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.

In that case, I will certainly take my own advice upthread SGM

Ousel

I didn't show her the thread, and her reaction wasn't all positive, but we discussed it very openly. Difficult to say more really.

Charles Dickens was a social reformer - he cared about the underclass and prostitutes in particular.
That's the relevance. >

as in I'm in my own little world and nobody has the slightest idea what I'm on about becuase I make no sense?

Or as in I just spontaneously combusted and all that's left is a slightly charred copy of Razzle?

I'm sure there was an insult buried in their. Never read any of Dickens work personally. Well, I've been compared to worse things than a highly respected writer of classical fiction who was also known as a social visionary.

Getting back on topic, OP, I hope things work out with your wife and you can kick the habit. If you do, you'll be doing better than most men. I'm glad my input was helpful.

"...buried in there ..." even.

RitaLynn your last few posts have left me shaking my head.

Why are you so keen to make a case for excusing porn consumers?

Teenage boys who use porn may not mean to be misogynistic, or think that they are being misogynistic, but the reality is that they are participating in misogyny.

Whilst I do think that young people who watch porn are being exploited, I think it is important for responsible and adult members of society to wholeheartedly frown on the actions of these youngsters and label their actions for what they are.

We will never get anywhere otherwise.

I don't know if you have daughters, but I do, and I vehemently do not want male counterparts, who are part of their lives, to be sent the message that porn is ok and some sort of right of passage.

We have the example of a young man on this thread who has figured things out for himself, and well done to him. These things should not be left to chance however.

Older men have no excuse, but young men using porn should not be condoned under some sort of 'they didn't mean it' umbrella. The young men in question may not be the ones to blame but society needs to be ashamed of itself if it does not act as moral guardian on their behalf.

I once did a workshop on pornography with young men from a seriously under privileged area in France. They all admitted to using porn. I asked them if they would be happy for their sisters or other female relatives to be in porn. They all, without exception, said no. They didn't find it easy to express why, but after some thought, they all said that they thought it would be bad for the women they knew and would be damaging for them. they also said that they would hate for their female relatives to be thought about in 'that way' by random men.

There were some wise heads on young shoulders - they just needed someone to give them the opportunity to think about things and question them.

It's not just the underprivileged boys though - I went to a boarding school; it was co-ed and in some ways very enlightened (it was a teacher there that got me interested in feminism). However pornography, when it was discussed as part of PSE (personal and social education - I guess that would be called citizenship these days), was just dismissed as the price you pay for free speech and a free press; I remember we looked at the Oz obscenity trial. Basically we were being told "don't gripe about porn, because censorship is wrong", which is an entirely different matter altogether. But it also meant that is was a while before I gave pornography any serious thought from a feminist angle, because I always saw it as tied into the free speech discussion.... I don't know if any other boys (or indeed women) saw it this way.

Quite MrIC.

I mentioned that the boys were from an underprivileged area because, despite the fact that they have been pretty much left to one side by society, and they lived in an area that was violent and uncaring, they all were able to understand why the violent and uncaring nature of porn was wrong.

They were also, unsurprisingly, able to see how racist porn is.

The liberal 'free speech' 'freedom to choose' argument is infuriating in its complacency.

I've been following this thread with interest and read all the links. I feel just horrible, I used porn in the past as it seemed so acceptable and mainstream. It's actually making me cry now to think that I have participated in something that harms women so much, I feel dreadful, and should do. It's been a long time since I used anything like that (it was something an ex-p liked to do) but I never really thought of it as being 'bad' until quite recently, and even then, hadn't really thought about the damage it did. Am thinking now, and honestly, after looking at those links, I can't stop crying. It's horrible, I feel horrible. Can't believed I watched all that and thought it was OK because 'consensual'. Can't believe I was so stupid.

Sorry for hyjack, not sure why posting - maybe 'fessing up? Will probably get told to sod off forever off the feminism board.

Don't be silly, Ellie

Do you think all the women on this board have never seen porn ?

You are right to feel horrible after following the links, you would have to be made of stone not to do so

Don't beat yourself up though, it's a learning curve

Alhough I believe ignorance is not an excuse, I am as guilty as you are (and lots of other people too)

Society's brainwashing that tells you that porn is OK and is healthy people having healthy sex is very pervasive. Having a complete change of heart, and admitting you were wrong shows strength of character

Now dry your tears and start thinking of small ways you can help to spread the message x

EllieG, I don't want to speak for other MN feminists but I think I can safely say that nobody will tell you to sod off.

EggyFucker's post says all I want to say really but I just wanted to add another 'voice'.

You are thinking about it now because it has been brought to your attention. We all think the way we do because one day it was brought to our attention by someone.

Just, join the 'club' of people who don't want to put up with it and use your new found knowledge to be true to yourself.

The truth about the porn industry is a difficult one to face for many many reasons. To cite a well known reference here, I don't blame myself, I blame the patriarchy.

Don't beat yourself up.

I agree that people shouldn't be condoning pornography, but I'm not sure we should be attacking the casual user. I agree with you that pornography shouldn't be a rite of passage, but what AtomicBum showed was that at around 20, he had an epiphany, and previously hadn't thought too much about it. But what if he'd been 25, or 30, or 35?

I think these people who watch it have a perfectly valid excuse - a) it's legal b) they think it's consensual

I googled porn last night to have a look, and some of it is gang bangs, etc, but an awful lot, from my survey last night, looked like consensual sex, albeit in strange situations (the pizza delivery boy, my best friend's mum, etc)

I'm not sure that the freedom of speech or the press arguement really stands up with pornography. Yes, the press can print their own opinions, but they still have to work within the confines of the law and censorship. They can be prosecuted for lible or copyright, so why then is pornography so different?

