censored: feminist porn, topless toddler girls, and quizzical mama

Eyes of Desire

In today's new porn by women post at Good Vibrations Magazine — "Eyes of Desire: Mutual Gaze and Reflective Role-play" — I discuss Candida Royalle's Eyes of Desire. The film picks up on the exchange of a desiring gaze, which Royalle introduces in her early Femme Productions erotic rock videos; but in this film's case involving the use of a telescope.

As I will discuss more in posts to come, Eyes of Desire and Eyes of Desire 2 also interest me for their featuring of a range of sexual preferences and reflective approach to role-play. Other Femme Productions films such as My Surrender (1996) and The Bridal Shower (1997) also focus on characters demonstrating a mindful appropriation and play with erotic fantasies without becoming reduced to the part they perform. On the contrary, role-play here becomes a way to expand the characters’ sexual play-field, suggesting how new porn by women can serve as a vehicle for women (and men!) to explore their sexualities, and even a radical, liberatory new language with which to approach heterosexuality.

I'm also putting together a post about Royalle's feminist commitment to fighting political and cultural censorship. Interestingly, as I sat down to work on it this morning at the library of our neighboring town where my daughter is attending a nature camp, I found myself censored. After trying to log on to my account at Good Vibrations Magazine, I got an "access denied" message due to "pornography." I checked with the librarian on how to disable the filter; she told me she could not help and that the computer display of pornographic images is not allowed in the library. Now, the post I was working on is still without images; yet, she refused to help.

Had I been at a public library in Los Angeles or Brooklyn where library patrons' right to watch porn was recently defended, I would have been fine. But since I found myself at a small Minnesotan town's library, I was forced to look for a more relaxed coffee shop.

While there sipping my latte, I wrote about the censoring of little girls' bodies when they're told that "proper swimwear" for them includes both a top and a bottom. Which is what happened to my own three-year-old daughter at our city pool last weekend.

What is going on when the nipples of a girl’s undeveloped breasts are asked to be covered? Isn’t that taking the sexualizing of young girls to the extreme?

Why can't this be proper swimwear?

And as one fellow mom at the pool said, had we swapped my daughter's bikini bottoms with the bottoms of her three-year old boy (who has the same curly, blond locks as my daughter), the pool staff would probably have picked on them instead. So this is about gender discrimination too. And the gender stereotyping enforced by manufacturers of children’s attire. Because had I dressed my daughter in a rare to come by pair of gender neutral bottoms as opposed to the frilly pink bikini bottom she got from her grandma, the pool staff wouldn’t have said anything, because they wouldn’t have been able to tell if she's a boy or a girl.

I complained to the pool manager who finally got back to me later in the week with an apology and explanation that at our city pool, "proper swimwear" necessitates a top for school-aged girls. So girls younger than five or six are off the hook. I still have an issue with this. -- Five?!

When nudity is considered unacceptable, but highly-charged sexual messages in advertising and pop videos are not, is it any surprise that so many children are growing up with a confused attitude to their bodies, or feeling ashamed to take their tops off in a park when they’re hot? (link)

In our body-sex crazed and conflicted culture, most girls try to cover up their budding bodies at an early age. Many girls feel awkward about the first signs of their nipples changing. Telling them to cover up even BEFORE they show any signs of pubescent development is not going to help them feel better. I'm opposed to an age limit for toplessness.

Please chime in on the subject.

Update Sat. July 23: My article on this at Good Vibrations Magazine: "Proper Swimwear" for a Toddler Girl Includes a Top?!

Update Wed. July 27: After today's publication of my letter about this incident to our local newspaper, the pool manager's supervisor, which would be the head of the Park and Recreation Advisory Board, finally called. She told me the board had discussed the "pool attire" incident at least week's meeting and concluded that for girls, "proper swimwear" implies tops for girls age five and up. I am not done pursuing this matter. Please; I'd like to hear from more of you what you think about this.