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Times article on Pornhub - and the response to it

120 replies

RoyalCorgi · 10/05/2023 16:18

In today's Times, Helen Rumbelow wrote an excellent article about Pornhub, and the preponderance of videos where men are shown to be enjoying violence and abuse of women.

On Twitter, someone called Mic Wright has claimed (either because he's stupid, or because he's deliberately trying to cause trouble) that Rumbelow didn't realise the porn participants were actors, and that she's just a bit silly for not understanding that this is all just fantasy and therefore harmless.

He clearly hasn't grasped, or begun to grasp, the idea that boys watching, for pleasure, scenarios in which women are beaten or choked, is not healthy.

What's depressing is the number of men who have joined in to mock Rumbelow.

What's also depressing is that men like this not only watch the most vile, disgusting porn revelling in the depiction of women being harmed, but are prepared to boast about it publicly on Twitter. They don't have the decency to feel ashamed. It makes me despair about men.

https://twitter.com/brokenbottleboy/status/1656178711627014145

https://twitter.com/brokenbottleboy/status/1656178711627014145

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SuePine69 · 18/07/2023 11:32

PomegranateOfPersephone · 16/07/2023 07:08

A PP mentioned Exodus Cry

https://exoduscry.com/

there is also this organisation campaigning against the pornification of society

https://www.collectiveshout.org/

According to Wikipedia "Exodus Cry is a Christian non-profit advocacy organization seeking the abolition of the legal commercial sex industry, including pornography, strip clubs, and sex work, as well as illegal sex trafficking. It has been described by the New York Daily News, TheWrap, and others as anti-LGBT, with ties to the anti-abortion movement".

On the Exodus Cry site it states that PornHub has got videos of Ukrainian refugee women. Julie Bindel stated 'Pornhub has a new category: “Ukrainian girls and war rape videos”'. This is false.

As for Ruchira Gupta, I don't know about her, but I do know about her Cambodian equivalent, Somaly Mam. It turns out she is a liar. "During the years Somaly Mam was supposedly trapped in a Phnom Penh brothel, she was actually attending school in her hometown." She also told a supposed victim to say that a pimp gouged her eye out when the truth was it was the result of the removal, at age 13, of a non-malignant tumour.

Activists like Somaly Mam promote brothel raids where the women are either deported or imprisoned. Women held against their will try to escape. Police brutality against prostitutes is enormous, including rape, but these activists don't want to talk about that. They try to deny funding to rival organisations who don't share their ideology.

DarkDayforMN · 17/07/2023 00:18

It takes some balls to sneer at people for not keeping up with the latest porn releases as eagerly as you do.

MerlinsLostMarbles · 16/07/2023 20:19

The Fake Taxi pornography series launched in 2012, why is it being talked about now?

Zodfa · 16/07/2023 09:11

Most people wouldn't accept "it's fictional" as an excuse for positive portrayals of extreme misogyny in mainstream film or TV drama, why should pornography be any different?

PomegranateOfPersephone · 16/07/2023 07:08

A PP mentioned Exodus Cry

https://exoduscry.com/

there is also this organisation campaigning against the pornification of society

https://www.collectiveshout.org/

Collective Shout

for a world free of sexploitation

https://www.collectiveshout.org/

PomegranateOfPersephone · 16/07/2023 06:59

“Jordan Peterson has some very anti-woman views. He thinks "enforced monogamy" is the answer to preventing incel terrorism for example. He is a hero for the alt right, antifeminist man. I strongly suggest you don'tintroduce your son to his thinking”

I have read and listened to Jordan Peterson a fair bit and never come across anything like this unless you are referring to similar ideas to those expressed by Louise Perry and Mary Harrington? His interview with Helen Joyce was interesting and thoughtful, not on YouTube anymore as they deemed it hateful so I am very skeptical nowadays when I hear anyone dismissed as “hateful”, misogynistic and son on. There is a human tendency to demonise particular people, newspapers, forums etc. I used to do this too before coming into women’s rights and gender identity debates. I kept looking in vain for articles about women’s rights in the Guardian, I only ever read the Guardian or Independent and would have been disparaging about the Daily Mail or the Telegraph and their readers, it took a while before I understood that I needed to read and listen more widely.

