Women watching porn

[OhGodAmITheOnlyOne]

I've name changed and also posted about this in chat, but thought I might get better response here. This is 100% genuine. I occasionally look at porn or read erotic stories because it gets me in the mood. I don't know if DH knows, but I was wondering if it's common, if many women do? Or am I an awful person?

What did you think of the Channel 4 documentary, Date My Porn Star?

But the idea that women exist for men's benefit has been around a lot longer than porn has. I think the biggest error made by people who oppose porn is that they blame porn for driving sexism and misogyny when mainstream (not the interesting, independent, fairtrade stuff) porn (like a lot of other mainstream media) reflects what's already going on.

It both reflects misogyny and spreads misogyny.

I have to say that it's one of the most effective propaganda tools you could imagine since it's connected to sexuality and the biggest reward the brain knows - an orgasm.

Interesting, independent, fairtrade porn is a very small minority, unfortunately

I don't think that misogynistic porn drives the abuse of women, I think it reflects it and normalises it. Which really amounts to the same thing as the generations come through getting more and more desensitised to it, thus fuelling escalation of what used to be run of the mill sex stuff. I hate to think what the young people after this cohort will be exposed to as a matter of course.

Yes it reflects and it drives.

New research is showing how some/many?porn users are driven to more and more extreme porn to get an affect.

You only have to talk to any young people to know how normalised some 'extreme' (to old folk) practises are: spitting, choking, fisting, violence against women.

Interesting SGB have you got a link for porn reflecting rather than driving misogyny?

If that is true Thisis, then that is extremely worrying. The things you mention are very dangerous and degrading. You can get damaged for life.

It is worrying - nspcc did a good report on this somewhere, I'll look.

From my limited experience I found that porn drove my exP's increasingly disturbing sexual requests. This is ofcourse a sample of one, but I am inclined to agree with the posters arguing that it drives and perpetuates misogyny.

Late to this thread but when you consider that most kids have a smartphone even in primary school or Year 7 at the latest, what on earth do you think drives sexism and misogyny more than porn, in the life experience of a group of AVERAGE 8-16 year olds? How does the sexual violence in mainstream porn reflect their worlds then?

It's the same race-to-the-bottom argument there's been about manufacturing; porn isn't the only culprit so it's okay.

No it's not okay.

Not accurate either. We've now had 2 generations of men and woman who watched uncensored porn before they had sex. What turbochildren is saying is replicated by thousands of others. Sexual and social behaviour is being determined by porn, not the other way around.

Even if you were adamant that it merely reflects society's contempt of women, why in anyone's name would you support something that adds to that contempt?

Wouldn't it be better if it DIDN'T?

Dm link, but relevant.
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2135203/Jamie-13-kissed-girl-But-hes-Sex-Offender-Register-online-porn-warped-mind-.html

It's frequently claimed that 'nice, normal' people become monsters after too much porn. It's a popular pro-censorship argument which is based on the idea that everyone ELSE is stupid and easily led. The people who seek out more and more 'extreme' images are people whose desires were unusual or asocial in the first place (for a variety of reasons, including family violence in their past, or inherent personality disorders etc). People who are turned on by (eg) spanking will seek out spanking-related material, but there is no reason for them to want to move on from that to (eg) strangulation or bestiality just because they've seen a picture of it or heard about it.

Oh and 'two generations of uncensored porn'? WTF? In 1997 the BBFC relaxed its rules on video porn slightly so that films showing intercourse could be sold, but the Internet then was still a minority interest and incomprehensible to a lot of people. What we have had is generation upon generation exposed to the objectification of women as domestic servants, mothers, carers, glorified pets, saints or bitches. And generations of kids recieving sex education that's all about disease, abstinence and heteronormative bullying. Stigmatizing porn will not make misogyny go away. It's not even the logical place to start.

Rubbish.

We are talking about children here whose sexuality hasn't even begun to be shaped. Children, in case you hadn't noticed, tend to be easily led.

Get your facts right. The internet was not a minority interest in 1997. Most people I knew used it as early as 1994; 19 years ago. So a whole bunch of 20-30 somethings started searching for porn and now their children follow suit.

You haven't answered the question and in fact have dodged it throughout the entire thread as far as I can see. Your entire argument seems to be based on 'porn isn't the only culprit'.

Why the hell do you support something that you say 'reflects' the misogny that you are supposedly against?

Wouldn't you prefer it if it if DIDN'T?

Of course all women are being oppressed and abused, that's just the sort of attitude I expect from other women more than men. Women really do give other women very little credit.

I love being an empowered women and watching other women who are clearly in charge and enjoying sex.

The assumption that women in porn are being coerced is mostly held by other women who can't get it into their heads that women chose to be porn stars.

