facts about porn

[littlesez]

I hate it and Im not starting a thread to debate about it because i know its been done here before, but i am wondering if people can please help me to find some facts about porn. Rather than personal opinions on it. Of course feel free to debate/discuss/share opinions on it

I am wondering if there is any info out there about the effects of it,facts about pay especially men V women, the devastation it can have on those involved and such.

I feel really strongly but not very good and stating my case so much and so i am asking for help! I want info/facts to back up my argument. sorry if it sounds a bit silly

Non-mainstream- ie.more extreme porn eg. BDSM etc (bondage, domination, sadomasochism).

The issue I imagine with finding a control group is that porn in some form or other is everywhere so difficult to find someone who hasn't seen something even if it was lads mags/music vids rather than anything else- especially as the group was sexually active 18-25 year olds.

Am interested in this idea now though- will ask some colleagues and try and find out re. controls using such a group.

Thandeka, you wrote, 'speaking as a scientist...'

What has you being a scientist got to do with you speaking about pornography?

Only if you are selling washing powder on a TV advert.

Sigh. MillyR that was in reply to Dittany asking what my role was. I work in sexual health and do a lot of work with young people around pornography, I am also about to start some research for my dissertation for my masters in sexual health either on homophobia in schools although maybe I will change it to sexualisation/pornography effects on young people as is also an area that interests me. So it was just to say is more than a passing interest but appreciate I sounded totally wanky by writing it like that -so apologies for that! Not trying to sell washing powder no!

The OP stated she wanted some anti-porn facts/evidence to support her arguments which I was interested in reading as well but don't think I have the time or energy to engage in a big debate on it at minute but shall continue reading with interest and respect our differing opinions on it.

Thandeka, possibly I should leave this and will no doubt regret pursuing this, as don't want to single you out and hijack the thread.

But I still don't see how this has anything to do with science. Your possible dissertation topics sound like social science, and talking to young people about pornography is advice work.

So I still don't understand what the science is that you are carrying out, and how this science has anything to do with pornography.

Surely there is a side to porn that is to sex what TV cooks (Ready Steady Cook, Masterchef, Heston Blumenthal etc) are to eating?

Out of interest, taken as an entire industry, is it definitely true that the women get paid more than the men?

Many of the men also work in gay porn for men and presumably there is a quid or two to be made in that. Conversely many women are trying to "break into" the porn industry as there are a few women who are very highly paid and I understand that they can be exploited.

When people say that the pay is reversed, are they talking about the few very famous female porn stars, or are they talking about an average across the whole industry?

Would be great to see a link if anyone has one.

Already apologised for sounding wanky- in my head what I was trying to say was more "I'm from quite a scientific background (degree and main job til I switched!) so personally for me I like/need to look at facts, evidence, research, correlation not causation re.the whole porn debate before I make a definitive opinion on it- but it came out totally wrong and I sounded like a bit of a plonker and so yes please stop singling me out!

I dislike the ubiquitous spread of porn in the media (music videos have me apoplectic!) and lots of aspects of the industry but can't ascribe to an "all porn is bad" mentality as I just haven't seen enough evidence that it really is although I appreciate aspects of the industry are.

I totally hear what you are saying Dittany about it being the status quo and that being problematic- but in terms of being a practitioner working with young people on the ground, its unfortunate that we have work with what we have- we try to encourage critical awareness of the issues and media literacy and just telling kids "porn is bad" is going to get me about as far as if I tell them "just say no" in terms of sex!

Also the last time I looked many of the films available on a popular website appeared to feature women who were unconscious. I'm not sure how much they were getting paid

thandeka, it should be possible to find a control group. My DH has never seen any porn. Until he went out with me I don't think he'd ever seen even the kind of 'sex' you get in an 18-rated film. It's against his religion. There must be plenty of men who have religious or cultural reasons for not watching porn.

I'm not saying this to attack btw, just making a point.

dittany, I usually agree with you but you're coming across as really rude on this thread.

And dittany- thanks for the link to Shelley Lubbens website- thats interesting reading

No Dittany, I don't see women as food but I do see sex as a biological function just as eating could be described as a biological function.

yeah I was more pondering on control group though in terms of exposure to sexualised media eg music vids etc that maybe hard to avoid but could have an effect on the research?

Was then pondering about research on men who never accessed porn eg. hill tribes or Amish communities (maybe taking it bit far as a control group as the cultural differences would be a bigger factor affecting research!?)

Also in terms of violence against women it was pointed out to me somewhere else that countries that don't have similar exposures to porn (eg. Saudi Arabia) their violence against women stats are higher (but have no link to that research plus obviously correlation does not =causation etc etc)