welcome to the fest

@RikkiTikkiTavi

I think it's more in line with propaganda and should be countered as such, which means not banning it no matter how we feel about it, instead simply giving people better information to counter it. Most people's first exposure to sex is via porn, which aside from being the travesty we all know and despise, is a horrid place to learn such information and can reasonably serve as a bulwark against better information. I would instead propose people learn more accurate and better information from earlier on so that when they look at the portrayals in porn they would find it less appealing or, hopefully, not appealing at all.

There's more issues with attempting to ban/outlaw victimless porn; it overlaps with art. Where does an artistic nude stop and sexist pinup start? Is that story a vehicle for sex or is the sex a vehicle for the story? It's along the same lines as; is Romeo and Juliet a story we should emulate for the deep passion the leads have for each other or a cautionary tale that blind adoration can only lead to disaster? These are all difficult and nearly impossible questions to answer uniformly and in a systematic manor, so I'd rather side with art than a “just to be safeâ€￾ argument.

As for artificial prostitution, I'm a little more hesitant towards; there's a lot of good and bad to be done there. In the plus categories it enables people to have victimless sexual outlet aside from “rubbing one outâ€￾ as they say, it could be used for a learning tool for a lot of areas, and it would enable a lot of people of both genders to learn their bodies and what they enjoy in a safe environment. On the down side it would enable predators to express themselves to perhaps build up the courage to act, it would also likely end up building up an expectation of partners that they literally can't uphold like many dildos and vibrators have done, and it would likely encourage more people to separate from society than already do which given the people that do that already I'm not sure is the worst thing in the world. On the whole I think it'd be a good thing; it fills a “needâ€￾ and makes it so there is no one getting hurt. It also would likely demolish the underground prostitution rings; why go through the effort and risk of getting living person who is “close enoughâ€￾ to what you want when you can just order exactly what you want through the mail. Humans, if nothing else, will almost always go for the lazy option whenever possible.

I wholly agree things should be done about live action porn and even more so prostitution, but I don't think barring digital, written, and artificial media is going to help in reducing the number of overall victims of the patriarchy. I guess the way I see it is like vaping; some people get hooked on it, others look to use it ween themselves off worse, and it's something a lot of people want them to quit, but it's still nowhere near as bad as the real thing.

I've always been curious about the world and why people think the way they do, what causes them to hold certain beliefs and why they chose those. In most instances I see a slew of cultures and ideals that are gathered purely due to their having been born and indoctrinated into them for the majority, or the entirety, of their lives. I find these concepts fascinating in ways that are difficult to describe with radical factions hitting those high points without equal, though I've always been able to keep my mental distance from them to look them over objectively. I would be lying if I said that Radical Feminism wasn't one that ended up skewing my views some; the points are meaningful and driven, the issues that are pointed out are real and tangible, and there are few gaps to be seen in the cause. These are rare traits in a radical faction, especially the points being real, far too often a faction will have a cause that is purely fabricated out of their own imagination, like the Incel community and the absolute absurdity that it claims are issues.

It was my curiosity that brought me to wanting to learn more about the Radical Feminism community, but it was the compelling points that urged me to stay and really take it in. I have since noticed many of the patriarchy aspects getting pushed into society and into women, especially at a young age; the marketing and “contestsâ€￾ that are put forward, “The Bachelorâ€￾ being a particularly appalling demonstration of that. The political battle for women's rights and anything even appearing to aid women being a brutal uphill fight for reasons that are so meaningless and entrenched in identity politics that it's simply disgusting.

For a very long time I've known that women had it harder than men in society, but I was never able to articulate the reasons, “it's just the way it wasâ€￾ and I couldn't ever put any points on it. As I've gotten older and learned more about the world, I've learned what those reasons are as attention has been brought to them. While I've never been in many of the most iconic situations, I can empathize, and I wholly agree something must be done to stop the atrocities against women and Radical Feminism offers the answer to the overwhelming majority.

It feels so easy to fall into the depths of Radical Feminism as there is so much good to be done with it and there is such a strong need for it, but I have to hesitate. I was raised to and believe in learning all there is to know about a faction or cause before throwing in what relatively little weight I have behind it, and unfortunately there are a number of questions I still have about it. Likely the most predominate one is about the seemingly ever present stance on PIV sex being abhorrent, while I agree that it is often used as abuse and is nearly the sole method of male on female rape, the sheer disdain and at least implied banning of it raises the question of how would the human race carry on with meaningful numbers without it? Artificial insemination is an option, but I've seen that be dismissed as “breeding like a cowâ€￾ which leaves very little alternative for humans not going extinct, or am I misunderstanding that entire aspect?

I've known a few people whom were you could say "pet mom" and a lot of the time it seems to be centered around their childhood. For one I know it was because her mother unbelievably manipulative of her and her sister, so when she thought about having children with her husband at the time she adopted...