University of Oregon offers free screening of documentary on porn

From www.kval.com- UO journalism associate professor Debra Merskin will provide framing comments following the screening of a hard-hitting documentary about the porn industry “The Price of Pleasure” tonight at 7 p.m. in Room 221 Allen Hall on the University of Oregon campus.

This free event is jointly sponsored by the Center for the Study of Women in Society, Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, ASUO Women’s Center, Office of Greek Life, Alliance for Sexual Assault Prevention, and the UO School of Journalism and Communication’s Communication Studies Program.

Viewer discretion advised: contains violence, nudity, and sexual imagery.

Once relegated to the margins of society, pornography has become one of the most visible and profitable sectors of the cultural industries in the United States. The pornography industry’s annual revenue is estimated at more than $13 billion. At the same time, according to the makers of this documentary, the content of pornography has become more aggressive as well as more overtly sexist and racist.

According to University of Texas journalism professor Robert Jensen, who is featured in “The Price of Pleasure,” one of the central aims of the documentary is to move the debate about pornography beyond the usual kinds of predictable, and distracting, arguments about morality and free speech.

“The film tries to move the discussion beyond a clash between a rigidly moralistic position and the irresponsibly individualistic free-speech response we hear so often whenever the issue of pornography comes up,” Jensen said. “Instead of asking important questions about what a relentlessly sexist and routinely racist pornography genre says about our culture, conservatives try to assert control and liberals try to assert independence. Complex questions about contemporary pornography are too often derailed by a debate that never gets past First Amendment arguments.”

“The Price of Pleasure” intervenes in this debate by taking a sustained and often disturbing look at pornography itself, placing the voices of producers, performers, industry critics, and anti-porn activists alongside candid observations from men and women about the role pornography has played in their lives. The film paints a nuanced portrait of how pleasure and pain, commerce and power, and liberty and responsibility are intertwined in the most intimate parts of our sexual identities and relationships.

In response to the national controversy surrounding the screening of a hardcore porn film at the University of Maryland in early April, documentary filmmakers Chyng Sun and Miguel Picker—the makers of “The Price of Pleasure”— cut a deal with their distributor to make their film available at no charge to any campus that wants to show it, which is exactly what the makers of the porn film had done with theirs.

“This is a great opportunity for this film to reach a wider audience,” Sun, a professor of media at New York University, said of her documentary. “Especially given that male college students were our target audience going in. We did numerous focus groups to find the right tone and approach to speak to them.”

The Media Education Foundation is distributing “The Price of Pleasure.”

“The reason we’re making this film available to screen for free is simple,” said MEF Executive Director Sut Jhally. “What’s needed on this issue is more discussion, not less, and this film is a perfect vehicle for achieving this. If faculty and students who supported the decision to show the porn film at the University of Maryland are serious about their defense of free speech and open debate, they’ll fight to make sure this documentary is shown as well.”

The firestorm at the University of Maryland ignited when students decided to screen a $10 million-dollar, 2 1/2-hour hardcore porn film called “Pirates II: Stagnetti’s Revenge,” which is being offered to campuses around the country for free by Digital Playground as part of an innovative marketing strategy. When state legislators tried to stop the screening, students on the College Park campus fought back, claiming overly moralistic politicians were threatening their free speech rights.