Fruit Porn

Yesterday evening I was invited by a friend to a jewelry party. Not usually my bag, but I like the woman, so I decided to take the opportunity to get to know her.

The party is beside the point (and yes, I did end up buying things I don't need.) The point is that in less than two (2) days I have stuck my foot in my mouth talking about pornography at two separate social functions. Now, you may ask: why talk about pornography at social functions? Good question. I suppose it's because I feel like good conversation is lively, and that in the realm of intellegent social discourse there should be very few taboos.

You see, it all started with this book I had to read at lightening-speed for my new book club. As a recovering English graduate student, I have shied away from discussing literature for fear that I might become physically a)violent or b)sick. Graduate school has cured me of any desire to talk about literature for the past seven or so years. Somehow, the whole experience sucked every bit of enjoyment I got out of literature. I suppose it's like the old adage that if you enjoy cooking, you should never open a restaurant.

At any rate, so my newfound interest in discussing books again met an opportunity with this new book club, made up of insanely smart and talented stay-at-home-moms. The book is called "The Piano Teacher" by Elfriede Jelinek, who is an austrian writer who won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Not a bad pedigree, you might say.

However, this book so pissed me off that after spending days forcing myself to read it, when I finally finished I threw the damned thing across the room. Basically, it's about a woman (a piano teacher, hence the title) who is totally controlled by her mother (with whom she still sleeps in the same bed-- eeew!) and who is totally incapable of any emotion except pain and disgust.

She ends up trying to seduce a student of hers (though seduce is not actually correct-- perhaps a more accurate description would be to dominate her in many very imaginative, painful ways). Without going into more detail because you'll either get disgusted or I'll start looking around for something to throw, perhaps you can see why the book lit my ire. The characters were all miserable, self-serving and impossible to one another.

But what's more, it was annoying as hell to be teased by how unfulfilling any of the relationships were (with always the vague promise or notation that they should be) and on top of that, no good sex! None! Nada! Call me crazy, but at least if I am going to be reading some version of a romantic thriller, I do want a little action!

Now, intellectually, I know that that sublimation, that inability for the story and its characters to be redeemed (whether by love, by sex, or perhaps by one freaking kind word or thought about humanity) was exactly the point of the entire exercise, but somehow it still doesn't matter to me.

At any rate, that got me thinking about why I indeed was able to finish the book, given my scathing assessment. And the truth is, it really to me has to do with being nosy, having my interest piqued by the lives of others. In literature, you may have glimpses into the interior monologues (and yes, sex lives) of others... where you, in other words, under normal life circumstances, would never be allowed to tread.

It reminds me of one of Judith Warner's NYT blogs where she talks about the chick flick "The Holiday" as so-called "mommy porn". That movie really upset her because she felt like the Jude Law character (a widower and father of two young, impossibly cute girls) was so idealized that in some way, he was being objectified, the same way that many feminists claim that idealized women characters objectify women in general.

She argued that such idealized visions of fatherhood, and romance in general, were not helpful. She felt betrayed somehow by it. To which I responded in the comments that I am not at all against "mommy porn".

I think chick flicks exist for a reason: that watching a movie or reading a book that expresses our ideals for relationships can be cathartic. I am the first to say that romantic movies, as long as they're well-hewn and not insipid, make me feel romantic. I don't leave a picture and sigh and say, "Oh, if only my husband were more like Hugh Grant."

Being around and thinking about love makes me also vicariously feel love. Now I am not saying that relying only on such images and thoughts is a good thing-- you could definitely fall down the slippery slope of expectations only to live your life in dire disappointment.

But perhaps, in small doses, we have a need for vicariousness, for envy, and for a kind of pornography. I mean, People magazine, according to my definitions, is definitely a form of pornography. So is Martha Stewart Living, any travel magazine, and the Harry and David catalog, for amazing-dewdrops-on-lucious-plums' sakes!

I think, in that sense, that pornography (and yes, even the kind that depicts sex) serves a very elemental, very human purpose. I am not saying that I condone the really nasty and abasing stuff-- that's not pornography, that's abuse. I am simply saying that pornography, in the form of idealized representation of things and people, is understandable, is available in a mind-boggling array of degrees, and is in most capacities, not immoral. It is human, and it serves important human needs.

So there. I said it. Not that this is going to help me live down my reputation as an intellectual porno-apologist or as a self-professed fascist (long story. you don't want to know.) But now at least it's in the realm for you to think about, perhaps without attaching all sorts of nasty words and (heaven forbid!) pictures to what I'm talking about.

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a marzipan-apricot scone to eat.