#1 December 18th, 2004 08:15 PM

MrLance

Member

Now this is good...

In past conversations in this forum it was made quite clear to me by some of the more vocal (pretentious?) members that to consider the content of this site to be porn is not only wrong but demeaning to the women who choose to be a part of it.  Then we get this description straight from the front page...

Just when you think this folio's getting all Helmut Newton, *blam* the porn hits you like a sharpened stiletto. Either crystle slipped out to the hairdresser's half way through this set, or she switched with her sister?

Head

Member

Re: Now this is good...

In past conversations in this forum it was made quite clear to me by some of the more vocal (pretentious?) members that to consider the content of this site to be porn is not only wrong but demeaning to the women who choose to be a part of it.  Then we get this description straight from the front page...

Just when you think this folio's getting all Helmut Newton, *blam* the porn hits you like a sharpened stiletto. Either crystle slipped out to the hairdresser's half way through this set, or she switched with her sister?

The discussion has been whether this is a porn site or not.  There is porn on this site, and there is art, but does that make it an "art site", or a "porn site"?

theda

Member

Re: Now this is good...

[QUOTE=MrLance]In past conversations in this forum it was made quite clear to me by some of the more vocal (pretentious?) members that to consider the content of this site to be porn is not only wrong but demeaning to the women who choose to be a part of it. 

Whether this site is porn or art or both is a matter of personal perception. I agree that there is porn on the site and there is art on the site, but I don't regard ISM as a porn site at all. So if people percieve this site as art and with honourable intentions, how can that be pretencious?

MrLance

Member

Re: Now this is good...

[QUOTE=MrLance]In past conversations in this forum it was made quite clear to me by some of the more vocal (pretentious?) members that to consider the content of this site to be porn is not only wrong but demeaning to the women who choose to be a part of it. 

Whether this site is porn or art or both is a matter of personal perception. I agree that there is porn on the site and there is art on the site, but I don't regard ISM as a porn site at all. So if people percieve this site as art and with honourable intentions, how can that be pretencious?

While I do not question the artistic integrity of this site, I do question the ideal of some that is not porn.  I think what we have here is the most authentic "reality porn" site out there.  The content is provided by the subject and the only filter to what we see here are the adminstrator(s). 
Like wearing socks with sandals, justifying looking at nudie pics and movies by calling it art is pretentious(sp?).

Belgareth

Member

Re: Now this is good...

While I do not question the artistic integrity of this site, I do question the ideal of some that is not porn.  I think what we have here is the most authentic "reality porn" site out there.  The content is provided by the subject and the only filter to what we see here are the adminstrator(s). 
Like wearing socks with sandals, justifying looking at nudie pics and movies by calling it art is pretentious(sp?).

I don't think that there is any doubt about the status of this site, at least in my mind and the minds of my adult girls. I think that I would be very uncomfortable viewing a porn site with either of my children looking over my shoulder but they quite often look over my shoulder at this site, unsually adding very positive comments about the folios. I don't consider the folios to be art, they are simply people taking off their clothes in front of a camera because they want to. How they do it and how they display the results is their choice and it is that choice which makes ISM what it is - unique.

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liz

Member

Re: Now this is good...

While I do not question the artistic integrity of this site, I do question the ideal of some that is not porn.  I think what we have here is the most authentic "reality porn" site out there.  The content is provided by the subject and the only filter to what we see here are the adminstrator(s). 
Like wearing socks with sandals, justifying looking at nudie pics and movies by calling it art is pretentious(sp?).

I think it really depends upon the intention behind calling it porn or calling it art.  If you are calling it art simply to justify looking at it, to make yourself seem better, as in, "Dear me, certainly it's not porn.  It is art, I tell you.  I would never look at porn.  I'm not one of those disgusting perverts.  How dare you" - then it might be pretentious.

However, in my mind art and porn are not mutally exclusive.  It can be both at the same time, and that's the way  I see ISM, in most cases.  But if someone came up behind me while I was checking out the latest folio and asked what I was looking at, my first response would not be, "Oh, it's an art site."

I think that some of the women do take more of an artistic approach than others, looking at it in terms of creating art, and others simply look at it as taking a set of nudie pics.  It's very open to personal opinion and interpretation.

"Porn" as a word, as a concept has such a bad reputation, that I think a lot of people shy away from it, which may be part of the issue here.  If, in most people's minds, the word "porn" didn't instantly conjure up thoughts of dirty old men wanking it to air-brushed pictures of exploited women, then we'd be a lot less leery of using the word as simply a descriptor, without the attached "dirty" or "bad" connotations.

Nevertheless, while it may often be art at the same time, I think that if you are sitting around looking at breasts and bums and spread-wide legs, I don't see how you can deny that it's porn!

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"If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution."
            -Emma Goldman

theda

Member

Re: Now this is good...

While I do not question the artistic integrity of this site, I do question the ideal of some that is not porn.  I think what we have here is the most authentic "reality porn" site out there.  The content is provided by the subject and the only filter to what we see here are the adminstrator(s). 
Like wearing socks with sandals, justifying looking at nudie pics and movies by calling it art is pretentious(sp?).

I reiterate that whether something is art or porn is perception.
For example the film the Story of O has long been considered a cinema classic and is even taught in universities as art. I saw the film however, and I thought it was garbage, and just softcore porn. But then other members of my class and my lecturer saw it different. It's all perception, not pretension.