I think I played tackle football twice in my life, sometime around seventh grade.
I hate being hurt. I hate getting tackled. I hate pain. I hate the risk of injury.
Yet I love watching football. I love to see a blitzer tackle a quarterback from behind and just watch his body crumble under the impact.
I would never box yet I love watching boxing.
I would never have sex on camera and share it with the world and yet I have often watched people do just that.
I think the self-destructive nature of engaging in such activity makes it particularly compelling to me to watch it.
I don’t think I’d ever go to a dangerous place in Afghanistan or Iraq or anywhere just for a news story, yet I love to read the stories of people who do just that.
I would never want my children to risk themselves in the activities yet I am happy to be entertained and informed by those who freely choose to do so.
I am generally against the government providing welfare and subsidies yet I am happy to take advantage of such when that serves my self-interest.
I last played touch football in April 1998. I fell and broke a bone in my wrist that day and have not played since. I avoid roller-skating for similar reasons and any activity that could lead to a sudden fall and injury. I don’t have much calcium in my bones and they break easily.
On the other hand, I write freely about personal details of my life that most people would never share publicly. I have no problem if such people particularly enjoy my work. I want them to read me and it does not matter to me if they’d never say such things themselves.
As the moral leader to thousands of impressionable young Jews around the world, I have more severe strictures on my behavior than the average guy who’s free to drink and smoke and lend his bum to other blokes.
Washington Post advice columnist Carolyn Hax writes:
If you do start (or stumble into) the “should” conversation, then try approaching it as a true-or-false question: If you believe an industry is so unsafe or dishonorable that you wouldn’t offer up yourself or spouse/child (real or hypothetical) to work in it, then you shouldn’t use the products of that industry.
Cool thing is, this works not just for porn, but for meatpacking, contact sports, mining, art, education, pubs, multinationals, politics, you name it. Discuss.
