Tolerance

“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.” Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Tolerance implies no lack of commitment to one's own beliefs. Rather it condemns the oppression or persecution of others.” John Fitzgerald Kennedy

I usually try to keep my blogs light and fun while at the same time discussing things that are close to my heart, and try never to turn them into soapboxes, but after the recent Martin Luther King holiday, and after watching the State of the Union address last night, I feel inspired to write about something that might be a little more meaty than most would like.

I want to start out by saying that this has nothing to do with gender, race, religion, politics or anything else of the sort. What I am going to write about is something that exists across a very diverse group of people and I am not going to single out any one group and lay blame there. Regardless of where it comes from, there is a huge problem; just as huge a problem as the civil rights struggle in the 1960’s.

This problem that I’m speaking of is the prejudice, opposition, and hatred of people of alternative lifestyles. I’m speaking of those that in the LGBT community, those in the adult film industry, exotic dancers, escorts, fetishists, polyamorists/polygamists, and the list goes on.

Take for example the fact that we are in the year 2011 and gays and lesbians still do not have the most basic legal rights in most states. Possibly one of the most quoted and well known passages of all time, directly from our own Declaration of Independence states, “ We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” And yet, we continue to deny millions of American people the right to be married or to have even basic domestic partnership rights.

Gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgendered people are still in fear of being abused and persecuted, including in the school system, and have barely won the fight to openly serve in the U.S. military in defense of OUR freedom. People of alternate lifestyles are still being discriminated against in everyday life, in the workplace, and in politics. It is commonplace for adult film entertainers to receive hate mail and threats because of the profession that they have willingly chosen to enter.

Our society still looks down upon, judges, and scorns those that have chosen to celebrate who they are and the form of sexuality that resides within them. Instead of the segregation based upon skin color that we struggled against 50 years ago, we now struggle against segregation because of the sexual provocations that a person was born with. Instead of people believing that the earth is flat, burning books, or conducting “witch hunts”, we now have people that truly believe that living an alternate lifestyle is wrong, and that they can and should impose their opinions and beliefs on others.

I recently had someone ask a friend of mine why I would choose to be an adult film star when I obviously had so many other avenues in life that I could have pursued. I immediately asked myself, “Why WOULDN’T I choose to be what I am?” While being an adult film star is a choice, unlike being gay or lesbian, I immediately had to ask myself, why is the career I’ve chosen any less to that person than the other career choices I have? I’m an openly bisexual, polyamorous woman who loves sex, and finds it incredibly empowering and beautiful to have sex on camera for others to enjoy and be turned on by. Yes, there are many other careers or paths that I could have taken, but I’m proud and happy to be a porn star, and there is nothing I would rather be doing. I feel privileged and honored to be able to share my sexual journey and provocations with others – and hopefully inspiring them to explore their own sexual needs and wants.

I became an adult film star to break down boundaries and taboos regarding sex, to portray sexuality in a beautiful, positive light, and to sexually empower people, especially women. A tremendous amount of people are sexually repressed, even traumatized and damaged when it comes to sex, and I think it’s a terrible tragedy. I would love to see every person become comfortable with talking about sex, experimenting with their own sexuality, and to see sex as the beautiful gift that it is.

I hope that in my lifetime, or at least in the lifetime of my children, that people become more tolerant and loving of those that are different than themselves. I find it amusing sometimes that the most judgmental people are the ones that are most afraid of confronting the issues at hand, therefore, they have never been exposed to the “wrong” that they suppose they might find. Maybe if we could all explore not just our sexuality, but all of our fellow human beings, we would discover that what we find is much more beautiful than the darkness we imagined.

"What is tolerance? It is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other's folly - that is the first law of nature."

Voltaire