Porn - I use it and feel bad - help convince me porn is wrong

[GuiltyPornUser]

Firstly, sorry if this is the wrong place to post this, although I thought it may be the most appropriate. I'm a married man, and I use porn fairly regularly. It's not something I feel has a massive negative effect on my life, but I feel bad about it. I'm not someone who specially goes out of my way to buy porn, (I've never paid for it), but with the internet, it's only ever a few clicks away.

I want to be convinced that it's wrong. I recently read Andrea Dworkin's book on pornography, but it hasn't stopped me. I appreciate that a lot of stuff on the web is very brutal and degrading to women, but a lot of the stuff is less obviously so.

My DW wouldn't be happy with me using porn, and I want to stop. I want to be convinced that it's wrong, and how I go about stopping using porn, when it's so easy to find on the internet.

There may be some here who think porn is acceptable and I'm just suffering from some almost religious guilt.

I'd really welcome some advice here, because my DW could find out one day and I want to stop.

Dorothea Your point about the women being presented as happy and confident is very true. I read a great article by Robert Jensen on the weekend (led there courtesy of the links on this thread - so while I have been kicking myself for giving the OP any of my time - I actually got a lot out of this thread even if he didn't...pfffft) where he and Gail Dines interviewed Australian porn actresses at some Sex Expo in LA who were supposed to be fulfilling the au naturel/girl next door niche. They weren't allowed back to interview after the first day because their questions were too difficult and the porn site's owner- girls had decided they didn't want to answer the questions. The whole account highlights how much effort goes into maintaining that happy confident image...but how quickly it fades....was then reading about Linda Boreman (aka Linda Lovelace) and her testimony that she was forced to film Deep Throat with gun threats from her abusing 'husband'. There are lots of reports of her being heavily into drugs for the years she was involved in porn. It does seem that the porn profiteers know how to target and draw in vulnerable women with troubled pasts. And yet as Dittany has pointed out all we get fed is the Belle De Jour myth. One Belle can wipe out any number of other women's horrifying experience of exploitation and abuse it appears.

Yes, TKE - this which was linked from the other porn thread backs up that point about the "happy and confident" appearance. One suspects "Bella Donna" is doing putting on the cheeriness to kid herself as much as the interviewer (and when questioned about the constant smiling, she breaks down).

That video is so sad, that poor young woman.

The smiling thing also makes me think of this which I posted already on another thread but it seems appropriate here too.

""Finally, the harm is invisible because of the smile, because women are made to smile, women aren't just made to do the sex acts. We are made to smile while we do them."

"I live in a country where if you film any act of humiliation or torture, and if the victim is a woman, the film is both entertainment and it is protected speech. Now that tells me something about what it means to be a woman citizen in this country, and the meaning of being second class."

www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/WarZoneChaptIVF1.html

I've read all the links ( and have checked out some porn sites as advised )

Final opinion is that the majority of pornography is absolutely fine and not harming women. 99% of What You see in porn films is completely legal and harmless entertainment/escapism. If I wanted to have group sex tonight with 3 men I could and I wouldn't be breaking any laws, if I wanted to film that and show it to the world I could. Enjoying different types of Sex is not illegal, it's a normal part of the human condition. If I want to get off watching pornography that's up to me, I'm not a threat to anyone and do not consider all women in porn ' victims' - most of them are laughing all the way to the bank.

Most male users of Pornography are normal/ordinary men and women , they are not women haters and are never going to harm anyone purely because of pornography ( I know porn has been linked to some crimes but I'm pretty sure those crimes would have taken place anyway ) to suggest all men ( and women ) who use porn are depraved inadequates is crazy.

Plus You will never be able to ban it because there's too many variations of it, do you just ban the hardcore stuff ( & H/C means different things to different people ) or do you ban everything including Jordan? ( she's doing more damage to women than the whole porn industry put together imo )

so, if you're a consenting adult and want to watch porn (or even be part of the industry) go right ahead. I like it sometimes.

I wanted to make a point about the positive images that are presented of porn. Let's ignore the issue of the man lying to his wife. I don't know what he's watching, but let's assume he's not fairly mainstream porn.

He sees videos of happy girls enjoying consensual sex, and he's unlikely to have heard of Jensen and Dines before he came here, like 99% of men.

I think the key is in educating these men about the reality of porn, rather than telling them they're potential rapists. Just like we don't tell people who shop in Primark they're child abusers.

Inmydreams,

I'm not sure how you conclude that when you hear the anecdotes of women harmed in the industry. Could you elaborate?

