The Attorney General’s Commission on Porno-
graphy, also known as the Meese Commission, was
formed to study the effects of pornography and pos-
sible responses to those effects. Dworkin’s research
and opinions were accepted by the committee. As a
result, at least for a time, store owners were forced to
remove pornographic magazines from high-visibil-
ity shelves and to relegate them instead to more ob-
scure and protected store locations. Public aware-
ness of the proliferation and possible consequences
of overt pornography was heightened as a direct re-
sult of Dworkin’s effort. While Dworkin firmly be-
lieved that pornography resulted in harm and some-
times even death for women, she was not in favor of
obscenity laws, considering them ineffectual. In-
stead, she advocated passage of federal civil rights
laws for women who were sexually victimized, as well
as a host of punitive laws against pornographers.
Dworkin published a treatise on sexual inter-
course (aptly titledIntercourse) in 1987. In it, she as-
serted that even classic literature often portrayed
male-dominant sexual positions as a method of sub-
jugating women. She was consequently incorrectly
quoted as saying that all intercourse is rape, reinforc-
ing the widely held perception that she hated men
categorically and irrationally.
Impact Andrea Dworkin raised American aware-
ness of hate crimes and sexual crimes against women.
She encouraged government to extend civil rights
protection for victims of unwanted and violent sex
acts, laying the groundwork for hallmark legislation
in the future.
Further Reading
Dworkin, Andrea.The Political Memoir of a Feminist
Militant. New York: Basic Books, 2002.
Steger, Manfred, and Nancy Lind.Violence and Its Al-
ternatives: An Interdisciplinar y Reader. New York: St.
Martin’s Press, 1999.
Twyla R. Wells
See also Feminism;Handmaid’s Tale, The; Meese,
Edwin, III; Pornography; Rape; Sexual harassment.
Dynasty
Identification Prime-time television soap opera
Producers Aaron Spelling (1923-2006), Esther
Shapiro (1934- ), and Richard Shapiro
(1934- )
Date Aired from January 12, 1981, to May 10,
1989
Conceived as ABC’s answer to CBS’s successful prime-time
soap operaDallas,Dynastybecame a weekly ritual for more
than 100 million viewers in more than seventy countries.
Viewers rearranged their schedules to watch the program,
andDynastyparties were not uncommon, as fans got to-
gether to cheer for their favorite characters and gasp at the
twists in the plot.
Set for the most part in Denver, Colorado,Dynastyre-
volved around Blake Carrington, a self-made mil-
lionaire played by John Forsyth. The show portrayed
both Blake’s business dealings and his personal rela-
tionships with family members. Of particular note
were his continuing conflicts with his ex-wife, Alexis
(Joan Collins), and his love for his second wife,
Krystle (Linda Evans). Both women were extraordi-
narily beautiful and wore designer clothes, but nei-
ther was young, making them unusual protagonists
for a soap opera. They were outstanding in their
strong, goal-oriented personas. Alexis, introduced
in the second season to win more viewers, wasDy-
nasty’s equivalent ofDallas’s J. R. Ewing, a ruthless
character whom fans loved to hate. She was a busi-
nesswoman at a time when women were still dream-
ing about cracking the glass ceiling. Krystle, a more
traditional character, acted as the moral center of
the drama. A physical fight between the two women
in a lily pond was a highlight of the 1982-1983
season.
The show’s principal viewers were women, at-
tracted by the glamorous lifestyles portrayed, and
gay men, lured by both the campy style of the pro-
gram and the story line concerning Carrington’s gay
son Steven.Dynastywas the first prime-time network
drama to feature an openly gay major character.
Dynastypremiered as a three-hour movie in Janu-
ary, 1981; as a prime-time series, it quickly climbed
in the ratings once Collins joined the cast. For the
1984-1985 season, it was the top-rated show in the
United States. The cliffhanger that season, a deadly
wedding in Moldavia, ended with nearly every char-
acter on the show being caught in a hail of automaticThe Eighties in America Dynasty 305