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Men Watch Porn, Women Read Romance. Why?
Years ago I met a man who intrigued me. He was my first real love. But I didn’t go headlong into a relationship, I wanted to get to know him, understand him.
I became the detective, trying to determine whether he was right for me. Was he devoted, caring? Empathetic? Did he appreciate me? Was he in love with me or was I just a passing fancy?
He thought understanding each other was overrated.
My sleuthing confirmed my initial attraction – that he was deep. Unless the subject was sex and relationship, which he thought were the same thing. Big problem!
I eventually learned that this dynamic – men seeking sex and women seeking answers – is not unusual. It is even reflected in the erotica we seek.
A recent piece in the Wall Street Journal by Ogi Ogas says that men search the internet for two-minute clips that are all about skin and explicit sex. Women’s erotica is more like detective novel meets romance, and takes hours to read and digest. (The number of women romance readers and male online porn viewers are about the same. And keep in mind that one in 10 men are into romance while one in 10 women check out porn clips.)
The men’s interest is simple, uncomplicated. But women more likely want character-driven stories that reveal the lover’s nature. Sex is not for its own sake, and not with impersonal strangers.
As Ogas notes, the female cortex is highly developed and skillfully scrutinizes all available evidence – social, emotional and physical, somewhat consciously but largely not. All this leads to a general feeling of favorability or suspicion: Is he committed and kind? Is he a rouge? A player? Only if the detective work leads to a stamp of approval will physical and psychological arousal unite.
Men’s desire has been likened to an on/off switch, while women’s to a complex circuit board.
Why? Who knows? Some will point to evolutionary psychology: To best reproduce themselves women need a man who will stick around and support their children with resources. So women must be careful, picky. But men (having a great deal of sperm) best reproduce themselves by willy-nilly spreading their seed. It’s a popular theory, but I have my doubts since women in some cultures behave a lot like our sexual stereotype of men. American Indians prior to European contact, for instance.
Others say that in a world where women have less power, women’s lives are more affected by men than vice-versa, so they need to be more careful, even if their sleuthing isn’t very conscious. Women are more likely to follow husbands who are transferred in their careers than vice-versa, for instance. Also, men’s social status affects women more than women’s status affects men’s. When a waitress marries a dentist, her social status immediately rises to his. Not so much for the trucker who marries a female business executive.
And since men are typically bigger and stronger, abused women suffer greater injuries and have more difficultly defending themselves.
Women are also more likely to depend on men, financially, because they are more likely to stay home full-time with kids. Is he dependable? Can he keep a job? If men leave, women in our society bear all the responsibility for children (versus Ancient American Indians who parented communally).
Also, women’s sex drive is typically lower in our culture (largely due to repression), perhaps leaving women wanting emotionally connected sex more than variety and experimentation.
And of course, women were raised on a diet of Disney princesses living happily ever after with their one and only true love. Could have an effect.
Meanwhile, because men are bombarded with sexually objectified women, they come to see women’s bodies as objects that are all about sex, with women’s body parts as sex-signals. Hence the simple look-arousal response. (Surprisingly, the breast fetish seems to be learned, not natural.)
When women and men so often have contradictory ways of seeing and being, you have to wonder why (for about 95% of the population) women and men are thrown together in the first place.
That said, guys are getting more romantic. So while there are reasons why women are more likely to read romance novels and men are more likely to look at two-minute porn clips, in real life there is a bit more coming together.
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Real Women Competing With Porn Stars
Overconsumption of porn is having unintended consequences.
Once upon a time men were hesitant to purchase pornography. Walk into an adult bookstore or movie house? Ring up a purchase with the girl at the counter? Way too embarrassing. But now internet porn is easily available in the anonymity of home. It’s even free. Porn has gone mainstream. Who doesn’t do it anymore?
But porntopia has an unexpected downside. Standards of sexiness are growing narrower. Some men expect their partners to act like porn stars. Sometimes both. Everyone ends up disappointed.
Young men and women are indeed being taught what sex is, how it looks, what its etiquette and expectations are, by pornographic training, and this is having a huge effect on how they interact.
So said Naomi Wolf after a college campus tour.
