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From: msimpson@bbncca.ARPA (Mike Simpson)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles,net.motss
Subject: Re: Miss America
Message-ID: <867@bbncca.ARPA>
Date: Mon, 30-Jul-84 12:39:41 EDT
Article-I.D.: bbncca.867
Posted: Mon Jul 30 12:39:41 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 31-Jul-84 01:54:39 EDT
References: <2826@ut-sally.UUCP>
Organization: Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Cambridge, Ma.
Lines: 57

***
30 July 1984.

	This may be construed as stretching the point a bit, but
here goes nothing.

	Last week (I think it was Tuesday, 7/23) Cable News
Network's CROSSFIRE program had on a female vice-president of
Penthouse and a spokeswoman from NOW, debating the whole Vanessa
Williams affair.  I was horrified by two things:

	1) The speed with which the confrontation (if you watched
it, you'd agree with me that it was hardly a 'discussion')
shifted from 'was it right for Miss Williams to give up her
crown' to an argument over the magazine's First Amendment rights
to publish the pictures.  COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT!

	2) The intense 'power trips' that both women were on.

	To the NOW speaker, all pornography was an expression of this
society's violence against women, and the obvious solution was to
pass laws against it.

	Wasn't this once the land of the free?
        Whatever happened to the pressures of the marketplace --
i.e., don't legislate against sales of porn, rather educate
people not to buy pornography that in your opinion degrades
women?  (Side note -- I have heard few, if any, women talk about
gay pornography.  Why?)

        The Penthouse representative stoutly maintained that
Penthouse did not discriminate against women, that many of the
positions of power in Penthouse were filled by women, and that
the magazine was willing to defend Miss Williams against the
pageant's decision and to offer her a job promoting the magazine.
Of course, right after that came Guccione's remark about Williams
being a 'shameful, deceitful little girl' who was now paying the
price for 'trying to put one over on the pageant' and who 'denied
another, possibly more worthy girl' of winning the title -- a
remark that speaks volumes.  (But I digress.)

        Each speaker ran roughshod over the other, and over
'moderators' Tom Braden and Pat Buchanan.  Each one was more
certain of the 'wrongness' of her adversary's position that of
the 'rightness' of her own. Fortunately, perhaps, the speakers
were not physically on the same set -- a very undignified battle
wouldn't have been out of the question. 

	Did anyone else see that CROSSFIRE show, and care to
comment on it?  Mail responses, or post them.  
		-- Mike Simpson, msimpson@bbncca.{arpa,uucp}
-- 
-- your obedient servant,
   Mike Simpson, BBN
   msimpson@bbn-unix (ARPA)
   {decvax,ihnp4,ima,linus,wjh12}!bbncca!msimpson (Usenet)
   617-497-2819 (Ma Bell)