Is Porn Bad for You?

[wintler2]

symbolic relief

At least you're being straightforward with what you're really criticising: "self abuse".

Congratulations, you missed everything i was trying to say.
Whatever. But don't go putting words in my mouth, okay? My choice of terms might push your buttons but i thought i had made it clear that what i was talking about extends well beyond masturbation/sex/porn.

Maybe i'm offtopic, so sue me, but i'm not attacking wanking. I have no problem at all with masturbation - i do have a problem with merely symbolic living, and porn like videogames and airport novels are made for that purpose.

[barracuda]

I've misunderstood you? Perhaps. But I fail to see how that is really my fault. You said,

All porn, even porn that is nonexploitative nonsexist etc (assuming such exists), shares a sad foundation: it can only provide symbolic relief for real needs.

It sounds as if "symbolic relief" (emphasis on "relief") = masturbation while viewing porn, and "real needs" = IRL sex, love, companionship, etc. At least that's how it sounded to me in this context. Apologies if that was not your intent.

But it would seem you are condemning fantasy itself as "sad", whereas I believe it is among the highest of human endeavors, no matter that our modern world has attempted to shove it into a video or a handheld device. Vicariousness and symbolic action have their place in life. There's really nothing sad about with daydreaming. Every creative act of will begins as a thought about what might happen if. Even if most such thoughts go nowhere, the remainder make it happen.

[Canadian_watcher]

I just read the last five or so pages of this thread and have a few comments, if I may.

I am enjoying the dissection of the value of the 'voice of the victim'.. it's a theme that is important to me, and, I believe, to society in general. This idea that we can't really trust the words of the 'disgruntled employee' so to speak serves the master class. I would like to believe that RI is a place where people have already come to terms with that. Interjecting personal experiences into stories of rape and other matters of gender conflict seems to be roundly and routinely rejected as a ploy around here, but maybe in this thread that can change?

From what I've read in the last pages, I'd have to say that I agree with what I believe Wintler is getting at. And I think the language he is using is appropriately strong. cheers.

[Luther Blissett]

I'll just throw my hat in the ring here as a resource for any questions anyone might have regarding the contemporary porn industry - I was in a relationship with, and married to, an adult model / actress for 7 years (still am, technically). I also knew her when we were both fifteen and sixteen, a couple of years predating her modeling career. Any managers / higher-ups along the way in her career were very hands-off and the majority of time were women. She never met any of them face-to-face. She worked in the industry for about 7 years, from ages 18-25. Through her, I came to know her little cabal of friends around the world who were also involved in the industry in one way or another, to varying degrees and for wildly different reasons.

Just being a 31-year-old male who was involved in dating through his twenties, it's inevitable that I met women who have naked photos and videos of themselves on the internet - whether professional, amateur, or recreational, and whether or not they did it themselves or someone else did it to/for them. The recreational sharing of personally-produced pornography is now very commonplace.

I have conflicted feelings about pornography because of my perspective - I believe that to some degree, we as a society attempt to consume what we perceive as the most beautiful aspects of life - and when it comes to our fellow humans, this consumption is marked. Psychic imprints can be left on persons who present themselves to the world in a pornographic way - even those with the best heads on their shoulders and the best original intentions. Does it destroy everyone? No. Does it do irreversible damage to everyone who participates? No. Does it even change people who take part in it? Not in every case.

I acknowledge that my perspective only accounts for one aspect of pornography - the artistic and glamourous end - I can't speak as well for the aspects that address other elements of human sexuality because I am not as familiar with those industries. But I do feel that the empire does not take well to unique combinations of beauty and talent - it makes us want to consume that person whole. However, that's not to say that the object of desire always has to succumb to it.

[slomo]

Till now, i've been criticising porn that debases/is violent towards low rank participants, for reasons that are clear. Now i'd like to make a different, subtler criticism of porn as a whole (i haven't been holding out, this angle is new to me, from a mate over dinner).

All porn, even porn that is nonexploitative nonsexist etc (assuming such exists), shares a sad foundation: it can only provide symbolic relief for real needs. What is symbolic relief? Its wearing an expensive branded tracksuit and living in a trailer, its playing shoot'em'up video games after kissing ass all day. Just as movies make us vicariously powerful or impassioned, providing symbolic relief for our lack of power and passion in real life, porn provides a symbolic tableux for us to scrape up a little synthetic power and/or imagined intimacy. With our ego's thus reinflated, we can show up for another days humiliations IRL (so we can afford our smokes/grog/shoes/car/porn so we can show up for another days humiliations...).