Can you share links to Jordan Peterson saying what you find objectionable?

I would much rather my daughters find boyfriends who are reading/listening to Jordan Peterson than pornography. He encourages men to behave with integrity and to value family and relationships, to find a sense of self respect in being their best from what I can tell.

Anyway not to make the thread about JP, the topic is too important and should not be derailed but I could not let what seems an unjust accusation against a named individual who I think has a contribution to make in fighting pornography and gender identity ideology pass without comment.

PrawnofthePatriarchy · 15/07/2023 16:34

I posted about this here some years back, so excuses for those who've read it before.

Years ago I took my kids on a holiday. My older son had his own room but his brother, who was about 10 or 11, had to share mine. And this turned out to be a blessing. Such a blessing.

in the middle of the night I must have made a noise which told my son I was awake. So he started talking in the dark...

I had blocks on our Wi-fi at home but one of his friends who had a very disrupted home life, including a steady stream of stepfathers, had shown my son abusive porn. DS2 found it incredibly worrying. He was revolted at the idea he would be expected to take part in violent threesomes or watch women weep or scream. Poor little bugger thought it was compulsory.

I succeeded in reassuring him. Among other things I pointed out how unlikely it was that his friends' parents - lovely, affectionate couples - were treating each other like that. When I managed to make him laugh I knew I was winning.

So boys don't automatically get turned on by things on Pornhub. Gentle, loving boys like my DS are as repelled as women are. We need to talk to them, and reassure them.

ScrollingLeaves · 15/07/2023 15:03

Not the BBC itself but the WH presenter

ScrollingLeaves · 15/07/2023 15:02

SuePine69 · Today 14:50

AdamRyan · 12/07/2023 13:58

Are you really arguing that porn and prostitution are low risk activities? 😆🙃

You've got Alec Baldwin waving guns around on set and suicides from Love Island. You don't want to talk about these though, you want to talk about made-up stories about pornography.

There is a great deal of modern slavery in countries like India but people like Richura Gupta don't want to talk about that. Instead she wants to make generalisations about prostitution worldwide.

I heard Ruchira Gupta talking a lot of sense on Woman’s Hour

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001np00

about little girls being sold into prostitution in India. She also described prostitution/rape, as ‘sex by invasion’ not ‘sex work’.

Don’t worry, the BBC was very quick to interject, re her interpretation that prostitution should not be called ‘sex work,’ to say that ‘Not everyone agrees with that’.

BBC Radio 4 - Woman's Hour, The effect of being a victim in high profile cases, Ruchira Gupta, Women Plumbers Women & premature deaths, Story of Ana Obregón

Patricia Clarke on her podcast, 'Modern Family: I Had My Dead Son’s Baby at 68'.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001np00

SuePine69 · 15/07/2023 14:50

AdamRyan · 12/07/2023 13:58

Are you really arguing that porn and prostitution are low risk activities? 😆🙃

Show quote history

You've got Alec Baldwin waving guns around on set and suicides from Love Island. You don't want to talk about these though, you want to talk about made-up stories about pornography.

There is a great deal of modern slavery in countries like India but people like Richura Gupta don't want to talk about that. Instead she wants to make generalisations about prostitution worldwide.

PatatiPatatras · 12/07/2023 16:24

AdamRyan · 12/07/2023 13:58

Are you really arguing that porn and prostitution are low risk activities? 😆🙃

Show quote history

😂🙃cringe

RebelliousCow · 12/07/2023 14:41

If a woman is having sex on camera, she is not " acting". she is actually undergoing and experiencing what is happening to her/ body.

This idea that it is 'just' an " actress" with the implications that it is not 'real' is pure bullshit.

