One thought provoking suggestion is that association with the prudishness of the religious right has stigmatised the anti-porn movement as being against freedom of speech and expression. For Gail Dines porn is not about art or expression at all, but the hatred of women. She chillingly describes the statistical links between porn use and rape, and paedophilia. So how do we draw the line between liberty for authentic expression of art and censorship for dehumanising depictions of females? The truth is, even in regular media the line has been drawn far over into the latter, meaning women are degraded in front of our eyes everyday on TV, in Magazines, and on Billboards, let alone the sub-mainstream of the porn industry.
A second interesting suggestion is her comparison with the ideological battle against slavery:
She says the blueprint for her aims is the eradication of slavery in the US, which was achieved despite the fact that every single institution was geared to uphold and perpetuate it. "What is at stake is the nature of the world that we live in," says Dines. "We have to wrestle it back."The question for me is, in the light of those two things, would such a fight today be helped or hindered by the participation of Christian organisations? There can be no doubt that this is the sort of thing Christians should be behind, but how would we avoid getting in the way?