In sum: women are now expected to behave like actresses in porn flicks. Emphasis on “actress.” Even porn stars don’t behave that way at home.
And how do the actresses act? It’s male fantasy: It’s all about the guy.
Pamela Paul found something similar in her research for Pornified:
Among men who overconsume porn, real women are now expected to: Howl and moan with delight at the sight of the male member, or in anticipation of oral sex. They must enthusiastically swallow, let their boyfriends ejaculate on their faces and bodies, or maybe be peed upon. Suggesting an interest in lesbianism is always good. And through it all, they’re expected to have quick, easy orgasms. Ideally without much foreplay.
A man named Luis reported,
I’ve broken up with women who wouldn’t perform certain things.
Some recognize the problem. A man named Harrison stated,
I think that a guy’s expectations of his partner might be affected by the images he sees in porn. People’s expectations of their partner’s sexual performance or of what their partners might be willing to do might be unrealistic.
A 2004 Elle-MSNBC.com poll found that 35% of men felt sex with real woman had become less arousing. Twenty percent said the real thing couldn’t compete with virtual sex.
If women want to compete, they’ll need to become actresses, too. Not so much fun for them.
Women who bed these men end up feeling empty and unsatisfied. After watching porn with her boyfriend, a woman named Cara observed,
The women were all fake. No intimacy, nothing sensual. Even when he and I were intimate, the sex wasn’t intimate.
Perhaps this is what happens when sex objects have sex — and not when flesh and blood human beings have sex.
Distracted by candy, everyone ends up missing something more nourishing and substantive. We miss out on the deep, connected intimacy that brings so much meaning to relationship. Soul needs.
Why act in ways that leave us empty and spiritually wanting? Is he that into you to be worth it? The focus on his pleasure, only, suggests he is not.
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What Happens When You Beat A Sex Object?
Sexualizing abuse
What happens when you beat a sex object? Or hang her? Or rape her? Or hogtie and torture her?
Pop culture is filled with images of women as objects. It’s also filled with images of women as abused objects. But then, the two go hand in hand: Objects have no feelings to empathize with, no lives of their own to interrupt or worry about. They can exist just for sadistic pleasure.
Oddly, I’m not seeking to shame anyone who gets aroused by these images. People tend to unconsciously absorb their culture like a sponge – we all do. Even my women’s studies students and the feminist blogs I read register a taste for this stuff. No surprise that so many find it sexy, our society is so filled with these images.
At the same time, I’m not dismissing the issue. Whether you want to participate or fight it, at least have eyes open and look at the downside.
When I was a little girl I got a children’s book from the library. In one story a woman was punished: She was stripped, placed in a kettle-like contraption with spikes to poke her, and driven through the town in humiliation. That’s my first memory of sexualized abuse.
My second encounter was flipping TV stations as a child, and seeing a man throw a woman over his knee to spank her. Apparently, if I’d flipped through a magazine I could have seen an ad with the same image.
When I got older the Rolling Stones promoted their “Black and Blue” album with a picture of a woman bound and bruised.
At the movies women are killed – in sexy bras and panties – in popular horror flicks. In tamer fare, Scarlett started out resisting Rhett, but ended up enjoying a night of passion as “no” turned to “yes.” In the soaps, Luke raped Laura and they fell in love.
Devo’s “Whip It” showed a man whipping the clothes off a mannequin. The red hat from this video is now in the Smithsonian.
In magazines and billboards we are bombarded with ads depicting violence against women.
Romance novels and erotic tales tell stories of women who are abducted and raped and who fall in love with their captors. Mainstream movies like 9-1/2 Weeks and The Secretary depict women enjoying abuse at their lovers’ hands. Justine Timberlake slapped Janet Jackson around at the Super Bowl before ripping off her bodice. More recently Megan Fox gets beat up in a popular video that you can view over and over again. In the background Eminem mouths “I’m in flight high of a love drunk from the hate,” to which Rihanna replies, “I like the way it hurts.” And then there’s the porn world full of “no’s” turning to “yes.” Or “no” remaining “no,” but that’s sexy, too.
