Sometimes I get a bit riled up and do a bit of a dissertation on some current affair or other. It’s usually something that’s been in the media a while, usually to saturation point and I get a bit sick of that and feel compelled to share my oh-so-unique insights on it.I would do this more but I usually just can’t be bothered; I’m not quick enough on the uptake to get my thoughts into some coherent form. This happened with the Bill Henson thing and it was a bit of a post script when I actually got around to writing something. Even then it was a bit half-arsed.
But the issue has raised its head again after Art Monthly published a very tame image on the cover of a young girl who had no clothes on. A bit of a publicity stunt probably but they say it’s in protest of the furore that ensued after Henson’s work was confiscated from a Sydney gallery.
So I’d like to make two points about it while it’s still relevant. And they’re my opinions, which you can feel free to disagree with if you want.
The thing that annoyed me from the beginning about the whole debate over the images in question is that the frame of reference by which we were being asked to view the images was through the eyes of a paedophile. I don’t think it’s fair to impose a standard on the whole of society because a very small percentage may get the wrong idea about something. I don’t want to have to ask myself whether a p/phile would get his rocks off whenever I look at a picture on a wall. Who else would I have to be worried about? What would a murderer think? What would a foot fetishist think? What would a Liberal voter think? What would a [insert religious following here] think?
A fellow blogger made the point that nasty p/philes get off looking at ads for bathers in the Target catalogues. Yet there’s no call to ban department store publications. If the result is the same gratification from a fetish, why does one depiction have calls for it to be banned and not the other? People are becoming frantic whenever they see a bit of under-18 skin, almost as if they’re afraid p/philia may be contagious and they might catch it if they look at bare kiddy bums.
The second point I want to make, related to this is the way politicians try to speak for the entire population on a moral issue. Now, the PM, from what I’ve seen in my admittedly limited exposure to interviews on the topic, has at least prefaced his comments by saying they’re his personal views. He said Henson’s images were ‘revolting’, from memory. It’s a shame he feels that way. I’d hate for him to see my daughters’ bums and say they’re revolting. How can you say the depiction of a certain thing is revolting yet not say the thing itself is.
Anyway, Mr Nelson, who doesn’t even represent a majority of Australian voters since his party lost the last election (a fact they still seem to be having trouble coming to terms with), has said Art Monthly is sending a “two-fingered salute to the rest of society” as if it’s AM against Dr Nelson and his loyal, every-single-person-in-the-country posse.
It’s pathetic. I wish politicians, who are elected largely on their economic credentials, would just shut their fucking mouths (sorry, Gordon Ramsay is on TV right now) and leave the moralising to those qualified to impose their morals on society at large. By whom, I mean no one.
