bad when something horrible happens to them. And do you know how much heat and hatred I get on non-porn sites when I defend porn stars while others say they should all die and rot in hell?
And as for the government, we need laws. If there weren’t any laws, havoc would run through the streets. Some laws are worse and ridiculous than others. That’s why we have elections where we can vote in or throw out certain lawmakers.
4. We sell fantasy. The problem is most people in this busuness have allowed their greed to cloud what they know isthe fundamental difference between right and wrong.
>>>>Well if you ever want anyone to help you in life, you should help others around you because you might need help in the future. We can’t go on with life being selfish bastards.
So we should only help others because it’s in our long-term self interest? Sounds pretty selfish to me.
Also, don’t misconstrue my opposition to this particular government policy as my oppostion to government as such. I’m not an anarchist.
Gonzo,
I understand you’re scared. You have a right to be; what the government does to porn is obscene. But you’re never going to be free from tyranny by convincing yourself that your fear is acceptable. Don’t throw an innocent man under the bus just to spare yourself an extremely unpleasant thought: that our government is out of control. That’s the type of evasive, fantastic thinking I was writing about in my first post. And, ironically, it’s the reason why a government of the people, by the people, and for the people has become the people’s worst enemy.
Grant – Anyone that knows me will tell you . . . “I Aint Skeert”. I know the difference between right and wrong. And that allows me to sleep damn fine at night and walk around bulletproof and 10 feet tall.
Im thinking of getting a cowboy hat to walkaround in San Fransisco as a spoof and call myself Max GonZo.
Consideing I know the place will have a Fed or 2 sniffing around . . . does that sound to you like a person thats scared?
I work for the worlds largest VOD company, Ive been online with my first domzin since 93 and I shoot nekkids like Mike South does. [Of course Im not a 2 time AVN winner]. Mike will tell you sitting in the corner and keeping my mouth shut isnt my style and most of the scammers in this business hate me for it.
Ill remind you that this is the good ole USA and I have a right to say Paul Little.
Do you think he does this for the glamour?
Hes in it for the mon-ay and right now hes cashing it for all its worth being gilb. He and Joe Francis have the same problem. They dont know when to shut the fuck up.
Gonzo,
Maybe, but you’re still jumping through all kinds of hoops to explain to me why Paul Little is so much worse than anyone else with the words “teen” or “BDSM” in their domain name. I don’t know, the guy may be a dick. His stuff might be more over the top than anything else out there, but the departure is a small matter of degree compared to the degree of punishment he’s received.
The rest of you guys suffer the scorn for society at large, you don’t go to prison. The last thing Little needs is to have other people in the industry back away from him like he’s so radically different. He may be different, just not radically so.
Sure, his tactics might have been stupid. His content may have crossed a line. He may value money out of all proportion to it’s function, but why wasn’t the industry screaming those things before the Feds got him in their crosshairs? Why disown him now?
Self-preservation is a powerful instinct, but it’s just an instinct. The real means of self-preservation is a concious, principled committment to individual rights and a government afraid of it’s citizens.
Personal preference.
How much are you sending for his support campaign?
Grantsinmypants, Max Hardcore is an innocent man? He’s a sexual deviant. He and others like him give a bad name to porn. I wouldn’t call what he does porn. I’ve said before I’m all for hardcore, extreme, kinky rough sex. But what he does goes way above and beyond that and he knows it. He knew this day was coming and he has no one else to blame but himself. We don’t live in a communist country where the government dictates our every day lives. But there are laws set for a reason.
yep he is salt of the earth
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Darrah, I don’t know if Max Hardcore is innocent or not. It’s quite possible that he did brake community standards, but thats not the point. The point is that _any_ kind of obscenity law at all ought to be unconstitutional. What is obsene or not is absolutely subjective, and just because a majority of the people in your state thinks that something is obscene doesn’t make it so. Furthermore even if something could objectively be classified as obscene that doesn’t make it right to ban it. Freedom of speech and obscenity laws are simply not compatible. As distasteful as you might find his movies, as long as the people acting in them are doing so consensually he has done nothing wrong.