At Eric’s suggestion, I visited CNN.com to see what might be news-worthy for the blog. None of the headlines grabbed my attention, the mother cat nursing a baby squirrel was sweet but not compelling, so I checked out this short video interview for my own entertainment: Laurence Fishburne’s Daughter Enters Porn Industry. Porn is an easy mark for sensationalism, so I wasn’t expecting any real ‘news’ here; after all, the lives of celebrities get a disproportionate amount of attention in our culture and that’s not the Planet Waves game.
Why am I posting this then? Because I nearly fell over when I heard the contrast between Ms. Fishburne’s poised, sex-positive, art-positive confidence and self-esteem and the (female) interviewer’s measured attempts to undermine it. The news anchor begins by stating, “I’m not a prude […] I’m not afraid of sex, if it’s part of art.”
Really? Sex needs to be a part of art for you not to be afraid of it? And who exactly gets to decide what constitutes art? Montana Fishburne explains her view of porn as art, albeit a more graphic type of art, full of beautiful people touching each other in sensuous ways. To my ears, she clearly is doing this because she believes in what she is creating.
Given her father’s career, we know she’s not hurting for money or connections if she simply wants to become an actor. I don’t know the family’s dynamics, but her manner of speech does not seem to indicate an urge to ‘get back at daddy’ for anything.