Today a guest blog post by Clive Hamilton, Australian author, Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at Charles Sturt University and a contributor to Getting Real: Challenging the Sexualisation of Girls. Here Clive takes on Dymocks Bookstore for selling Playboy and makes the point: “If promoting porn is today’s high ground, the surrounding landscape must have sunk pretty low.”
There it is, next to the “Great Holiday Fiction”, “School Holiday Reads” and “Books for Cooks”, unmissable at eye level as you walk into Dymocks—the boxed set containing the first ten years of Playboy.
I suppose we should expect it; the porn industry has so successfully mainstreamed its product that even a “family company” like Dymocks doesn’t think twice before cashing in.
When I expressed surprise to the sales assistant that Dymocks should be selling porn, she replied, a little embarrassed: “Well, it’s not porn really, not these days”.
We know what she means; the first ten years of Playboy were pretty tame by today’s hardcore standards. But if Playboy is not porn, then what is it? Light entertainment? A leisure product? Family fun?
It’s true that few today would object to the sale of pictures of naked women displaying bare breasts and some thigh (if my memory of teen years is reliable). Innocuous really, in an age where everything that the most perverse and disturbed mind can imagine can be viewed on the internet.
But Dymocks’ decision to sell the Playboy collection, and to put it in the most prominent spot, further normalizes porn, breaking down the barrier between pornographic imagery and mainstream culture. When kids walk into Dymocks the message, explicit or subliminal, is that Playboy is acceptable everywhere.
And while the first ten years of the original stick mag were tame, the last ten years are anything but. So would Dymocks stock a boxed set with the last ten years of the magazine? Complete with … well, I don’t know what. But if Playboy has to compete with the internet, then inside its covers the term “explicit” has been redefined. And its online material is more explicit again – even moreso Playboy TV. So Dymocks has made itself a convenient stepping stone from the relatively innocuous to the hard-core.
Perhaps Dymocks’ managers would feel uncomfortable asking the young women who staff their shops to sell pictures of “extreme close-ups”. If so, where does the line fall between “not really porn” and porn? 1980? 1990? 2000? When exactly did “not really porn” become porn?
So the venerable old book retailer is now a willing part of the porn industry’s unrelenting campaign to mainstream its product, aiding the transformation of the sexual exploitation of women into something cool, so that today young women can proudly wear the Playboy logo to signal their open-mindedness.
Dymocks boasts of being a “family owned business” that looks for “the opportunity … to take the high ground”. If promoting soft porn is today’s high ground, the surrounding landscape must have sunk pretty low.
*Contact Dymocks. Ph: (02) 92240411. Online contact form: feedback@dymocks.com.au
Have you or anyone close to you been negatively affected by compulsive use of pornography? Would you be willing to share your experience with me? You don’t have to use your real name (will need to verify if decide to publish or use in any other way). Please contact me using the contact form at the top of my website. And of course feel free to post a comment on your experience.
30 Responses
It’s everywhere you go. Shirts in Jeans shops. The supermarket is rampant with sexualised images of women to sell everything from dish liquid to canned vegetables. You can’t go into any department store without sexualised images surrounding you selling clothes, make up jewellery.
It’s on tv, the newspaper, it’s on the radio and the sides of buses.
I went into a shop to buy myself a uniform the other day and the ladies behind the counter were using a Ralf mouse pad in the shape of a a woman with 3d breasts to rest your hand on.
It’s out of control and hardly anyone seems to be concerned about it.
Very interesting article. Your question in response to the shop assistants comment about the book set is spot on…. “Where does the line fall between “not really porn” and porn? 1980? 1990? 2000? When exactly did “not really porn” become porn? This question highlights so clearly how the everyday consumer/retailer is manipulated, desensitized and cornered by the pushy powers of the porn industry into somehow dividing between levels of distaste and depravity. They put you in a corner saying ‘don’t be such a prude … that’s not porn hunny …. I mean gee you should see the stuff we have out now!’. So in this case, what was out wide naughty stuff 10 years ago is today coffee table reading for the whole family. And I mean hey, you should definatley make that into a box set and sell it by the 100’s!
Dymocks like all the other retailers we see named and shamed on this site (Target, City Surf, Etsy)are all just going with the flow, saying nothing and going to bed with the porn industry by selling their different ‘not pron products’ while cashing in. So sad. So sick. Good on you Clive for pointing this out. There is always a bunch of us here willing to join with you in speaking up.
