To think that porn should be illegal unless you specifically opt in

[Balloonatastic]

I am 40 and I think I’ve been deeply damaged by porn. Now I’m ‘sober’ as it were, but have come round to the view that its prevalence is so harmful for relationships and young people.

I’m not against it per se. If people like it and can use it healthily then perhaps that’s OK.
Pre-internet, people’s access to it was much less and involved them actively going to a shop or newsagent or whatever. The embarrassment must have put most people off and limited demand.

Now demand is huge. The industry is massive, and ever more participants in it are harmed as producers chase customers and performers need to do more extreme things.

So AIBU to think that we should go back to a situation where people have to actively opt in to be able to access adult websites? Bring back an embarrassment factor. I sometimes wonder whether this would have the knock on impact of reducing the demand for nude selfies etc that teenagers get into because there would just be less nakedness generally on peoples screens, if you know what I mean.

Age verification is all well and good but I wonder whether we should make it much harder for people to access porn.

I know that my life would have been better without it.

I don’t think this would work how you like. Most men would opt in, so would many women. It just wouldn’t be the big, shameful event you think because most of society doesn’t think it’s as awful as you do.

It’s like a system to publicly opt-in to say you want to eat meat. I’m sure many vegans would think that would deter people - it wouldn’t though. Because meat eaters aren’t as ashamed as vegans think they should be.

On top of that, what about exposing people who are then subject to potential backlash and violence. Do you still favour this public register of pornos for a Muslim woman who is then honour-killed? Or for a single mother trying to find out if she should be worried about a term her son used?

I don't use it, I don't come across it by accident and it's never recommended when I'm just poking around the internet.

I don't think it can be brought under control now. Everything is a fetish.

Remember how they made adult phone services opt in ? You had to specifically ask for them to be enabled on your line.

No, I don't either.

Adult phone lines are very different to porn sites.

I really do think it would be embarrassing for people. Eating meat isn’t comparable.

Essentially you’d have to publicly acknowledge that you masturbate, and use pornography to do so. Neither of those things need be shameful but a lot of people would be ashamed to admit it. I really do think it would work. It’s why during my porn use days I’d visit a website but not a sex shop. It’s why I bought my vibrator from Lovehoney not Boots.

I’m not saying that the register need be publicly available. I don’t think that the honour killing thing is an issue. But I would want people to consider signing up to the list an unpleasant and embarrassing thing to do. That way fewer people would, and exposure to porn would be limited.

I would love it to be banned and hate that it can undo the good work parents do to try and raise decent men. But I’m sure people would be saying it stops men raping etc like they say paedos going on the dark web stops them abusing children themselves physically.
I’m so sick of the world catering to mens sex drives

I’ve never heard the argument that porn use stops rapists! If anything I suspect it encourages them.

It’s not just men’s sex drives. Women’s too. But my point is that we survived until the internet (probably smart phones really) without porn and nobody died. The harms far outweigh any benefits or arguments about censorship IMO.

Isn't the law changing this year so you have to prove you're over 18...so effectively opting in? Or did I miss hear that (possible)

In my opinion it should be a sign in service , where you have an account and even if free , register a debit/credit card. It would go a long way to prevent really young children from accessing it or “stumbling” onto it, or impulse viewing, anytime , anywhere. The age verification thing is pure bullshit atm as all you have to do is just click to confirm you’re over 18. Not a safeguard or a deterrent by any means.

You are of course right. If only my friend had known that when her 13 year old racked up £4,000 in charges after discovering that there was no bar on adult phone lines for residential customers.

That was a campaign no one was interested in.

Ouch. I have a friend who racked up a massive internet bill from the early 2000s on a porn site.

But it’s an interesting point. The cost was a deterrent back in the day. Now it’s all free. And my original point about the difference between adult phone lines and internet porn stands as well. The harms from the latter are much greater.

Yes. I think it should be this as an absolute minimum. But I think really there should be an automatic block on credit / debit card use for porn verification unless you actively change this with the bank. And maybe your ISP as well. Make people ring up and ask.

I was just being snippy, because back in the 90s, when access to premium adult lines was the default, and I tried to help my friend recover her money, there was no interest from anyone in parliament about making it an opt-in service.

Baby steps. This would be a good start and it’s achievable and reasonable. Other regulations could follow, but this should be a bare minimum requirement. Just like with cigarettes, prevent as many (young) people from starting/getting addicted to it/being brainwashed by it. Change would be slow, but it would happen.

Cigarettes are a really good comparator I think. A pastime that people enjoy but which is damaging to both the user and others. Addictive, hard to give up but not impossible (I am living proof!).

Makes me wonder whether porn sites should have mandatory warning signs before you access them. Ten seconds of a message saying ‘causes erectile dysfunction’ or ‘encourages abuse of women’ or whatever would potentially put a lot of people off.

I’d agree if it were a case of “disclose or don’t disclose”. This is a case of “disclose or don’t do it”. More than enough people would disclose to completely obliterate the current stigma.

Once enough people disclose, the whole embarrassment goes. It’s a bit like if you could have a baby without announcing to the world you had sex, no one would go on the internet and fill out the “I had sex” form. But, if you couldn’t have a baby without having sex, people will be perfectly fine with everyone knowing they had sex. Now, the stigma is broken.

The first few would be in for a rough ride, after a few hours, the list would be so long that no one would care. Like when all those MPs started announcing that they’d previously done drugs - by the time it got to Rory Stewart doing opium in Persia, no one cared

I agree.

Yes women use it too but it’s mainly a male thing, if it wasn’t there women would be fine

I think porn is utterly disgusting and should be illegal.
It primarily demeans women and fuels abuse and violence in many different ways.
Quite prepared to be called a prude or whatever.
Sex should be private.

I don’t think ‘sex should be private’ is an argument against porn. If anything, porn use is too private in that people spend too much time in private watching porn and getting gratification than they do in real life meeting people they can form meaningful relationships with. It’s how I realised I had a problem.

I have mixed feelings about banning it. But restricting access to it massively would get over any concerns I have whilst restricting harm significantly.

I think porn use is way more embarrassing than making a baby by having sex. I have discussed my sex life with friends, but never my porn use or lack of. There is a taboo around masturbation generally, and porn is considered ‘dirty’, rightly or wrongly. That’s despite its mass use.

FWIW I don’t think people would rush to sign an ‘I watch porn’ register. I guess we’ll never know though.

but how can we then counter only fans when its peoples on free will ?

society can be stranger than you think

“Not only is the Universe stranger than we think, it is stranger than we can think.”

As Mrs Heisenberg said to Mr Heisenberg when he wondered where all the coat hangers in the wardrobe came from,.

Yeah make it harder

I see what you did there.