I think this dsicussion has to be taken in the broder context of the morality of pornography, as thats what were effectively looking at... 50s soft core porn

That is certainly a debated topic, but there are quite a few thoughtful, liberal, intelligent and wel leducated feminists who argue that pornography is in fact a boon to the women's movement.

Historically in christian societies, sex has been labled as bad or sinful, and women being the focal point of 80% to 90% of men's sexual feelings, have gotten thus labeld as equivalently bad/sinful. The only ones who escape this are women who live up to totally unreasonable and inhuman levels of asexuality (the cult of the virigin.)

The argument for pornogrpahy is that pornography is one form of open and honest dialogue abotu sexuality and in a still primarily male structured society ANYTHING that brings sexual feelinsg out of the closet and into the light is nothing but good for the women's movement.

I believe it was Kinsey who reported that the single msot common form of male or female fantasies were bondage fantasies (both binding and being bound for both sexes). Given that power-play seems to be inhrently tied to sexuality isnt it better to openly disucss such things and how they fit into our goals of being good and equitable human beings?

Frankly, IMHO, the strident preachign of both feminists against pornigraphy and the religous reactionaries against pornography both come from a common root cause-- fear of sexuality. Theirs and others'.