Requiem For Compassion

Professor J,


Good for your colleague trying to stem the tide of ignorance and apathy. I wonder how many of his students appreciate his effort. I highly suspect that in the future at least some of his students will wish they had paid more attention.



"Porn is about getting off at someone else's expense." (p.57) (Can I quote that? This is going to be tricky. :)) I have to say that this idea and some others I'll mention were far more disturbing to me than the descriptions of events and language in the second chapter. While it made for some harsh reading the underlying attitudes of callousness and cruelty were much more offensive. We could change that quote to "getting rich at someone else's expense" for those purveyors of the violence and degradation we see Hedges outline,  or in the case of several men quoted we could even change it to "getting even."


Let's start with getting rich, since the original quote is rather self explanatory. According to Internet Filter Review, that Hedges uses as a source, worldwide porn revenues topped $97 billion in 2006. "Annual sales in the United States are estimated at 10 billion or higher. There is no precise monitoring of the porn industry. And porn is very lucrative to some of the nation's largest corporations. General Motors owns DIRECTV, which distributes more than 40 million streams of porn into American homes every month. AT&T Broadband and Comcast Cable are currently the biggest American companies accommodating porn users with Hot Network, Adult Pay Per View, and similarly themed services. AT&T and GM rake in approximately 80 percent of all porn dollars." 

Let's give some people what they want and make a lot of money at it, while we destroy other people. Tragic. Often, the women being used and abused in these films are starting out at a disadvantage in life, Hedges gives an example:


"Roldan, like many of the women who drift into the porn and prostitution industry, had a difficult and troubled childhood, including a physically abusive mother. Her mother threw her out of her home when she was seventeen, and she spent time in homeless shelters." (p. 58) 

 While I will say that these women are responsible for themselves and their decisions it is also true that for a variety of reasons some people are more defenseless than others. The women we do see emerge from the porn industry with their health, self image, and money they've made from it in tact tend to come out of the Playboy system. It's the only place we see women with anything resembling business savvy, managers, and agents. Whatever else I might think about Hugh Hefner, he does seem to genuinely like women, something that can't be said for the majority of  men in this chapter. Preying on the weak which is what happens in this industry most of the time, is despicable. Hedges exposes the standard thinking by quoting a director he met at a porn convention:


"...they are nineteen. They are hookers. They don't care. (I wonder if he has asked them if they care) They are a throwaway commodity in a throwaway world.' He turns to look, with disdain, at Kenci and says to me, 'She doesn't know what a book is, I bet" (p.78)



Of all the depressing stories related in this chapter this one made me especially angry. To destroy another human being for your own profit and then mock them for their situation, is beyond cruel. As a former flight attendant much of what is said by these women even when they weren't performing reeked of Stockholm Syndrome to me, in which a hostage comes to identify with, and even defend a captor. It seemed to be exactly what had happened to Jollee as she relates the story of the men on the fire truck. She had reframed the event in a way she could deal with gushing about how grateful she was to the "pervert" (her word) who took her there, when she was clearly under age,  and considers him a friend and says she will "thank him every day for the rest of my life." (p. 69)


Besides getting off and getting rich, lots of men are getting even in some warped way which they seem to use as justification for their behavior. The titles of the films and the language and situations are filled with humiliation and degradation. I don't include the doll guy in this group because he is probably doing women everywhere a favor by staying at home with his silicone harem. :)


"My whole reason for being in the industry is to satisfy the desire of the men in the world who basically don't care much for women and want to see the men in my industry getting even with the women they couldn't have when they were growing up,' Bill Margold, a performer and producer of porn, has said. 'I strongly believe this, and the industry hates me for saying it ...We're getting even for their lost dreams. I believe this. I've heard audiences cheer me when I do something foul onscreen." (p.74)


His reasoning is interesting. Apparently in his mind one's lost dreams are suitable cover for brutality and barbaric behavior. Disturbing that large numbers of men are living these cruel scenarios out vicariously. And so we watch the culture disintegrate further into an attitude of whatever I want, I should have. There is alarmingly less "us", less "we".

Where is that road taking us? Because we are an "us" whether we like it or not. So we have to ask the same question Robert Jenson is quoted as asking on p. 61. "What does it say about our culture that cruelty is so easy to market?"  I think it says there are a million little fissures just under the surface in lots of areas, weakening us as a whole in all these areas we're discussing. I'm afraid it says that at some point we may find ourselves on the edge of a very ugly tipping point.