Shira Tarrant, author of Men and Feminism, When Sex Became Gender and editor of the anthology Men Speak Out: Views on Gender, Sex and Power, introduced the panel at the Oct. 16 event, which dealt with the issue of, in Tarrant’s words, “feminist sex, or how to be sex positive and anti-sexist.” …

Shira Tarrant offered the most substantive comments of the evening, on the importance of men to the feminist movement and masculinity’s place as part of the feminist dialogue. She outlined the ways that hyper masculinity limits men; the constraints on male behavior by the perpetuation of “the nice guys finish last” motif, and invoked bell hooks in gently chastising women for falling for the bad boy type something she claims to be guilty of in the book’s preface. She quotes Michael Kimmel, editor of Men and Masculinities, spokesperson for NOMAS (The National Organization For Men Against Sexism) and the author of Guyland – “fear and shame are at the center of men’s identity. Men internalize male gender rules to avoid shame.”

Pornography is a flashpoint for people discussing how to remain sex positive in the face of sexist sexual material, as well it should be. As Tarrant pointed out, mainstream pornography reinforces male privilege – it focuses on things being done to women, and women pleasing others. Cruelty and degradation are a central theme. “This is a political issue,” says Tarrant, but one that people excuse and take off the table, waving it and its greater implications away as being “just fantasy” and therefore not problematic. “Arguing that porn is just fantasy is like saying that advertisements don’t affect our buying habits, or that the news doesn’t affect how we see the world,” says Tarrant. Compounding the problem is the prevalence of porn culture in the mainstream. “It’s where people are getting most of their information about sex and what sex should look like, and it shows the same degrading tropes over and over.” …