Stormy Daniels Presses Gail Dines’ Button

Some years ago, I had the privilege of being introduced to the actor Sam Elliott. He had long struck me as the quintessential ‘American’: a rugged and formidable man; the easy-going philosopher/narrator of “The Big Lebowski”; the line-walking moral center of “Tombstone”; and the battered-until-morally-flexible victim of Big Tobacco—a decent man who ponders a late-life payout—in “Thank You For Smoking”. (In the latter, Elliot riffed on his own past as The Marlboro Man. In real life, I was pleased to find Mr. Elliott seemed to embody the fine attributes of all these men.

I had recently heard a radio interview with Rod Lurie, who had directed Elliot in the film, “The Contender.” Lurie noted the actor’s professionalism and even-tempered affability: regardless of what was asked of him, Lurie revealed, Elliot would casually reply, “No problem, mijo.” The refrain was so automatic and frequent that Lurie joked it was like pressing a button.

Radical feminist anti-porn crusader Gail Dines is, in nearly every respect, the diametric opposite of Sam Elliott: a short, stout, female ex-patriot Brit; loquacious, slippery, and humorless. Dines shares what one personality trait with the famous actor: it’s not professionalism, as she is an infamous academic fraud who has stated that no quantum of evidence would ever cause her to alter her views; neither is it calm affability, as the bleating radfem has an atrocious, grating demeanor befitting her hateful, hollow rhetoric.

The sole characteristic linking these two personalities is their reflexive views of the all-purpose catchphrase.

In radfemland, there are no individuals, only members of groups. Whenever Ms. Dines is faced with a real-world living, breathing example who does not fit her absurd Marxist-feminist paradigm, she summarily dismisses that person, their experiences and views, as “not representative” of the group or class Dines has assigned them. Alas, the term has been so over-used by radfems that it has become something of a joke. In its place, Dines & Co. now sometimes refer to an “anomalous” individual or a “rare” “exception.”

Author and social commentator Camille Paglia has said that modern feminism is akin to “a religion for a lot of neurotic women.” I would not disagree with her. One central characteristic of all religions is that they propose to deal with “revealed wisdom:” so-called “truths” that must be swallowed whole and taken as articles of faith.

Because they traffic in faith and belief rather than reason and rational inquiry, such cults need never treat evidence—be it, on its face, supportive of or contradictory to a particular premise—with logic. There is simply no reason to test evidence against experience for those happy few who are convinced they already know all they need to know.

Christian orthodoxy—the system of belief that executed thinkers for saying that the earth was not the center of the universe—still preaches that dinosaur bones were placed in the ground by God to test man’s faith, and that the many ancient savior myths which are amazingly similar to the story of Jesus Christ while pre-dating it by centuries were composed by Satan to trick us.

Marxist feminists may not be burning people at the stake (although some have indeed suggested the killing of sex workers as “traitors to their mythical sisterhood”), but is there a better definition of “fanatic” than a single-minded person who reflexively tut-tuts away contrary evidence, or worse, rationalizes it as further proof that their world-view is true and correct?

Gail Dines’ (co-authored) essay at The Conversation earlier this year, “Porn ‘disruption’ makes Stormy Daniels a rare success in increasingly abusive industry”, finds the Marxist anti-porn campaign in familiar territory. The screed is essentially a series of insults and unsourced alarmist claims: that pornography is by definition abusive; that being an adult performer is not really a career; that corporatization is bad (because corporations are) and the corporatization of the adult business is doubly bad because it has caused working conditions “to further deteriorate.”

According to Dines, Stormy Daniels‘ story “is exceptional the vast majority of women in the industry suffer abusive working conditions and don’t progress to real careers.” As if success is owed to workers for just showing up. We have certainly highlighted Daniels’ faults at this site but her success in porn is something that no one can take away from her. She an exceptional writer and a reliable director. She earned her success.

