We refine a line of feminist criticism of pornography that focuses on pornographic works' pernicious effects. A.W. Eaton argues that inegalitarian pornography should be criticized because it is responsible for its consumers’ adoption of inegalitarian attitudes toward sex in the same way that other fictions are responsible for changes in their consumers’ attitudes. We argue that her argument can be improved with the recognition that different fictions can have different modes of persuasion. This is true of film and television: a (...) satirical movie such as Dr. Strangelove does not morally educate in the same way as a realistic series such as The Wire. We argue that this is also true of pornography: inegalitarian depictions of sex are not invariably responsible for consumers' adoption of inegalitarian attitudes toward sex in reality. Given that pornographic works of different genres may harm in different ways, different feminist criticisms are appropriate for different genres of pornography. (shrink)

Pornographic speech harms women by playing a key role in sustaining the social conditions through which women's liberty and equality are undercut. Though there is a principled moral and constitutional basis for pursuing a legal strategy in fighting pornography, we should not overestimate the effectiveness of the law or underestimate its potential dangers. The struggle against pornography must be waged through education, expressive exploration, and protest, not through the law.

This article provides an overview of the key philosophical themes and debates in discussions of pornography. In particular, I consider the major positions on how pornography ought to be defined, when (and if ) it should be regulated, whether it is best understood as speech (or action), whether there is evidence that is it harmful. I argue in favor of what is known as the civil rights approach to pornography, as reflected in the work of Catharine MacKinnon.

Through her silencing thesis, Langton has contributed to the study of epistemic injustice by highlighting a possible cause of such a phenomenon: She asserts that the pornographic representation of sexual relationships affects the felicity conditions of speech uttered by women, so this speech is not understood as an illocution by men. This fact arguably undermines women’s credibility, since their testimony is not even registered in men’s testimonial sensibility. However, this thesis entails problematic consequences from at least two standpoints. From a (...) theoretical perspective, it enacts a circularity when it comes to the empirical individuation of the subordinative effects of pornography. I will point out that this problem arises from Langton’s substantive conception of power, i.e. from her notion of authority as an attribute which can be ascribed to preexisting subjects. From a political perspective, such conception of power allows Langton to performatively rank women as credible when testifying sexual violence, but it also leads her to silencing alternative political strategies, e.g. the ones proposed by Butler. Hence, I propose to consider this form of silencing as a specific kind of epistemic injustice, one that neutralises the performative value of political discourses. (shrink)