On a feminist website, one woman described the joys of being a sex slave avatar to a dominant man in the virtual world of “Second Life.” Another explained the appeal with the help of a poor understanding of evolutionary psychology: Through evolution, she explained, women have come to want male domination in their relationships.
That’s not really what evolutionary psych says (and I have issues with that field, anyway). How would craving your own abuse, or even domination, be adaptive? Pain is meant to warn us to stop doing something. Women’s genes don’t crave poor treatment. If they did, we’d find eroticized violence in every culture, but we don’t. Egalitarian societies like those of the American Indian (before contact with patriarchy) did not sexualize abused women.
Here are two big problems with eroticizing male dominance and women’s pain: First, women and men can both come to crave the abuse of women in real life. Second, when we make male dominance seem sexy, we become more accepting of male dominance.
Neither of these aid the fight for equality, justice or human rights.
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Porn: Pro and Con
When it comes to pornography feminists are divided. Where do you stand?
Pro-porn feminists
Feminists who call themselves “sex-positive” say sexual freedom is essential to women’s freedom. They feel patriarchy represses women’s sexual expression, and say porn can liberate through challenging conventional notions that women should be monogamous, romantic, and that sex should be tied to procreation. They do not believe that laws written in a male-dominated society would serve women’s interests.
Anti-porn feminists
Many feminists who oppose pornography say it turns women into objects, promotes misogyny, eroticizes male dominance, and leads to violence against women. As one anti-porn blogger put it, “instead of being portrayed as individuals, as human beings, they are treated as fragmented body parts; women, men and children are depicted and used as holes, cunts, living sex aids, receptacles for the depositing of waste fluids.”
Others worry that porn can lead men who over consume to become disinterested in real women. Naomi Wolf points out that some porn-users come to find real women less than porn-worthy, in body or in bed, leading to detrimental effects on relationships. High consumption can leave sex without its mystery and men with decreased libido.
Does pornography cause violence against women?
Studies are not conclusive.
Researchers asked male volunteers to administer electric shocks to women, under the guise of providing feedback in learning experiments. Men who had been exposed to violent and humiliating pornography were more aggressive in administering shocks.
Men who were shown violent and humiliating pornography also developed attitudes that were closer to those of rapists’. But the effects evaporated after a couple of months. Of course, men who view violent and humiliating pornography probably don’t wait a couple of months between viewing.
But we still don’t know whether pornography causes actual rape.
On the other hand, correlation studies often find that the more pornography is consumed, the lower the rate of rape. Does pornography decrease rape? Other factors could be in play. Over the last 20 years:
- pornography consumption increased due to the Internet
- women’s power and status rose because of increased opportunity in our society
- the rate of rape decreased according to Justice Department victimization surveys
Has rape decreased because of higher pornography consumption or because women’s power and status has broadly risen despite porn?
Civil Libertarian Feminists
Other feminists believe that pornography is offensive and even harmful, but they feel that protection of individual rights and freedoms is more important.
What should be done?
Should pornography be celebrated as “pro-sex” feminists believe? Should laws be imposed against pornography as many anti-porn feminists advocate, and as civil libertarians fear? Should those who are concerned about negative effects of pornography turn to dialogue and education rather than the law?
Where do you come down on the issue?
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Women Learn the Breast Fetish, Too
Meredith Chivers, a highly regarded psychologist at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, showed men and women, both straight and gay, short film clips of heterosexual sex, gay and lesbian sex, a man masturbating, a woman masturbating, a nude well-toned man walking, a fit woman doing nude calisthenics, and bonobos (an ape species) having sex.
Chivers then asked the men and women to rate how aroused they felt. But she also used probes to gauge penile swelling and vaginal blood flow.
Men’s responses were as expected.
But women’s genitals and minds seemed to belong to entirely different people. For instance, hetero women’s bodies were more aroused by the exercising woman than by the strolling man – though they claimed otherwise.
In other research, she asked men and women to wear goggles that track eye movement, and had them look at pictures of heterosexual couples in foreplay. The men gazed mostly at the women – their faces and bodies. But the women spent equal time looking at both sexes, with their eyes focused on the men’s faces and the women’s bodies.
