vr
a novel
Scott Alexander Gabriel Reiss
April 1998
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
From: SAGReiss
Date: 9 April 1998
Subject: Semantics
Assuming that you can figure out the etymology of the word "erotica", here's
a note on the origin of the term "pornography". The Greek roots mean "whore"
and "writing", but the compound itself is a hapax, used only once by a writer
of ancient Greek in a surviving text. (If you want to know his name and work,
see Liddell and Scott, for I can't remember.) The problem with your definition
("purpose" being the operative word) is the same as with the Minnesota judge's:
"I can't define it, but I know it when I see it." If pornography is something
that exists in the world, then it exists independantly of reader and writer.
It is a thing, something. As such, it may be defined. I would suggest: "The
explicit representation of sex," based wholly on internal evidence. In other
words, if you preverts find coprophagia arousing, that's your problem. If
the characters in The 120 Days find coprophagia arousing, and they do indeed,
that's pornographic. Same thing for little girls' bicycle seats. Pictures
of fully-clothed little girls riding their bikes are not pornographic, whether
or not the evil and perverted negatron is photographer or guilty viewer. Obviously
one could argue endlessly about these matters, such as what constitutes "explicit".
Two points are important, one of which you made. The distinction between
"porn" and "erotica" (usually meaning "what I don't like" and "what I like")
is dumb and stupid and mean and ugly. Whatever definition we make should
be verifiable, meaning not dependant on the reader or writer.
RECTVM VINVM
Scott Alexander Gabriel Reiss
From: Columbine
Date: 10 April 1998
Subject: Re: Semantics
Oddly enough, Gabriel, I agree with you on all particulars. In fact, I wish
we'd thought to mention some of that in the column. -c
From: Nichelle
Date: 16 April 1998
Subject: girls kick ass
My submissions to the contest at UW- body piercing haiku.. Won't win me
a pub, but I get some kind of hat that says "girls kick ass"
many silver studs
one for each time I got dumped
running out of room
gold loop in navel
belly dancer fantasies
mother would be proud
seven in each ear
won't tell where the others are
masochistic joy
rings in nose and brow
such Seattle wannabes
you're tragically hip
Nichelle
From: Nichelle
Date: 23 April 1998
Subject: well...
I hate to give you this heartbreaking news by e-mail, but the string quartet
concert is sold out. So.. It depends on you.. I'll check my e-mail later before
I leave campus.
Other possibilities...
U-District- film the Butcher Boy 7:15, 9:45
The Vagina Monologues 8pm (700 Union Street) (sounds good)
film- Love and Death on Long Island (at the Harvard Exit- on broadway) 7:15,
9:20
Let me know...
From: SAGReiss
Date: 23 April 1998
Subject: Columbin
My first taste of Ricard in nine months. I wonder if this constitutes being
born again. Hard day at work. Other than that working hard trying to reconstruct
Shakes' phonetic system through the rhyme scheme of the Sonnets. I'll pass
it along as soon as I'm done with this infernal table which consists of the
2155 line-ending words grouped by rhymed pair, rhymed phonemes and rhymed
(tonic) vowel. Well, Todd, you're full of surprises. I must confess that my
reaction may properly be called the Nykisha (sp?) Phenomenon. I think: "A
man wrote that silliness?" I've been reading, sometimes skimming, Mouthorgan
since its inception, but I've always excused the nonsense thinking: "That's
just some lipstick lesbian in the grasp of post-undergraduate syndrome," the
illness from which most hardcore internet users suffer, no real education
and no real work. I don't know what to think now that I'm told the author
is a man.
RECTVM VINVM
Scott Alexander Gabriel Reiss
From: SAGReiss
Date: 23 April 1998
Subject: Re: well...
The ugly truth is that I'm in a bad mood. I don't want to go anywhere. I'd
like to have a nice evening at home, even two in a row. I'd like to cook something
good, drink some Ricard and have wine with dinner. Would you mind that? We
can talk about it when you come home. I'm tired and don't feel like going
out. The Cafe Lago doesn't have smoking. I hate everyone and everything.
