>>> Bang for Your Buck
By staff writer David Nelson
December 26, 2007
Essential New Word of the Week: midtown mindfuck (definition hint: skunk in the city)
As a columnist for Points in Case, the website preferred by 4 out of 5 dental hygienists, I often feel that we must do more than just entertain. We’re here to educate as well, because no other website out there is going to give you the straight scoop on how to deal drugs or improve vaginal hygiene. Especially not those pansies at Oprah.com.
Occasionally, I’ve contributed to the collective knowledge, by exploring, say, the history of something we all love dearly. I believe that in order to enjoy a vice, you have to truly understand it. And with this in mind, it’s time to break out our history books once again. Only this time, I’m going to titillate as I entertain and educate. Call it “titercation.” That’s three emotional responses for the price of one.
Pornography. You’ve all seen it, you’ve all enjoyed it, and, chances are, some of you have starred in it. The word itself comes from the Greek pornos, meaning “flesh,” and graphos, meaning “of a supple young boy with soft skin, possibly covered in olive oil.” Alot of Greek words mean something like that, actually.
“Every guy my age has spent many a sleepless night in front of scrambled porn.”
But stereotypes aside, I bet you didn’t know that porn dates back to Neanderthal times. When our primitive ancestors first learned to paint crude images onto cave walls using fermented mastodon poop, what do you think they chose to depict? It sure as hell wasn't the Flintstone family portrait. It was far more likely to be a gangbang scene involving the Loyal Order of Water Buffaloes.
The most common themes for cave paintings were large animals such as bison or horses. This may not seem overtly sexual, but anyone who’s ventured deep enough into the interior of Mexico should know better. Tracings of human hands were also popular. For one thing, they’re easy to draw. More to the point, I think we all can agree that in the absence of attractive partners, there’s nothing sexier than your own five digits.
Clearly, prehistoric porn had a long way to go. Matters improved as humanity embraced civilization. All those naked statues from ancient Rome: we see them as works of fine art and put them in museums. But I’ll bet anything the Romans sculpted them just to have wank material lying around. “Hail, Lentulus! That Venus de Milo is a dirty slut, is she not?…and having no arms must mean she’s verily skilled as a fellatrix!”
The invention of paper was a giant leap forward for the depiction of naked women. At first, paper production was a closely guarded secret of the Chinese. So, if you needed a porn fix back then, it was convenient if you had a thing for Asian chicks. Of course, the influence of this can be seen today, in publications like Shaved Orien-tails and Lactating Korean Midgets Monthly.
As time marched on, porn became more and more sophisticated. In the middle ages, monks scribbled down all kinds of obscene things. When you’re staring down the barrel of a lifelong vow of celibacy, I guess you have to sort of take matters into your own hands. Interestingly, texts about how to flog, burn, and invert the nipples of suspected witches could be considered the first fetish porn.
Porn played a significant role in modern history as well. You might think that WWII was won on the basis of superior weaponry or strategy. Perhaps, but consider all the nudie mags shipped overseas. If not for sacrifices of America’s brave young sluts, you might be reading this article in German. With our soldiers’ libidos taken care of, Americans could rest easy knowing their boys would come home; horny, but victorious.
The 1970’s was a transitory time for porn. VHS technology, known to today’s kids as “those weird plastic bricks,” was on the rise, so it was easier than ever to obtain videos of people fucking. Unfortunately, it was not a decade known for impeccable grooming. I’ll bet more than one dude was turned gay by mainstream porn, with its disturbing portrayal of rampantly hairy muffs.
In the 80’s, porn started appearing on the premium cable channels. These channels were scrambled, and you needed a special decoder to view them. Of course, if you could afford that in the 80’s, you were probably too busy snorting cocaine off a hooker’s chest to need it. Still, every guy my age has spent many a sleepless night in front of scrambled porn, hoping for a 5-second interval of clarity, so that we might spy a non-distorted boob.
As time marched on, new technologies emerged, allowing humanity to exchange information at speeds never before thought possible. So, naturally, the first thing we did with this technology was use it to distribute close-ups of women’s crotches. Yes, the internet certainly revolutionized the way we jerk off. And I mean that in a scholarly way.
Once, it was necessary to venture into a back alley video store to verbally request the latest copy of Anal Squirting Grandmas. And heaven help you if the clerk didn’t speak English and you had to resort to mime. Now, the magic of cyberspace brings you the sickest pornographic images you could ever want, and the process is 100 percent anonymous, at least until you’re hit up for a credit card. With any luck you can fill up on free samples, like at upscale supermarkets.
DVDs, on the other hand, somewhat revived the idea of venturing out of doors to buy or rent your porn. In other words, it’s once again possible to build up a collection of the World’s Most Extreme Vegetable Insertions. Better have a foolproof hiding place from your girlfriend/mom/cleaning lady.
However, I’m not convinced that DVDs will be a profitable format for the adult business. If you’re anything like me, you only need porn for 20-second intervals, really. And since DVDs can hold something like a billion megabytes worth of spread asscheeks, a smart connoisseur can make a single disk last well into his twilight years, when he probably needs it the most.
High-definition is the latest innovation, and we have yet to see how it will affect porn and vice-versa. HD-DVDs and Blu-Ray disks are locked in a bitter grudge match for market supremacy, and the winner will likely be whoever is backed by porn. It must be disconcerting to know the fate of your company, with all its shareholders and whatnot, depends on people named Courtney Cummz and Wendy Whoppers, for example.
Once again, though, I’m not sure that this new technology will ultimately be good for the porn industry. High Definition is great for things like sports, and action movies, but it’s not that forgiving of the naked body. A little blurriness can be a good thing; who wants to see all those razor bumps, stretch marks, and hidden genital warts?
All in all, the future looks bright for makers of porn and their greasy customers. Radical feminism and its anti-porn agenda was once the bane of every red-blooded guy, but now it appears that porn has won the war. Hell, I can find full penetration on TV after midnight, and I don’t even shell out for premium channels. What an age we live in.
There’s no doubt that porn will continue to be at the forefront of new technologies. For a long time, science fiction has been promising us crazy virtual reality headsets with full sensory capabilities. When that becomes a reality, people aren’t going to buy cartridges that allow them to experience great moments from the life of Charles Dickens. No, they’re going to buy “Hot, Sweaty, Monkey Sex with Jenna Jameson.” Third input extra. And well worth it.
Essential New Word of the Week:
midtown mindfuck n [‘mIdtaun ‘majndfUk]
I live in a part of my city that nicely splits the difference between the action/excitement of downtown and the relative safety/calmness of uptown. It’s a great place to live. It’s also great because a lot of my friends live nearby, and some of them enjoy getting mashed on a fairly regular basis. In our little world, everything “midtown” is just better. Especially when not in control of your own faculties.
This frame of mind gave rise to this week’s word, which denotes a particularly strong drink, strain of pot, or whatever your intoxicant of choice is. If you’ve got the midtown mindfuck in your hands, you better be prepared. That sissy uptown shit can’t compete. And the downtown stuff will leave you unsatisfied. No, dude. The midtown mindfuck is where it’s at.