How does porn make you feel about yourself and men

[Wandawomble]

A question here - how does porn make you feel about the world, about yourself in the mirror. About your partner if you have discovered it or about men generally? I never see threads about this, about how it makes women feel without them being shouted down as prudish.
Porn was something I found in my brother’s drawer when I was borrowing his socks at age 5. It was a magazine and I took a marker pen and drew clothes on the women. Later boys used to share it and I remember feeling my body was inadequate, I was embarrassed! In my teens boys used to share photos of women having sex or Pamela Anderson and I felt humiliated and shamed. When I started having boyfriends - there was one who was obsessed with porn and he creeped me out. I ended up having a lot of body issues because of the women he would be fawning over. I found some disturbing porn on a boyfriends laptop once and I remember throwing up afterwards - the barely legal incest porn. He had sisters.

Porn makes me feel inadequate and unsafe - it makes me feel creeped out that men seem to think it’s their right to watch it.

My partner doesn’t watch it now because of my feelings - I think it gets in the way of sex and makes it feel like masturbation instead of connection.

I know a few men who use porn and then don’t approach women in real life because they have an inflated view of what kind of woman they can get - and then they are disappointed that real women aren’t model types - I think it gives men an inflated sense of their own entitlement to beautiful women.

It doesn't make me feel inadequate but it does turn me off if I find out a man uses it. Its like claiming that very bad fast food is the height of sophisticated fine dining.

I went clubbing a couple of years ago (house music retro night, age mix from early 20s to 50ish). It was very bloke-heavy to start off with but gradually evened out. It wouldn’t have bothered me in the late 80s/90s. At this event it occurred to me that a lot of the men in the room would now get off on seeing women choked/raped/spat on etc in porn and it wasn’t a good feeling.

It doesn't make me feel inadequate. I don't feel inadequate against women who are being exploited. I feel sorry for them and glad it's not me.

I don't mind the idea of porn per se - as in sex based entertainment where all participants are fully consenting and enjoying it. But the reality of it is that women are exploited, it doesn't represent the kind of sex women enjoy and it promotes a kind of behaviour that is harmful to women.

My ex (who was abusive - not a great catch) watched a lot of porn and what he watched did a lot more to put me off sex than turn me on.

I really dislike it. I don't like the way it portrays women as accessories to male pleasure. I hate the idea of having my body looked at and touched in that way.

I'm a full, complete human in my own right. My body isn't for anyone else to leer over or paw at for their own gratification. It's degrading and dehumanising.

... women watch porn too !.

@Pyewackect

... women watch porn too !.

Yes. But it's been shown they enjoy different porn to men. The industry caters to the male taste as that's where the money is.

@Pyewackect

... women watch porn too !.

And I was asking how it makes women feel about themselves. If you are a woman, how does it make you feel about yourself? If it makes you feel great then say that rather than shouting women watch it too.

I think degrading and dehumanising covers it, for both men and women. It seems to be almost a given nowadays but pre-internet, grown men going to special shops to get dodgy videos were seen as pathetic. I wonder how many men who happily use and discuss porn now would realise that back in the day they would simply have been viewed as dirty old men.

I think the porn generally available from pre internet was very different from now. ( I go back to an age when women still had hair.) There has always been extreme and/or fetish material available to those who knew where to look. Most users though, contented themselves with The 'top shelf' or had to brave going into the smut shop.

The instant free porn available now is quite horrific. I used to think I was open minded in that if a woman chose to go into that profession it was up to her. If she wasn't being coerced and had autonomy it was ok. Boy, was I naive.
Even the stuff that says it is consensual I have my doubts about. If it's ok for poor women to consent to this, why don't we get scores of rich women getting choked for money?

As for the men that delight in the degradation and humiliation of women, I have nothing but contempt. It makes me feel disgusted with some young men & heartbroken for the young woman that are brainwashed into thinking porn sex is what they should be doing, otherwise, they are a prude.

When I walk by groups of teenage boys I often feel uneasy thinking they must see all sorts online.

Dont feel anything about it. Porn isnt real. I wouldn't want to date a man that couldn't tell the difference or preferred fact to fiction.

But I do think most men watch it. I also think more women would if it was ethical, and more driven by female pleasure.

Wrong way round

or preferred fiction to fact

It doesn't make me feel anything bust sad and angry, that at peoples - mainly males' - fingertips, they can watch women being choked, fucked up the arse, rape fantasies, all kinds, just to wank over.

