See, that's why I gravitate more to amateur and homemade porn than the commercial stuff: the commercial ones always seem to target men to the Nth degree.
I don't find watching a guy sitting or lying there doing nothing while the woman (or women) and her breasts bounce around like he's a trampoline sexy. I like my men on the active side.
And what's with all the blowjobs? I actually skip parts which have blowjobs because I have zero interest in watching other people do it. What am I supposed to think? Am I supposed to think about what it would be like for the woman to blow my non-existant dick, or how giving some guy head while he's grabbing my hair and tries to splooge on my face would be nice?
Plus they're always so campy. I'm more likely to laugh at the sheer idiocy of it all than actually get turned on.
@Mally: yeah, SERIOUSLY. The fact that anyone is even thinking "I just don't understand why women aren't crrrrrazy about porn like men are?!" is ridiculous if you've actually seen any and know what's in there. I watch it, but most of the stuff that really gets me off is still the product of my imagination(/good memories) because what's on camera is all utterly designed for guys.
People act like the demographics divide is as arbitrary as the cliche of women liking romance and men liking action in the theatres, seemingly forgetting that porn is about sex and your tastes in sex are directly informed by your gender/orientation. (edit: that is, no matter how much you like giving head, the giver's enjoyment is gonna max out at "majorly turned on" while the receiver actually gets to get off, and you're probably not going to be looking at porn if your fantasies max out at "being kinda horny." Reach for the sky, right?)
I want to hear men moaning instead of ladies making that annoying cat-like whine. I want to see his hips grinding riiiight against that clit instead of carefully angled out of the shot so the camera sees maximum vag exposure. I want to see doggy-style where he's sucking on her neck and reaching around her hips to rub her clit and she's running her fingers through his hair because that feels great, in a way that half an hour of BJ doesn't! I don't want to see some dickhead randomly strangling the lady he's fucking, I don't want to see semen get in anyone's eye and I sure as fuck don't want to see ass-to-mouth. If guys had to sit through scenes of male porn stars licking a shit-and-e.-coli-coated ice cream cone during every other random porn, I think they'd be a little warier about the content too.
Honestly, when shit like that is mainstream and anal is ubiquitous, I suspect that any guy who acts shocked at the concept of porn being degrading is just being disingenuous.
PS I propose that Jezebel makes it illegal to brag about the awesome homemade/amateur stuff you've found without throwing some links out there, just sayin.
@dj: Oh yes, the moaning! If I wanted to hear women screaming so badly I'd just watch some cheap, B-grade horror flick. It would be more entertaining and just as much a turn on or lack thereof. Now men making (realistic) noise, now that's yummy and too rare. Sometimes I watch videos of guys just masturbating for the noise alone...
And the manhandling in mainstream porn is such a turn off. I'm not one to think that sex is all about love, sugar and rainbows, but geez, if you want a woman to change positions or something, tell her! Don't grab her out of the blue and try posing her like she's a blowup doll. I have no qualms about turning off the porn in those cases, because I find it such a turn off when men act like only THEIR needs are important and screw the comfort of the women (pun not intended).
Heh, I wish I could post links (what are Jez's policies on linking to NSFW material, anyway?) but I never bookmarked the links due to snoopy mother risk. It makes me sad now that I think about it, 'cause I waded through so much mediocre stuff (and before a sponsor filter was put in place) to find them. I don't even know if they were as good as I remember them being :(
This is exactly right. I couldn't have put it better myself. It definitely accounts for gender differences in porn viewing.
But I think a lot of women still watch porn, anyway, even if they aren't the target audience. They'll just skip the stuff that doesn't do anything for them and go for whatever does, like guy on guy or whatever. Maybe women just aren't as open to admitting their porn use than men are.
I don't know if this is the whole story - i think women and porn has a lot to do wtih access.
