Oy, vey.
I am not at all opposed to sensitive criticism of my work. I just rarely see it. And the starting post of this thread was not an example of that. Its author uses a collective pronoun to refer to himself, as though his personal tastes were shared by all, which does not suggest that he's a thoughtful critic. Unless of course he has conducted a private survey, which he should cite if he's announcing its findings. He's also basically telling me when I'm allowed to speak and when I'm supposed to take off my clothes and give the boys what they want to see. I find that disrespectful and patronising. 'The value of your mind is finite to me, but the value I place upon your body is endless. Now get your fingers in there before my dick goes soft.' Fuck you. Your claims to love my 'intelligent and articulate' 'talk' mean nothing to me if, at the end of the day, you wish I would just hush now and do what I'm best at.
For the record, folks, I am actually not an exhibitionist. I do not become aroused because you are watching me. I do not do this because I love to show off my body. I do this with an exploratory spirit and a desire to make a difference in the way sexual images are made and consumed. I am skeptical that you've actually paid any mind whatsoever to anything I've ever said, daddy571, because you have absolutely no idea what I'm on about. The Gala who 'loves to show herself off' exists only in your fantasies, and you need to remember that there is a divide between your fantasy versions of the contributors here and their real selves before you go making an arse of yourself in public.
I am grateful that some people here are happy to support me when someone less-than-tactfully disapproves of my decisions with words or images - which actually happens quite a lot more than I was expecting when I took this role. It used to upset me a lot more than it does. Just like I can't expect everyone to like the way I cook or write or drive, I can't expect everyone to like what I make for IFM. I have a lot of work visible here. You pretty much know that I'm the only one writing blurbs and I have one of the largest collections of films of the site's contributors - and that's not work I just conjured up, those are things I was asked to do. So my level of exposure, creatively and sexually, is relatively high. I accept the fact that this opens me up to criticism, and when it is constructive or thoughtful, I can usually meet it on the same level. Well, I'd like to think I could, if that situation ever presented itself. But the level of critique is generally somewhere along the lines of 'I wish you had shown your boobies' and 'I just don't like you as a person and everything you do grates on me and I really, really need to tell you that, as obnoxiously as possible'. Nothing about any of that considers the work that I've done in any thoughtful way. It's just a bunch of spoiled brats having a winge about something that, on a website with over a thousand films, amounts to piddle. What the fuck are you doing taking the time to complain about mine when you could be spending those precious minutes watching something that you do find suitable?
There are reasons why you'll find people being quick and insistent in their responses to negativity directed at contributors. The first and biggest is that we, at the very core of what we do, want these girls to feel good about having done this project. It's the least we can do, when they've shared something so honestly, to try to protect them a bit from the shit that people may thoughtlessly hurl at them because they're used to being able to value them based only on their sexualised bodies. We're over that, dontcha know. We think about what would happen if she came here and read someone bitching about her work, and that makes us feel awful, so we either prevent that from happening, or support her when it does. There are also people here who are my colleagues and, whether or not they always agree with what I make or my approach (and, I promise, they do not), I think there is a level of respect among the people who work together to produce this site which compels us to defend one another's work.
While I think you have oversimplified a few things, dhulme, I appreciate the way you say you consider what I've offered on this site - that whether or not you always like it, you at least acknowledge that I believe in what I make and that I deserve some level of respect for that. (At least that's the way it read to me, do correct me if I'm wrong.) I really don't mind if you think there should be fewer videos of me talking, because you seem smart enough to just not watch them, which seems to me like the most logical (and mature) action to take.
The video diary is the first thing that I've been in that I can say 'this is something I made' rather than 'this is something I was in'. I'm offering something that I've made for view, and this is the particular space it was made for, and so yes you can directly criticise me for its existence, but I think it's wise contextualise it before you do so. You are at IFM, where the production is carried out with particular and strongly-held values, ones that will be upheld in whatever conversation you spark with your comments.
I am getting so sick of having to say these things all the time.
Last edited by gala (11-09-09 09:44:36)
