Should moderators take down opinions of DU members?

I have to agree with this comment. I think all poetry is subjective, and even the most vulgar or overtly 'naughty' poetic forms have significance. Limericks and nonsense rhyme are two quick examples of often offensive or subversive poetry forms that absolutely matter. I know from experience that even in a largely anonymous place like this, it can be a big deal to put your work out there (especially people who want to improve). If we start standardizing the differences between erotica and porn so as to not offend other poets, then (sorry to be terse) but we might as well toss out all the limericks, funny eulogies, nonsense poems (seeya, Lewis Carroll), nursery rhymes, and any other poetic form that anyone deems inferior or 'low'. Consider:

Song of Solomon

1 The song of songs, which is Solomon's.
2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine.
3 Because of the savour of thy good ointments thy name is as ointment poured forth, therefore do the virgins love thee.
4 Draw me, we will run after thee: the king hath brought me into his chambers: we will be glad and rejoice in thee, we will remember thy love more than wine: the upright love thee.
5 I am black, but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.
6 Look not upon me, because I am black, because the sun hath looked upon me: my mother's children were angry with me; they made me the keeper of the vineyards; but mine own vineyard have I not kept.
7 Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon: for why should I be as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions?
8 If thou know not, O thou fairest among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed thy kids beside the shepherds' tents.
9 I have compared thee, O my love, to a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots.
10 Thy cheeks are comely with rows of jewels, thy neck with chains of gold.
11 We will make thee borders of gold with studs of silver.
12 While the king sitteth at his table, my spikenard sendeth forth the smell thereof.
13 A bundle of myrrh is my well-beloved unto me; he shall lie all night betwixt my breasts.
14 My beloved is unto me as a cluster of camphire in the vineyards of Engedi.
15 Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves' eyes.
16 Behold, thou art fair, my beloved, yea, pleasant: also our bed is green.
17 The beams of our house are cedar, and our rafters of fir.

-- King James Bible

In its day, this was considered very risqué.

*gets out the loud speaker and clears throat* ... You can please some people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time!!

Transmission over.

The issue of porn in poetry is an entirely different thing from censorship. If every comp thread was filled with discussions and opinions, the comp would be too hard to judge. No one wants to sift through hundreds of posts that are not entries in the comp to read 20 poems and try to remember which poem was the best. Comps are the wrong place for opinions.
I personally enjoy porn. And as I said, I enjoy John Valby singing prn and I participate at his shows. It's great fun. I just feel that what makes poetry poetry, as opposed to prose, is the use of metaphor, imagery and meter in a creative way. In my opinion, spouting profanity in poetry is not creative. It's fun during sex, but I've tried writing poetry during sex and it just doesn't work...
We are all entitled to our opinions. You don't have to agree with my opinion of poetry or change the way you write. I write by my own guidelines, you write by yours. But if someone sets up a comp with rules that say no profanity in erotic entries, you have to follow that rule in that comp. That's not the issue though. There is no linkage between what is poetry or porn and where you posted an opinion. This forum is the appropriate place to discuss it and a comp is not.
JJ

calamitygin said:This was not about the three Cs....
And that is great for you that you avoid them at all Costs. I dont and mamy dont.....and i dont write trash or porn.

My issue was with this....

OK, other strictures – if you go erotic, don’t go pornographic… What’s the difference? ‘glad you asked!
*If the heat on the page requires no imagination from the reader… pornographic!
BUT
*If the heat on the page is all in the imagination of the reader… erotic!

I am a good erotica writer. By his definition i write porn...
I dont.
I dont write pussy slop....
And my poetry wasnt taken down...my opinion was. Nothing derogatory was said.
This is what i said....

Really? Requiring no imagination is pornographic. Thanks. Many of mine, many of yours i have seen require no imagination. I write erotica and art. Not porn.  And there are many in DU that do the same. I take serious offense to that defintion. Take offense for them. Great poets that use phrases like "His cock beat in my cunt until its quake shook me to quake"
This is a debate that has been gone through many high up channels to decide....good to know you have that answer.

If i cant express this opinion...where is the line drawn?
Can we tell others in our opinion they wrote a good piece? Are we never aloud to speak our minds when we have a serious issue with what is being said? When we find it offensive.
If we cant...if i cant then someone needs to lay that out in black n white.

