Effects of Pornography on Women and Censorship

EFFECTS OF PORNOGRAPHY ON WOMEN AND CENSORSHIP

"Pornography and the New Puritans" by John Irving discusses the pornography victims' compensation bill. "Reply to John Irving" by Andrea Dworkin argues against pornography using her own personal experiences. John Irving argues that the victims' compensation bill is ridiculous because it makes the publisher and not the perpetrator responsible for what is acceptable. It is in violation of our First Amendment and should never be passed. Andrea Dworkin knows about the lives of women in pornography because she lived the life of being sexually abused and turned to prostitution. In my opinion, it is not logical to blame someone else for the actions of another person. If this bill passed, it certainly would be in violation of our constitutional rights.

Irving argues, "If this bill passes, it will be the first piece of legislation to give credence to the unproven theory that sexually explicit material actually causes sexual crimes" (418). He quotes the Commission on Obscenity and Pornography that there is no reliable evidence that exposure to pornographic material makes someone go out and commit sexual crimes. Irving shows that prior to the production of pornographic material, sex crimes existed. He states, "rape and child molestation predate erotic books and pornographic magazines and X-rated videocassettes" (418).

Irving makes reference to his own experience in his novel, The World According to Garp, wherein a selfish young man loses part of his anatomy while enjoying oral sex in a car. Thinking back about that particular hate mail, he says, "I don't recall a single letter from a young woman saying that she intended to rush out and do this to someone; and in the fourteen years since that novel's publication, in more than thirty-five foreign languages, no one who actually has done this to someone has written to thank me for giving her the idea" (419).

Irving makes an appeal to the literary community that they should just say no to censorship in any and every form. He is not in favor of child pornography, but that is what the people in favor of censorship try to exploit. He states a fine example when he compares not wanting murderers to be set free if he disapproves reinstating public hangings. In the final appeal by Irving, he says, "No writer or publisher or reader should accept censorship in any form; fundamental to our freedom of expression is that each of us has a right to decide what is obscene and what isn't" (424).

Andrea Dworkin is set on trying to have the victims' compensation bill passed. She claims that by the time she was eighteen she had been sexually assaulted three times. She learned to trade sex for money. She states, "I come to speech from under a man, tortured and tormented. What he did to me took away everything; he was the owner of everything" (428). She states that men act out pornography on women and, in turn, women's lives become pornography.

Dworkin drafted the first civil law against pornography which held pornographers accountable for what they do. They traffic women, eroticize inequality in a way that promotes rape, battery, maiming and bondage. They exploit and hurt women to make pornography, and then consumers use the pornography to assault women verbally and physically. She says, "male liberals seem to think we fight pornography to protect sexual innocence, but we have none to protect" (429).

It is my opinion that John Irving references his own personal experiences and uses logical appeals to establish his case. He presses upon the fact that sex crimes can't be caused by pornography because sex crimes