When I was reading the other article this weekend about women not watching porn, I realized that if I wanted to find porn on my own, I would have no idea where to look. I mean, google porn? God knows what I'd find. Would I have to pay for it? Guys download free porn... but from where? I have NO IDEA.
Guys, from a young age, have brothers/cousins/neighbors/friends mentioning good sites, trading links, sharing porn memberships (they mentioned it in Superbad, remember?) Women don't have that.
Why don't men read romance novels? Because they know where to get real porn!!!
"You can usually tell when you're in the intended audience" This really blew my mind. Not hard to do these days as I'm sleep deprived, but woah Ms Marcotte. Way to go.
I think that's at the heart of it: women aren't the target audience and can figure that out. I think it's very much the same with click flick vs. manly men action movies: the intended audience is different. I love action movies and hate chick flicks, but I have to say, there are times at action movies where I feel very much "the other". I think it's something women get accustomed to more or less.
@HarpMadness: Porn is sexual gratification without all that messy going out and hooking up with someone. I've never found it enticing or sexy -- people just look silly having sex.
@HarpMadness: My favourite bit of watching the trailers is "guess the intended audience", I think once out of the last six movies I've been to see has the intended audience been "female aged 18-24"
Once as a job benefit for working at a cable company, I got free porn on my cable. I think I watched it non-stop for the first month and the novelty wore off and I went back to watching Golden Girls reruns.
Rom coms is the most difficult genre to pull off. Everyone knows the couple is going to end up together so how do you make it interesting?
Back in the day sexual tension (even if you never saw the couple have any) provided a lot of the humor and subtext. Can't really use that today. Today it's all about "high concept". To me these movies seem like marketing ideas in search of a film.
All movies regardless of genre need conflict. What conflict can you come up with in a Rom Com that doesn't ring false? That is what a lot of writers struggle with.
I can't even get into what gets greenlit and how it's marketed. It's too depressing.
@nyc-caribbean-ragazza: I think the problem is that most writers don't struggle with it. I think the ones who do, make great films. I really like your line about marketing ideas, though, I'd never thought of it that way! Very true.
I love the classic screwball stuff but I'm amazed no one's mentioned Clueless as a great rom-com. In some ways it does play into some stereotypes but it doesn't take them that seriously.
@VincentioCresphontes: I loved the movie! It both totally buys into the stereotypes, all the while giving them the finger. I like that contradiction. It's refreshing. And their outfits make me miss the mid-90's like whoah.
I find Marcotte's post an unappealing serving of polemic. While romantic comedies are increasingly marketed as a series of vignettes involving high-end luxury goods and the thirst for the world's greatest wedding, the quest for self is the underlying plot in all romantic comedies.
Speaking as a recent graduate of a top university, I can assure Marcotte that almost all of my female friends adore romantic comedies even when they are steaming piles starring Kate Hudson. As much as I hate to admit it, I ventured to see Bride Wars last weekend and while the movie succeeds on few levels, it has one winning subplot-- the same plot that makes films as weirdly misogynistic as 27 Dresses palatable and almost satisfying.
Romantic Comedies are not about men or clothes or weddings, they are about women coming of age, and in the process confronting the effects of a repressive patriarchy. Romantic Comedies may not reflect some ideal world, but the struggle of self that they present is accessible, identifiable, and unpretentious.
Certainly, many romantic comedies are not worth their weight in Splenda, but that does not mean that we need to damn the whole genre. In some ways, damning the genre reeks of self-hatred, as though women who enjoy Romantic Comedies-- and other denizens of the women's film ghetto-- have somehow sold out the cause of feminism.
Rather than spitting on the genre, why can't we recognize that the genre will always be divisive because it is about wish-fulfillment and identity, and everyone has a unique flavor of this that they are looking for. Until then, articles such as Marcotte's only serve to highlight the naivete and intolerance with which some view the genre.