In these two pieces of research we find hetero women more aroused by nude pictures of women than men, and spending more time looking at nude women’s bodies than men’s.
Odd huh?
Chivers isn’t entirely sure what to make of it all. Since women’s blood flow rose in every sexual situation they viewed, including the bonobos – and because lubrication (and blood flow) also increase among rape victims when sex is unwanted – she speculates that women’s bodies may lubricate whenever a sexual signal arises in order to reduce discomfort, and the possibility of injury, during penetration. With this need, women’s bodies may simply be much more sensitive to any sexual signal than men’s, whether or not they feel sexually aroused.
Okay, but why were women more aroused by looking at the nude woman than the nude man? “Possibly,” she said, “the exposure and tilt of the woman’s vulva during her calisthenics was processed as a sexual signal while the man’s unerect penis registered in the opposite way.”
The notion that the women were less turned on because they couldn’t see an erection seems odd given that Playgirl, until recently, has had a long history of hiding the penis. Many women are ambivalent, at best, about the penis as a visual turn-on.
Perhaps Chivers is referring to some primal response that women aren’t consciously aware of, responding to a sexual stimulus requiring need for lubrication. Yet a nude exercising woman is no more likely to penetrate than a flaccid man.
Also, straight women spent more time looking at the bodies of nude women than nude men during sexual foreplay. Why did women’s bodies draw greater interest?
Many will seek out biological explanations, but as a sociologist, I think culture may explain the oddity.
Society teaches us how to see the world: How to think about it, feel about it, and react to it.
The male body is pretty much ignored in our culture. Billboards aren’t splashed with sexy men. No men in Speedos. Nothing much but an occasional underwear ad.
Women’s bodies are focused upon, with breasts selectively hidden and revealed, creating a captivation, leaving us wondering about that which is hidden. The camera gazes, zeroes in on women’s bodies. We talk about women’s breasts as alluring. So they become a sexual signal to both men and women. We don’t treat any part of the male body in the same way.
Men learn the breast fetish, too. In cultures that don’t selectively hide and reveal the breast, they are no big deal. So tribal men, who see them all the time, aren’t especially interested. European men’s attraction waned when topless women suddenly appeared all over local beaches and billboards. And men can become numbed to titillation with overexposure to porn.
Hetero women likely experience all this a bit differently from men. For one thing, the fetish isn’t attached to their natural sexual interest, which may weaken the allure. Homophobia may also lead to repression. Women might also see other women’s breasts as competition, distracting from the erotic. Or, they may become angered by female objectification — another distraction. But research suggests that women often do experience the fetish, none-the-less.
I’m hetero, but ask me which image I find more erotic, a nude female or a nude male, and I’ll choose the girl. Many of my hetero female students nod in agreement.
I used to think that was odd, until I realized that the breast fetish is learned, and not based in biology.
To anyone who plans to inform me that I am bi, please see this post first (I’m tired of answering repetitive comments): Men Know My Sexuality Better Than Me
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What Do Top Model and Hard Core Porn Have in Common?
What do hard core porn and reality show, Top Model, have in common? Hard core pornography often gets the viewer off on women’s suffering. So does Top Model.
In the first episode the models underwent Brazilian bikini waxes on camera. As Jennifer Pozner described it, “Cameras flitted back and forth from their pained facial expressions to their nearly nude legs spread wide in the air, while the audio lingered at length on the models’ blood-curdling screams as hot wax was spread over their genitals and their pubic hair was ripped off.”
The only thing missing was the close-up.
Pozner went on to describe how contestants have been asked to drop from platforms onto surfaces with little cushioning, or to sit on ice sculptures in freezing temperatures. One model was asked to pose in a pool of icy water – shaking, shivering, and begging for a break – until her body began to shut down from hypothermia and she was rushed to a hospital.
If pain and suffering isn’t imminent, models are asked to act as though it is, coached to look “scared! Something’s chasing you! Something’s coming to get you!” Scared, “but pretty,” that is.
Host, Tyra Banks, has also asked models to act like they are in pain: chest pain, fingers slammed in a door, strangulation… A signature pose was suggested for one model, “Look like you’re getting punched.”