Thanks for alerting us to this Clive & for being a voice against it.
It is indeed another example of the normalising of porn & the ostracising of anyone against it.
Time for some consumer pressure on Dymocks!
Yeah, I agree with Clive.
Melissa French highlights above that Playboy have been smart desensitising people to think that it isn’t porn. Smart advertising and marketing has got the brand everywhere. I think also the market share with Hustler, Maxim, has made Playboy look a little softer maybe.
Playboy is PORN: (X-rated materials, adult literature, adult materials, obscene art, sexually explicit content, sexually explicit literature, smut, sexual inuenndo etc)
One just needed to look at what was available in stores during Christmas to see that even shops like Adair’s have done a ‘Mansion Collection’ for customers http://www.adairs.com.au/mansion-collection-by-playboy/
Yet another store I will be boycotting.
Playboy has made a promise recently: ‘He plans to pursue a brand strategy that includes reviving the long-dormant Playboy Clubs and slapping the company’s recognisable bunny silhouette – adorned with bow tie – on everything from men’s underwear to energy drinks and slot machines.
Full article can be view here: http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/business/playboy-founder-hugh-hefner-to-buy-back-company/story-e6frede3-1225985767521
I hope Dymocks are disgusted but they are not alone, Borders also supply porn – I should know, I got caught taking pictures of it recently so that I could write a letter and complain.
Well done Clive for continuing to speak up about this issue, always thankful.
Thanks Melinda for continuing to covering hard issues.
Well, there went one of the few remaining retail-type outlets I still enjoyed visiting – the bookshop. Depressing is an understatement.
Thank you, Clive, for this piece – and Melinda, for providing a site where all these things can be identified (as a researcher, I can’t help thinking that this cataloguing-type activity is very useful – not to mention the networking and social change dimensions of the site, of course!)
Emma Rush
Very good article.
I believe society in general is very desensitized with sexually explicit contents.It is very important to act, if we let go of the small things the porn industry will keep on expanding, make more money, have more lobbying and it will get worse and worse. I have seen males in public places proudly holding this type of degrading material like it was a novel, some with there girlfriends and even children.
I had the same kind of debate recently when I have complained about degrading magazines for men being sold and placed at a height of the eyes of a 4 year old at the entrance of a Coles store. I have been told that the Zoo, FHM and the rests of them were not classified and therefore they could, by law put them wherever they wanted. After learning more about Coles policies and complaining further, they moved the magazines up at this particular store (cover is now less showing). It made me feel better to know that there was a slight improvement for the sake of young children, but I had the same question, why a family company chooses to sell these degrading materials? And going further by choosing to place sexually explicit covers and themes at the height of young children (while the adult male’s eyes are considerably higher).
Won’t buy from them either…
Thanks for your excellent article Clive. We need to keep pointing out to retailers that selling the Playboy brand is literally supporting and marketing the porn industry. The disconnect is extraordinary and the list of retailers is endless
Will be contacting Dymocks tomorrow…….I urge others to do the same. Have tried to find a phone number to ring but there doesn’t seem to be a “head office” to ring. All i could find was an email address which is feedback@dymocks.com.au.
I will be writing to Dymocks, but if you want to phone their head office number is 02 9224 0411.
I am 18 and happy with my body, I don’t compare myself to other women I meet dressed in everyday clothes. Saying this, when I see playboy – or any porn (that includes “mens magazines”), I suddenly feel insecure. I see images of women with unrealistic breasts and know they are fake, I am fully conscious that this is not the natural state of a womans body and would never choose to do that to myself but there is still that nagging notion in the back of my mind that this is what all men want, this is what they find attractive. These pictures don’t make me feel ugly they make me feel worthless, like any parter I have is settling for me when what they really want is this still image – busty and brainless.
I’m sick of men excusing porn by saying “well some women watch it too” or “It is just the way men are – visual”. I’m sick of having to be the one to avert my eyes and remind myself what is really important. I’m sick of feeling like I am at war with every other woman on this planet. I’m sick of hearing people my age talk about porn as if its an everyday part of life – everyone watches it/owns it/talks about it. I’m sick of places like book stores – a haven for intellectual thinking and creativity which ignores conventional beauty in the place of talented writers and minds, buying into this demeaning and hurtful culture. What I’m really sick of though is my gender being diminished to a sex symbol. I shouldn’t feel like a piece of teenage meat being drooled over, critiqued and judged constantly, but this is how Playboy makes me feel – a piece of flesh to feed unrealistic sexual desires.