@sweetchilisauce: Well, speaking as an almost graduate from a decent university, I can tell you that most of my female friends find romcoms to be somewhat demeaning, mindless, and a little nauseating to watch. But maybe that's because we weren't at a top uni.
I would argue that they ARE, in fact, about men and weddings, along with the ever-present noble quest for true and unadulterated lifelong love. I don't think they're necessarily about coming of age - how about The Wedding Planner? Clearly a dopey chick flick, and she's not struggling with her sense of self or her age. And how about How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days? She's not struggling with anything except how to get rid of a man in ten days or less. And whoops, she fell in love along the way.
I also disagree that disliking chick flicks means I reek of self-hatred. Disliking a genre doesn't mean I'm a self-loathing wart, it just means I don't like it. I also dislike violent films, does that mean I hate myself, too? I don't like when films wrap up perfectly into a neat ever-after package, I think it's unrealistic and annoying. I'm left with the answer in my lap - love! always love! - and don't have anything further to think about. It's mindless and mind-numbing. I would rather be pushed to think about it later, to ponder what it meant, to think about how I can fit its morals into my life. How can I grow as a person? As a graduate from a top university, you assuredly are familiar with the Kafka quote - A book (or movie, in this case) must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us. If I'm going to spend two hours of my life watching a film, I would like to feel like a better person for having done so, rather than feeling my IQ slowly drop, and being left with an empty hole where my broken-until-I-fix-him-and-he-shows-me-t...
I-am-worthy-of-love white knight ought to be. Why is the search for a man so important? Why am I not complete on my own, with or without this sappy and gushy true love? That, to me, is what has sold-out as far as feminism is concerned - the idea that I am not complete, or am severely less happy and fulfilled if I am not in love or happily married to a man.
Had you read all our comments again, or perhaps with the critical eye with which you enjoy viewing silly movies, you may have seen that we are not generally damning an entire genre. Rather, we are damning the largest steaming piles, and raising up those which were worthy of our time. Hortense and other commenters pointed out that Apatow's films are pretty good, and there were 136 replies in a thread asking about a good romantic comedy. Clearly, we are able to come up with romcoms that are worth their weight in Splenda. Hell, some are even worth their weight in real sugar.
Surely your top university had the good sense to encourage critical thinking skills, one of which would be reading all possible evidence before passing judgment or proffering your own relevant views on a given subject. Or, you know, damning those who came before you, along the way insulting an entire community of people who have been having a pretty enjoyable discussion before you stepped in and, from your lofty ivory tower of self-importance, told us, with as much disdain and pretentious attitude as you could muster on a Sunday evening, that all we're intolerant, naive, and self-hating for disliking something you have deemed worthy of your well-educated time.
Am I the only person who thought The Holiday was a good non-stereotypical romantic comedy? Both the guys were sincere and, well, not-douchey, and the women were both sane and neither of them were obsessed with the idea of getting married.
Maybe I'm just biased because of my girlcrush on Kate Winslet.
@anne_boleyn: Wasn't the You've Got Mail guy a dick, though? He was sweet in letter, but in person I vaguely remember him being a douche.
Fun fact: Did you know You've Got Mail is a remake? It was an old 40's film The Shop Around the Corner. Cute flick, if you liked You've Got Mail! [us.imdb.com]
07/27/09
07/27/09
I don't find watching a guy sitting or lying there doing nothing while the woman (or women) and her breasts bounce around like he's a trampoline sexy. I like my men on the active side.
And what's with all the blowjobs? I actually skip parts which have blowjobs because I have zero interest in watching other people do it. What am I supposed to think? Am I supposed to think about what it would be like for the woman to blow my non-existant dick, or how giving some guy head while he's grabbing my hair and tries to splooge on my face would be nice?
Plus they're always so campy. I'm more likely to laugh at the sheer idiocy of it all than actually get turned on.