Getting that symbolic relief may be better than doing nothing with or suppressing the itch .. but really i think the itch is a symptom we should be listening to rather than 'take a pill'/quick wank/symbolic relief.

I very much agree with this point-of-view, although I worry that it is too subtle and difficult to comprehend in a world that insists that we be ashamed of our sexual impulses.

In so many aspects of our culture we have become jaded. Sex is just one of them, food is another. There is a passage in one of C.S. Lewis' books (can't remember which one) in which he describes our collective distorted perspective of sex by analogy: (paraphrasing) it's as if we would put a plate of roast and potatoes on stage, slowly and seductively raising the curtain in order to tantalize the audience into a frenzy. The irony is that in the early 21st Century, food has become marketed almost in the same way as pornography. But I digress...

When I look over my life, I see that the periods of heavy pornography use were the darkest, loneliest periods. The causal direction is clear in my mind: pornography was a retreat, a relief from severe sexual frustration. It did, however, keep me from "acting out" in ways that would be self-destructive. Fortunately, as a reasonably attractive gay man, I have usually been able to find sex, if not true companionship. It is when the latter has been wanting that I was most interested in pornography. Which seems to point to the real issue here: we in this culture are starving for true intimacy and companionship. Pornography is like a sea of candy bars and HFCS-sweetened energy drinks in a nation that it is unaware that it is starving for simply prepared whole food.

[Stephen Morgan]

Wintler seems to be saying there are underlying factors and that masturbation is just a treatment for symptoms, not for the underlying psychological desire which generates the symptom, the desire to masturbate.

[slomo]

Wintler seems to be saying there are underlying factors and that masturbation is just a treatment for symptoms, not for the underlying psychological desire which generates the symptom, the desire to masturbate.

Fair enough. There is the desire to have sex, and then there is the desire to masturbate to fantasies of having sex.

In my experience, having regular, satisfying sex does not necessarily extinguish the desire to masturbate, although it does diminish it quite a bit.

Are you saying something different?

[blanc]

"I'm glad you're back. It doesn't read as judgmental. And if it did, that would be fine, as long as the judgments didn't casually toss whole classes of people many of whom are very vulnerable individuals -- eg, addicts, men who consume porn -- whose sufferings and sensitivities you cannot know into an undifferentiated less-than-human trash heap.

I'm not blind. Nor am I deaf. Nor am I dumb. And nor am I entitled to suggest that other people are simply because they don't see and hear what I do. Nobody can see all human truths remotely.

I mean, I could say that I was a survivor of addiction, since I am. And I could also say that I know at a glance that someone I see in a pornographic photograph is an addict, since I'm certain that I do. I've known a lot of addicts who didn't survive their addictions, some of whom were kids of both genders who prostituted, were raped, beated, burned, you name it. Drug addiction (and drug trafficking) are both highly germane to this topic, objectively speaking. People are enslaved and tortured in the service of both.

Am I entitled to suggest that you or anyone else here is blind and deaf to the suffering of those people, or complicit in the crimes committed against them? Not by my standards. Would it be in-bounds for me to take the position that you had no excuse for not acknowledging them as central? Or, ftm, me, in my capacity as a regular, old non-experiencer of RA who has nevertheless known pain and a bunch of other feelings too on a lifelong basis, validly? Again, not by my standards.

I really, really like you. And I learn from you. And I appreciate you. I don't see what you do. But I do not say your eyes deceive you. I say, as you do, that mine do not deceive me.

That seems to me to be fair. Am I wrong?"

I'm confused by this post c2w. Absolutely no idea where you're reading what you seem to be reading into my posts. Where did I get to be insensitive to the problem of drug addiction/trafficking/enslavement?

[Nordic]

Well, even if we all agreed that pornography was universally evil..

Strawman.

Wasn't a strawman, it was "what if" statement.

And my point was, we can complain all we want about porn, but it's not going away any time soon. We're powerless to do anything about it, except that we can ignore it for ourselves. That's about it.

It's everywhere. Hell, the Victorian Secret fashion show is about to become a Superbowl-like event on television. What is that, if not a type of porn, but where the women are paid more than normal? The shit is just all over the place.

So its okay? Your country has military bases in nearly 200 other countries - does that make it okay? Large numbers of clergy have been abusing their power for centuries - is that okay?

Uh .... where the hell do you get THAT out of what I said? I'm not saying it's okay, I'm saying "even if we agree it's universally evil", you know, exactly like LIKE the U.S. military and its imperialism...

