Pornography: Men Possessing Women, by: Andrea ... - Feminish

true parent but clearly not his parent. W hat more suitableobject of vengeful thoughts than the person who has usurpedthe parent’s place: the fairy-story step-parent? If one ventsvicious fantasies of revenge against such an evil usurper, thereis no reason to feel guilty or need to fear retaliation, becausethat figure clearly deserves it.. . . T hus, the fairy storypermits the child to have the best of both worlds; he can fullyengage in and enjoy revenge fantasies about the step-parent ofthe story, without any guilt or fear in respect to the trueparent. 9Notice the incredible obfuscation of gender: which fairy talesinvolve a wicked stepfather? T he male child is encouraged to learnthat the mothering female is wicked and is a “suitable object ofvengeful thoughts”; he is encouraged to enjoy fantasies of revengeagainst this figure who is more like his mother than she is likeanyone else; ideally, he will not feel guilt or fear. T he strategyendorsed by Bettelheim with reference to fairy tales is basic tochildren’s stories of all sorts: the male child is taught to experiencehis mother not as she is but as an object with symbolic meaning.T he adult male never seems to move beyond the boy enjoying hisfantasies of revenge on a female object, except in one respect: heacts, using real women. Still calling revenge fantasy, he acts.T he way in which the adult male acts was described with sublimeunderstatement and delicacy by pseudofeminist Havelock Ellis:“She is, on the physical side, inevitably the instrum ent in love; itm ust be his hand and his bow which evoke the m usic. ” 10 Rabidantifeminists Ferdinand Lundberg and Marynia F. Farnham makethe same point with less elegance:Here, we should again like to point out to female egalitarians,is a good place to ponder this fact: for the male, sex involves anobjective act of his doing but for the female it does not. As anact in which he is playing the leading role (leading, that is,within the confines of the copulatory process) it is bothsuperficially and deeply im portant to the male that it be carriedout without faltering. Any failure to carry through the act is bisfailure, not the woman’s. H er role is passive. It is not as easy as