I have been enjoying an unexpected break from the usual display of pornographic posters in the local Bras and Things shop (not a poster in sight!) – only to learn this about Dymocks. It’s just relentless – I’ll continue writing and talking, but the battle seems so overwhelming.
Bellatrix, my heart goes out to you, as I completely empathize with what you have expressed in your post.
Clive, thank you for standing up and speaking out about this. It seems to me that if more men spoke out against such matters, more men would listen. In my own world, men who hear my point of view dismiss it with a, “Lighten up.” I get the distinct impression that they’ve decided what I have expressed amounts to “female histrionics.” If they heard such messages from men they respected, then maybe they might actually consider the message. I hate that I don’t have the same credibility in their minds. In THEIR minds. Not in my own.
I will be writing Dymocks about this.
This is what I sent to Melinda about how porn has affected my life.
Hello Melinda.
I’m writing to you to share a bit about how porn has negatively
affected my self and my families life.
When my husband and I first met and were going out before we even got
married I made no secrets about how much I did not like porn and was
not ok with him using it- or doing anything else related. Strip clubs
and similar.
All was fine or so I thought. We were very happy.
8 years later and and 1 year ago I stumble across porn that has been
looked up on our computer.
After the lies not working my husband finally came clean to his porn
use to varying degrease over the time we had been together, but mostly
after we had our children.
This however set of even bigger alarms for me (especial the ease in
which my husband could lie to me and be convincing).
After much, much “questioning” I find out a seedy other life of
drinking- a strip club visit, more porn, perving, chatting up girls,
sleeping with other girls, topless bar and more…
I know not all of this is pornography use- but I blame pornography and
the industry- in part (no one forced my husband to make the choices he
did)- for this.
For making this sexualised life seem so normal, so easy to do, no
consequences to family or health (I have an STD to carry with me for
life now from his infidelity) no problems just fun. Hey everyone is
doing it right? Right?
it would certainly seem like it if you just take a look around you at
advertising, magazines, newspapers, tv, movies.
A life time growing up absorbing this had to show up in the end.
I have found a great site call rage against the manchine that has a lot of good anti
porn articles and the affects on everyone including the user. I sat my
husband down at the computer and got him to read them.
he cried.
He cried once and I have cried, sobbed and been destroyed for a year
and who knows how much longer. My marriage is never going to be what I
had dreamed. My life at times seems so fallen apart I don’t know what
to do.
We go to a counceling once a week. Do they put that in Playboy? Is
that sexy and fun?
If I thought I hated porn before it’s nothing to how much I loath it
now. I am so glad to have found this site and be part of the hard work
you all do.
Dear Anonymous,
Thank you for sharing your story, no matter how painful it was to have written it, you bared your struggles. You are a very brave woman.
I say this to encourage you, for I hope that it does…
Your marriage may never be what you thought it was going to be, but it can be even better, with willing hearts, forgiveness, and God’s work in your lives.
I know of many people who have been in similar situations and come out stronger, in time.
I hope that helps.
This is what I emailed to Dymocks:
Hi,
It has come to my attention that Dymocks is selling Playboy products. My name is Louise, and I would like to take a stand against pornography being promoted in a bookstore.
Yes, we see porn and aesthetics of porn everywhere. In magazine editorials, on television and in film, and in a whole range of advertising.
But I thought a “family owned” bookstore would be a refuge from that.
As a 22 year old woman, I feel the influence of a myriad of sexualised images, that pressure me to look a certain way. Images of thin women in lingerie, large breasts spilling out, with the sole purpose of being sex objects for the visual pleasure of men, makes an inescapable, consistent dent on my self-image.
The diversity and beauty of female bodies are not celebrated in the public sphere. Rather, an archetype of sexualised beauty is enforced on men and women by the sheer amount of images that we see every day, therefore normalising only a narrow definition of beauty, of sexuality, of what a woman should look like.
I believe this is damaging to both sexes, and our culture.
Geez, wouldn’t it be great if Dymocks took a stand against the mainstreaming of soft porn in our culture! Please stop promoting Playboy. By displaying it prominently in your stores, you are sending the message to all customers (men, women, children) that the sexual objectification of women is definitely ok. Have you had a look at Playboy recently? Not so family friendly anymore.
