In a book that completely changes the termsof the pornography debate, Laura Kipnis challenges the position thatporn perpetuates misogyny and sex crimes. First published in 1996, Boundand Gagged opens with the chilling case of Daniel DePew, a manconvicted—in the first computer bulletin board entrapment case—ofconspiring to make a snuff film and sentenced to thirty-three years inprison for merely trading kinky fantasies with two undercover cops.Usingthis textbook example of social hysteria as a springboard, Kipnisargues that criminalizing fantasy—even perverse and unacceptablefantasy—has dire social consequences. Exploring the entire spectrum ofpornography, she declares that porn isn’t just about gender and thatfantasy doesn’t necessarily constitute intent. She reveals Larry Flynt’sHustler to be one of the most politically outspoken andclass-antagonistic magazine in the country and shows how fetishes suchas fat admiration challenge our aesthetic prejudices and sociallysanctioned disgust. Kipnis demonstrates that the porn industry—whosemultibillion-dollar annual revenues rival those of the three majortelevision networks combined—know precisely how to tap into ourculture’s deepest anxieties and desires, and that this knowledge, morethan all the naked bodies, is what guarantees its vast popularity.Boundand Gagged challenges our most basic assumptions about America’srelationship with pornography and questions what the calls to eliminateit are really attempting to protect.