There are ruleas as to what can be shown on television, and there are rules as to what can be shown on the cover (albeit they can be twisted a bit - see Sunday Sport), and (as far as I know) you cannot buy XXX pornography out of a shop in Britain.

So, if the law has to be followed by the press and what they print, if prostitution was illegal, surely then so would pornography? If it were illegal to pay for sex, then it would be illegal to film someone being paid to have sex. Yes, there would still be posing only photographs, since there is no law against a person posing for a photographer, but it would cut out the hardcore stuff. I know that there would be the counter arguement that this person is having consensual sex, and is being paid only to allow filming of it and to have sex, but that is just a semantical arguement, surely? Mainstream pornography, if I understand it correctly, has contracted sexcual acts, doesn't it? And therefore the person is being paid to perform sexual acts.

That's true, TAB and like Sweden and now, by the looks of it, France, the UK should make paying for sex illegal - which would throw an interesting legal light on pornography depicting some sort of sex act.

At the moment, paying for sex is still legal in the UK AFAIK.

Yes, Inmculada, I believe it is legal but there are laws, aren't there? I'm fairly sure a pimp is illegal? And therefore, by extension, is a producer of pornography classified as a pimp? And I also believe it is illegal to advertise yourself for prostition, or at least to make any display or something, so is it ellegal to advertise pornography?

Ousel, I think what Rita is saying is that the excuses used by the viewers are valid only in that they are convinced that they are true because society has told this is so. Not they are they valid reasons why it's OK to watch, but valid reasons for not knowing the harm of it, IYSWIM.

Yes, AtomicBum, that is what I'm saying, if you haven't investigated to the extent that some of us have, then it "looks" harmless and consensual fun.

I think that it's a mistake to begin a priori, as some of us do, with the idea that it's clearly abuse and therefore that the men must like watching the abuse of women

I would certainly say ignorance is not a "perfectly valid" excuse, but yes, it is an excuse.

Would most "casual" porn-users stop if they knew more about it, I wonder?

Laws re internet porn

Ok, maybe perfectly valid excuse is taking it too far, but there's the analogy made in these discussions of shopping in Primark - do we shout at the consumer and call them child abusers, or do we rather try and educate them, and try to tackle primark itself?

I think if most consumers of porn knew they were watching abuse of vulnerable women, I think then maybe many would stop (maybe I'm naive)

I don't think porn users asking genuine questions do get shouted at.

I think the OP got shouted at because of his tone tbh.

The trouble is that some men think they are paying for sex when they take a woman out and buy her dinner....it's almost like thats what they expect at the end of the evening.....

EllieG: why would anyone tell you to bugger off? You have a valid POV and you haven't insulted anyone. I'm only a sporadic poster, but get a lot from the feminist threads and I say, the more the merrier. Welcome.

RitaLynn - if porn is all happy clappy happy smiling laydeez making sweet sweet consensual lurve with the kind and caring pool 'boy' (not man), how come when I go to porn sites the titles of the videos are fucking hideous?

Are you using a different google to me - one that transports you back to the 1970s?

I typed porn and clicked on the first result - here are the titles;

"Asain amateur babe fucked hard by...."

"ATM hottie " (thats ass to mouth for anyone who is still in the 1970s)

"Big black cocks in da butt XXX"

"Pretty lesbian teens on hot orgy"

"Interracial Double Dicked XXX"

"Plug My Leaky Hole"

"Long hair brunette gets doggystyled and facial"

"Dirty whore gets banged"

"Busty MILF with great pussy gets banged"

"Chocolate slut hardcore fucking action"

"Hot wife fucked like a dog"

"Teen babysitter slut fucks and sucks"

There is also a charming advert down the bottom of the page for a website called "18 and abused".

There are pictures of double penetration/gang bang/women being penetrated anally by very large penises/very young women/surgically 'enhanced' women/women tied up/women having their hair pulled and, listen carefully; two women in stocks . Remember this is a mainstream website.

You know what - even if this does look consensual to deluded misogynists, it doesn't actually matter. This is hate speech against women. The women are not women, they are blonds/brunettes/babes/cunts/whores/dirty whores/sluts/bitches/teens/MILFs/fucktoys - and these are the less violent and abusive terms. There are much worse.

This, this is the result of society turning its head the other way and spouting 'ach it looks consensual, boys will be boys, they don't mean it really, I once saw a porn film and the slut woman in it was smiling.'

You know one of the things I hate most about the 'it looks consensual so I'm just going to jack off and not engage my brain' argument? It is that to add insult to injury, the women in porn films are constantly having to 'beg for more' and say 'harder harder' and try not to gag, and to hide their pain and distress and look like they just love drinking the cum of ten different men. They also have to lie about their sexually transmitted diseases, abortions, drug habits, anal tears and prolapses, alcoholism and the fact that they work in prostitution.

Again, ask any man who wanks to what he has deluded himself is consensual porn - would he want his sister/girlfriend/mother/cousin to be in porn. I guarantee you he will say no. Men know this stuff is wrong, they just don't care. They don't care because society tells them it is fine to not care about these women - they aren't real women anyway. They are sex objects, they are the sex class.

The wider problem is that society's tolerance of porn sends out the message loud and clear that abusing women is sexy and a male right. Indeed it sends out the message that this isn't abuse because women like it. They consent to it. They beg for more the dirty sluts.