'Pornographers Against Free Press' Plan Weekend Protest

I am with Matt Smith on this one. Not his characterization of Kink, per se, which is a little squeamish for the land of the Folsom Street Fair, and not with respect to whether it should be ok or not for BAYVAC to service a particular entity, but that Matt is entirely within his rights to call this stuff out. The fact of the matter is that the entire history of Kink in the City has been one of exposing a huge fissure in the coalition of the so-called progressives who tend to speak out of both sides of their mouths when it comes to "family values" and San Francisco values. Case in point, gay gentrification (they vilify it), "family housing" (versus hipster lofts) and so on. In the land of Mission hipsterism, where an affordable apparel retailer (AA) is shot down, but ultra-exclusive and pricey shops are allowed to flourish, the hypocrisy is laughable.

Well, I'll state right off that first, I too was absolutely appalled by your article and am completely disgusted by how you've let yourself become a mouthpiece for the cranky and crank-ish neocon feminism of Melissa Farley. AND I am against the demand that you pull the article in question.

At the same time, I don't think consumer boycotts are a form of censorship, and in fact, I think its in the best First Amendment tradition that segments of the community that you're hurting by your straight-up ignorant stance on BDSM and sex work trying their best to make sure their consumer dollars don't end up in your pocket through the businesses they support. I might also point out that your friend Melissa Farley supports such tactics over a broad range of media that "glamorize" pornography and prostitution, including, ironically, consumer (and maybe even legislative) action against weeklies like yours that carry sex industry advertising.

However, asking that the article be pulled after its been published is not remotely a reasonable demand (though as far as I can tell, this is only the demand of one person) and one that contradicts the larger pro-free expression goals on "our side" of the fence.

Matt's "journalism" was about as bad as a Bay Guardian hit piece...and he left out a lot of facts that didn't fit his opinions.

That's fine, that's his right, and others have the right to call out his bullshit too. Just like the Weekly does when the Bay Guardian plays "selective facts" with their hit pieces on the Weekly.

So bullshit away, hippies, just remember you're no better than any other stupid alt weekly in this little town.

First of all it has nothing to do with porn.

It has to do with your hateful language towards a community who's paramount purpose is "safe, sane and consensual".

It's not a "massive protest" rallying call-it's educating a community about the views of the SF Weekly and You,Matt Smith.

Calling public dismay about his badly-researched article "a mass protest movement among pornographers opposed to freedom of the press" is BS of the highest caliber. None of the people I work with at Kink.com are against press freedom nor behind the boycott. Smith's forte is clearly pulling sweeping generalizations out of his ass and publishing them.

Smith misses, or ignores, the true mood of the angry mob. What most of us are mad about is not his exercise of free speech, but his complete lack of journalistic responsibility in mischaracterizing both BDSM and the narrow-minded medivalism behind barring Kink employees from ETP training. The fact that he printed only the elements that served his point -- which seemed to be that BDSM is icky and wrong and taxpayers shouldn't fund its production -- yet completely neglected to talk to any BDSM practitioners, working BDSM models, or Kink employees affected by the loss of ETP training means that anything he writes is laughable, self-serving propaganda.

I don't ask that Smith be gagged, but that he simply be held accountable for his total lack of integrity or professionalism in spreading the equivalent of salacious gossip disguised as news.

You know what – after reading over all of the comments in that article, I think its pretty safe to conclude that you, Matt, are full of it in your response here. There is no mass call for having the article pulled or forcing you to retract the article. That seems to be the opinion of one commentator and the poster of the anonymous flyer (who may or may not be the same person). From what I can see from see, that commentators inarticulateness and extremism was not well-received by others who chose to comment on that statement.

Nonetheless, for your part, rather than chose to either engage with the very real criticisms of what a lot of people see as yellow journalism on your part, you've focused on that one commentator, then blown that up into a very ill-conceived "the porn industry is trying to censor me" rant.

You know, if you really want to be taken seriously as a journalist or public commentator (rather than as just a mean-spirited petty nosegoblin), maybe being a little more thoughtful and engaging than the face you've put forward in this blog post might be called for.

Dear Mr. Smith-
My contact information is on your voice mail. I'd love to engage in a public debate or discussion with you. Let's get this off the net and into a live arena!
As Always
Mz B.