From: Columbine
Date: 23 April 1998
Subject: Re: Columbin
Scott Alexander Gabriel Reiss wrote:
> I think: "A man wrote that silliness?" I've been reading,
> sometimes skimming, Mouthorgan since its inception, but I've always
excused
> the nonsense thinking: "That's just some lipstick lesbian in the grasp
of
> post-undergraduate syndrome," the illness from which most hardcore
internet
> users suffer, no real education and no real work. I don't know what
to think
> now that I'm told the author is a man.
Hmph. You *could* address specific sillinesses, you know. I'd love hearing
your always provocative views [to use the mild term]. As it happens, mouth
organ is a team effort; the inu material is the solo stuff.
Both of us who together contribute 90% of mouth organ have a fair amount
of education (although I finally got fed up with the universities I went to
and have no degree) and we both work real jobs. Unless you don't consider
computer work a real job. I personally have done my stint waiting tables,
tending bar, cleaning floors, washing dishes, being a short-order cook, minding
a gas station, and all those jobs ... and will be happy if I never have to
do them again.
I'll agree with you that mouth organ, at its worst, is two people spouting
bullshit into the void. I'd like to think it's pretty high-caliber bullshit,
though.
I'd rather be a lipstick lesbian than an academic in an ivory tower. By
the by.
-c
--
Tornadoes and Southerners going through a divorce have a lot in common.
In either case, you know someone is going to lose a trailer.
From: SAGReiss
Date: 23 April 1998
Subject: Weak homo
"Gabriel, can you help me carry this chafer?" "Carry it yourself." "Come
on. I'm just a weak homo," said Michael, the HIV-positive queen alluded to
months ago. It's nothing specific, Todd, just an accumulation of specific
lapses which I interpret as a general trend, a lack of erudition and intellectual
rigor which might seem acceptable, even charming, in a member of the fairer
sex, but come as an unpleasant surprise from a man. Most of the boiz and grrls
(of both sexes) I work with are strong, able to carry sixty-pound trays through
crowded dining rooms. I can excuse the ladies if they cannot, though it has
nothing to do with the physical limitations of the sex. (Anyone who's been
to Oriental restaurants has seen ninety-pound babes do this.) I simply expect
more of a man. I expect him to be strong, methodical, have read everything
and speak many languages (at least three). Diplomas are optional and exceptions
are made as needed. Of course computer work is no real job. Computers are
a tool, and tool-making is near the bottom of the food chain, just below hookers
and above speculators. Food-service is, as we know, at the very top of the
list.
RECTVM VINVM
Scott Alexander Gabriel Reiss
From: Nichelle
Date: 23 April 1998
Subject: Re: Weak homo
Gabriel, that was a very rude letter. I can forgive you for not wanting
to go to 'The Vagina Monologues' with me downtown, but I will not forgive
you for expecting less of 'the fairer [read: weaker] sex'. I don't care if
you're mad at the world, and fuck you, you never want to go out. You are
berating our friend, who is no different now than she ever was. Is it really
so shocking that things on the internet are not always the way we think they
are? That is simply how things work, a fact of life, or have you forgotten
that? I wish you had known about it two years ago. It might have made your
life easier.
All of your rigor and strength and methodical early morning newspaper reading
on the toilet doesn't seem to have won you any great honors. Despite your
criticisms of Columbine's page, she (and I will continue to refer to her as
'she' unless told otherwise) manages to put some very interesting writing
on the web on a pretty regular basis. I'm too angry to say more.
Nichelle
From: Joy
Date: 24 April 1998
Subject: Re: Weak homo
well we've always known that sagreiss is a sexist elitist bastard.
isn't that also the source of his charm?
i'm told that he's alot 'nicer' irl, but since i don't ever deal with him
in irl i find that rather irrelevant. (sp?)
don't ask me why but i still consider him something vaguely akin to a friend.
perhaps a wicked conversationalist and thinker. with faint glimmers of humor
now and then.
and now, on with the show...
killjoy the unclever plant
hey negatron how's the snow?
March 1998
May 1998
vr: 1998
