Bob and the Will To Pornography.

30.EPILOGUE.57: August 23, 2003.
"Bob and the Will To Pornography."

If you don't stop that, you'll go blind.
-- Trad.

        And Bob wandered through the shelves of the bookstore, waiting for Heather's break to start, and he found a book of old erotica. Pornography, when it gets old enough, becomes something called erotica. This is because when anything gets old enough it acquires a sense of nostalgia, and with that nostalgia, something people like to call "artistic merit." In the case of pornography, this is partially achieved through the use of lighting techniques, film stock, hairstyles, clothing, and body types that are now viewed as being quaint, of another time, and utterly non-stimulating.
        In other words, when pornography stops sexually arousing people, it becomes "erotica."
        The book Bob found was a deluxe hardcover. An oversize coffee table book.
        Very heavy.
        Over 600 pages.
        The dustjacket was made out of a paper. The paper felt like thick plastic.
        The book itself, leatherbound.
        All the pages, glossy, on heavy stock. And they smelled like expensive ink.
        The photos in the book were laid out one or two to a page. They were sepia-toned. Faded with age. Grays and blacks on yellow (and in some cases rusty) backgrounds.
        Bob shuddered.
        He always found old erotica creepy. This was primarily because he knew that the people in the pictures were long dead. He was looking at the pictures of naked people fucking and sucking, and they were all long dead. It felt kind of like necrophilia. But he also couldn't stop looking.
        Yellowed paper. An old bicycle from 1916 standing in front of a wall. And some guy standing there, beside the bicycle. And he has a handlebar mustache, and he's naked and skinny with a sunken chest, and he's holding his cock. And a woman there, beside him. And she's kind of fat and dumpy, naked except for an parasol she's holding over her head. And her breasts are saggy, and she's fingering her pussy.
        The effect was also kind of funny. But back then, when photography was still in its infancy, this picture was probably hot stuff.
        And, in order for the image to be captured on the plate, these two would have had to've stood like that for minutes. Absolutely still, frozen in a stupid tableau.
        Another page:
        A woman, again kind of fat and plain, lying on an ornate couch that looks like an artifact from the 18th century. And she's naked, spreading her legs, one arm raised behind her head and the other arm hidden. She has hairy armpits and a drugged look on her face. Presumably boredom from having to hold this position for so long.
        To the left of the couch, a stuffed dog sitting attentively, looking right at the camera. The dog has to be stuffed because no dog would stand that still, for that long, in order to be photographed in the old way.
        And to the right, some kind of weird table that looks as if it is encrusted with jewels. No doubt cheap glass.
        Bob flipped more pages.
        But even though the pages. These pictures were the only record some of these people had. And that made Bob feel kind of sad. And also kind of excited-- but he didn't really understand why.
        And the same thing applied to pornography now. To the magazines and stuff he found on the Internet. All those pictures and videos encoded into binary or printed on glossy paper, they were the only records some people had of their own existence. And we all need to leave records of our existence, somehow. Our lives have no meaning if we aren't remembered because it's the memories of others, the memories of the ways we interact with others while we're alive (and in some cases after we're dead-- because people leave traces, art), that gives meaning to our lives.
        If nobody sees you, if no one knows who you are, if no one remembers you, your life has no meaning.
        Meaning is not intrinsic, no matter how much we want to believe it is. Meaning is imposed from the outside.
        And even the people who think that meaning is intrinsic picture themselves watching themselves, picture themselves remembering themselves, imposing recognition and meaning upon themselves from above. They become a third party in order to judge their lives as having worth. Either that or they imagine some sort of God up in the sky judging them and giving them worth-- even if ultimately they're all alone and there's no God up there in the sky.
        And so, these pictures and videos, that's the meaning of those people. And it might not be much of a meaning, but at least it's something. Sure, it's porno, but it's still better than some guy who lives a life going to work every day, has a family and some kids, and dies unknown. Because if he dies unknown, his life was for nothing.
        We only care about things we remember.
        And Bob also knew that pornography is necessary.
        That pornography is sad and desperate and lonely, but for some people pornography is a necessity that keeps them alive. These people are men, mostly.
        But the idea that women don't like pornography is a myth. There are women who like pornography. Don't believe that they don't.
        But there are also women who don't like pornography. It's just that the women who dislike pornography are just more vocal than the women who like it. And people pay more attention to them. Because women who dislike pornography conform more readily to a common social idea about women. They are perceived to be more status quo, and hence are more acceptable.
        But, for some people pornography actually keeps the guns out of their mouths. People who can't connect, who need some sort of release.
        Now, it could be argued that pornography put that gun there in the first place. But that can never be adequately proven. There are just too many contributing factors to postmodern alienation and that you cannot blame the despair of the lonely exclusively on the proliferation of pornography. It's just a good scapegoat because it deals with bodily fluids and lots of people find bodily fluids gross. And also, chances are, whatever religions people subscribe to, they've been told (by those religions) that sex is bad, that desire is unhealthy, and so on.   It doesn't matter what the religion is, really. And of course pornography capitalizes on desire and sex, and bodily fluids. And so most of the basic religious templates of society all (either overtly or covertly) preach that pornography is evil. And even if you're not religious, you still get influenced by religion. It's unavoidable. And so, even people who aren't religious tend to look down upon pornography. Even users of pornography look down upon pornography, and themselves.
