La Créme de porno

To a man, porn is like a juicy Big Mac: While it might be cheap, it's always piping hot, it satiates his appetite and it doesn't require a lot of fussy presentation. \nAin't no shame in it, boys. A man got to eat. \nBut Oxygen TV believes a woman's porno palate craves a more complex fusion of flavors. In its weekly anthology series titled "Bliss," a new soft-core tryst explores the life of today's independent woman -- how she comes to grips with her sexual frustration and finally allows herself a morsel of pleasure in a world that is competitive and male-dominated. \nIt's about 28 minutes of plot, character development and commercials, with about two real minutes of alluded-to sex. I say "alluded" because the most skin shown is the profile of a squashed breast against some dude's hand. In this case, arousal comes from merely suggested erotica -- no doubt, the filet mignon of visual stimulation. \nPlease pass the au jus. \nIn one episode, an executive woman searches an Internet dating service to find a partner for unattached, impersonal sex. When she receives an inquiry, she agrees to meet the man, but she rejects him when she realizes he wants a relationship. \n"I don't do romance," she says. \nCoincidentally, this man works for the tech support of her company. Naturally, computer problems happen, even to top businesswomen. When he answers a call to service a defunct hard drive, he ends up getting driven hard himself. \nCareer Lady: I don't like kissing endlessly, all right? I like it fast and to the point.\nHopeless Romantic Techie: You don't even know my name!\nLady: Now, let's not talk our way through this. Undo my blouse! Rip it! (He does.) Take off your clothes! (He does. He then tries to caress her shoulder, but she flinches.) Not like that! \nBut the techie gets the best of her, and in a sentimental final scene, she admits, "I may not be ready for romance, but what I do want is intimacy." \nThank God a man came along and showed her how to be a woman. \nI cringe to think how Oxygen has so poorly misrepresented the feminist movement. Lust is lust. Women do it just as their male counterparts do. Why give these characters fancy jobs, have them boss around men in bed, then apologize for being too horny -- or not horny enough? Porn geared toward a male audience doesn't try to psychoanalyze men, so why take the fun out of female-oriented porn? \nOxygen must feel that without an empowering message, pornography is just degrading to women. But the definition of the word "degradation" is subjective. The most important concept in the feminist movement is that a woman has the right to express herself however she deems appropriate and should not be forced to live by someone else's standard. For many centuries, women have been forced to suppress their sexual urges. Whether or not you find it appealing, porn portrays men and women as being equally sexual. That equality of sexual expression can be an empowering phenomenon in itself. \nThe concern is that women are used as "bodies," reducing them to objects. Even if that were true, women are just as much their physical forms as they are their emotions and intellect. No one seems to mind when women are represented as "brains" to the exclusion of their various other characteristics. To be a true feminist is to realize that no one expression of the gender is degrading when it is self-determined by the individual woman. \nThere's no need for any woman to have a guilty conscience about starring in porn or watching it. We simply don't need pretentious excuses to rationalize our fantasies. \nAin't no shame in it. A woman got to satisfy her hunger, too.