Beautiful, sexy women in fear and pain. All reminiscent of hard-core pornography. In the popular video, “Two in the Seat #3,” an actress is asked by an off-camera interviewer what will happen. She replies, “I’m here to get pounded.”
In other pornos women are hit or raped. Too-large objects are inserted as actresses scream out. Sometimes pain is registered in penetration. Even when suffering isn’t purposely placed in the script, directors don’t bother to edited it out, suggesting viewers’ taste. More and more, the new edge in porn involves cruelty.
I worry about a society that develops a taste for women’s torment. Or for anyone’s distress. As pain becomes eroticized, women can develop a desire for their own suffering. My women students sometimes talk of getting turned on by a little S&M in the bedroom. Depending on how far it goes, the sex play can lead to broken skin, bruising and infections.
We worry about women being battered. Should we worry when women come to crave their own abuse?
As they sexily submit to domination and acts of violence by their male partners, male domination, itself, becomes sexy.
We may have come a long way, ladies. But we’ve still got a long way to go.
Georgia Platts
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Sources: Robert Jensen, Ph.D. “The painful truth about today’s pornography – and what men can do about it.” Ms. Spring 2004; John Stoltenberg. “Pornography and Freedom” in Susan Shaw and Janet Lee’s Women’s Voices, Feminist Visions, 4th ed. 2009
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Men Finding Fewer Women “Porn-Worthy”
![jenna-jameson[1]](https://broadblogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/jenna-jameson1.jpg?w=230&h=300)
Feminist, Andrea Dworkin, had feared that easy access to internet porn would turbocharge women’s objectification and turn men into wild, raping beasts. But internet porn actually seems to be having the opposite effect, deadening male libido in relation to real women, with men who over-consume finding fewer women “porn-worthy.
This is what author, Naomi Wolf, noticed when students talked about their sex lives during her speaking tours of college campuses.
Others have made similar findings.
Pamela Paul interviewed over one hundred people, mostly men, in her research for Pornified, and found that porn-worthiness was a common concern among those who over-indulged.
One young man talked of his change in perspective:
My standards changed. Women who are otherwise good looking but aren’t as overtly sexy as the women in porn don’t appeal to me as much anymore. I find that I look more for women who have the attributes I see in porn. I want bigger breasts, longer hair, curvier bodies in general.
I find that when I’m out at a party or bar I catch myself sizing up women. I would say to myself, wait a second. This isn’t a supermarket. You shouldn’t treat her like she’s some piece of meat. Don’t pass her up just because her boobs aren’t that big.
Paul went on to cite a 2004 Elle-MSNBC.com poll which found that one in 10 men admitted he had become more critical of his partner’s body with exposure to porn.
Meanwhile, 51% of Americans believe that pornography raises men’s expectations of how women should look.
Many of the college women Wolf spoke to complained that they couldn’t compete, and they knew it.
Men, she said, learn about sex from porn but find that it is not helpful in teaching them how to relate to real women. She ended with this observation:
Mostly, when I ask about loneliness, a deep, sad silence descends on audiences of young men and young women alike. They know they are lonely together, even when conjoined, and that this imagery is a big part of that loneliness. What they don’t know is how to get out, how to find each other again erotically, face-to-face.
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Frats Invite Sluts, Bitches; Women Accept Degradation. Why?
“Dear Bitches, I mean witches.”
So began Duke’s Alpha Delta Phi’s e-mailed invitation to their Halloween party. It continues just as charmingly:
“The Brothers of Alpha Delta Phi know what true fear is. Fear is having someone say ‘I love you.’ … Fear is riding the C1 with Helen Keller at the helm (not because shes deaf and blind, but because she is a woman). Fear is waking up with no wallet, phone, keys, or front tooth next to a girl who you could generously deem a 3.”
Not to be outdone, Duke’s Sigma Nu frat offered their own enticement:
“Whether your dressing up as a slutty nurse, a slutty doctor, a slutty schoolgirl, or just a total slut, we invite you to find shelter in the confines of Partners D.”
Ummm, how appealing! (And I don’t just mean their grammar and spelling.)
