to be surprised at how many Mumsnetters are fine with pornography?

[Elizabetth]

Particularly as porn has become so much more mainstream in the past few years, I'd have thought that people would be concerned about premature sexualisation of children. Also I'm surprised that so many women are fine with it given that the humiliation and degradation of women is the central theme of pornography. You only have to look at the titles to realise that.

There are many vulnerable sorts in society. Including those vulnerable to suggestion to the point that by watching "rape porn" will make them think its "okay". They'll also be the ones who think it's okay to go and mug old ladies because their need is greater than the old lady they are mugging.

As a society we are responsible for those in our family, our community and who we interact with. Ensuring we bring up our children to understand their own sexuality, what is right and wrong, and that porn isnt (always) real or a reflection of real life then. The fact is if people werent so keen to brush sex under the carpet and keep a lid on it, young men wouldnt be so confused about what is wrong or unacceptable when buying a girl "just one more drink" to relax her, or thinking that her saying no is a game.

Educating our daughters (and sons) to be strong enough in listening to their own bodies and emotions and realising that sex isnt the be all and end all would help too.

I don't think the Weribee boys (see up thread) were particularly vulnerable. They were just boys who had been corrupted by our pornified society and thought that sexually assaulting a developmentally disabled girl and making a porn movie of it was a good idea.

(Really sorry to hijack - QV, where on earth is Pan? Has he gone, never to return?)

JV - I think he has RL issues to deal with.

Hunker - seen your email.

Elizabeth - pornified society is an over-simplification of what happened at werribee. We can blame "society" for all our ills. As long as we remember that we are the ones making society. IMO those who have come from either repressed or abusive backgrounds are far more likely to offend than those who have come from 'normal' backgrounds but have watched some porn.

vvvqv....you're wise married you know...even wiser that is!

OK, thanks QV.

LOL! Why thank you sophable

I can honestly say, with all the experiences I've had, most of them were in my teens, and were at the hands of teenage 'boys' who clearly hadnt had too much of a talking to about sex from parents etc and relied on their peers to demonstrate sexual 'etiquette'.

They'd have had limited access to the internet, because frankly, it wasnt really up and running back then, and when it was, most families didnt have home pc's with internet access to all this "rape-porn". So, I'd say any access to porn they had - well, their parents would have been close at hand to monitor things...........

All these ideas about getting a girl drunk and 'taking advantage'.......where'd they get that from? From other people. Not a porn mag.

I don't think it's an oversimplification at all VVV. I think it's something that is staring us in the face and people are too scared to actually look at. It's easier to stay in denial and pretend that one is too sophisticated to notice these things or that there are far more complicated reasons than the obvious explanations.

There's no evidence that those boys were repressed or abused. There were eleven of them - do you think they were all abused little boys. What they did was the usual gang warfare that boys have always done, but instead of throwing stones or making explosions, they assualted a girl and made a porn movie of what they did. None of them have shown any remorse and apparently they are swaggering around their school like the little kings they think they are.

Men and boys are watching increasingly violent and abusive porn. I've described a bit more of it on this thread but nobody has picked up on it - ass to mouth? gagging on a penis? don't either of those raise any thoughts? - those are now what the porn market (male consumers) demand. It's frightening and it's even more frightening that very few people seem to think it's a problem and continue to defend porn as if their "couples" stuff (which isn't really couples) and women's so-called consent could possibly defeat this tide of misogyny and abuse.

Right, bed time.

It is.

Because you are saying, quite simply that "the porn did it".

" ass to mouth? gagging on a penis? don't either of those raise any thoughts? - those are now what the porn market (male consumers) demand..."

erm.. no, I don't think this is the case , reading from research further down the thread from DaddJ, I think.

Men's tastes in porn IME is much more easily defined as tits/arse/leg etc, not so horrible abuse as you so describe, E.

policywonk, must reply to two of your posts before going to bed.

Yes, lapdancing clubs are very odd and in my view
very Anglo-hypocritical for the reasons you mentioned.
I think they are popular, though, because they allow
English lads to have some sleazy fun without feeling sleazy
because hey! no hands, see?!

The other point I wanted to make was this:
we sort of agree that there should be no place for violent porn
but what do we classify under that?

The site content I mentioned earlier (I cannot remember what
the site was called - NOT Bangbros) was not directly violent but grossly
humiliating. Can we still class it as violent and ban it?

Another example: there is an American S&M website that
specialises in Humiliation/Rape Fantasy/and some other similar categories
but they do it in a very humane fashion, clearly outlining
where fantasy begins and where it ends (the couple are always shown
having a laugh and a cuddle after the 'rape' fantasy for example).
Should we ban that, too? It has bodage and FSRP but it is
explicitely packaged as fantasy.

Sorry, Elisabetth, but I need to correct you on Bangbros,
particularly as I made the same mistake myself, and in the past
few hours you repeated the claim that the site is abusive etc:

Bangbros is strictly vanilla.

The categories are fairly unspectacular standard fare -
blowjobs, hand jobs, swallowing, round asses, big tits, big cocks
reality stuff (spring break, picking up girls off the street).

No ass to mouth, no rape, no humiliation, no gagging/oral assault.

So the most popular commercial porn site is in fact not about gonzo,
just about the age-old obsession with t&a.

The woman-hating material that you refer to certainly exists
online but, and this is important to the debate, it is NOT
mainstream. The huge majority of men DO NOT come into contact
with it, even if they do go looking for porn online.

Go to bed man! You came home for this?????????????????

Wow, the differences between people. There is no proven link between what we view and what we do. That's just propaganda put out to censor us all. Otherwise you'd watch a James Bond movie and go out and kill. Anyway you'll never convince people so all we can do is challenge legislation which removes people's rights to view the material they choose to view in a free society. We need more of those freedoms not fewer. And plenty of women view porn. It is by no means just a male thing.

interesting to get your perspective DaddyJ. I don't know much about the situation, but i did read an article by a journalist who was a former porn addict, who said the more porn you watch, the harder and more brutal it has to become in order for one to get off. So would it be fair to say that if one watches a lot of porn, one gets acclimatized fairly quickly to the vanilla stuff and then want something that goes beyond? is that part of the problem? I don't know, just wondering.

I understood what you meant mmj

I don't think we are over sexualised. I think a lot of people have far too many sexual hang ups. This country has never been very good at sex or dealing with it since about 1800.

Remember in my life time a man couldn't rape his wife in law. You gave continuous consent to sex when you married.

me too mmj don't worry

anyway I'm going to try really hard to stay away todya bcs I think it's becoming a little.. reductive.

btw has anyone engaged with the idea that vanilla porn - done on a nice clean set, with free tissues, no force, and excelletn pay, no ass to mouth - could still be damaging to the rest of us?
Either through direct contact or through the trickle-down effect.

has anyone read Pornotopia?

OBM: Pornotopia, I think so - by Lawrence someone, published by serpent's tail? Erm [shuffles feet] if it's the one I think it is, I am quoted in it.

Elizabetth: your exaggerations are becoming idiotic. very few people are turned on by vomiting, and the key component of the fantasy for most porn consumers is that someone else is as enthusiastic about their particular turn on as they are.

OBM (again), Yes I will engage with the idea that friendly, vanilla porn filmed with well-paid happy performers has some kind of 'negative' effect. The idea is only valid if you think that sex should not be about fun, enjoyment and fantasy. Otherwise it's bullshit.