“These pictures are awful!” she told him, flinging the magazine down in disgust.
“But what if, instead of such beautiful, perfect, unattainable women, they were pictures of women who look like you? Only as pretty as you, or even not as pretty as you are. What if all such images, of women or men, were of anyone, everyone—all human forms instead of just the perfect ones? Would you, would I, then be free to enjoy them since we were no longer being so undemocratic and exclusive? You know, including everyone in the game?”
“God, you've missed the point entirely,” she said in an exasperated tone. “It's pornography that’s wrong, not undemocratic pornography!”
“Why would even democratic pornography be so objectionable?” he said stubbornly.
“It just is! It's—well, the reduction of people to mere impersonal objects!”
“And is the actual objection,” he asked, “to being an object or to being an impersonal object? After all, we're all an object of one sort or another to each other. We're all objects in nature's game, aren't we?”
“Nobody ought to be anybody's object,” she said firmly.
“Is that the answer to my question?” he asked. “Are you saying it's the mere-ness of being an object, and not the impersonality of it? Which really bothers you?”
“If I had to answer your question, I guess I'd say impersonal objects,” she said with a frown. “But I just don't see how or when anybody is somebody's personal object. It doesn't make sense. Are you sure there is such a thing?”
“If there isn't, I'll by God invent one,” he grinned.
“I thought so,” she said, looking at him sternly.
He shrugged and nodded. He wanted to say, “Go ahead, you goddamn lunatic Lady Cop, hit me, beat me senseless with your crazy moralistic nightstick!” But she would never have understood. She was driving him crazy just with the way she looked; she was beautiful, she was hot. She was desirable, but the things she was saying weren't helping him a bit. He wasn't doing her much good either, though, he realized.
“You’re a friendly fellow,” she said, “but, really, you’re just a sexist.”
“Realizations aren't always worth much,” he muttered bitterly.
2nd draft: 09/16/05
©1989 Ronald C. Southern
Robert Byrne
"Getting caught is the mother of invention."
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