Someone had the sense to print out the invites and scrawl handwritten messages: “If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention,” “Is this why you came to Duke?” and then wallpaper the campus.
Strangely, sorority sisters interviewed took it all in stride as “boys-will-be-boys.”
“Honestly, when I first received those e-mails I didn’t think anything of it,” said Emily Fausch, of Delta Delta Delta sorority. “This is the kind of thing I’ve come to expect from fraternities. In my heart, I know it’s a problem but I’ve really gotten used to it. I don’t take it too seriously. I think that college boys will be college boys.”
Now, not all fraternities are created equal. Some actually work to be respectful toward women. But at many frats, women are routinely degraded in attempts to create a sense of male superiority and “manhood” by putting women down, according to sociologist, Michael Kimmel.
But why do women so often support their own disgrace by continuing to fraternize with the frats? This woman’s comment that she’s simply gotten used to it is telling.
We live in a society that sees women as lesser-than, and which sexualizes male dominance. Both lay the groundwork for accepting ill treatment.
A few quick examples: Man, brother, and guy encompass women, but woman, sister, and gal don’t encompass men. So man becomes primary, and woman secondary. A woman marries and becomes Mrs. Leonard Smith. A man never becomes Mrs. Emily Struthers. Unless it’s an insult. Send a card from the family? Likely dad’s name goes first, then mom’s, then the children in order of appearance. Men tend to feel insulted taking the secondary spot. Women are just used to it.
We sexualize male dominance when Rhett takes Scarlett up the stairs for a night of marital rape and Scarlett cheerfully awakens the next morning. Or when Rihanna sings about enjoying mistreatment from her man, while Eminem celebrates abusing women. Watching women enjoy humiliation in porn or mainstream movies like The Secretary also eroticizes male dominance. The list goes on.
Continually treated as secondary, second-rate treatment becomes taken-for-granted, invisible. The women are used to it. It seems natural. Sometimes even sexy.
As too many frat brothers intensify the world of insult, women acclimate to the higher level shame.
All this teaches women to accept attitudes and behavior that regard them as second-class.
A college roommate of mine dated a frat boy who treated her like dirt. She defended him to all of us who cared about her. She had certainly learned to accept her own humiliation.
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Men Aren’t Hard Wired To Find Breasts Arousing
Men aren’t hard wired to find breasts arousing?
No.
And how do we know this?
The same way we discover that many things aren’t biologically-based. By learning about other cultures. And the breast fetish does not exist in them all.
Men and women both resist the claim until they’re reminded of tribal societies. We’ve all seen pictures from National Geographic. And we all know that among tribal people women’s breasts are no big deal.
By the mid-1980s, topless beaches and overexposure to nudity in advertising had a similar effect in Europe. Topless women were plastered all over billboards, magazine and television advertisements because both men and women looked. But by the mid-eighties, no one paid much attention anymore. It was all so blasé. European men studying in the U.S. asked why American men were so obsessed with nudity. What’s the big deal, they wondered.
Even men who are overexposed to porn can lose interest, according to Pamela Paul, who has studied porn’s effect on male sexual arousal. As one man put it,
At first, I was happy just to see a naked woman. But as time has gone on I’ve grown more accustomed to such things.
Now he seeks more extreme stuff.
Meanwhile, studies show that even women learn the breast fetish, with images of a nude woman creating greater blood flow to the vaginal area than images of a nude man. More on that later.
How odd. Breasts turn on Western women, but not tribal men? And hetero women get more aroused by a nude woman than by a nude man?
Fetishes are created by selectively hiding and revealing — making that which is hidden enticing. Both men and women become intrigued. (Women do experience all this a bit differently from men, which I’ll discuss later.)
Meanwhile, a student of mine lived in Iran after the Islamic revolution when women strictly covered themselves except for the face. She told me that every now and again she would pull her veil back a little and watch the men go wild over her “hair cleavage.”
In America around the turn of the last century even seeing an ankle was sexy because they were always covered. In some old family photos one of my grandmothers is pulling her skirt up above her ankle to look scandalously sexy. I couldn’t even comprehend what she was doing until someone explained.
Covering is captivating. If you see the same thing all the time, it’s no big deal.
