For most of my life I have heard the adult entertainment industry exploits women. From reasonably tame magazines such as Playboy to pornographic films to so-called Gentlemen's Clubs, they are all in the business of exploiting women, therefore this is all bad and such things should be shunned. I'm certainly in favor of banishing all things that exploit women, but I think we often miss the mark in our battles.
The traditional exploitation culprits are things I'm too familiar with. Before the age of 10, I was a regular reader of Playboy (but just for the articles), and many similar, less literate, more graphic magazines. At one stage of my life I spent so much time in a local strip club, that I was their version of Norm from Cheers. The manager would sometimes buy me drinks, the kitchen manager would give me free samples of meals he was experimenting with, the bouncers would all stop by and ask how I was, and nearly every dancer stopped by just to chat, give me a hug, or tell me their latest problem. I even worked briefly for a man who owned a large chain of adult book/video/peepshow businesses. I've been friends with porn stars, strippers and prostitutes. It will come as no surprise that many of the women involved in these occupations have been and continue to be exploited. What you may find surprising is that the exploitation often goes both ways.
There are many cases of women being forced into these industries by boyfriends, husbands, even by their own parents, and I've met several examples, including one who was sold to be a sex slave by her own mother, at the age of 12. Deplorable and despicable, I agree, but it happens and it will continue to happen. There are just as many cases where intelligent, driven women have realized the money men are willing to pay for just a look, for a few moments of fantasy. One very good friend was working as a waitress to help pay her way through college when she found out she could make more money waiting tables at a strip club. The pay increase was good, but the dancers were making a great deal more. Since she had studied dance most of her life, she realized she could make more in a few hours than she made in two weeks. She finished her degree and began dancing. Within a few years her income had soared. It took her about 10 years, but she managed to buy and pay off a nice house, a new car, a new Harley, travel all over the world and then quit dancing and, using money saved and contacts made, started a very successful traditional business. Now she's a married soccer mom/businesswoman. I have known several others who went the same route, with varying degrees of success. Who was exploited?
Let's get away from the seedy side and look at the traditional world, where women are not exploited. I grew up with certain knowledge about women's roles in the business world. Women could be secretaries, nurses, teachers or stewardesses (long before we had flight attendants), but most often they were homemakers. They cooked, cleaned and raised children. The implied assumption with working women is that they were having sex with the boss. Stewardesses with pilots, nurses with doctors and secretaries with the sort of person who is too important to write their own memos. If a woman wanted to move up in the business world, she had several options, but they all involved penetration. The Hollywood casting couch is a worn out cliche, but it is just a reflection of what women have always faced.
For much of the past 30 years strides have been made. In 1991, the trial of William Kennedy Smith for rape, even though he was acquitted, introduced us to the possibility that having sex with a woman too drunk to stand, might be wrong. Movies, such as "The Burning Bed" (1984) suggested that perhaps a man did not have the right to beat his wife. Although we still have a long way to go, great strides have been made and today there are very few occupations unavailable to women.
Don't get too excited just yet. There is still a long way to go, and recent trends have been to reverse those earlier successes. Recent laws in several states have made it clear that women are and will remain the servants of men. How independent can you be, when you are not even allowed to make decisions regarding your own reproductive system? It's hard to feel empowered when a rapist is either acquitted or given a laughable sentence because a judge has decided you were "probably as much in control of the situation" or because your manner of dress provoked the rapist. And let's not forget it is becoming nearly impossible, in many states to abort the pregnancy caused by the rape. Of course that is only right because such a result of rape is "A gift from God", and women don't get pregnant from rape, so bruises, bleeding, physical and emotional trauma aside, it's clear you couldn't have been raped.
If you're a man who wants a woman to wait on you, to cook, clean, fetch your slippers and be in every way your perfect menial slave, by all means go find a woman who wants this sort of life. They are out there. If you're having trouble finding one, you might consider the advice of Phil Robertson, the Duck Dynasty start at the heart of a recent controversy, get one that is still in high school. Find yourself a 15 or 16 year old, or maybe someone will sell you a 12 year old. Then you can train them to be what you want. Just don't be too surprised, if one day they come to their senses and you awaken to find your penis in the blender.
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
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