I won't give too lengthy an introduction to last Saturday's thorough discussion of the politics and business of pornography in America, other than to ask: where else will you have feminism and Foucault intrude upon what is thought, generally, to be too taboo a topic to discuss in our public news sphere? From Mediaite's recap:
Harris-Perry noted that the question of who benefits is key to the discussion, with those who are adamantly against pornography not acknowledging that “hotel chains that show pornography, academics who write about pornography and sell their books” are among those who benefit. [Georgetown professor] Michael Eric Dyson agreed, “throw[ing] a little Foucault in there” to note that power “is distributed across the board,” and that the success of niche porn “an extraordinary view of affirmative action penetrating into the realm of pornography.”
That's just the beginning, folks. If you missed this discussion last week, I recommend making some time to not only watch it, but also read this from Amanda Hess, now of the forthcoming Tomorrow magazine. It's a terrific look from last November at the porn industry through the perspective of James Deen, a porn actor now trying to break into mainstream films.
The second half of the discussion is below the jump. See you all today at 10am ET, when we'll get it started with something that's definitely G-rated.