Melinda and Clive you are both wrong for calling Playboy magazine pornography, you are both
Australia’s answer to the Taliban who would execute women for showing their skin or having sex with another man.
The worst aspects of the 50’s with it’s hypocritical high moral ground are relegated to the dim past.
You should be ashamed of yourselves!!!
Hmmmm, Dymocks has been selling salacious books for years – you’ve never noticed before? They haven’t gone out of their way to promote them, but nor have they hidden them out the back in a dingy room either. And this is as it should be. If people want it there it is, if people don’t then it’s easy to ignore (as Clive’s apparently managed to do for the past twenty or more years).
I do object to being visually assaulted by sexualised images every time I step out on the street (oh alright, sometimes I don’t but I what I do object to is that no one gets a choice), or turn on he television but if someone wants to quietly sell porn in their book store, then I find it hard to get upset.
But maybe you disagree. Porn ought to be banned. Here’s another 725 books you should complain to Dymocks about while you’re at it. http://www.dymocks.com.au/Search/Results.aspx?Ne=4294967255&N=4294967292+4294967222
There are a number of assumptions that bother me about this article and the responses. Assumptions that I don’t think are true. Indeed, perhaps the first point is that it isn’t like this collection is open with explicit imagery all over the cover. You first have to be aware what Playboy is, and then purchase the collection. My first real problem is in regards to the definition of pornography. Pornography has been sold in book shops for decades. I doubt anyone here complains about the sale of Nancy Friday’s ‘My Secret Garden’. Some of the fantasies therein are rather explicit (although, it’s a fascinating book). It can be argued that Mills and Boon books are also pornography of a kind. And there’s no end to the more explicit books that make the false equivalence between ‘erotica’ and ‘pornography’ (for instance, a lot of work by Violet Blue). Indeed, the best definition of pornography that I have yet seen is:
“Pornography is communicative material produced with the key intention of causing sexual arousal in the targeted audience, and it is reasonable to expect the material to succeed in causing such arousal”
Is the problem here that there are images involved, rather than just words? Exactly what difference does that make? Humans have always had a fascination with sex. Among the first known artefacts created by humans are (rather explicit) fertility symbols. Some of the oldest surviving photographs are nudes. Regardless of what Hugh Hefner has become today (and that’s a sad little man), I think he started a really important conversation with Playboy in the 1950s. Sure, he started it from the privileged white male perspective, but that’s hardly surprising. From a sociological perspective, the first 10 years of Playboy should be incredibly fascinating. What topics were taboo 60 years ago? What sexual issues have remained the same over that time? What’s changed?
Assuming consent and a respectful work environment, I don’t see anything inherently wrong with nudity. It isn’t like clothes are ‘natural’ in the sense that no other animal wears them. Exactly how much nudity is socially accepted is very much a social construction, and entirely dependent on culture (everything from the Burqa to a the practicality of a loincloth).
The next assumption that bothers me is the references to ‘the porn industry’ as if it is some united, single minded entity. It most certainly isn’t, and there certainly isn’t as much money in it today as there was even 5 years ago. Image and film pornography has suffered the same piracy problems as music and movies. Perhaps even more so, because few are prepared to deal with it honestly. On the other hand, there has been a huge rise in the number of couples filming themselves and sharing their recordings with others. The point is, there is no vast global cabal of pornographic companies working to infuse popular culture with pornography. Pornography is becoming mainstream because people are interested in sex, how others do it, but talking about it is a taboo. Indeed, it is perhaps the most harmful taboo still in our culture. The Internet has allowed everyone (almost all men, and at least a third and growing number of women) to explore how other people engage in sex in privacy. The ability to explore in private is the big feature the Internet has brought. It is becoming mainstream because more and more people are prepared to discuss sex more openly.
I think the mainstreaming of raunch, which is what most people here seem to be really complaining about, is a side effect. Never since the rise of Christianity have Western people been able to discuss sex in a relatively open and honest way. I’d certainly agree that the current environment is repressive in one way; that we all have to be sexual all the time, especially women. However, the over-the-top reaction is expected with such new found freedom, but I’m sure it’ll die down as the root repression problem is slowly flushed out. The big problems are still slut/prude shaming and the virgin/whore dynamic. I think they’re getting better, but it is going to take some time still. Really the point is it shouldn’t matter if a particular individual wants to have sex with as many partners as possible, or only have sex with one partner in their lifetime. Neither should be treated as a lesser human being, nor not allowed to share their experience with those who want to hear it. However, for too long has society not been able to talk about it at all.