07/27/09
People act like the demographics divide is as arbitrary as the cliche of women liking romance and men liking action in the theatres, seemingly forgetting that porn is about sex and your tastes in sex are directly informed by your gender/orientation. (edit: that is, no matter how much you like giving head, the giver's enjoyment is gonna max out at "majorly turned on" while the receiver actually gets to get off, and you're probably not going to be looking at porn if your fantasies max out at "being kinda horny." Reach for the sky, right?)
I want to hear men moaning instead of ladies making that annoying cat-like whine. I want to see his hips grinding riiiight against that clit instead of carefully angled out of the shot so the camera sees maximum vag exposure. I want to see doggy-style where he's sucking on her neck and reaching around her hips to rub her clit and she's running her fingers through his hair because that feels great, in a way that half an hour of BJ doesn't! I don't want to see some dickhead randomly strangling the lady he's fucking, I don't want to see semen get in anyone's eye and I sure as fuck don't want to see ass-to-mouth. If guys had to sit through scenes of male porn stars licking a shit-and-e.-coli-coated ice cream cone during every other random porn, I think they'd be a little warier about the content too.
Honestly, when shit like that is mainstream and anal is ubiquitous, I suspect that any guy who acts shocked at the concept of porn being degrading is just being disingenuous.
PS I propose that Jezebel makes it illegal to brag about the awesome homemade/amateur stuff you've found without throwing some links out there, just sayin.
07/27/09
And the manhandling in mainstream porn is such a turn off. I'm not one to think that sex is all about love, sugar and rainbows, but geez, if you want a woman to change positions or something, tell her! Don't grab her out of the blue and try posing her like she's a blowup doll. I have no qualms about turning off the porn in those cases, because I find it such a turn off when men act like only THEIR needs are important and screw the comfort of the women (pun not intended).
Heh, I wish I could post links (what are Jez's policies on linking to NSFW material, anyway?) but I never bookmarked the links due to snoopy mother risk. It makes me sad now that I think about it, 'cause I waded through so much mediocre stuff (and before a sponsor filter was put in place) to find them. I don't even know if they were as good as I remember them being :(
07/27/09
But I think a lot of women still watch porn, anyway, even if they aren't the target audience. They'll just skip the stuff that doesn't do anything for them and go for whatever does, like guy on guy or whatever. Maybe women just aren't as open to admitting their porn use than men are.
07/27/09
When I was reading the other article this weekend about women not watching porn, I realized that if I wanted to find porn on my own, I would have no idea where to look. I mean, google porn? God knows what I'd find. Would I have to pay for it? Guys download free porn... but from where? I have NO IDEA.
Guys, from a young age, have brothers/cousins/neighbors/friends mentioning good sites, trading links, sharing porn memberships (they mentioned it in Superbad, remember?) Women don't have that.
Why don't men read romance novels? Because they know where to get real porn!!!
07/27/09
07/27/09
AND I read romance novels. Guy-on-guy romance novels.
Hmmm. I'm noticing a trend here.
07/27/09
07/27/09
07/27/09
07/27/09
07/27/09
07/27/09
07/27/09
02/02/09
Back in the day sexual tension (even if you never saw the couple have any) provided a lot of the humor and subtext. Can't really use that today. Today it's all about "high concept". To me these movies seem like marketing ideas in search of a film.
All movies regardless of genre need conflict. What conflict can you come up with in a Rom Com that doesn't ring false? That is what a lot of writers struggle with.
I can't even get into what gets greenlit and how it's marketed. It's too depressing.
02/02/09
02/01/09
02/02/09
02/01/09
Speaking as a recent graduate of a top university, I can assure Marcotte that almost all of my female friends adore romantic comedies even when they are steaming piles starring Kate Hudson. As much as I hate to admit it, I ventured to see Bride Wars last weekend and while the movie succeeds on few levels, it has one winning subplot-- the same plot that makes films as weirdly misogynistic as 27 Dresses palatable and almost satisfying.
