Speaker of the House Mike Johnson admitted that he and his son monitored each other’s porn intake in a resurfaced clip from 2022 https://t.co/THNyCkttcw
— Rolling Stone (@RollingStone) November 5, 2023
I'm just a normal basic human, and I don't care to know anything about my parents' porn habits. I did learn that adult humans had down-there hair because my dad used to hide his skin mags under the bathroom sink when I was like, five, but he corrected that. And I never really had to think about that again. Much.
But anyway, this news is freaky to me: that's some serious boundary issues they've got there, in my humble estimation. But why is the father in this situation entrusting his browser history to his son? I can appreciate a parent having some level of curiosity about what their kids are up to online, that they aren't becoming white supremacists or bullying other kids for being gay or joining a cult, but the screwed-up thing for me this is like co-opting your kid to be able to vouch for your own version of No-Nut-November-October. They are an alibi. You can say your kid is not viewing porn. And as far as they know, your kid can say the same about you, for some reason?
Now, in my brain, at first this seems cute: folks are just going to go back to the humble skin mag and maybe save a part of the print industry that has suffered lo these many years in the digital age. Hello, skeevy anonymity. Ah. That's not a thing, anymore. Maybe folks will go back to using their imaginations?
Nothing so innocent. It's about shaming people for being curious or horny, which are actually two of the neater things people actually even are. It's about control. And if the app can screencap your history, it can be about blackmail depending on who images are shared with. And who knows what's being saved, or what searches can be flagged? Not just "tig old bitties". But "Gay". "Contraception." "Depressed." "Abortion." "Normal delayed period." "Atheism." "Evolution." "Freedom from religion." And so on. I've been worried in the post-Roe world how app data can be used against people. And with folks like Johnson, we seriously have a problem.
I don't think this sounds like a healthy set-up. Not just for the way it creates shame around sexuality, but the way it can be used all-around to control what someone wants to see of the world outside the one engineered by one's parochial environment.
Anyway--this is something Josh Duggar had installed on his computer so his wife would know what he was looking at. It is possible for users to still be deep in some messed-up stuff and it not being under the "All Seeing Eye". (Note: the founder of the app created it because of the "burden" of porn. Just like little Missus Johnson felt the "burden" of all these gay kids out there and so on. Authoritarians like that word. Taking on someone's burdens sound a lot better than minding other folks' business. They are practically domineering your life as a favor to you!)
But anyway, also, a member of congress who now has sensitive access to national security info might be compromised by his anti-wank narc program.
Anyhow, Johnson's attitude to his family, if expanded to his worldview, is just all kinds of alarm bells. Again and again, I'm saying: the vibe is off.
2 comments:
The corollary for Republican women is when Nancy Mace was vilified for speaking about sex; thus wrecking the beautiful madonna image rightwing men had slotted her into and when Laura Dick-Grabbin' Boebert was so over-the-top in her "body of work". The complaints from the right-wingers had nothing to do with their vile, inhuman politics but, on their violation of the accepted display of "womanhood".
It will be very horrible when these Fascist Fundamentalists are able to exert control over non-conforming states.
Conservatives are supposed to keep their freaky business in a closet--I feel like there's a lot they can get away with if they keep it out of sight, but in case of a Ted Haggard, Larry Craig type situation, there are whole rituals (penance, renunciation, public crying, etc.) that have been designed to exorcize the "demons" of whatever odd channels their sexuality flows when it isn't treated as just a healthy part of a human life. I didn't notice Mace and Boebert being as pilloried, nor Kristi Noem or MTG for being, um "women of a certain reputation". I have determined this is because hypocrisy in a woman has been determined to be a feature, not a bug, and possibly even kinda hot.
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