Comments on: Reprint: Mystery, Anxiety, Vulnerability, and the Longing for Acceptance — a note on penises

By: A

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 21:27:40 +0000

I agree with Casey Dancer. I think your focus is a little off on this one Hugo. I agree with your points that the male penis is unjustifiably censored from media that readily accepts female nudity and that our society overall has a pejorative attitude towards it. There is no reason that the penis should be viewed as any dirtier part of the body than an arm or a hand (which probably has 50+ times more bacteria at any given time than the penis). However I think the overlying reasons for the discrepancies between male and female nudity is more because of a misogynistic social order than it is about perceived male dirtiness. Let me explain. Lets take the example of Viggo Mortensen. His nudity is used as an expression of vulnerability, which is quite understandable considering in our society everyone is supposed to be clothed in the public sphere, he is able to overcome this vulnerability because of his superior fighting ability. When women are nude in film, which they are to a MUCH greater extent than men, it is not an expression of vulnerability, in fact most of the time her vulnerable position because of her nudity is not even acknowledged, as it is superseded by her desirability. The fact that she is not portrayed as having the basic human emotion of vulnerability and instead only sex appeal leads us to a conclusion: that women are portrayed nude in film because they are objects and not people, and men are not readily portrayed this way in film because they are not objects, but people with emotions and legitimate concerns over being in a public situation while nude. When they are shown nude in film it is to accentuate the character’s vulnerability or his boyish nostalgia of a time before clothes were important to him. I would like to make the point that this is more about the objectification of women and the assumption of a male audience as the “norm” and a female audience as the “other” than it is about the dirtiness of male genitalia.

CaseyDancer also brought up a very valid argument concerning that porn has moved away from ejaculation on the stomach or another part of the female body (which is surely sufficient imagery of acceptance of the oft pejorative view of the penis, the close up image of his genitalia and ejaculation and acceptance of it by his partner onto her a part of her physical body) to ejaculation on the face, and it has done so quite in time with the rise in rights of women. The movement from ejaculation onto other body parts to the face is not simply a continuation of the need for genital acceptance. The face is obviously not just another body part. When we are hit or spat at, if it is done to the face as opposed to on your arm or at your feet, it is viewed as being particularly offensive and degrading. This is because the face/head is associated with autonomy and intelligence. The movement of the porn industry to the normalization of the “facial” is about the domination and shaming of women. To suggest that it is otherwise, or to downplay it as secondary to “shaming” of the penis (which as I said I’m sure DOES play a role..just not as big as the role that misogyny plays), is a little offensive and more draws much needed attention away from patriarchy and misogyny in pornography and in society in general.

By: NotSoSure

NotSoSure — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:18:16 +0000

Thank you; that was lovely and insightful. As a wife, mother (of both an adult son and daughter) and lover, I am grateful when I read discussions of penises and sex that elevate the conversation and that help us to see each other through compassionate eyes.

By: jayhardy

jayhardy — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 00:58:01 +0000

mythago, your point is valid: as long as even men themselves perpetuate the myth that any activity in which one is engaged with the penis is a dirty activity worthy of insult, little progress will be made. I don’t deny that men play a part in the “dirtying” of the penis, but I also think few men stop to consider the inplications of this type of language (ie, degrading the oral sex act leads to women being disgusted by it, which leads to less oral sex, and who wants that?). However, I think mens’ use of words like “cocksucker” don’t have as much to do with degredation of women and the oral sex act as they do with homophobia, since such comments are usually directed at other men. That being said, directing those words at anyone, of either sex, is repulsive and I try as much as possible to avoid surrounding myself with anyone (man or woman) who regularly uses these types of demeaning labels. I won’t lie; I find myself usually surrounded by female friends and lovers because I find so many males to engage in this type of talk. However, I cannot disregard the men I think are worthy of discussions like the one Hugo begins in this post about their very real difficulties.