AdamRyan · 12/07/2023 13:58

SuePine69 · 11/07/2023 21:49

You wanted to show that porn does harm others, and you came up with fake news. It isn't true that a 'porn actress in Japan died from choking on semen in a bukkake film'. This is what it says on this site https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-goldwater/

"I have never reviewed this website, but within 2 minutes I located a fake news story: Japanese Porn Star Drowns In Semen While Filming Bukkake Scene. This fake/satire story originated in the now defunct Sunday Register, which was a known satirical website. The Goldwater did not label this article as satire, so one must assume it was passed off as real news. Overall, The Goldwater is a Questionable Source as confirmed by three different reviewers."

In a recent article by Julie Bindel she wrote 'Tina sold sex from high-end London hotels for years and was forced to sleep in handcuffs every night'. She gives a reference for this, a link to a site belonging to Rachel Moran. Yet if you do a search on this site for 'Tina' or 'handcuffs' nothing comes up. There is testimony from women but no Tina. None of them say anything about handcuffs.

I have read Rachel Moran's book and it doesn't say that women are physically forced into prostitution. That's not her message.

You could easily have done some research as I have done and seen that this story is false. Bindel's readers could easily click on the links in her article and seen that they don't confirm her opinions. The problem is that even though people like you know nothing about the issue you think 'that sounds about right to me' and you don't bother.

People like Julie Bindel rely on people like you not bothering to check the facts. You insist that prostitution does 'involve coercion in the majority of cases'. But you can't back it up with facts. So I would say that the evidence is that it is people like you who are living in cloud cuckoo land.

Show quote history

Are you really arguing that porn and prostitution are low risk activities? 😆🙃

ScrollingLeaves · 11/07/2023 23:02

Listen to Richura’s Gupta on Woman’s Hour yesterday about coercion and prostitution. She called prostitution sex by invasion.

She said she did not consider ‘sex work’ to be an appropriate description.
(The woman’s hour presenter interjected at that point to say not everyone agrees with that, annoyingly imo, as I do not see ‘both sideism’ as being valid here.)
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001np00

SuePine69 · 11/07/2023 21:49

AdamRyan · 18/05/2023 09:01

We live in a society where people can do what they like as long as it doesn't harm others

Women are harmed during filming of porn. I suggest you watch the film "hot girls wanted". A porn actress in Japan died from choking on semen in a bukkake film.

Women are harmed in relationships with men who want to act out what they've seen in port. Anal injuries in teenagers are on the rise.

And men are harmed as 'legal' porn is a gateway into illegal images. It's estimated there are lots of men prosecuted for watching/distributing CSA who wouldn't have been interested without the porn slippery slope.

I don't know how porn addled men discount all this. But you do you

You wanted to show that porn does harm others, and you came up with fake news. It isn't true that a 'porn actress in Japan died from choking on semen in a bukkake film'. This is what it says on this site https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-goldwater/

"I have never reviewed this website, but within 2 minutes I located a fake news story: Japanese Porn Star Drowns In Semen While Filming Bukkake Scene. This fake/satire story originated in the now defunct Sunday Register, which was a known satirical website. The Goldwater did not label this article as satire, so one must assume it was passed off as real news. Overall, The Goldwater is a Questionable Source as confirmed by three different reviewers."

In a recent article by Julie Bindel she wrote 'Tina sold sex from high-end London hotels for years and was forced to sleep in handcuffs every night'. She gives a reference for this, a link to a site belonging to Rachel Moran. Yet if you do a search on this site for 'Tina' or 'handcuffs' nothing comes up. There is testimony from women but no Tina. None of them say anything about handcuffs.

I have read Rachel Moran's book and it doesn't say that women are physically forced into prostitution. That's not her message.

You could easily have done some research as I have done and seen that this story is false. Bindel's readers could easily click on the links in her article and seen that they don't confirm her opinions. The problem is that even though people like you know nothing about the issue you think 'that sounds about right to me' and you don't bother.