Romantic Comedies are not about men or clothes or weddings, they are about women coming of age, and in the process confronting the effects of a repressive patriarchy. Romantic Comedies may not reflect some ideal world, but the struggle of self that they present is accessible, identifiable, and unpretentious.
Certainly, many romantic comedies are not worth their weight in Splenda, but that does not mean that we need to damn the whole genre. In some ways, damning the genre reeks of self-hatred, as though women who enjoy Romantic Comedies-- and other denizens of the women's film ghetto-- have somehow sold out the cause of feminism.
Rather than spitting on the genre, why can't we recognize that the genre will always be divisive because it is about wish-fulfillment and identity, and everyone has a unique flavor of this that they are looking for. Until then, articles such as Marcotte's only serve to highlight the naivete and intolerance with which some view the genre.
02/02/09
I would argue that they ARE, in fact, about men and weddings, along with the ever-present noble quest for true and unadulterated lifelong love. I don't think they're necessarily about coming of age - how about The Wedding Planner? Clearly a dopey chick flick, and she's not struggling with her sense of self or her age. And how about How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days? She's not struggling with anything except how to get rid of a man in ten days or less. And whoops, she fell in love along the way.
I also disagree that disliking chick flicks means I reek of self-hatred. Disliking a genre doesn't mean I'm a self-loathing wart, it just means I don't like it. I also dislike violent films, does that mean I hate myself, too? I don't like when films wrap up perfectly into a neat ever-after package, I think it's unrealistic and annoying. I'm left with the answer in my lap - love! always love! - and don't have anything further to think about. It's mindless and mind-numbing. I would rather be pushed to think about it later, to ponder what it meant, to think about how I can fit its morals into my life. How can I grow as a person? As a graduate from a top university, you assuredly are familiar with the Kafka quote - A book (or movie, in this case) must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us. If I'm going to spend two hours of my life watching a film, I would like to feel like a better person for having done so, rather than feeling my IQ slowly drop, and being left with an empty hole where my broken-until-I-fix-him-and-he-shows-me-t...
I-am-worthy-of-love white knight ought to be. Why is the search for a man so important? Why am I not complete on my own, with or without this sappy and gushy true love? That, to me, is what has sold-out as far as feminism is concerned - the idea that I am not complete, or am severely less happy and fulfilled if I am not in love or happily married to a man.
Had you read all our comments again, or perhaps with the critical eye with which you enjoy viewing silly movies, you may have seen that we are not generally damning an entire genre. Rather, we are damning the largest steaming piles, and raising up those which were worthy of our time. Hortense and other commenters pointed out that Apatow's films are pretty good, and there were 136 replies in a thread asking about a good romantic comedy. Clearly, we are able to come up with romcoms that are worth their weight in Splenda. Hell, some are even worth their weight in real sugar.
Surely your top university had the good sense to encourage critical thinking skills, one of which would be reading all possible evidence before passing judgment or proffering your own relevant views on a given subject. Or, you know, damning those who came before you, along the way insulting an entire community of people who have been having a pretty enjoyable discussion before you stepped in and, from your lofty ivory tower of self-importance, told us, with as much disdain and pretentious attitude as you could muster on a Sunday evening, that all we're intolerant, naive, and self-hating for disliking something you have deemed worthy of your well-educated time.
02/01/09
Maybe I'm just biased because of my girlcrush on Kate Winslet.
02/01/09
02/01/09
When Harry Met Sally.
Pride and Perjudice (which i refuse to watch in anyone elses presence as the ending makes me get all sappy)
Notting Hill
You've Got Mail was ok...
notice all the guys in these werent assholes? Rom-com is more fantasy than elves and faeries to me and damn it I want a GOOD man
i liked Zack and Miri Make a Porno
it was different, not the whole typical thing...
02/02/09
Fun fact: Did you know You've Got Mail is a remake? It was an old 40's film The Shop Around the Corner. Cute flick, if you liked You've Got Mail! [us.imdb.com]