And i just dont know if i want to be a part of a site that sees me as a porn writer, and picks and chooses who they discriminate against.

I  am really dissapointed. Do you think Tom Robbins writes porn? Anne Rice...Anais Nin....Henry Miller....they all use words like.
This is like the Church putting fig leaves over genitalia.
I use my voice. And i write erotica...not porn.

And i have seen lots of people say horrible and offensive things to people...all the time. Those things are not deleted.

I am just in tears...i feel like i have lost home. And now i know what others feel about my "porn"

And warning to everyone never have an opinion and say it out loud.

Love you Jen. Love your work.

I love when someone has something to say during my comps. And encourage it.
I just love that i have had peoples opininions posted thtoughout my comps...things like "you stupid ho!" and "bitch"  by Smook...
Comments by Rev Al
...i heard a story that sucking cock gives ypu tapeworm and that's what this poem reminds me of."
Comments by Crazy admirerer about my fat double chin, and he also callled me bitch.  
I see opinions every day in a comp....and why censor what i said. It was not mean spirited. I just defended my writing.
DU can just erase anything said. Things that hurt no one....

But they leave up the stuff that hurts people. Period.

You bettet start censoring a lot. I bet Hitler had milllions of reasons to burn books.
Is DU a dictatorship? How do you decide?

Poetryman said:The issue of porn in poetry is an entirely different thing from censorship. If every comp thread was filled with discussions and opinions, the comp would be too hard to judge. No one wants to sift through hundreds of posts that are not entries in the comp to read 20 poems and try to remember which poem was the best. Comps are the wrong place for opinions.
I personally enjoy porn. And as I said, I enjoy John Valby singing prn and I participate at his shows. It's great fun. I just feel that what makes poetry poetry, as opposed to prose, is the use of metaphor, imagery and meter in a creative way. In my opinion, spouting profanity in poetry is not creative. It's fun during sex, but I've tried writing poetry during sex and it just doesn't work...
We are all entitled to our opinions. You don't have to agree with my opinion of poetry or change the way you write. I write by my own guidelines, you write by yours. But if someone sets up a comp with rules that say no profanity in erotic entries, you have to follow that rule in that comp. That's not the issue though. There is no linkage between what is poetry or porn and where you posted an opinion. This forum is the appropriate place to discuss it and a comp is not.
JJ



Show me that rule Poetryman. And i have no problem sifting through. My ego has room for others opinions. Especially when those opinions suggest my writing is pornographic. I wont sit quiet. I was raped and molested. Stabbed and left for dead. My attacker told me count to 1 hundred till i speak.
I dont count anymore. I speak out when i have any cause to do so. I thought this was a safe place to do so. Aparently not.

Of course many hosts make us wade through tons of their own posts and pieces in thier own comps....im sure that helps cut down on time and reads. Lol i read a comp recently that the host had almost as many of thier pieces in the comp as entries.

Frankee_thecat said:Love you Jen. Love your work.m
Thank you sweetheart!

just feel that what makes poetry poetry, as opposed to prose, is the use of metaphor, imagery and meter in a creative way. In my opinion, spouting profanity in poetry is not creative

I use plenty of metaphor, imagery in.prose
Prose is chock full of metaphor...
Tell me, would you call Vonegutt a pornographor? He uses profanity in poetrry and prose. It is about a feel and the voice, socio circumstances, and atmosphere.  Just because you dont no one should and there is no just cause?!!
WOW we seem to have some lofty opinions of ourselves.

ive been thinking about this a bunch since I first commented on this thread. I've looked up definitions for pornography and erotica. When it comes right down to it, I really think they are the same. There is no way to really, definitively, peg it down. It's highly subjective. What you call erotica, I might call porn.

When I watch porn, there are certain categories I like better than others. Same as when I read it. Sometimes I like it explicit and every action spelled out for me. Sometimes I like to let my imagination take over and read something that takes a little thinking to get me there. Both are good. Both are forms of art. Both have merit.

So it leads me to believe that this is a semantics problem.

