This month at The Psychology Podcast we discussed pornography and philosophy with Stoya and the importance of commitments for living a fulfilled life with David Brooks.

Foucault, Heteronormativity, and Good Porn with Stoya

Stoya has been working with sexuality for over a decade. Her writing credits include the New York Times, The Guardian, and Playboy. Her first book of essays, Philosophy, Pussycats, & Pornis available through Not A Cult Media, and her experimental porn project lives at ZeroSpaces.com. 

In this episode we discuss a wide range of topics, including:

  • What is porn?
  • What is good porn?
  • Can there be feminism under capitalism?
  • Stoya’s critique of “liberal feminists”
  • The importance of values that transcend sexual preferences
  • How our collective conception of “normal sex” leaves out a whole lot of sexual preferences that “normal” people have
  • Focault on how preventing the discussion of sex is making us even more obsessed with sex
  • The science of sexual fantasies
  • Are there any sexual fantasies that are damaging to normalize?
  • What we can learn about privacy from pornstars
  • The benefits/disadvantages of choosing a porn career
  • Comparing/contrasting BDSM with monogamy
  • Why BDSM is too wide a category to be considered a sexual orientation
  • Why Stoya has to be physically aroused in order to be creative in a porn scene
  • How Scott and Stoya know each other
  • Which author - from anytime thru history - would Stoya like to go out partying with? And what would her drink of choice be for such an occasion?
  • The link between ADHD and creativity

The Quest for a Moral Life with David Brooks

Today we have David Brooks on the podcast. Brooks is an op-ed columnist for The New York Times and appears regularly on “PBS NewsHour,” NPR’s “All Things Considered” and NBC’s “Meet the Press.” He teaches at Yale University and is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the bestselling author of a number of books, including The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement; The New Upper Class and How They Got There; The Road to Character, and most recently, The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life.

In this episode we discuss:

  • The evolution of David’s thinking about character
  • The relationship between our commitments and our fulfillment in life
  • Brook’s criticism of self-actualization taken to the extreme
  • The four crises of our time
  • David’s current stance on reparations
  • Why David is a “border stalker”
  • How David reconciles the need for commitment with identity fluidity
  • Commitment vs. individualism
  • The importance of healthy transcendence
  • The enunciation moment
  • What we can do about the current political landscape
  • David’s thoughts on polyamory and the single life