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

domain, inviolate and sacred. Sex, a word potentially so inclusiveand evocative, is whittled down by the male so that, in fact, itmeans penile intromission. Commonly referred to as “it, ” sex isdefined in action only by what the male does with his penis.Fucking—the penis thrusting— is the magical, hidden meaning of“it, ” the reason for sex, the expansive experience through which themale realizes his sexual power. In practice, fucking is an act ofpossession— simultaneously an act of ownership, taking, force; it isconquering; it expresses in intimacy power over and against, bodyto body, person to thing. “T he sex act” means penile intromissionfollowed by penile thrusting, or fucking. T he woman is acted on;the man acts and through action expresses sexual power, the powerof masculinity. Fucking requires that the male act on one who hasless power and this valuation is so deep, so completely implicit inthe act, that the one who is fucked is stigmatized as feminine duringthe act even when not anatomically female. In the male system, sexis the penis, the penis is sexual power, its use in fucking ismanhood.Male sexual power is also expressed through an attitude orquality: virility. Defined first as manhood itself, virility in itssecondary meaning is vigor, dynamism (in the patriarchal dictionaryinevitably also called force). T he vitality inherent in virility as aquality is held to be an exclusive masculine expression of energy, inits basic character sexual, in its origin biological, traceable to thepenis itself. It is, in fact, an expression of energy, strength,ambition, and assertion. Defined by men and experienced bywomen as a form of male sexual power, virility is a dimension ofenergy and self-realization forbidden to women.Male sexual power is the substance of culture. It resonateseverywhere. T he celebration of rape in story, song, and science isthe paradigmatic articulation of male sexual power as a culturalabsolute. T he conquering of the woman acted out in fucking, herpossession, her use as a thing, is the scenario endlessly repeated,with or without direct reference to fucking, throughout the culture.In fucking, he is enlarged. As Woolf wrote, she is his mirror; bydiminishing her in his use of her he becomes twice his size. In the