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Porn truths

38 replies

untouchable · 26/01/2014 12:38

Please could someone recommend some reading material for my Husband who does not believe me that most porn is misogynistic and abusive? He believes that the stuff he has been watching is 'consenting' and will not explain how he comes to that decision.

This is important to me so please don't answer if you are an apologist. I am not interested in your opinion.

TIA

OP posts:
Tonandfeather · 26/01/2014 13:02

Gail Dines. Pornland.

Robert Jensen. Getting Off. Pornography and The End of Masculinity.

IamGluezilla · 26/01/2014 13:04

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

CogitoErgoSometimes · 26/01/2014 13:04

Are you sure he's interested in your opinion? Are you interested in his opinion? The sex industry is a very broad church and it's not exactly apologising for anything to point out that some of it is done with the consent of the participants.

Tonandfeather · 26/01/2014 13:08

Consent is a political issue. In this context it is rarely free consent based on freedom to pursue alternatives.

WalkingWithAGhost · 26/01/2014 13:10

I second Gail Dines. She's on youtube as well. There's also a documentary i think its called Hardcore about an english girl who goes to america to be in porn and how she gets on. (Some of it is quite awful though, to me anyway)

EirikurNoromaour · 26/01/2014 13:23

Shelley lubben has a lot if testimonials from ex porn actors on her site. She's a bit rabid and pro life but the testimonials are powerful.

OxfordBags · 26/01/2014 13:40

If someone can't even understand how porn might be misogynist and abusive, I think they must be a lost cause. Preferably one I'd try to lose, IMHO. It's a bit worrying and disgusting that he can't even see the possibility of how it might be bad. Surely the very fact that the women in porn do stuff, or have stuff done to them, that the majority of women outside of porn don't must point to it being an abnormal and negative choice to 'consent' to.

There was an excellent documentary on Ch4 a few months ago, called something like 'Date My Porn Star', or similar, and it took 3 men who loved porn and thought the same things about it as your husband. By the end of the experience, the men had been crying, had been sick, and were thoroughly disgusted, shocked, horrified and ashamed. Even one guy who insisted he was still cool with it admitted in the 'several moths later' interviews that it had totally changed his thinking about it. And this was not the secret, extreme end of porn, either. Perhaps you could find this online (4OD) and ask him to watch it.

Tonandfeather makes an excellent point: studies done on the backgrounds of women in porn consistently reveal that they have been abused as children and/or raped as adults or had very sexually abusive adult relationships. If someone's sexual boundaries and sexual identity has been consistently and profoundly damaged and weakened, they are not capable of making genuine, informed, positive consent. Just like some women who grew up in households where they witness domestic abuse will end up in abusive adult relationships, thus some women who have been sexually abused will end up in sexually abusive jobs.

TinselTownley · 26/01/2014 14:41

A lot of people just can't see the correlation between porn and the criminality that goes hand in hand with it but - then again - it's not always entirely fair to ask them to do so, assuming the porn they consume is perfectly legal.

Most people who use porn do so to achieve sexual arousal and climax. You can lecture all you like but, if that's how he gets his rocks off you're not going to get him to cease being stimulated by it.

I'm fundamentally not a porn person, and I do see the sadness and exploitation below the surface. However, this sounds more like a compatibility issue between the two of you than him consciously and nefariously exploiting women directly.

It might be better to approach this from the perspective that you really don't like his porn use rather than trying to shame him into feeling like a people trafficker, drug smuggler or gun runner. He'll just go underground. There are probably things you do he finds hard to bear and the real issue here is what you can live with or him live without.

MissScatterbrain · 27/01/2014 15:17

Oxford - have just watched Date with a Porn Star and thought it was really good and interesting. Thanks for the recommendation.

untouchable · 27/01/2014 16:15

Thank you Oxford I will do that.

Thank you all for your responses. I have heard his POV, this isn't about me trying to control, it has been the opposite situation unfortunately with me being EA with enforced celibacy for 7 years as I was told it was a health issue...which was a blatant lie.

I am in a lot of pain and this is just the one thing I can do, along with counselling that might help. He will not take my word for it that porn instead of a relationship is not right. He will not take my word for it that porn is misogynistic and abusive in some cases and that he cannot possibly know whether what he is watching is 'ethical' or not.

OP posts:
Logg1e · 27/01/2014 16:29

WalkingWithAGhost I downloaded the Kindle sample to the book you recommended. I found it really difficult to read, but intend to buy the rest of book and persevere. Thank you for the recommendation.

I also second the documentaries Hardcore (available on YouTube) and Date My Porn Star.

TinselTownley · 27/01/2014 17:00

The EA puts a totally different slant on things but also makes it less likely he'll be open to reason. He's probably doing it mostly to hurt you, anyway. The shit.