What do we do about it? Go to protests where we "Occupy the Porn Biz?" People are making this shit out of their college dorm rooms.

And teenage girls as young as 11 and 12 are going online and doing video chats with boys where they're doing all kinds of nasty stuff. Of their own volition, and for free. They seem to have no idea that the boys are probably recording it (but he said he wouldn't record it!) and saving screenshots. It's really weird.

Not really: children ape their elders, god help them.

Well sure, they got the idea from somebody. The boys see this shit on their computers, then while chatting with their girlfriends on videochat, compel the girls to do this. The girls are apparently VERY happy to do this for the most part. Believe me, this has become epidemic among middle school kids right now. One of the only ways to get through to them is to remind them that they're making kiddie porn and could be arrested if anyone ever sees the shit.

Seriously what can anyone do about it?

How about sort own shit out first?

[/quote]

A fine idea, but not remotely what I was talking about.

I was talking about what any of us can do to rid the world of porn. There's literally nothing any of us can do at this point. It's too prevalent, people want it too much, and there are always those willing to make it, all they need is a computer with a web cam and an internet connection.

We can't stop it any more than we could stop all the dogs in the world from sniffing tree trunks.

[Project Willow]

Now it may be that in your experience, such exhibitionism or joy in showing yourself to others does not really exist. In my experience it does, and is a fairly common interest of any number of women. They find it immensely exciting. I never considered them to be in some way perverse or unusual in this regard, rather they were interested in realising a widely held fantasy. People think it all the time, and people actually do it all the time, too.

Unless you want to make the argument that your women friends intended their private creations for use in the porn industry then what, exactly is your point? I find your assumptions about blanc's personal experience insulting. I resent this perception of survivors as sexually suppressed and repressive, it's wrong, and, why am I having to say this to you?

.........................

I'm confused by this post c2w. Absolutely no idea where you're reading what you seem to be reading into my posts. Where did I get to be insensitive to the problem of drug addiction/trafficking/enslavement?

I am confused also but I believe it boils down to the usual concerns that survivors voices will require some sort of special attention and set of concessions and admissions that make everyone uncomfortable.

......................

Pornography is like a sea of candy bars and HFCS-sweetened energy drinks in a nation that it is unaware that it is starving for simply prepared whole food.

I like this analogy very much, it ties back into my question about the common features of commonly available porn and what that says about human sexuality, if it can say anything. Does anyone have thoughts on this?

[semper occultus]

talking of dogs sniffing tree-trunks has "dogging" caught on your way yet ?

...this kind of exhibitionism fits into the very important issues raised by the 'cuda & nordic concerning the whole behavioural phenomenon of "amateur" porn....which fills-out much on-line content....

the invention of the cheap digital camera & camcorder & social-media networks ( & their many porn-a-likes ) have completely blurred the line between producer & consumer & must in many ways undercut a more traditional framing of the porn "industry" ( note the term ) as exploitative ownership of the means of production ( to whit film / duplication / studio equipment, distribution networks etc ) on the one hand & oppressed alienated "worker" on the other..the process is effectively democratised & virtually cost-free....

this goes hand in hand with & has undoubtedly driven what one could describe as a "...technologically-mediated ‘folding’ of public and private space..." whilst the less precious might just say that basically the barriers of what's public & private have totally broken down under the onslaught of technological & social change where no self-respecting aspirant celebrity would dream of not "inadvertantly" leaking their own video-taped sexual performances to an indifferent world....

this sort of leakage of private behaviour into the mainstream is offensive to many but it is also very painfully clear that to those who have suffered abuse or trauma it comes freighted with all sorts of negativity that goes very far beyond that...which is very sad

[barracuda]

Unless you want to make the argument that your women friends intended their private creations for use in the porn industry then what, exactly is your point? I find your assumptions about blanc's personal experience insulting. I resent this perception of survivors as sexually suppressed and repressive, it's wrong, and, why am I having to say this to you?

I guess I could understand your resentment if this thread were named, "Is The Porn Industry Bad?", or something like that. If the thread is a referendum on the exploitation of women for pornography, I think we could all agree on the verdict. I sure don't mean to be insulting, but I think it's important to draw a distinction between making and looking at dirty pictures and "the porn industry", if at all possible. The former is a perfectly normal and healthy activity, imho, while the latter is rife with demonstrable evils. Also, I'm trying to point out that exhibitionism is not necessarily a bad thing, or the result of abuse, but is a rather commonly held proclivity amongst people of all stripes.