What did you think of those documentaries I mentioned up thread?

I ask you again Joys.

What exactly have you read about porn and porn addiction?

What research have you undertaken about what happens in porn and to some of its viewers, especially children?

As a woman (presumably) you're certainly not giving a lot of the women on this thread any credit Joy.

The reason so many of us 'can't get it into our heads' that porn stars might not actually enjoy choking, having their vaginas stitched up in between takes or enduring faecal incontinence is twofold. We've read and watched their stories, done a lot of research, read numerous books and most importantly we believe what those women have to say.

Not being a credulous thicko helps though

There's nothing 'empowering' about watching a woman get injured, anymore than there's anything 'empowering' about being wank fodder and a cash cow for consumers and producers who don't give a shit for women's health and safety.

If you think we're making it all up though and it's just something we've 'got into our heads' why do you only use live porn with people who consent face-to-face with you via skype? Or was that a bit of a porkie aimed at the credulous amongst us?

Strangetown: the increase in internet access and use in the late 90s was good for people's sexual education, on the whole. It meant that people whose tastes were unusual could find likeminded others and feel less isolated, given that this was still the era of 'perverts' being demonized and a spread of abstinence-driven sex-ed in schools (an utter disaster and extremely harmful). The more open and widespread discussion of sex becomes, the better. Teaching young people about sexual diversity and sexual ethics is better than telling them to save it for marriage and treating them all as heterosexuals who will reproduce.

The only problem with porn which does need addressing is the unsafe and exploitative working conditions which some performers are subjected to.

And I don't know if you have noticed, but the latest proposals to censor the internet are already offering - oh what a surprise - the chance to block information on sexual health and LGBT issues as well as providing the Government with more excuses to snoop and spy on people.

SGB schools weren't spreading an 'abstinence-driven' agenda in the late 90s when the internet came in. Far from it.

I wouldn't expect you to have any detailed knowledge of what happens in secondary school sex ed. now as your lad is too young, but post about what you know and stop commenting on what you don't. I assure you that sex ed has come a long way since the 70s when you were at school and the pendulum has swung so far the other way that the main concern now is the lack of information about what constitutes consent.

It's that's sort of frothing about things that didn't happen, or things that no-one in the discussion has ever said, that IMO often weakens your argument in threads like this.

Even I was surprised though to see you say the only problem with porn is the working conditions.

Really?

You're okay with rape porn then? And to be specific, porn made with willing uncoerced participants which simulates rape?

Not sure, wouldn't that be the same as willing uncorked actors simulating murder on screen, in some ways? Maybe not, as the key thing in censorship is whether the watcher is meant to abhor it or get turned on, that is why Human Centipede 2 got banned, I think.

Of course, going back to the OP's post, well, national treasures Caitlin Moran and Victoria Coren have fessed up quite cheerfully to watching porn, with nary a blush, so she's hardly alone. I mean, Coren has even made a porn movie and written a book about it. Still, they're women, so it's okay, and Coren sounds posh, and posh gals banging on about sex always puts them at a premium.

Not sure if Lucy Mangan watches porn, one senses that for her, 50 Shades of Grey on Kindle would be the worst kind of atrocity imaginable...

Blokes can fess up to watching porn so long as a) They look like they're getting sex anyway and b) they are charismatic comedians who can pass it off as a joke, or somehow ironic, or fessing up to their vulnerabilities and pratfalls e.g. Frank Skinner and Russell Brand.

I'm with Professor Dent on 'rape porn' ie stuff made with willing actors (and entirely distinct from stuff which is made by assaulting people who did not consent either to the acts or their being filmed) - I can't see that it's any worse than actors playing murderers or murder victims.

As to the positive/negative effects on the viewer, someone who likes to watch people being hurt can (and frequently will) crack one out to (eg) misery memoirs/horror films/searing documentaries about violence and exploitation. I do honestly wonder about the people who devour misery memoirs - what are they getting out of harrowing descriptions of children being abused?

You can't see the difference between films or books that tell a story and have wider remits than getting people to wank?

And no, women who support all forms of porn are not 'okay' Professor Dent. Matters not if they are in the public eye or whether they are a poster on this thread.

You're right though to make the distinction about censorship. It doesn't apply to the internet.

Is that the Caitlin Moran who calls the porn industry offensive, depressing and emotionally bankrupt?

Cm, like many contributors to this thread, have said that the porn industry produces a pile of misogynistic shit. The ethical woman-made stuff accounts for approx only 5% of output.

But no, carry on, that 95% is marvellous for us all.

Not sure what your point about Lucy mangan was either.

Many people found fifty shades pretty atrocious.