why do good men look at porn?i dont understand male physche.......

[freya555]

I posted y- day re fact that my Ds looked at porn after we had our child- I got some really supportive advice and we are going to councelling which is important- i do understand that he did it becos he was feeling lonely.However what I dont understand is WHY men do it - i dont think i understand men ! .One person said that it was prob no big deal to him but to me its offensive and makes me feel now that im like an objject when we have sex - and that if a guy doesnt get sex with a real woman then turning to just a picture makes me feel like i just serve a function - does that make sense.?ie if he doesnt have the real thing hey ho an imae will do and it makes me feel yakkkk! he doesnt do it now but its imbedded in a bit which is why we are going for councelling but in meantime any advice re male mind set as i just feel rather niave!!

what do they wank to then ?

Morris - I wank to pictures, and vids, and stories - if it turns me on, I wank to it Clearly I have never met you in this case

Why are you rolling your eyes? I don't know how many times I have to say I KNOW SOME WOMEN LOOK AT PORN.

That is not news to me. I know they look at it, I know they write it, I know they make it.

But I am saying I do not beleive that it nearly as common as some on here think it is, my reasoning being that in my circle of friends (sexually active, open minded, solvent thirty-somethings) not one of us wanks to pictures. As for any of my relatives of my mums generation I'd be surprised if they even knew that porn aimed at women existed, never mind used it themselves. My gran probably only just knows that porn for men exists, but doesn't like to think about it.

What do they wank to then? Me, the answer is I don't wank.

GASP.

No doubt this post, like all the others I have written, will be taken by some to read 'No woman ever uses porn LA LA LA' so I will not answer that further. I have no fresh way of saying I know that some women do.

well, it was the 'i've never in my life met a woman who wanks to pics' comment i was using the skeptical smiley for, as that means clearly i've never met you - trying to be light hearted. Silly me x

Sorry sab. Should also say that yes I also know that statistically I have probably met lots of women who wank to pics but who I don't know well enough to discuss that with.

I'm not naive in other areas, trust me. But I can't even picture how a woman would er, do it. It just isn't and never has been part of my life - and I've been sexually active since Wham were in the charts.

No doubt my class mates were all wanking to pictures of Andrew Ridgely in tennis shorts.

< snigger >

I agree actually about the wanking to pictures being unusual. I get turned on by sexual fantasy and images in my head, which are more likely to be prompted by reading something than watching anything...I sometimes like the idea of a scenario and just make stuff up as I go along. I would never in a million years shuffle off to the loo with a copy of Razzle For Girls though to clutch in my sweaty palm while I cracked one off.

Morriszapp, just because you can't imagine other people doing something doesn;t mean that they don't do it. SOme US studies seem to have shown that something like 40-45% of porn videos rented, were rented by women and there is a substantial and profitable US market in 'couple porn' ie films showing attractive (if very glossy and airbrushed) people having sex usually with some sort of storyline.
But my last post was meant to be querying - if you consider porn to be 'split beaver' stuff, what do you consider the likes of Scarlet, Forum and Petra Joy films to be?

I don't know what they are SGB so I can't comment. I've never seen or read any of them.

Please, please believe me when I say for the billionth time that I am aware that women do look at porn. Really, I am.

I can't imagine it, but I didn't ever say that means nobody does it. I know that many do. I can't think of a new way to express this. I was just referring to myself and my friends, I know we do not equate to the worlds entire female population.

My point is that if I can't imagine it, none of my friends do it, and I've never seen the magazines you refer to, maybe it isn't as common as some have suggested.

I don't think you can extrapolate anything from what you and your friends do and claim that your suggested percentages (ie fewer women do it) are more valid than the impression given on MN given that it's reasonably likely that you have fewer friends than there are members of MN ie MN members are a larger statistical sample than you and your friends. Whatever the subject matter.

A husband posting here.

Why do men use porn? Because they want a nice easy wank, and porn is a very quick way to build up an appetite and get the appropriate parts erect.

Sweetkitty put it best: it's like scratching an itchy back. The only difference is that if one has an itchy back, one just scratches it. Of course, having a wank is pleasurable, but isn't possible without an erection. Porn solves that hurdle.

I suspect that Freya555 (with whom I sympathise) may be wondering why men sometimes prefer wanking to sex. I imagine that it's just the same as why women will sometimes prefer giving themselves a rub to sex. It requires no energy, it's entirely self-gratifying, one can go at one's own pace, and so on. Porn is a sort of magic bullet to make it more pleasant.