I hate it and feel so sad for all the women being used and abused.

My husband doesn't watch it. He probably did years ago, but because of a job he had with perpetrators of violence towards women, he doesn't see abused women as objects to wank over.

@Hazelnutlatteplease

Dont feel anything about it. Porn isnt real. I wouldn't want to date a man that couldn't tell the difference or preferred fact to fiction.

But I do think most men watch it. I also think more women would if it was ethical, and more driven by female pleasure.

The women and children being abused in porn are real! How can you say it's not real, when those people are experiencing real pain and real abuse?

I was shocked that it was real. I naively thought it would be simulated. Absolutely hate it. It creeps me out. Thankfully dh doesn't watch.
We are both dinosaurs and grew up in simpler times in a simpler country.

Without getting too personal ex boyfriends who watched porn treated me differently in bed than those who didn't. I never felt inadequate but I felt like a play thing and there it provide pleasure and my pleasure or comfort didn't matter.

Porn makes me feel sick and it makes me worry for the young women who are wanting to date and find a relationship but are pretty much taking their life in their hands. The women I know who are single can't trust men as they all appear to be porn soaked and into choking etc.

It also makes me worry for boys and men as it can ruin your sex life completely, I forget the stat but some young men get erectile dysfunction, they can't get it up unless they watch porn.

The only benefits I see go to those behind the camera making the money without the risk of an anal prolapse.

Has no effect on how I think of myself.

Not seen any for a few years but the stuff on the homepages of mainstream sites, the category names etc were so grim I just stopped.

In a magical different utopia I'd be fine with it in theory.
In practice it's a hard no.

It's mysoginist, racist. Het porn seems to focus on male sexual domination of women. The words as well - destroyed etc

Nope.

What does it make me think of men?

It makes me think that the fact that so many men watch it, combined with what it most commonly portrays these days. And all from the male gaze of course. Means that a shit load of men and boys are consuming/ seeking content which reveals a very worrying view of girls, women and get sex.

I've got mixed feelings on it. there's obviously lot of bad stuff out there, but there's SO much now that if I wanted to find someone who looked like me, positive body image, female led etc i could too.

It never made me feel inadequate. It contributed to my feeling of being prey though, with no right to defend myself either. As for how it affected my feelings towards men - I struggle to find words to express my contempt for the inability to think without using their genitals, while still presuming and desperately pushing their superiority.

It’s nice to see a few threads on here about regular feminism today, not just trans.

It made me feel that my enjoyment was irrelevant and that I should expect sex to be something I would have done to me by a man. It taught me that a woman's pleasure in sex was only about pleasing the man.

I put up with some appallingly bad sex when I was younger and it just didn't occur to me that I could expect better. I just thought that was the way it was, the man orgasms, but the woman just fake moans and takes satisfaction in the man's orgasm.

I wouldn't necessarily have said that at the time but it definitely had that effect on my expectations. I was naive then to how horrible the industry was and hadn't thought critically about it at all - now it makes me feel sick and just really, really sad. It makes me feel that men who genuinely respect women are a tiny minority.

When I think about my children watching it in the future, which I know I won't be able to protect them from forever, I could cry. For my daughter and my son.

I'm older and when I was young while boys still had their 'checklist' and applied pressure, the checklist was very mild compared to now.

Also they had an idea probably a hangover of the 70s etc that women were supposed to enjoy it.

And while it could be irritating when you don't know what you like yet to have an equally in inexperienced boy asking if you had come every 2 secs, that's definitely better than what I've heard of attitudes now.

Also I know this gets people's backs up and I understand why but in my day most blokes were so pleased to get into a sexual situation with a girl they treated you accordingly. Not always obv and there was pressure but the attitude now seems to be much more that. Sex is about male pleasure, the woman is there to provide it, she should be plucked and spruced and give him what he's seen in porn.

The threads on here where older women have gone back to dating after splitting with long term partners are eye opening. And these are men their age as well, not just the youngsters.

It depends. Some makes me feel repulsed, some makes me feel sad, some makes me aroused

It doesn't make me feel anything about myself, it would if I had a partner who sacked off sex with me to watch porn instead but that's not an issue.

It makes me feel inadequate, that I don’t look right and am a poor substitute for the porn star they really want. Ashamed.
And it makes me see men as grimy and cum stained. It’s a real turn off.
Which may be why I avoid men..... even with the nice ones, I suspect they’re secretly watching women get strangled and choked every night. Gross. I just can’t respect them.