Thursday, April 14, 2005

The Police Have Brought Playboy in for Questioning

Andrea Dworkin, the anti-porn theorist whose star burned brightest in the 1980s, is dead at 58. I remember being about 21, and everybody I knew who was in University was reading Dworkin. She was provocative in a way that few writers are anymore. But, she was also insane, and a lot of people didn't really know how to deal with that. I have deep sympathy for mental health consumers, especially the undiagnosed ones. But, I was very uncomfortable with people like Dworkin or Kate Millet whose deep psychological problems were their selling point for a sort of feminism that can't appreciate women who aren't psychologically damaged.
Anyway, the best thing I've seen about Dworkin is this obit by the ever-wonderful Susie Bright. It also shows why so many of us love Susie Bright. Few people have the expansive kindness to honor the life of someone who, in this case, called for their assassination. Should I contemplate the utter decency and goodness of this perverted pornographer as compared to the mean-spirited wrath of the anti-porn crusader? Or wonder what that could possibly mean?
Nah.

1 comment:

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