People like Julie Bindel rely on people like you not bothering to check the facts. You insist that prostitution does 'involve coercion in the majority of cases'. But you can't back it up with facts. So I would say that the evidence is that it is people like you who are living in cloud cuckoo land.

The Goldwater - Bias and Credibility

QUESTIONABLE SOURCE A questionable source exhibits one or more of the following: extreme bias, consistent promotion of propaganda/conspiracies, poor or no

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-goldwater

AdamRyan · 28/05/2023 21:01

I have thanks Valerie and I don't agree with him at all.

Valeriekat · 28/05/2023 20:41

AdamRyan · 12/05/2023 18:47

Jordan Peterson has some very anti-woman views. He thinks "enforced monogamy" is the answer to preventing incel terrorism for example. He is a hero for the alt right, antifeminist man. I strongly suggest you don't introduce your son to his thinking

Show quote history

Perhaps read what he ACTUALLY said!

Valeriekat · 28/05/2023 20:22

Mammillaria · 11/05/2023 07:41

I wonder where these men would draw the line?

What degree of violence is it socially acceptable to have a wank to? If it's only acting and special effects is it ok to wank over an acted scene where a woman is being beaten to a bloody pulp? Killed?

If that's not ok, then what's the difference between that and the simulated rape many men get off on? The ability for them to convince themselves that deep down the bitch whore likes it really?

Or maybe they do think it's ok, and that'll be the next wave of porn.

Snuff

QueefQueen80s · 18/05/2023 20:02

FoodCentre · 18/05/2023 19:24

Men are influenced by porn. But they're not influenced to think women in taxis are all sleazy and willing to drop their knickers, that's just not realistic - at least not for anyone who's touched grass recently. I think few men are influenced in that specific way.

The sexualisation of women... that's porn unfortunately. It's going to show women in a sexual manner.

I don't think the key issue is that porn is too sexual. But that's just my opinion on it, probably expressed incoherently

You're assuming all men have healthy intelligent minds with a high moral code.. and that's a dangerous assumption.

FoodCentre · 18/05/2023 19:24

Men are influenced by porn. But they're not influenced to think women in taxis are all sleazy and willing to drop their knickers, that's just not realistic - at least not for anyone who's touched grass recently. I think few men are influenced in that specific way.

The sexualisation of women... that's porn unfortunately. It's going to show women in a sexual manner.

I don't think the key issue is that porn is too sexual. But that's just my opinion on it, probably expressed incoherently

WeeBisom · 18/05/2023 10:32

It doesn’t matter if it causes real life harassment or not, the message it’s sending about women, the propaganda, is stereotypical and disturbing. The message is that women are ready to have sex with strange men at all times. And given that porn has already massively influenced male sexual behaviour (they’re all into slapping and strangulation now) I find it extremely hard to believe that men aren’t influenced by this shit. If you watched racist videos for hours a week and linked this to your brains reward centre I’m sure you would start to believe dodgy shit.

QueefQueen80s · 18/05/2023 10:14

WeeBisom · 18/05/2023 09:44

Even if the taxi videos don’t involve rape, they still send out a deeply unpleasant and disturbing message that women are theoretically willing to have sex with a random taxi driver. It promulgates this idea that women welcome flirtation from drivers, that he might well have a shot. When in reality women just want to get from a to b in peace. It’s a very vulnerable place, to be in a car with a stranger , and it would be excruciating if he came onto me. I know people are trying to minimise the porn and say it’s not showing anything illegal or nasty, but the way I see it it’s false propaganda about women that has the potential to put them in uncomfortable situations.

Agreed. Since taxis have become more tracked, the drivers are less sleazy but it still happens. I know far too many women who have been raped in taxis. It feels pointless to try and prevent all this and then porn sets it backwards. Same with teacher/student etc, on one hand it's abhorrent but then men are watching it in porn. It ruins their minds.