To a rational person, Daniels’ successful 15-plus years in the adult industry would fatally undermine the premise that porn is a tool of the evil world-wide “patriarchy” that tricks and subjugates women reducing them to mere sex objects. However in Gail Dines’ bizarro world of class struggle tautologies, the fact that Daniels has thrived somehow proves the opposite point.

Furthermore, Dines’ assertion that Daniels is “one of the very few women who have transitioned to production” is also fatally flawed. (Note, Dines doesn’t say “directing” or even “producing”; she terms it “production” to frame the adult business as a class struggle where “workers” are oppressed by those controlling the means of production). First, her definition “production” is ridiculously naïve ignoring the many performers who run thriving online clips stores and membership sites, among other platforms.

Second, Dines ignores the throng of women who have produced and/or written and directed adult films for major adult studios for decades. A simple google or IAFD search turns up a formidable list.

And third, Dines’ claim assumes that a similar number of a women as men seek to “transition” into careers behind the camera. There exist many reasons why fewer women than men may want to become producers or directions; assuming that their reluctance or failure to do so is due to systemic oppression is just more agency-denying Marxist claptrap, assuming facts not in evidence.

Dines’ assertion about working conditions in the “abusive” porn business – she actually uses the term “porn sweat shops” – demonstrates the kind of sick disingenuous and revolting propagandist she is.

Her explanation goes like this:

After the inherent bubble ruptured and rampant piracy knocked the wind out of the adult business, evil corporations like Mindgeek moved in. Once the carpetbaggers had established monopolies, they used their “political muscle” to oppress performers, citing Mindgeek’s funding of the campaign against Los Angeles County Measure B in 2012, which Dines frames as pro-worker legislation.

This construction of events is pure fantasy. There are Colombian drug mules that don’t pull this much out of their ass.

Yes, Mindgeek backed the No On Measure B campaign, but opposition to the initiative was near universal among performers (the group that the legislation’s creator, AHF’s Michael Weinstein claimed he was trying to “help” but whom he refused to even consult).

Furthermore, voters actually passed Measure B; it was later blocked neither by MindGeek nor the political process, but by a court ruling that found it unenforceable on constitutional grounds.

The court challenge was filed by Vivid Entertainment, one of the old school video labels that has been around since the early 1980s and hadn’t recently “moved in.”

All subsequent attempts to pass similar legislation in California were defeated by a coalition of performers, health organizations, and business groups, as well as the will of the statewide electorate.

The Sky Suspended

Dines is merely repeating the same garbage she’s been peddling for years. So why recycle it now? The answer lies in the reference to Stormy Daniels in the essay’s title. There’s no bigger headline-chasing opportunist than Gail Dines.

But there’s another factor at play.

Dines’ grim essay illustrates radical feminism’s alarm that an unrepentant sex worker and pornographer has attained cultural significance and influence. Daniels’ huge base of support is likely the reason Dines does not attack her as a traitorous oppressor of women; a collaborator with evil capitalists, and Mindgeek (to whom she is now under contract) in particular.

The article is constructed around the fatuous “push-button” exclamation that the sturdy Daniels is not representative of adult performers as a class. Daniels is an anomaly, Dines warns all those under the canopy of her malignant influence (to borrow a magnificent phrase from Bob Dylan) but the reader can detect both fear and jealously when dines notes that this “porn star” has secured numerous mainstream media appearances including once on TV’s  “60 Minutes” program.

Dines concludes that irrespective of Ms. Daniels the adult industry is “unsalvagable” and further declares that there is no such thing as “socially responsible” porn (as if this were the mandate of art or entertainment).  I am reminded of something the Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes noted in The Buried Mirror — “The California state law decreeing that English is the official language of the state proves only one thing: that English is no longer the official language of California.”

Dines breathless verdict proves only that, having lost their firm grip on the narrative, radfems fear Daniels, a woman of poise with obvious intelligence and agency, now that the sun has swung her way. They perceive Daniels’ celebrity as a pressing thunderhead. The wind of disruption has begun snagging cloud wisps, and the authoritarian feminists fear the blaze of lightning.