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Bill, Merlin, Happy, and Kay are among the porn-film performers and producers who tell their stories to Dr. Robert J. Stoller in this pschyodynamic ethnography of adult heterosexual pornography. Their engrossing accounts reveal in rich detail not only the inner workings of "the Industry" and the fantasies and motivations of its participants but also the relation between this most denigrated of occupations and "normal" human erotic behavior and attitudes. Consistently nonjudgmental about the material he presents, Dr. Stoller nevertheless draws provocative conclusions about porn, its practitioners, and its effects on society. Everyone at work on a porn production, he says, uses it as a vehicle for unloading his or her rage against something--mores, institutions, laws, parents, females, or males. According to Dr. Stoller, pornography does not exist only to degrade women, there is no reliable evidence that it increases the frequency of rape, and (with the exception of child porn) it does little harm. Pornography, says Dr. Stoller, seems more the result of our changing society than a cause of chan≥ it reflects, more than influences, our values and mores.… (more)
A bit dated but still interesting. The author devotes a chapter each to Kay Parker and Nina Hartley who are two of my favorites. I am always fascinated by how rebels, deviants, social reformers or people who engage in marginal behavior or trades navigate the social world that typically condemns their behavior or ideas. ( )
Bill, Merlin, Happy, and Kay are among the porn-film performers and producers who tell their stories to Dr. Robert J. Stoller in this pschyodynamic ethnography of adult heterosexual pornography. Their engrossing accounts reveal in rich detail not only the inner workings of "the Industry" and the fantasies and motivations of its participants but also the relation between this most denigrated of occupations and "normal" human erotic behavior and attitudes. Consistently nonjudgmental about the material he presents, Dr. Stoller nevertheless draws provocative conclusions about porn, its practitioners, and its effects on society. Everyone at work on a porn production, he says, uses it as a vehicle for unloading his or her rage against something--mores, institutions, laws, parents, females, or males. According to Dr. Stoller, pornography does not exist only to degrade women, there is no reliable evidence that it increases the frequency of rape, and (with the exception of child porn) it does little harm. Pornography, says Dr. Stoller, seems more the result of our changing society than a cause of chan≥ it reflects, more than influences, our values and mores.
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From Publishers Weekly Stoller's self-styled "ethnographic" study of heterosexual pornography consists of reprinting transcripts of his interviews with porn actresses, actors, directors and producers. Much of the material has the aura of a hardcore flesh magazine. Affecting a nonjudgmental attitude, he writes in a short concluding chapter that most porn scripts are not "simply anti-female . . . these stories are often full of freedom--women depicted having a marvelous time." Most pornography "does little good and little harm" except for child porn, he avers. A UCLA professor of psychiatry, Stoller qualifies his position in his summary analysis, stating that anger or rebellion against one's parents and society underlies most pornography, that it exploits men as well as women and that a desire to degrade or be degraded is an element of pornography. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Bill, Merlin, Happy, and Kay are among the porn-film performers and producers who tell their stories to Dr. Robert J. Stoller in this pschyodynamic ethnography of adult heterosexual pornography. Their engrossing accounts reveal in rich detail not only the inner workings of “the Industry” and the fantasies and motivations of its participants but also the relation between this most denigrated of occupations and “normal” human erotic behavior and attitudes.
Consistently nonjudgmental about the material he presents, Dr. Stoller nevertheless draws provocative conclusions about porn, its practitioners, and its effects on society. Everyone at work on a porn production, he says, uses it as a vehicle for unloading his or her rage against something—mores, institutions, laws, parents, females, or males. According to Dr. Stoller, pornography does not exist only to degrade women, there is no reliable evidence that it increases the frequency of rape, and (with the exception of child porn) it does little harm. Pornography, says Dr. Stoller, seems more the result of our changing society than a cause of change; it reflects, more than influences, our values and mores.
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