I find a great deal of the commentary here to be sexually suppressed and repressive sounding, without necessarily qualifying the commenters as being survivors. The subject lends itself to moral judgements. I have nothing but sympathy for those who have suffered abuse, and I hope we can discuss this question from all points of view. So, my apologies if I came off as an asshole to you, blanc.

As I tried to say, the act of filling your car with gas and driving down the road directly perpetrates a system which encompasses slave labor, millions of deaths and population displacements, as well as demonstrably severe injury to the environment, but somehow one rarely hears discussions of personal choices of vehicular transport framed in such severe terms of morality. Why is this question treated in a substantively different manner?

[Project Willow]

this sort of leakage of private behaviour into the mainstream is offensive to many but it is also very painfully clear that to those who have suffered abuse or trauma it comes freighted with all sorts of negativity that goes very far beyond that...which is very sad

Here we go again. Much like how you've described this process with amateur porn* no one can keep boundaries on anything in this discussion. What does it mean that the simple act of making the private public is traumatizing to survivors?

I've said straight out, I'd like to see more filmed consensual activity. I do have a problem with abuse in the porn industry. Why are these two being conflated?

*Which I am not seeing in great proliferation, I am seeing a lot of professional porn labeled as amateur, and a few actual amateur vids here and there, maybe my search skills are off.

I guess I could understand your resentment if this thread were named, "Is The Porn Industry Bad?", or something like that.

I perceived blanc's statements to be specifically addressing the porn industry.

Also, I'm trying to point out that exhibitionism is not necessarily a bad thing, or the result of abuse, but is a rather commonly held proclivity amongst people of all stripes.

Can you please point out a post where someone claimed that exhibitionism was the result of abuse? I missed that one.

Why is this question treated in a substantively different manner?

I see a lot of presumptive, preemptive defensiveness where it's not needed.

[Simulist]

Pornography is like a sea of candy bars and HFCS-sweetened energy drinks in a nation that it is unaware that it is starving for simply prepared whole food.

I like this analogy very much, it ties back into my question about the common features of commonly available porn and what that says about human sexuality, if it can say anything. Does anyone have thoughts on this?

Yes, a few. But for now, just one. (The following is not directed at anyone in particular, just us humans in general.)

One of my thoughts is that ALL OF OUR THOUGHTS are uncomfortably inadequate in the face of nature. Seinfeld talked about being "masters of our domain"; turns out, sex is often just another reminder that we humans aren't masters of even that — but we often pretend to be. ("Ha! Ha!")

It used to be (we thought — kinda stupidly it turns out…) that the earth was the center of the universe! It, uh, isn't. ("Ha! Ha!") Then Darwin comes along, and makes us face the fact that we humans are actually animals! Fuck! — and what a come-down! — especially after having accepted ourselves as an article of faith to be "the crown of creation." ("Ha! Ha!") Then that bastard Freud tells us that, as animals, we're driven by urges we have trouble controlling or even understanding completely! Masters of our domains indeed… ("Ha! Ha!")

So, yeah… It's pretty amazing the stuff that turns us humans on — and it's often scary! "Whoa! If that turns me on, then I must be a freak!" Well, maybe, I guess… but not necessarily. You may just be like the rest of us human-animals, and that's all. And it's amazing really just how little control we human-animals have over what we find sexually arousing sometimes. "But I'm 'supposed' to be turned on only by _________, _________, and _________!" ("Hey, I'm allowed those last two on the list 'cause I'm a liberal Protestant now…") Well, it doesn't work that way. Sorry.

Porn can be an in-your-face reminder of the very, very humbling fact that we're not really masters of much of anything, including our genitals sometimes. ("Ha! Ha!")

FWIW.

[Stephen Morgan]

Wintler seems to be saying there are underlying factors and that masturbation is just a treatment for symptoms, not for the underlying psychological desire which generates the symptom, the desire to masturbate.

Fair enough. There is the desire to have sex, and then there is the desire to masturbate to fantasies of having sex.

In my experience, having regular, satisfying sex does not necessarily extinguish the desire to masturbate, although it does diminish it quite a bit.

Are you saying something different?

I just see sexual release as a physical desire, like hunger or leg pains. If I'm hungry I have a sandwich. If I'm horny I have a wank. If my legs hurt I have a nice sit down. There's nothing more existential to it than that, as far as I'm concerned.

Regular discharge is important for the health of the prostate. You wouldn't want to end up with something nasty, like prostatitis or prostate cancer or Tantra Induced Delusion Syndrome, would you.