RL; - There will be some women who are harmed - just like there will be some men harmed. There are people being 'harmed' all over the world by all sorts of things - it's not a perfect world and never will be.
I could make a documentary today about women in porn who have done very well thank you - like any report, it depends where you're coming from.
Pretty much everyone has access to the likes of Katie Price. She has made her fortune out of being very pretty and selling her body. Is she a success?
My 11 year old son knows who KP is - he doesn't have a clue what pornography is - this is my point - there is an 'acceptable' side to the sex industry that is just as ( potentially ) damaging to impressionable people.

I've seen some music videos on TV that could be considered pornography.
You can't stop people selling sex - it's everywhere.

Inmydream I actually can't believe that you've read the posts here and come to that conclusion. Maybe you didn't understand much of it, maybe you didn't want to. But please don't portray your opinion as some kind of objective weighing of the evidence on this thread when it's clearly not. There's overwhelming evidence here of the harm pornography does to us.

Inmydream, I am blown away by your total lack of empathy. Did you watch the documentary about Felicity? Did you see her being forced into sexual acts she didn't wish to partake in? Did you register that she was being raped and assaulted? Can you even imagine what would have happened to her if the documentary crew hadn't been there?

Would you go to LA to be a porn star and sign Richard up as your agent? Would you let your daughter do that?

How can you watch that film and come away not even thinking that at the very least the industry needs serious regulation?

I find it quite chilling that you can so easily write off the fact that some women will always be harmed and that the majority of porn is just "harmless escapism".

Inmydreamimawesternhero do you hold racist views as well as sexist ones?

I'm only asking because the porn industry, you seem so enthusiastic about, is rife with racism and racist stereotypes so it seems like a given.

why is it that when it comes to porn, people are so ready to point to the exceptional earners like Jenna Jameson and talk as if they are typical when they so obviously aren't? I mean, no-one thinks all computer nerds earn as much as Bill Gates or all children's authors make as much money as J.K. Rowling, do they?!

SGM

I'm anti-porn (I want to stress this), but the point I want to raise is why should they care, when they are presented with pictures of happy women having consensual sex?

Do you question whether the woman in the bank is being abused when she provides a service? The assumption is that she isn't. The abuse that occurs in porn is largely hidden from the consumer (unless we're talking very extreme porn)

My problem with porn is what I know to be true behind the masks, as well as more generally the objectification of women, and what the messages it gives to men about women.

Another thing the porn enthusiasts do is chop and change their perception as it suits them.

For example when a woman smiles in porn this means she is happy and having a good time - this is her real reaction as a real women.

When a woman is being verbally abused/made to gag/hit/brutally penetrated/ that isn't real enough to mean anything important.

Hypocrisy? Stupidity? Cruelty? You choose.

I agree it's not the best analogy, but the point is that a woman in the bank may be being abused by the bank, and by using that company/bank, etc, you are in a way complicit in that abuse. A better example might be the sweatshops that make our clothes. That was the point I was trying to make.

To be honest, I don't watch porn, so I don't know how much of it "appears" to be consensual sex, and how much of it is the violent abusive stuff. Does it matter if it's the former or the latter as to the complicity of the man?

The point of working in a bank is not to be abused. (Counting money, processing checks, is the sort of thing that is involved in working in a bank.)

The point of being a woman in porn is to be abused. (Being called a dirty cock sucking whore, being penetrated painfully, being hit, having your hair pulled, being choked, is the sort of thing that is involved in working in porn.)

Why are most women in the porn industry very attractive with lovely bodies?
It's a bit unbelievable that all female 'victims' are physically attractive. Are some feminists jealous? - I have seen enough pornography to know that it consists mainly of good looking females. And if I had been Katie Price I would have done exactly what she's done. Should she have rejected a 20 million soft porn career to work in Tesco's just to keep a few feminists happy?

Beachcomber

Does your objection to porn then only relate to the harder violent stuff, and consensual sex porn is ok?

Inmydreams, you're not making sense at all there.

Just because most porn actress are pretty (that's debateable) and most are victims, it doesn't mean most female victims are attractive, and even if it were the case, why would it matter?

And if you want to hear stories of abuse - I'm reliably informed that female fashion models live on cotton wool balls soaked in orange juice just to stay thin.
I guess they make an informed choice about what to do with their lives/ body.

and do you think feminists think fashion models starving themselves is ok?

why do you keep coming back to Katie Price? Do you think she's typical? If not, why are you basing your argument on someone who is an exception to the norm?

rofl @ the 'jealous' comment - it reliably comes up when people have no actual arguments left. Yeah, we're all feminists because we're jealous of porn actresses, very plausible

We're jealous?

Yes, clearly. In my last job as a senior manager, in my current role as SAHM and in my relationship I often stop and say to myself how great life would be if there were just little more double anal to get me though the day.

Have you considered that you might be very stupid? And 'unecessarily' obsessive about Jordan?

Why would an I-phone add quote marks to unecessarily? I mean really, why?