There's no real mystery to it, unless the very lack of mystery is mysterious.

As for porn in general objectifying women: that is a red herring. Lots of things objectify women, men, and just about any discernable group one could think of. If we are to consider objectification in terms of the actual damage it does e.g. eating disorders and low self-esteem, then surely Vogue should be first against the wall, or at least before porn. Should we not also ban Jimmy Choo shoes for creating the image of the independent sexy woman, thus coercing poor innocents into a life of bunions? Perhaps we should.

This is of course quite different from porn that requires infliction of genuine exploitation or suffering in its creation: child porn, for example. But we need to be quite clear that considerations of that sort are quite different from the rightness or wrongness or porn in general.

Like many men I don't use porn, but my reasons are certainly not because it objectifies women. I don't use it because I love my wife and I don't want to upset her or trick her by using porn secretly: I do not need to share her views in order to adhere to them.

Vogue is a horrible magazine!
I haven't seen anybody here say 'porn is awful but women's magazines are great'.

I detest the way that most womens mags treat their readers, and undermine women's confidence by reducing their self esteem to a dress size. Vile.

Isn't it ok just to talk about how porn makes us feel without having to give endless caveats about 'other things in addition to porn are also awful'? This thread is about porn, not fashion magazines.

I've never heard of a husband feeling upset or undermined by discovering a Marie Claire under his wife's side of the bed.

Well, it's true that the fact that some men use porn as a wank-aid makes some women unhappy. For other women, it's a non-issue and for yet other women, they're actively interested.

Whether it's something that can be given up entirely, or compromised over ("Ok, you can have a wank to some porn if you need to, but I don't want to know about it and make sure the kids won't find it"), or something that someone is prepared to potentially end an otherwise good relationship about, is something for each individual to choose.

MorrisZapp, this thread has quite clearly become about the rightness or wrongness of using porn. As such it is clearly relevant to point out how men's use of porn gets singled out for particular opprobrium, and to my mind in a way that is quite disproportionate. It is true that probably very few husbands have got upset about their wives having a copy of Marie Claire under the bed. But probably not many have got too upset about their wives having a copy of Black Lace on the bookshelves either. What's the difference between pornographic images and explicit literature? The only difference I can see is that one has traditionally been frowned upon, and that tradition remains. The other has had just about no tradition at all, and hence not a bad one. In short, like cases should be treated alike, and this is not happening for historical reasons.

In my view if a husband's use of porn makes his wife feel bad, then he shouldn't use it. But that's not because porn is wrong: it's wrong to upset one's partner without a good reason, which is quite a different thing. What rules couples want to set themselves about porn use is a matter for them, but that shouldn't be confused with the supposed dangers of porn generally.

Maybe it is just the realisation that you are not special with respect to your sexuality - for him. For most men then - you wont be? Romantically ... maybe? Being the one they love ... maybe?

But given the chance - and if nobody were to find out ... hey presto! A hard lesson that needs to be learnt. But although most men will be like that - not all of them are I think.

There are other elements in this that may exist or not in a specific relationship wrt porn. Misogyny. Control. Sexual power. Power struggles. Insecurity. Inferiority.

The situation is different for every couple I think. Sometimes it is not really even about "sex".

Only you can decide.

Hi Fernfrost,

The realisation you describe strikes me as a misguided conclusion to come to. I am sure that every man who loves his partner regards her sexuality as special and unique. Her sexuality will not, however, be the only way he can become aroused. Indeed, men can become aroused by something quite impersonal - such as porn - but surely women are no different in this respect.

Regading misogyny, control, sexual power, power struggles, insecurity, inferority: all these things may also exist in a relationship without porn. The question is whether porn causes these things. I don't think so. A man who is a misogynist and a power freak might enjoy porn in which women are belittled. A man who is not would be belittled by that sort of porn. Speaking for myself, some porn I've seen utterly repells me. So it seems more accurate to say that men enjoy porn that touches character traits they already have. I get the feeling that many women feel that nakedness must mean vulnerability. It can also mean raw power, and plenty of men enjoy that too.

Sorry: typo. I said "A man who is not (a misogynist) would be belittled by that sort of porn"

I should have said "A man who is not (a misogynist) would be repelled by that sort of porn"