I read Mr. Smith's most recent attempt to wrap himself in the constitution for his poor journalism. In reading the responses to his inital article, you see that the primary target was not his right to publish the article, but that publishing an article that is poorly researched, edited and biased is a bad judgment call on the part of the weekly. Now Mr. Smith attempts to save his reputation by a single response out of over 50 fit his attempt to wrap himself in the constitution, to save what is left of his reputation.
Shame Mr. Smith, Shame.

Well I just read this article. You guys have complete freedom to write what you want.

A local paper should represent the local people and their views and beliefs. The bay area is a haven of sexual freedom. This poorly written article denies all of that. The author has not done his research and the words used to describe acts of bondage and S&M show that. This is not torture or obscene.

This wording of this article really reflects badly on the editors of the SF weekly. The worst part is that when people do decide to protest.. you make fun of it.

It must be pretty lonely up their on your high horse looking down at people who make adult films.

Also for a paper that seems to be so against porn or obscene or adult acts .. you seem to have no problem taking money from escorts. I find all types of ads for escorts in the back pages of this paper.

Maybe I should write an article about that.

So Matt, you're for a free press when you want to trash a business because you don't approve of their product but against a free press when people trash your business because they don't approve of your writing?

Hey Matt! You may want to note some of the intelligent comments, which were not ad hominem nor were they against the free press, on this post on SFist. Most people seem to think denying adult industry video editors technical training based on the product their employer sells displays a new, prudish low and doesn't particularly reflect well on the Weekly. Your article seemed to come from a place of personal disgust and shock and less from a place of understanding. How many actual porn models did you interview for the piece, "torture porn" or otherwise? Where do you get off comparing fetish porn with "CIA-style" torture? That just makes you sound ignorant, friend.

Too bad for Matt Smith BAVC doesn't offer classes on how not to be a douchebag.

It's been two years since I wrote and published this article on AVNOnline.com about Kink's acquisition of the SF Armory - seems timely based the substandard "Witch Hunt" article the SFWeekly regurgitated the other day. Enjoy - http://bit.ly/ATgoV

Thanks for the consideration.

Is anyone planning to boycott the ETP? You know, the people who actually made the decision to withhold funding from porn industry employees? Or do they get a free pass on this one.

We just ran a story on this ...

http://carnalnation.com/content/5685/10/sf-weekly-does-hit-job-kinkcoms-training-funds

How does one boycott the ETP? As far as I know, that's funded by a mandatory payroll tax.

An article on the way ETP funds are used could have been provocative and insightful but instead of rising to the challenge you were insulting and cowardly.

To say that we're trying to silence you is ridiculous. You've been linked, blogged, and quoted quite a bit in the past couple of days earning you a lot of publicity. Congratulations! You have a name we will remember for awhile and from the way your article read it didn't take a lot of work on your end at all.

Calling this "sexualized torture" is inappropriate to say the least. We all know what the definition of torture is by now and to portray what they are doing as torture, almost whitewashes the real criminality of horrific actions on defenseless people who actually fear for their lives, not as entertainment but rather persecution. Also I don't think that making constitutionality claims is the way to determine funding or not. What is the intent of the funding mission and is giving it to kink.com fulfilling this goal?

Shame on you Matt Smith for clouding your coverage with subtle innacuracies, but then again, if they aren't talking about you then your not important...right?

Mr curious blue, don't you have anything better to do with your time than stalk and defame melissa farley all over the internet?
Isn't it enough for you to plant garbage on her wiki, or talk garbage on the range of blogs you frequent? Nobody's going to steal your porn stash IACB, fear not. What we will be doing is to continue to highlight the cultural - and other - harms propogated by kink.com and the rest of your beloved pornographers.
I'm sure that the endless supply of women's bodies being degraded for your viewing pleasure will continue to be available on demand.

I don't fancy the idea of being whipped or burned, but I also recognize the right of any person to express themselves sexually as they wish, as long as it's consensual. Matt Smith should be ashamed for letting his personal feelings lead him to such biased, poorly researched journalism. Or is this perhaps some kind of reaction formation? Thanks for letting your repressed nature hurt the San Francisco economy, Matt.

Wow,

Matt, you've always been a tremendously talented though equally 'odd' bird. The only thing I can make of this superficial pile of shit you've defecated in front of your boudoir computer station is that you either are like really really really afraid you'll lose your job and want to grab onto a sensationalistic topic or that you're a closeted wannabe and like really really really want someone to tie you up and gag you and do 'it' to you.

Which is it my favorite SF writer?

h.