We always hear that “men are visual” (but that women are not). This isn’t based in biology. Men learn to become visual, while hetero women are left with nothing acceptable to look at. Culturally, we don’t sexualize the male body.
The fetish feels real enough, but then, much of what is learned feels biological.
As we shall see, all this can heighten bedroom excitement. Or it can have the opposite effect. More later…
If you would like to tell me why you disagree with this post, please read this first and comment over there: The Breast Fetish Is Natural? Afraid Not.
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Readers Discuss: Porn, Pro and Con
This discussion comes mostly from the post I made to the blog, FreeMeNow. Also see Porn: Pro and Con and reposted Porn: Pro and Con on BroadBlogs.
Love most things pornographic. Not thrilled with Snuff flicks and underage porn at all!!
Pornography destroys men. They get hooked on it and cannot be satisfied by normal sex. Unless you have seen what porno has become – You cannot possibly know just how degrading, demeaning and humiliating it is to women.
Porn is not what it was 50 years ago, it is now not enough to have sex and look at the women’s parts — now the woman must be hurt, urinated on defecated on and humiliated in every way imaginable all while smiling and seeming to love it and beg for more.
I agree! Equal rights do not mean equal absurdity, equal stupidity or equal degradation. We don’t stoop down to reach their level and call that equal do we?
Instead of asking for more money, more representation in government and the highest job in the nation we are asking for PORN? We are asking for the right to be used as urinals to be jacked off into and onto? We are asking for the freedom to screw all over the place and be hog tied like swine so we can squeal like pigs for the pleasure of perverts.
God help us and then we wonder why we are murdered at the rate of 4 a day and our little girls are yanked out of their sleeping beds and raped then buried alive after he has had his fill. Porn leads to more porn which leads to kidde porn.
Women are women’s worse enemies. And I agree we don’t need laws to stop PORN – we need women to stop porn – the animals who use it won’t. If we elevate ourselves and unite- as a majority we will have the power to get for ALL women exactly what we want and need and will never again have to be used like this.
I think the porn that is available today is gross and should go the way of the dinosaur. Having said that, if porn were more female friendly (i.e. consensual sex with a partner, foreplay etc) it could be a good thing for society.
A recent content analysis of the 50 best-selling adult videos revealed that across all scenes, a total of 3,376 verbal and/or physically aggressive acts were observed. On average, scenes had 11.52 acts of either verbal or physical aggression, ranging from none to 128. Forty-eight percent of the 304 scenes analyzed contained verbal aggression, while more than 88% showed physical aggression.
Seventy-two percent of aggressive acts were perpetrated by men; 94% of aggressive acts were committed against women.
The most common responses victims expressed when aggressed were either pleasure or neutrality. Fewer than 5% of the aggressive acts provoked a negative response from the female victims, including flinching and requests to stop the action. This pornographic “reality” was further highlighted by the infrequency of more positive behaviors, such as verbal compliments, embracing, kissing, or laughter.
I think when we outlaw anything it increases the desire to have it.
That being said, porn is an estimated $13 billion industry. While I do not think that it should be celebrated I also do not think that porn of the 2000’s is as objectifying a porn of say the 70’s. It is also a plus that more women in the industry are getting behind the camera and creating a woman’s version of porn.
Men view sex differently than women. Porn just shows that difference on a mass level. The majority of porn is done with consenting adults. No matter the loose subject matter. On the other hand kiddie porn and snuff films deserve the attitude some have towards all porn. Some S&M gets way beyond what some people can watch comfortably, but again, done with consenting adults and fairly well paid adults
As to the question of whether or not porn decreases rape. I would say of those that have overactive sex drives, yes it does. However, there are many out there that feed off what they view on the screen. It can lead to needing harder core porn on an increasing level. But that is the name of the game with anything and American’s as a whole, suffer from that notion in all aspects of life, not just sexually speaking.
But, the question is how much of that need is driven by societies “distaste” of the subject. Some get off on knowing that if they watch porn they are now one of the sinners of this world. It is very titillating to sneak through a painted door with age warnings and walk into an expanse that is hidden from the world and is a playground of possibilities and beautiful girls and guys. Very heady stuff.