I'm so sorry he's an unfeeling bastard but I wouldn't waste any time trying to reason with him. It's only bitter and recent experience that I speak from but if there's anything I've learnt is that trying to find substance in an emotional void is like running around trying to catch the wind. The wind will do what it likes and you'll be exhausted from the buffering while your own life blows out the window.

Do look after yourself and keep strong. You deserve better.

Tonandfeather · 27/01/2014 17:17

Why would you want sex with someone who's emotionaly abusing you?

Wouldn't it be better to leave and let him get on with it, rather than try to educate him?

Joysmum · 27/01/2014 17:19

Your going to be pissing in the wind about trying to persuade him otherwise.

From what you've written later, you're deluding yourself if you think trying to educate him will help your situation. He's not treating you right, your way out of it isn't by trying to persuade him that all porn is misogenistic or has consent issues which it isn't anyway

This isn't about him and porn, it's about him and you. You concentrating on the misogyny is misplaced.

It sounds to me like you're best out of their if you are in an emotionally abusive relationship.

Tonandfeather · 27/01/2014 17:24

Porn is a part of it. It's always in the toolkit of an emotional abuser.

But there's no point trying to reason with an abuser and women would be far better off getting out of relationships with porn addicts and have a few years sampling sex with men who DON'T use porn. Only when you;ve experienced the difference do the shutters come off.

untouchable · 27/01/2014 17:28

The EA I am referring to is the enforced celibacy, because to me, it is. Other than that he does not abuse me in any other way.

I am not prepared to give up without trying though, hence the counselling...which he has been trying to arrange. He wants to make this work too and has completely stopped the porn. He said he was using it as a release as he didn't know where to start after such a long time. (My reply to that was quite obvious).

He is not good with words or actions so is struggling to say the right things to me. He says he loves me very much but I had to actually ask him that question rather than him volunteering it.

OP posts:
Tonandfeather · 27/01/2014 17:32

Oh.
Why are you trying to make this work?

CuntyBunty · 27/01/2014 17:34

Is it you or him who is withholding sex OP? It's probably irrelevant as a marriage that has been sexless for 7 years is dead in the water.

JustALittleGreen · 27/01/2014 17:35

He's lied to you that he has a health problem leading to you having a 7 year sexless relationship, meanwhile he is watching porn??! Education would be the last thing on my mind, he has some serious, serious problems. He needs professional help and you, IMHO, need to get the hell out. I'm sorry you've been through this.

TinselTownley · 27/01/2014 17:42

OK. If a man said: "my wife doesn't want sex with me, therefore I am being emotionally abused", I would be really, really uncomfortable with that.

Really uncomfortable.

I hope counselling helps but I really don't think drawing a cognitive correlation between his personal fuck buttons and wholesale exploitation and crime is going to help.

I'd personally find that a massive turn off and I suspect he does too. He might fancy the pants off you but, from experience, someone demanding sex and making you feel inadequate or dirty for just not being in the mood is as terrifying as it is plain unsexy. Has I occurred to you that he might be using porn merely to try and ready himself for meeting your demands? For me, good sex is all about the emotional intimacy and if you're calling him an abuser because he for whatever reason doesn't get stiff as a board on demand then.....

I hope counselling does help but it really, really needs to be both of you. Really.

Thisisaghostlyeuphemism · 27/01/2014 17:45

He sounds like one of that growing tribe of lazy, incapable weirdos who can't be arsed with real life sex and would rather do it on their own with a tissue.

I wouldn't bother with him.

Thisisaghostlyeuphemism · 27/01/2014 17:47

I would call a woman who refused sex for seven years, who failed to communicate about it, who wouldnt discuss it, who failed to get help about it, who instead used porn, an emotional abuser too.

TinselTownley · 27/01/2014 18:05

I guess it depends how it's discussed though, doesn't it? I went right off sex for at least a year after both children. Right off. I honestly didn't know why. 'Talking about it' mostly constituted him telling me I was either having an affair or was like a 'black widow - killing him after I'd got what she wanted.' To be honest, after those 'talks' , what was on e an amazing sex life was never the same.

Dynamics are complex. Counselling can work. He might well have his reasons.

It must be awful being a bloke when everyone thinks your gender automatically makes you permanently 'up for it'. Maybe he's just not very sexual, in which case, you takes the money, you makes your choice....

I hate myself for wondering but what type of porn is it, exactly? Because if it's gay Nordic, Dwarf, MIlF shit, you're probably onto a non-starter with the counselling.

Thisisaghostlyeuphemism · 27/01/2014 18:11

Low sex drive is fine

"Low sex drive" yet he manages to grunt away nightly to Asian babes or barely legal not so fine.

No amount of education is going to change this disrespectful tosser.

OxfordBags · 27/01/2014 18:47

OP, I think it's not so much a case of him not taking your word that porn is dodgy, it's that he a) doesn't give a shit and b) possibly even finds those aspects extra sexy.

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