I just stumbled across this drama, so perhaps I am missing something fundamental.

But Matt, are you truly writing here about your own work in the third-person? "The column in question..." "the Matt Smith opinion column..."

And in response to opinion of your evidently cowardly reporting you wrote this with a straight face? -- "But I'm told perverse postures are standard fare at Kink.com's Old Armory headquarters."

When faced with opposing opinion, you state others have a serious misunderstanding of journalism. You are entitled to a stance, but so far all I have read of your self-declared journalistic efforts is limp, sophomoric paper-writing. You are not a journalist, not by a mile. And you are a very poor writer.

Do you mean to say that the First Amendment [b]requires[/b] us to buy advertisements in publications we disagree with. If that's true, I just can't understand how any newspaper in this great land is failing.

just face it matt.

you're pretty much a piece of shit.

live with it.

The notion of "hate speech" has been so watered down that it doesn't have much of an impact anymore. I've seen that accusation thrown at people for defending GBLT rights (supposedly hate speech against conservatively religious immigrants), pointing out the baking-to-death risk of leaving a baby in a car on a hot day(supposedly hate speech against parents), telling other women that a creepy guy who she still gave a chance in case he was a shy nice guy turned out to not understand other people have minds too and raped and nearly killed her (supposedly hate speech against autism), pointing out that a brothel is not an ideal foster care program (supposedly hate speech against children abused by their parents), etc.

sickofcuriousblue says:

"Mr curious blue, don't you have anything better to do with your time than stalk and defame melissa farley all over the internet?"

And don't you have anything better to do than be one of Farley's anonymous web peons, ready to pop out of the sky and fight vigilantly for the good name of Melissa Farley?

"What we will be doing is to continue to highlight the cultural - and other - harms propogated by kink.com and the rest of your beloved pornographers."

Who, other than Farley, in this instance is "we"?

And I'd be happy to debate the so-called "cultural harm" of pornography, which when it comes right down to it is based upon misinterpreted studies and outright junk science, filtered through what is essentially a fundamentalist feminism. Countering this misinformation is one of the reasons I blog.

There's plenty of intelligent discussion to be had around pornography, however, the "radical feminist" movement Farley represents is to pornography what Scientology is to psychotherapy. I often wonder if members of the mainstream media, like Matt Smith, really know what they're getting on board with when they endorse the likes of Farley.

If we taxpayers are paying for it, the least they could do is let us watch.

You're some piece of work, pal.

Final thoughts,

Smith's a great writer who sometimes turns out poorly researched and biased shit. Hey, we all do. His pieces on SFO's attempts to take over 3rd world airports was Pulitzer level material. His cartoons of Newsom were funnier (and edgier) then anything Don Asmussen has ever done and Asmussen (with Tom Meyers gone) is the dean of SF political cartooning in my always less than humble opinion.

Face it detractors (and supporters too), Matt Smith is what every writer wants to be. He is a 'Must Read'. Those jumping on his case now are ignorant or jealous but they all read him.

Keep typing Matt. We're all sure as hell gonna keep reading you.

h.

I haven't read the articles and responses (and don't particularly care), but I did read this part.

You completely misunderstand the concept of a "Free Press". The core to a free press is the government not having the ability to restrict what they say.

Consumers responding and, if they so choose, boycotting, is very much a part of free speech. It may be for dumb reasons, but they have the right to do it.

If they were petitioning the government to prevent you from publishing an article, you'd have an issue of "The free press has got to go". If not, this is just an example of someone who disagrees with you.

hbrown writes:

"Smith's a great writer who sometimes turns out poorly researched and biased shit. Hey, we all do.

Face it detractors (and supporters too), Matt Smith is what every writer wants to be. He is a 'Must Read'. Those jumping on his case now are ignorant or jealous but they all read him."

Excuse me, but ignorant and jealous? Care to spell out how precisely? Its one thing if you're going to argue that this article is "poorly-researched and biased shit" from an otherwise good writer, which is what you seem to start out arguing. But if this article is poorly researched and biased, then how exactly does that make the people who are calling him on it "ignorant and jealous"? And since when is anybody immune from criticism for something bad they've done or produced just because they've done something else good?

Going down Matt.

This makes it sound like Smith's column was one big piece of troll bait. For what it's worth, I think it's fine that he used his column to present his opinion -- that's what it's for and that's what he's paid for. (He is paid, right?) Others have the right to boo. And look, there are comments! Sounds like a dialogue to me. What's the problem?

