The Morality of the Male Maintenance

     I came across a video of a debate titled Is Porn Bad For Society?  Both sides made excellent points, but were often talking past one another.  Like life itself, porn can be both good and bad.

     But count me in the camp that has a real problem with pornography.  It's difficult to get the timing right. So oftentimes it happens that just when you're about to be delivered from your encumbrance, they cut to an extreme close-up, Learning Channel sort of shot.  Nothing romantic there.  In my experience the most common sin committed by porn directors is not keeping everything in the frame.  The viewer should be able to see everyone head to toe  for the vast majority of the video.  "Pull back!"  It's about context.

     Also, pausing is paramount.  Who's the Einstein who decided that having the "play" icon appear  in the middle of the picture every time you hit "pause" is helpful?  That triangular icon is usually blocking something important, maybe even another type of triangle.

     Yes, things would be different if I ran porn.  All I need to see is a few cute ladies, cotton undergarments and Newton's laws of motion.

     I once got into a conversation with a self-described "recovering priest" who tried to explain the reason why Catholicism  considers masturbation immoral.  Something about "You're not being devoted to your partner if you ejaculate on your own."  (Away from her?)  In other words, masturbation  cannot be separated from sexual intercourse, which is for procreation. 

     Tell it to the hand.  As I get older, the male maintenance is a job, not an adventure.  It needs to be done, and I don't necessarily enjoy it.

     I'd actually have to say that, in general, porn probably is bad for society for several reasons.   Like ice cream and twitter, it can be very addictive for many people.  And it usually does demean women.  However, masturbating is a personal health issue; and, to borrow from  (and paraphrase) the great stand-up Tom Rhodes, what are we going to look at?  The picture on the box of Close-Up toothpaste?

   

Keep a Ring on It?

     It’s not hard to imagine an uncorrupted family man (then again)—perhaps from an underdeveloped country—who moves with his wife and child to a modern, entertainment-addled community.  Then one day he sees something called a music video.  He has never seen anything quite like these gyrating, grinding dancers.  They mesmerize him, put him in some kind of trance.  Within a week of being inculcated by this powerful public service announcement known as Put a Ring on It, he begins to rethink the construct of limiting himself to just one woman—a non-gyrating one at that.  Mixed message.