Subject: Re: Dworkin attempts to censor negative comment (was: Andrea Dworkin Online Li From: rere@netcom.com (rere) Date: 1996/02/24 Message-Id: Sender: rere@netcom20.netcom.com References: Organization: NETCOM On-Line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Newsgroups: alt.censorship Avedon Carol (avedon@cix.compulink.co.uk) wrote: : rere@netcom.com (rere) [really Nikki Craft] wrote: : > Canadian Customs has long confiscated magazines and books crossing : > the border. In the mid eighties an editor of a major : > nudist/naturist magazine where I was employed always had trouble : > getting his issues across the Canadian border. Canada doesn't have : > and never has had a first amendent. That appears to surprise some : > of these US libertarians who would like to blame MacKinnon and : > Dworkin with all their ills. Not so. : But Canada Customs never seized Dworkin's books before _Butler_. One of : the books they seized, _Woman Hating_, has been crossing the border into : Canada since it was first published in 1974; only after _Butler_ did they : seize it. The lesbian magazine _Bad Attitude_ had also been crossing : into Canada for years; only after _Butler_ was it seized and prosecuted. : The sudden spate of attacks on all gay shops in Canada, as well as some : radical and student bookshops, after _Butler_, was clearly a result of : the decision in _Butler_. If any one would like to read Dworkin's press release about Canada can go to http://www.igc.apc.org/womensnet/dworkin/ and go to the section about the ordinance. : MacDworkinites want to pretend that they can go out of their way to call : the attention of the police, customs, and the courts to _gay_ material in : this way and that somehow they can not be blamed when _gay_ material and : _gay_ shops are victimized by the law. : Phooey. LEAF persistently used gay men's porn in their arguments against : _Butler_ to show that "pornography" is degrading (to women!). It is no : surprise that suddenly gay shops became the focus of police and Customs : interest, and that the periodicals and books they import, including a : lesbian magazine and Andrea Dworkin's work, were attacked. This link : between your pro-censorship activities and actual censorship by the : authorities is not nearly so tenuous as the one you imagine exists : between pornography and violence/sexism, and yet you choose to deny its : existence. All this proves is that you don't like porn and will accept : any excuse to censor it and any rationalization of efforts to censor it. : Feminist historians have been warning you since WAP began that if you : were ever successful in convincing anyone in authority of your "feminist" : arguments against pornography, the victims would be gay, lesbian, and : women's materials. You refused to listen. Now that it's happened, you : want to pretend it hasn't. Well, you're just plain wrong. Carol, I have never proposed legislation of any kind. I work outside the law not within it. I have a perfect right to critique pornography, and all other exploitation of women. We've been trying to warn you about what would happen if rapists adopt pornography's presentation of women that we are disposable cunts and now that that is what has happened what are you going to do about that? -- Re Re