By: mythago

mythago — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 06:50:40 +0000

jayhardy, have you talked to the men of your acquaintance who refer to oral sex as degrading – using terms like “blow me” or “cocksucker” as insults? (And think of the scene in A Few Good Men where Jack Nicholson’s character deliberately insults Demi Moore’s by bragging about how great it is to get a blowjob from your commanding officer.) I admit that I personally don’t understand women who both want to have to have sex with men yet find penises repellent, but I also don’t understand men who want their penises to be accepted and desired, yet turn around and treat blowjobs as something that degrades and dominates the person performing them.

By: B

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 16:12:00 +0000

Not about the penis itself, but one ex-boyfriend of mine, when we’d first started dating and began discussing bedroom likes and dislikes, said that women who spit semen out and go on about how gross it is made him feel like he was dirty. And the way he explained how it affected him mirrored how I feel whenever a guy talks about how going down on women is gross. I actually had a guy jump up after giving oral sex a try for the very first time, yell out “Nasty! Ew!” and run to the bathroom to brush his teeth, and come back and shudder and say he was never going to do that again. It definitely started me thinking differently about how men feel about themselves and how I can be more careful about not hurting bedroom partners’ self-esteem.

By: CaseyDancer

CaseyDancer — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 14:00:11 +0000

ds, yes I read the post and the one vague line about degredation “carrying some weight.”

My point was that I don’t really think HIS point carries much weight.

By: Lisa KS

Lisa KS — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 23:31:58 +0000

One thing all my husbands have had in common was delight in the fact that I liked their penises so much. I know, that sounds either funny or obvious–I don’t just mean I like to have sex with a penis, though. I mean, I like penises. I like to look at them. I like to get really, really close to them because not only do I love the way they look (testicles too actually) I really, really love the way they smell and taste. It clearly enhanced the husbands’ own feelings of sexiness to have someone feel that way about that particular body part. And I always knew about that, but not until the most recent husband did I fully understand it, because the most recent one loved the look, smell and taste of my genitals as much as I loved his–not an experience I had had with the first two. Not that they thought it was g-r-o-s-s (and of course all parties under discussion here were/are at-least-once-daily showerers, lol) but they didn’t love it. And I’ll tell ya, if you think little boys are programmed to think Down There is Dirty and Gross, for little girls it’s even more heavily hammered in, and reinforced well into adulthood too. But I finally got to find out firsthand how much sexier and happier it makes you feel to have your genitals thought beautiful.

By: ds

ds — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 22:59:13 +0000

CaseyDancer-

Did you read the post? Hugo wrote:

“The easy feminist analysis, which certainly has some weight, is that this obsession with ejaculating onto womenâ€™s faces is about degradation and a demonstration of power. Thereâ€™s much to recommend that analysis.”

So he covered that.

But no matter, the real reason for this post is that in talking at length about penises, Hugo is in essence talking about his own penis and hoping that, I quote him:

“…the shame and anxiety [I] feel, all too often, will be displaced onto [my] lovers, girlfriends, and wives [and my readers]. Enough.”

Enough, indeed. Yeesh.

By: CaseyDancer

CaseyDancer — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 14:55:37 +0000

I’m curious about why you think the “cum shots” in porn have recently migrated from the woman’s buttocks or breasts to the woman’s face, and if that isn’t more degrading somehow.

Because to me it really seems different – like, doing it on her buttocks or breasts (which are considered pretty sexual areas) is more about a sense of pride or reveling in his manliness & sexual potency, but that on her face is about a sense of control, power and degredation. Cum on one’s face can sting the eyes, get in the mouth and nose, affect/disrupt breathing, be generally annoying and (to many women) just plain gross (unappealing to say the least).

It just seems counterintuitive to want to ejaculate on the most delicate/sensitive part of a woman’s body, the one she most likely doesn’t want him to do it on and the one that would most “dirty” her, as a way of redeeming himself from the state of being “dirty.”

Your thoughts?

By: Randomizer

Randomizer — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 06:40:43 +0000

One of my lovers was an artist who has sculpted the penises of some men she has known. I have never posed for same nor had an impression done (though I might hope to have in other ways made one , but I would be flattered to think I might be immortalised in this way.