        Also, there's a social stigma attached. But this is also influenced by the religious.
        People don't want to have bodies. And religion is about how we're not our bodies, that we're more than our physical bodies. That we're not really animals.
        Pornography is about us being our bodies, about us being purely physical. And, stupidly animalistic.
        Even though people are animals, they don't want to be animals, Bob thought.
        But that's understandable, Bob thought again, I don't want to be an animal, either. Animals are stupid and smelly and, well, animalistic. They don't have language like we do. They have no concept of infinity. They have no concept of self. And hence no real understanding of pornography.
        Pornography forces you into yourself, to imagine yourself inside, and as, other people-- and so you exist both inside and outside, simultaneously. It also highlights the truth of human interaction: that we treat anything that isn't ourselves like an object. We objectify the world. And that's why porno is dangerous. People can lie to themselves and say they don't objectify others, but they do. You can't crawl inside another's mind. So the other is just an image you interact with. And the language the other speaks and the actions of the other, convince you that the other is a person. And so you treat that other like a person, like another you, but that's just lip service. In reality that other is being treated like an object and nothing more. The lip services is what keeps us from heartlessly killing off everyone that isn't us. We need to believe that others are people too, in order to survive as a species. But really, they're just objects for us to interact with.
        Thinking this way made Bob feel sad and creepy.
        He put the book back on the shelf.
        He thought about the Internet.
        In large part, the Internet had ruined pornography for Bob. There had been a point where the proliferation of flesh on the Net had been exciting. But now it was just dull. Empty. Hopelessly boring.
        He'd seen every fetish imaginable, and quite a few he hadn't even considered. He'd seen images that had aroused him and (lots of) images that had literally turned his stomach, caused him to disgorge bile. Once he even vomited.
        But, now, nothing. It was all dead to him.
        Pornography was, at very best, only mildly stimulating. At worse it was infinite boredom.
        Usually, he felt himself near the infinite boredom level.
        Ditto with violence, which is of course just another type of pornography.
        No violence shocked him any more. He'd seen so many images of death on the Net they, too induced yawning.
        Both sex and death-- the two great human extremes, two great drives-- had been nullified for Bob. No more drive for sex (unless with Heather-- as it should be) and no more desire to ogle violence. Not that he'd ever really liked violence.
        But, then again, deep down inside, even way back when he'd been so terminally revolted by all those death tapes, a part of him had liked them.
        Now he utterly, completely, and totally didn't care any more.
        Completely unshockable, now.
        But for some reason, he still surfed. He still looked at porno-- when Heather wasn't around, of course. Some times all day. Sometimes for the whole day. Sometimes for an entire 8-hour period.
        Trying to rekindle that spark. That feeling of danger and transgression that used to fuel him.
        Trying to feel like he had in highschool. Trying to feel young again.
        He'd had a lot of pornography in highschool. Hundreds of magazines kept in boxes under his bed.
        Somehow, his mother had never found them. And he would have known if she'd found them. She was very conservative and probably would've screamed and cried and slapped him and forced him to go to church.
        And Bob had one of the biggest porno collections of any highschool kid he'd known. If he'd had more friends this fact would have been significant. And if more students had known about his porno stash, he might have had more friends.
        But, back then, when procuring pornographic magazines and hiding them from Mom and Dad contained elements of real and true danger, the pornography was so very exciting. The danger of buying the magazines, the feeling that he was breaking the law. Being underage and having all this smut. The fear of-- and simultaneous wish for-- discovery. All that naked flesh. Amassing those magazine had been a thrill.
        But when he grew up and became legally allowed to buy smut, the thrill waned.
        It still lasted for a few years, but it still slowly waned.
        And now people-- adults-- who buy pornography now, now that there's so much of it for free on the Internet, what's the thrill?
        Do adults really think that other adults care if they jerk off to dirty magazines and movies?
        Does the thrill of being caught still fuel them?
        If it does, that's pathetic.
        Or, maybe just an outlet for things a partner or spouse won't do?
        That makes sense.
        Or is it just loneliness? Desperation? A desire for some sort of sexual contact? Or just some sort of contact? Any kind.
        If that's it, if it's loneliness, then pornography becomes sad beyond comprehension.
        (That aside, pornography is still a record. And everybody needs a record. No one should be forgotten.)
        But, still, when Bob walked into used bookstores that had large collections of pornographic magazines, and if he happened to spot a magazine he'd once had (the huge collection of porno had all been thrown out long, long ago. It too, with time and overexposure, had grown tedious and dull) he found himself crippled with nostalgia and longing. Longing for a simpler, innocent time when things actually were dirty. Back when things were dirty because they could be juxtaposed against things that were clean. Because things are dirty only when there's something clean to measure them against. Now, everything was dirty, prurient, and obscene. And because of that, the filth of simple nudie magazines, and videos of hardcore fucking, and images of people tied up and whipped or eating their own shit, or being being shot, garroted, strangled, having their eyes extracted while still conscious-- it all loses its power, ceases to be anything. Becomes nothing more than soft, soothing pink noise.
        And that's a million times worse than simply being offensive.
        Bob ground his teeth.
        Sometimes he felt like punching himself in the face.
        And then, usually, after that feeling faded, he liked spending hours thinking about highschool.

Next: Ron 'n' Russ....

Epilogue 58.
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