PORN. Now that I have your attention, 40% of the Internet: glabrous* Swiss philosopher, best-seller and all-around human brain, Alain de Botton** has written books on How Proust Can Change Your Life and most recently Religion for Atheists. He’s also created a social enterprise in Living Architecture and is the founder of The School of Life, an actual place which will school you in how to live like Alain. But it’s Alain’s next project which will probably hold your attention, as he aims to revolutionise pornography by asking the world “what’s next for porn?”
Al (I feel like I can call him Al***) intends to meet with leaders in the field of porn and the arts worldwide so as to bring about a new phase of better pornography, aptly dubbed “Better Porn.” That sounds pretty straightforward, right? Not if Alain has something to say about it.
ADB released the following statement outlining his intentions:
We shouldn’t have to choose between being human and being sexual (the Ancient Greeks knew this very well). Ideally, porn would excite our lust in contexts which also presented other, elevated sides of human nature – in which people were being witty, for instance, or showing kindness, or working hard or being clever – so that our sexual excitement could bleed [ed. BAD WORD CHOICE BRO] into, and enhance our respect for these other elements of a good life. No longer would sexuality have to be lumped together with stupidity, brutishness, earnestness and exploitation; it could instead be harnessed to what is noblest in us.
The real problem with current pornography is that it’s so far removed from all the other concerns which a reasonably sensible, moral, kind and ambitious person might have. As currently constituted, pornography asks that we leave behind our ethics, our aesthetic sense and our intelligence when we contemplate it. Yet it is possible to conceive of a version of pornography which wouldn’t force us to make such a stark choice between sex and virtue – a pornography in which sexual desire would be invited to support, rather than permitted to undermine, our higher values.
So there you have it. That’s the thrust behind/coming up in “Better Porn” according to Al (porn puns). I realise no one is probably going to want to put their hand up and answer this but does it sound like something you could get down with/to? Witty porn? Clever porn? Kind porn? And working hard porn (isn’t that regular porn?) Or do you prefer Mummy porn?
The School intends to unveil it’s “Better Porn” website soon, so do what you will until then.
*Fancy for ‘bald’
**
*** Alain doesn’t actually have a moustache. That’s just Ron Jeremy’s mo plastered onto his face. Sorry Al!
Via (fashunz fetish website) ShowStudio and The New Statesman