Even by Matt Smith standards, this is some whiny shit.

Once upon a time, the SF Weekly could turn out some good journalism. You published pieces by AC Thompson and had a good story about radioactive contamination at Hunter's Point Naval Shipyards. You even wrote reasonably informative investigative pieces about foreign airport manipulation by SFO, as h. brown references above. However, your puerile piss-off-the-progressives posturing has again laid you low, resulting in sub-Michael Savage dreck like the cover stories you ran on how plastic grocery bags are superior to paper ones because they take up less space in landfills and how illegal alien tranny hookers are sponging up our tax dollars.

Frankly, you guys aren't fit to sweep the floors at the Bay Guardian. It's sad, really, because we could use some real journalism. SF really doesn't need a second Ken Garcia.

Meeeeep!!!!
major mistake in the FIRST passage

"CIA-style sexualized torture"

CIA is ANYTHING but sexy, man

but seriously guy, you´re not offended by sex TORTURE
you´re offended by SEX torture.
Everyday thousands of people do horrible things to their body in the course of sports, culture, art (kink being close to that) and everyone salutes their dedication.

you don´t go against body artists, wrestlers, body-builders or skate-boarders, do you?

these boys and girls are just playing. it´s ll a game.

THe only one question that gets me is that Smith is claiming that the State is funding pornography, which isn't the case at all.

Despite all the warblings of this controversy, the fact remains that Kink.com doesnt hire employees it then sends in for subsidized government trainging, but rather hires capable, compotent employees who have the luxury of all other media employees; the opportunity to keep abreast of the every changing world of media and technology that keeps California ahead of the curve in production and distribution of media of all kinds.

Mr. Smith needs to think about his action solely because he is creating a heirarchy that places "journalists" like himself at the top of the ladder, while those who create media he personally dissaproves of at the bottom. At the end of the day, media is media, and SF weekly should stand on equally footing to any other website that is granted vocaltional training for its workers.

You have the right to write what you want, Matt, so long as you can get it past your editors and don't stray into libel territory. We have the right never to read your idiotic column again. And the SF Weekly has the right to fire you because you're no longer pulling in readers. Facts of life, amigo.

Kudos to Matt Smith for a great news column! There is nothing positive to support about pornography (especially torture porn) which degrades women, men, and children. Has San Francisco forgotten the breakthru lesson of women's liberation, that PORN is a patriarchal horror that objectifies human beings as sexual THINGS? Our society casually kills Iraqis and Afghanis while spewing buckets of cum over the image of Paris Hilton and the self-hating masochists and sadists (consensual torture is sane, give me a fucking break!) on kink.dot.dumb think they deserve tax money to do that which even Catholic priests draw the line at?

Grow up San Francisco: think with your heads not your dicks and clits.

Re: Peter Byrne

God, so much bullshit, so little time. What "breakthru lesson" of Women's Liberation? Oh, that's right, the narrow and sectarian viewpoint of the authoritarian "radical feminist" wing of the Women's Liberation Movement, apparently the party line you have wrapped around your tonsils. Which apparently you seem to thing justifies an utterly narrow-minded, ill-informed, and bigoted attitude toward BDSM practitioners, all wrapped up in feminist and anti-war rhetoric to make it sound oh-so-progressive.

I saw a picture today of this Soviet-era throwback marching in St Petersberg today. Reminds me a lot of our homegrown (not-so-) New Leftists and Second Wave Feminists.

Looks like Matt's news report is bringing all of the reactionaries of the 'perversion at any price' viewpoint out of the woodwork. The practitioners of kink.com are savvy exploiters of the wretched sub-class of disturbed psychotics that we used to protect from themselves by institutionalization. Now, the poor, lost, degraded souls are allowed to roam free and fall into the clutches of despicable
'entrepreneurs' who will produce any kind of toxic filth that a demented segment of society will pay money for. Well, do your thing - but don't look for my tax money to subsidize it.

Matt Smith, an radical and irresponsible journalist, has insulted not only the pornography industry but more importantly, private bdsm practitioners which I daresay number much higher than he realizes.

This scandal has reached the ears of kinksters nationwide and is spreading quickly.

We practice Safely, Sanely and Consensually and I'm looking forward to watching the SF Weekly taking their due hit from publishing such wreckless, biased and categorically untrue garbage.

Cool story you got here. It would be great to read a bit more concerning that theme.