Now you’ll get no argument from me that, following Sturgeon’s Law, much of pornography is complete crud, and the majority certainly doesn’t make good sex education. That it is being used as such by young people tells us how we are failing them as role models and teachers. The most unanswered questions that young people have, deal with how normal they are, and what sex is about.
Very few of us will see a large number of genitals in person in our life times. How can you answer the questions ‘is my penis size normal?’ or ‘is my labia shape normal?’ without this? I certainly agree that the images seen in pornography are hardly a representative sample, that’s why I applaud the work of people like Dr Betty Dodson, and projects like Scarleteen. However, their work is obscure. Something like it should be front and centre in sex education. What’s also missing is instructions for negotiating good sexual relationships, setting boundaries, exploration and partner communication.
What is particularly wonderful about the Internet and the conversation that Playboy started, is that it helps a lot of sexual minorities come to terms with themselves. Whether you are homosexual, bisexual, transgender or even asexual, there are people out there like you prepared to support you. If your sexuality deviates from the overwhelming heternormative mean, it can be a very lonely and depressing life growing up.
Bellatrix & anonymous – I strongly suggest you read the article ‘Sympathy For the Anti-Porn Feminists’ by Clarisse Thorn. Clarisse is an excellent writer. While she’s into BDSM (I’m not), she has thought deeply about these issues and has a lot of good to say.
anonymous – If you think that everything in your relationship would be wonderful today if pornography didn’t exist, I think you are sadly mistaken. This isn’t to excuse your husband. He certainly shouldn’t be lying or cheating on you if those are the boundaries you agreed to. However, pornography didn’t turn him into a douchebag. It is more likely he wasn’t honest with either you or himself about what he wanted out of a relationship. This is exactly the problem of the lack of partner communication skills I talked about earlier, and a society that enforces very strict definitions of masculinity.
That said, I also think that, while it is absolutely your right, asking a partner to refrain from pornography is getting dangerously close to imposing thought control. Everyone should be comfortable with their partner thinking/fantasising about other people. Everyone should be comfortable with their partner masturbating. Indeed, I think some of the aversion to pornography comes from the same place as feeling that a partner masturbating means that you aren’t good enough. Unless you’re very lucky, mismatched libidos are going to be a factor in every partnership, especially as you age and go through the different stages of life. A healthy negotiated sexual relationship means there are going to be times where one partner is horny and the other is not. Sometimes the reluctant partner may be prepared to begin a sexual episode, even if they’re starting from a point of no desire, but that is not always going to be the case. Masturbation is a healthy option in such situations, or even more generally. A vibrator, erotic story, or visual/audible stimulation can help build mood.
I think the vast majority of people can tell the difference between fantasy and reality. Anal sex, for example, requires a vast amount of trust, communication, preparation and clean up to be pleasurable to both partners (regardless of who’s receiving). However, if pornography is used as the sole source of sexual education because of a repressive society, then there is going to be a problem because those elements are left off the table.
There are two things I’d really like to see more of in the future. The first is greater prevalence of the female gaze. There is the beginnings of this in things like the popularity of Twilight, that viral Old Spice commercial and some recent pornography. Even as a heterosexual male, I would like to see more of the female experience in some of the films and books I enjoy. The second thing is improved, comprehensive sexual education of the type I described above.
Ever heard a man complain about the objectification of men in advertising? Didnt think so.
Remember that Diet Coke ad with the hot male window cleaner? No complaints.
Any ad with a bit of cleavage or excess skin? The wowsers come out to play.
Fabio didnt get rich from being a brain surgeon ladies. Think about it….
My feedback to Dymocks, which others are free to reproduce if they wish:
Dear Dymocks,
You appear to be the target of a PR campaign by Clive Hamilton, who
wishes to shame you into withdrawing a book from sale, or, at the
very least, stigmatising it.
He’s urged his readers to contact you, and Melinda Tankard-Reist
has piled on too.
This is a pretty simple equation, really:
I read. I read a lot. I spend over a thousand dollars per year in
your stores, year in, year out. I’d conservatively estimate that
you’ve made about $15,000 in revenue from me over the years, give or
take.
