Standing On My Wonky Soapbox

24May08

So I got my new glasses and everything is a little off-kilter. I went back to the optometrist after an hour of wandering about wondering why none of the floors in Warringah Mall were level, but they said to give it a week, so I’m giving it a week. But I am missing my old glasses, for even though they’re scratched and crappy, they make the ground seem level and level ground is much easier for walking on.

And also, for computer work, they make my eyes hurt less.

Stupid new glasses.

Anyway, I’m going to to jump onto my soapbox for a minute because, hey, it’s fun and I haven’t had a chance to do it for quite a while. Let’s hope I don’t fall off.

Yes, Bill Henson takes photos of scantily-clad adolescents. These photos are rather arty. They are often dark, and challenging, and difficult, and confronting. Sometimes they’re hard to look at. What they are not is sext. They are not titillating, or arousing, or kinky. In short, they are not porn. You may not like them, but that doesn’t mean they are porn.

And, honestly, I could remind you all that you have a choice not to look at them. But that’s not really the point, I suppose. I suppose the point is that there might be someone who looks at them and does find them tittilating and sexy and arousing – someone who makes something of them that they’re not.

But then again, that same person could then go down to the beach in the Christmas holidays and see much of the same. They could walk past a school or a playground, or check out a medical textbook, or buy a fucking Anne Geddes calendar, if they really wanted to. All of the above are actually easier to get a thrill from than going to a brightly lit private gallery in Paddington, with a bunch of art wankers and constant supervision from staff.

The fact is this, Bill Henson has been taking pictures like this for years and years and it’s never been an issue before. A  widely-advertised retrospective of his work attracted 65,000 visitors a few years ago, and none of them complained. No-one complained. Because there wasn’t anything to complain about.

So why now? Why does it feel like we’re all getting more and more and more paranoid? And why does it feel like you can’t find actual facts anywhere any more? Why does every single bit of coverage of this from some quarters feel so much like a Miranda Devine editorial? Why does the Daily Telergaph think it appropriate to put ‘art’ in inverted commas, but not ‘porn’, as though there’s no way to deny the pornographic nature of this stuff? What happened to keeping bias out of the news? And why does the media look for the worst in everyone and everything? Why do they want to keep us so afraid, for ourselves and our children and our grandparents and for everything?

I’d like to present a concise hypothesis but I really don’t have one. I honestly don’t get it.

My only thought is that maybe when various members of the media heard Helen Lovejoy exclaim the immortal line ‘Won’t somebody think of the children?’ when she found out about the burlsque house in Springfield,  they didn’t get that it was a joke.

And so – won’t somebody please, please actually stop and think of the children. Those poor, poor children in those photographs – none of whom have come out during this whole thing and said one bad word about how they were treated at the hands of this alleged kiddle-porn maker, despite the fact that Today Tonight and ACA have probably got their entire research teams- and a few fistfuls of dollars – engaged in a delightful race to find that ever elusive ‘I modelled for Bill Henson and boy was he sleazy’ story.  If ever any of them were mistreated – if their parents ever had any concerns – now would be the time that those stories would be coming out. But they’re not, and could kind of be telling us something, no?

So think of the children. The children who got asked to pose for these photos, and their parents. A few days ago they were excited about this really cool art exhibition that they were a part of. They were possibly telling their friends all about how they were in these pictures and they were going to the opening and possibly feeling pretty good about themselves.

Now their faces and their bodies all over the papers and the internet. Now they’re kiddie porn.  And suddenly, they’ve done something wrong, and they’re not feeling nearly so good about themselves.

And yet, all this fuss is out of concern for them? Really?

I call bullshit.

Filed under: Silly Media   |  1 Comment
Tags: Art, glasses, Media