Martha Stewart and Porn

Remember in all those Women and Gender Studies classes, when they told you how bad pornography was, and you asked why (we're talking here about the mainstream stuff, not the violent stuff) and after they were done with all the rhetoric and finally got to evidence they showed you all these studies showing that people who view pornography become less satisfied with their real life partners?

Here's a little test. Look around your house. Read a Martha Stewart magazine. Look around your house again. House look better, or house look worse?

It's easy to write that effect off--who cares if a few silly women get tied in a knot about the state of their homes after reading a magazine? Our homes aren't our bodies, after all. They aren't who we are.

I think our homes are deeply important--especially to women. They are expressions of who we are, they are our refuges, and they are the sanctuary we create for our families. And just like we need to make peace with bodies that sometimes show a little evidence of birthing babies and a few extra pieces of pie, we need to make peace with our homes. We need to insist that these are not spaces for guilt, comparisons, or constant nagging--they are spaces for life. And we can spend our lives worrying about stains and learning how to get them out of the carpet. Or we can decide that a stained carpet is not the end of the world--and get back to living.

You've heard this before, I'm sure. It is, ironically, a major theme of those women's magazines. They say "oh, you should feel less guilty--nobody can do it all". And then they give you examples of things not to feel guilty about. I remember reading that I shouldn't feel guilty for not ironing pillowcases. I remember thinking "Oh God! You can iron pillowcases?" How come they never put on the forgiveness list any of the things I actually do? What's with the fake guilt list with all that obscure stuff on it? Now I sit, playing on the floor with my son feeling guilty not only for not doing the laundry, but also for feeling guilty and not "letting go"!

It's not as simple as just "letting go". It also requires some discipline about what we allow to enter and take hold of our minds. Any magazine that judges our life-scuffed homes can go sit with the magazines that judge our life-scuffed bodies. I, for one, see stains and a little grime as a badge of honour for a house that has been delightfully, noisly, messily filled with life--something to be proud of. And I am determined not to allow the house-porn industry to replace my home with some made up, airbrushed, surgically altered version of my family's messy and lovable world.