Porn - I use it and feel bad - help convince me porn is wrong

Bloody hell, is this still going on?

if you dont like watching porn just stop. use your imagination instead

Bestnameever;

Can you imagine the reaction if a man posted that about a woman attending a group ( whatever group it doesn't matter ) your experience is not one I've shared thankfully.

Ime; attending playgroups, the token dad usually got ignored. ( not ideal either )
Maybe you're seeing too much into certain situations, you post came across as Very 'anti- male' - maybe it was supposed to?

Interesting BestNameEver.

I started reading your post and thought maybe you had posted on the wrong thread - and then the more I read, the more I saw the relevance.

However, don't mean to generalise about men - just blaming the patriarchy.

You're welcome Msrisotto. I agree with you about the soundbites.

Thanks sakura. That means a lot.

Beachcomber, I've just got to add to what others have said. The work you and dittany are doing is admirable. You changed my mind on porn forever, not that I was particularly pro-porn a year or two ago, but the pro-porn lobby had done such a good job of eliminating the harm and erasing the fact porn is a hate crime against the female SEX, that I was apathetic and didn't really think about it.

It's shocking that men use the racist, misogynistic language they do in porn, dehumanizing other humans like that on the basis of their sex. Honestly, the way men behave in porn is proof of what evil oppressors they are. And they would have us BELIEVE that the men are NOT abusing women in porn, and that the women are enjoying it, even though they're being paid to ACT.

How fucking stupid do they think we women are?
Honestly I'm losing my patience with men.

Beachcomber - Thanks for that article, I particularly liked these sound bites:

"The more porn sexualises violence against women, the more it normalises and legitimises sexually abusive behaviour. Men learn about sex from porn, and in porn nothing is too painful or degrading for women."

"The assumption that if you are a woman who hates pornography you are against sex shows how successful the industry is at collapsing porn into sex. Would the critics of the employment practices and products at McDonald's be accused of being anti-eating?"

And from the comments beneath

"Pornography is hate speech, and profoundly anti-sex and anti-human"

"Perhaps one way to get the free speech argument disentangled, is to separate pornography from profit - leaving all those people who claim there is no exploitation involved in the porn industry free to express themselves - for free."

In other areas witness testimonies have been taken seriously and form a major part of the information that we have about certain terrible events. The holcaust is one area where individual testimony has given us greater understanding of the events that took place.

After the war the individual testimonies of both victim and purpertrators formed the basis on which we convicted Nazi war criminals.

It is also possible to include the testimonies of others involved in the industry. Just as others have said on this thread about the pornographer and rapist Max hardcore "We are not happy until you are unhappy" his comment tells us a lot about how his behaviour towards women makes them feel and that he is absolutely clear about his intentions. Just one individual but I am sure it would be possible to find many more.

Interesting article by Julie Bindel on Gail Dines. Some mention of disturbing ways in which exposure to porn affects behaviour.

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/jul/02/gail-dines-pornography

It's only ever about women's experience that that attitude is takena s well. With other oppressed groups, their experiences are listented to with respect and acknowledged.

ousel - thank you for that story. It illustrates perfectly why being believed is important; it's acknowledging that someone matters.

jenny60 - what bothers me most about testimonies/survivor stories being dismissed, is the implication that these women are disposable and don't really matter . The so what attitude - it's so callous.

I'm afraid I'm a bit pedantic and a bit of a stickler for truth. Which is why I'm really dismayed at Prosperina making serious and unfounded accusations on this thread.

Prosperina, you said, and I quote;

"After two or so pages, he was accused of being a potential rapist."

You were referring to the OP.

When I asked you to quote the post in which the OP was accused of being a potential rapist, you cited the following post by dittany (correct me if I'm wrong).

"dittany Mon 11-Apr-11 11:30:55

He's still posting on that other thread.

He doesn't seem to be able to hear it when a woman draws a boundary and says no."

Dittany was referring to the fact that the OP posted on a memorial thread about a radical feminist whose wrote about pornography. She asked him not to stomp all over said memorial thread for reasons which can be found on said thread, and yet he continued to do so.

You are making things up. Nobody, anywhere, on this thread has accused the OP 'of being a potential rapist'.

You have made a very serious allegation and you have failed to back it up.

Do you understand what the word boundary means?

Why are you making things up and when are you going to apologise for doing so?

Sorry to interrupt but Newsnight will be doing a report on teenagers and porn this evening. It might feature some personal anecdotes and might not be rigorous enough for some here, but for the open minded among us, it might be worth a look.
p.s. completely agree flip. Many academic disciplines feature this kind of evidence and it is taken seriously when considered alongside other sorts of evidence.

I know this has been mentioned upthread, but it's really preying on my mind.

Why is it that people find it so easy to ignore/belittle/dismiss personal testimony..you know, oh it's just an anecdote, it doesn't mean anything?

Because to me, opening up about abuse (any kind of abuse tbh..and imo this is abuse) and not being believed is just horrible.

It reads to me that these women are dismissed non people and what happened to them doesn't matter. How on earth can anyone not find that awful? I just can't get my head round the idea that someone would read that stuff and not be massively disturbed by it.

Oh well, at least George Bush was right, you're either with us or against us. Post anything that isn't violently anti-porn, and you're pro-porn.

Think I'll name change back again now. Interesting debate though from some

Beachcomber, yes, it was a post on Monday 11 April at 11:30! The implication was clear

Anyway, amusing to think I'm seen as pro-porn, oh well, I've obviously not made myself clear to some of the folks here, no point arguing with those who think so.

Sorry - I assumed you knew what I meant - this is about porn users as a group, not the entire male population - clearly not all men use porn and most men do not cheat on their wives - but of the men who do cheat and use porn, - most are able to separate sex from love/empathy/call it what you will .
And I think men are fantastic - that's why I'm married to one.

One of the problems I have with threads about unacceptable male behaviour, whether it's porn use, visiting sex clubs, cyber sex, prostitute use or infidelity, is the statements made about men as a whole. It's deeply insulting to men who do associate love and feelings with sex, despise women being objectified for their sexuality and behave in their public and private lives as decent human beings. It always occurs to me that so many posters have a very low opinion of men, yet they seek to defend the worst male behaviour by suggesting that "all men" are like this.

They are not.

I am in awe of those of you who have kept this going. I'm going to have a break now and do some work. Thank you sisters and see you soon

Woah hold on a second there. I'm ignoring the 'I'm an anti-porn person who makes pro-porn arguments' and the touching empathy for the OP's wank habits.

However, Prosperina, I would like you to clarify this statement of yours;

"After two or so pages, he was accused of being a potential rapist."

Could you quote that post please - the one where the OP was accused of being a potential rapist?

That's actually a good point carmina - we could spernd the rest of our lives trying to compile the definitive proof of the harm porm does and it wouldnt make a blind bit of difference to men who will never see women as truly human anyway.

So let's not waste any more valuable feminist time on that - the work has been done. We shouldn't let anything distract us from campaigning for full criminilisation