And i would agree completely exept not all porn is art and erotica. And not all erotica is porn. And many are saying the use of some terms are vulgar, most likely porn. I write to stimulate mind not genatalia.....period.

Who decides what is art? Who says that all porn isn't art? If someone is using their mind to create something, it's art. You may not like it, but that doesn't mean someone else doesn't. I'm not a fan of the Beatles, but that doesn't mean they aren't musicians.

we don't get to control how others react to what we write. So while you are wanting to stimulate the mind, you very well could be stimulating the genitals.

And when it comes down to it, who gives a flying fig if someone thinks your word choice is vulgar. You do you. It is all subjective.

I care Minerva. I am proud of my writing.
Who cares?
Jesus christ! Who wouldnt!!!

Overall I see this as a misunderstanding. After the comment was removed there was notification and a request/suggestion to repost it elsewhere, so that's not really censoring in my opinion.

Hosts posting in their own comps--why not? If it gives them and any entrants, inspiration to write, then isn't that a good thing? You can't give yourself a trophy in your own comp anyway ( unless you're Vizard with multiple accounts, but that's another story ..)

Basically I think people should write whatever they want, period. But....if you're going to post it publicly, then any rules and guidelines that are in place for wherever you're going to share it, need to be adhered to, be it here in a comp, any criteria the website owner has set up, or anywhere else on the Internet or outside computer land. If those "rules" aren't adhered to, then yes, those in charge of monitoring have every right to tidy up, because they must abide by what is set in place too.

I also believe, too, that things/writing that purposefully attacks another person, promotes crime and criminals, supports things that are just morally wrong like terrorism, human trafficking, etc., should have no place anywhere. Yeah--that's the stuff that needs to be censored and thrown in the dump heap, and the stuff I'm talking about when I say "use wisdom and think before you write, speak, post, etc".

If writing hardcore porn is what jingles your jollies--go for it, but if it's specifically not called for in an area where things are publicly shared, then that's on the writer to abide by that request and post it where it is needed, welcome and wanted.

Hi..

Geoff, here, Hepcat61…

I seemly dropped a match in a gasoline field – and then slept, and worked, and slept again through the firestorm that match – unintended – caused….

A couple of things – never said porn couldn’t be erotic, never said erotica couldn’t be porn, one can be taken for the other and vice versa … I was merely setting the judging parameters for MY COMP… as to what would be considered as appropriate form and content for this particular competition…  I have since amended that part of the competition explanation to state my feelings on the erotic and porn...

Both of which are great friends of mine and, I have found, that when either are done well, the distinguishing between the two is almost impossible.

I was just trying to avoid having to put up the “extreme content” warning for as long as possible, but have already inquired as to how one does that… because I know I’ll have to at some point because poets are free thinkers, free wheelers, and generally averse to rules…

As to the pulling and later repositioning of the comment left in my competition… this was done while I was asleep… and I found out after the fact… way after the fact… I guess the mods felt that it belonged in a different place on the sight…  Personally I wouldn’t have cared… I would have liked it better if it had been in a poem consisting of 14 lines, 140 syllables, in 4 stanzas with the appropriate rhyme and meter… because that is exactly the passion I was hoping to see in the sonnet entries…

SO… anyone can post anything in my comp, relating to any subject they wish in any form they find appropriate to them in the moment…  including any kind of rebuke or refutation of the comp, me, the mods, DUP, God, life, the world and everything….

But only those in a 14 line, 140 syllable, 4 stanza format, with the appropriate rhyme and meter in non-explicit language will be considered for judging…

Which truly is all I was trying to get across… when I inadvertently dropped the match…

Sincerely,
geoff

I could care less what someone thinks of my work. Sure, I want people to like it, but if they don't. Ok.

If they think it's vulgar, so be it. I have no control over what they think. You have no control over what people think. I have no control over what they say. You have no control over what they say.

Hate to break it to you, but I would bet there are stimulated genitals after your pieces have been read. And if that upsets you, then maybe you should reconsider your genre.

All I'm saying is that you should be comfortable with the way you write and you shouldn't care if someone says your work is vulgar. If you do...maybe write about puppies and unicorns. Someone is always going to think that writing about sex (in anyway) is porn and it's vulgar.