Bookselling is an incredibly competitive industry. You know as well
as I do that I can just as easily buy my books at amazon.com or
bookdepository.co.uk at a far cheaper price than your inflated usury.
But often I don’t. About $1000 per year often.
There are two reasons (and only two reasons) why that’s the case.
The first reason is instant gratification: I can walk to your
store, find what I want, and buy it during my lunch break.
The second reason is that I don’t feel bad about being in your store.
Like the esteemed Mr. Hamilton says, you boast of being a “family owned
business,” which counts for something in my book (pun intended).
If I’m going to shop at a nasty profiteering chain-store, I’d at least
like it to be a nasty profiteering chain-store which doesn’t make me
feel, “ick.”
This is all a long-winded way of making sure you understand your
position in the value chain. A shorter version: “You have no
position in the value chain, unless I wish one upon you.”
So here’s the thing:
The first reason doesn’t mean I’ll shop at your store, because there
are lots of booksellers within three minutes walk of where I work.
The second reason only inspires me to shop at your store for as long
as I don’t feel bad about it.
And y’know what? It feels bad when I see people empowering
intellectual clusterpharques like Clive Hamilton, and completely reliable
censorious moralizing panic-merchants like Melinda Tankard-Reist.
So I’m offering you a deal:
You can choose to give oxygen to these oxygen thieves if you wish.
There’s nothing I can do to prevent you from bending to their will.
But there’s nothing you’ll then be able to do to maintain my
expenditure levels with you.
I expect to live for another 40 or 50 years, so I reckon that’s
about $50,000 in 2011 money you’ll miss out on if you even *APPEAR*
to entertain the notion of paying the slightest bit of attention
to Hamilton and Tankard-Reist. I absolutely swear, on a stack of
bibles I’ll buy at other peoples’ bookstores, that I will never
spend another cent in any of your shops for as long as I live if you
behave in the way these vapid spittle-cannons want you to behave.
Or you can ignore them, and maintain the status quo. You’ll keep
getting money, I’ll keep getting instant gratification and happiness.
Or you can (how can I put this) tell them to go and get f’ed,
loudly and publicly, making a big high-profile noise about
protecting the freedom to read that your entire business relies on.
I know you’re looking for a way to compete with online booksellers,
so let me tell you that that’d probably be enough to make me stop
shopping at bookdepository.co.uk, and you’d see a consequent
increase in revenue from me.
Your choice.
And mine.
– mark
I’m just sending this link, a poem by the wife of a porn addict
disturbing and challenging
(I’m sure how to post links, you might have to cut and paste)
http://www.challies.com/quotes/i-looked-for-love-in-your-eyes
Not just Dymocks – Angus and Robertson (which is owned by Borders now?) is also selling the same thing.
Thank you, Clive and Melinda, for this post.
Although the sales assistant said ‘it’s not porn really”, she was also ‘a little embarrassed’. Of course she was. The fact that pornography is everywhere is embarrassing; it’s an embarrassing and shameful statement of our inability, as a society, to stop the pornography juggernaut from permeating areas of our every-day lives. Try to have a conversation with someone who loves porn and see where their eyes go. I guarantee they won’t be able to hold your gaze very long, because they know that their addiction is deeply troubling; they are ashamed and embarrassed.
I think a few people commenting are confusing erotica with mainstream pornography. There is nothing wrong with ‘nudity’. I don’t think anyone has ever said that on this website. A crucial problem with mainstream pornography, of which Playboy is the torchbearer, is not nudity, but the sexual degradation of women for men’s pleasure. I don’t think there’s anything necessarily wrong with watching two people have sex who want to have sex and want you watch. But that’s not what mainstream pornography is about.
To those of you who believe pornography doesn’t harm women, I recommend reading Gail Dines’ work to come up to speed with the debates about pornography: http://gaildines.com/
@Emma: “Try to have a conversation with someone who loves porn and see where their eyes go. I guarantee they won’t be able to hold your gaze very long, because they know that their addiction is deeply troubling; they are ashamed and embarrassed.”
Try to have a conversation with someone about their sex lives and see where their eyes go. I guarantee they won’t be able to hold your gaze very long, regardless of how loving and healthy their sex life is. That doesn’t make their sex lives wrong, it just means there is a whole lot of guilt and stigma associated with sex that isn’t healthy. A lot of that is inherited from the patriarchal Christian tradition, and the desire to control people’s, and particularly women’s, sex lives.