Perhaps the better question is this…If we embraced sex in all its forms….would there be less rape in this country? If we started treated women as equal to man would there be less objectification of women as a whole? Both are very big “ifs” but I would sure like to try it.
As to the law….when we can not or will not self govern….this is when the law steps in. If American truly wants to keep “big brother government” out of their lives…perhaps they had better start talking – and listening – and solving issues on their own. Signing something into law is a cop-out. The lazy way to address issues. Even if there becomes a law that forbids porn of any kind….what manpower will be there to enforce it? And in the bigger picture of things is porn worthy of law enforcement at the level of catching a murderer? Pick your poison.
I feel porn is degrading and dehumanizing for women. The female becomes an object; males view them as an object, a piece of trash, especially if females submit to the degradation.
The video games Grand Theft Auto; the musical lyrics of the Rapper Two Live Crew were so filthy; disgusting that a Florida attorney was so repulsed he sued them, to prevent the public airing during normal day hours… and won.
I absolutely agree with that stand …our children should not have the smut forced upon them under the guise that freedom of speech allows it! What about decency laws??? Parents shouldn’t feel compelled to keep their children under continual surveillance either. Sadly that atty after 30 yrs of clean honest practice of law suffered the wrath of Hollywood’s enormous power to force the smut …he was disbarred by the state of Florida and has fought a valiant fight but even the feds are submissive to the powers of the Hollywood elite at the detriment of the people ….and I want to know why Hilary Clinton won’t take a stand on that??? She had supported the lawyer during the initial battle but abandoned him in his time of need, as did the US Supreme Court; the so called justice system.
Back to the issue of porn…..I think a poll of HS and college students would also be very revealing; I’d bet the findings would speak loud & clear that porn is dehumanizing for women …and beauty has nothing to do in the equation …it’s a tool to exploit the female!
Exposure to X-rated films among 522 black females aged 14 to 18, was associated with being 2.0 times more likely to have multiple sex partners, 1.8 times more likely to have sex more frequently, 1.5 times more likely to have not used contraception during the last intercourse, 2.2 times as likely to have not used contraception in the past 6 months, more than twice as likely to have a strong desire to conceive, and 1.7 times more likely to test positive for Chlamydia.
Wingood, G., DiClemente, R., Harrington, K., Davies, S., Hook, E., & Oh, M. (2001). Exposure to X-rated movies and adolescents’ sexual and contraceptive-related attitudes and behaviors, Pediatrics, 107(5), 1116-1119.
We live in a male dominated society, and throughout history, woman who are celebrated are valued as a care takers, as lovers. As creatures to try and put effort to gain their attention. That’s a great thing! Prostitution is the oldest profession. If it wasn’t for prostitutes, the women who were sexually powerful, they wouldn’t have known what pleases a woman and what doesn’t. And that’s what encouraged loosening restrictions on females, and so that changed so much in sex with men and their wives. Women just need to take charge of their sexuality, and recognize their bodies are amaz-ng, especially in this society. So if they by whatever reason, enjoys to have sex on camera, you can’t criticize them for doing so. Its erotica and expressional and sexy if its done in a positive aspect. But when it crosses the line, with anything in life, it has its potential to be dangerous. But porn can be healthy. And normal. Fantasy. And nice done in small amounts. Fair.
Porn is a sickness …a cancer that breeds cancer!!! What a repulsive excuse for behaviors even lower than the animal kingdom!!
We think we have a civilized society but is it really??? Pretty lowlife when even our children cannot be safe.
That pretty much says it all. And keep in mind this shit gets to our young boys and shapes their impressionable minds, then our young girls go walking down the street half naked…
You know — it doesn’t take a genius to figure this out ladies. Either you have been brainwashed to think this is ok or there is something seriously wrong and help needs to be found.
Most girls have been abused in one form or another from birth either verbally, visually or physically and this is the result!
It is not equality that allows us to have our bodies mistreated – it is pure stupidity and to think that you like it is sick and requires attention!
Some people cut themselves, take drugs, drink themselves to death too. That doesn’t make it normal- Get help!
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