Great, just great. At first it was the petrol stations moving the ‘lad’s mags’ so close to the counter I couldn’t fill up my car without being exposed to pornographic pictures and headlines. Then my local newsagent decided to pop their old adult material at the front of the shop so I couldn’t buy a bus ticket without getting some bonus breasts I never asked to see. Now I can’t even walk into Dymocks without having porn shoved down my throat?
I DON’T WANT TO VIEW, READ OR ENCOUNTER PORNOGRAPHIC MATERIALS. Why is this so hard for so many people to understand, along with the fact that I have a right to say no to virtual sex, as surely as I have a right to say no to physical sex? Why are the sexual desires of those who wish to use porn more important than those who don’t? Why should I have to change so many aspects of my life in order to avoid feeling violated, to protect my mind, to protect my child? Why am I so often considered the ‘dysfunctional’ one for thinking it’s wrong to want to be able to say ‘no’ and be respected?
Can’t wait to write to Dymocks (and I guess now A&R too) and ask them if they think the profits they’re going to make from joining in the exploitation of human sexuality is worth the customers they’re going to lose over this.
I wrote to Dymocks and complained:
I am shocked that a “family owned business” and one that promotes the NSW premier’s reading challenge is selling a boxed set of the first ten years of playboy. Playboy is pornography. It portrays women as objects and things that have no worth outside their appearance. Having the set in a place easily seen by children contributes to the normalisation of pornography in our society. It is not normal. It is damaging to people and especially children.
My children and I love to buy books. We love to wander in book stores and look at and buy new books. We will not be going into Dymocks until this set has been removed from shelves and we will be encouraging family and friends to also shop elsewhere.
Please remove the playboy boxed set.
Sincerely
Karryn Thiele
This is the email response I got from Dymocks:
Dear Karryn
Thank you for your email detailing your concerns with relation to Dymocks offering for sale the Playboy boxed set which presents a background to the first ten years of magazine covers of this publication.
Dymocks carries a very wide range of products catering for an even wider range of tastes. Publications that are available for general sale are not normally censored by retailers and we do not see censorship as our role. My observation of this particular book is that its packaging is subtle and would require it to be opened to offend.
I have asked that copies are moved to an appropriate position in the store; not in high traffic or highly visible locations
Thank you once again for raising this issue; we do appreciate your feedback.
Yours sincerely,
Steve Cox
GERALDINE’S LETTER TO DYMOCKS 13 January 2011 by email
I am really disappointed to see that Dymocks is selling a Playboy box set. You say on your website that you are a family company but pornography destroys families. It ruins marriages and harms children. I can’t believe that women who work for Dymocks thing that selling this nasty product is at all acceptable. I won’t buy anything from Dymocks even again and I am telling my friends to also avoid your stores.
DYMOCKS REPLY TO GERALDINE 17 January 2010 by email:
Dear Geraldine
Thank you for your email detailing your concerns with relation to Dymocks offering for sale the Playboy boxed set which presents a background to the first ten years of magazine covers of this publication.
Dymocks carries a very wide range of products catering for an even wider range of tastes. Publications that are available for general sale are not normally censored by retailers and we do not see censorship as our role. My observation of this particular book is that its packaging is subtle and would require it to be opened to offend.
I have asked that copies are moved to an appropriate position in the store; not in high traffic or highly visible locations
Thank you once again for raising this issue; we do appreciate your feedback.
Yours sincerely,
Steve Cox
General Manager – Buying, Marketing & Operations
Dymocks Group of Companies
Level 6, 428 George Street
GPO Box 1521
Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia
Direct Tel: 02 9224 0420 Direct Fax 02 9224 9402
Mobile: 0406 380 908
http://www.dymocks.com.au
Dymocks Franchise opportunities now available! Call 1800 643 303
Show me 100 men who hate pornography, and I’ll show you at least 90 liars.
So that proves that most men are vile misogynists-of course it does!
Cheers,Robert
That must be Dymocks standard reply then – I got exactly the same response word for word.
Dymocks stores are franchised. If any person has a complaint about stock on the shelves they should be talking to the owner of that particular store. All the stores are responsible for buying their own stock, so not every store would have this Playboy boxset on their shelves.