What does porn do to men? Edward Marriott investigates for The Guardian (2003)…
At its most basic level, pornography answers natural human curiosity. Adolescent boys want to know what sex is about, and porn certainly demonstrates the mechanics. David Morgan, consultant clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst at the Portman Clinic in London, which specialises in problems relating to sexuality and violence, describes this phase as “transitional, like a rehearsal for the real thing. The problem with pornography begins when, instead of being a temporary stop on the way to full sexual relations, it becomes a full-time place of residence.” Morgan’s experience of counselling men addicted to porn has convinced him that “the more time you spend in this fantasy world, the more difficult it becomes to make the transition to reality. Just like drugs, pornography provides a quick fix, a masturbatory universe people can get stuck in. This can result in their not being able to involve anyone else…”
Men, say psychologists, also feel threatened by the “emotional power” they perceive women wielding over them. Unable to feel alive except when in relationships with women, they are at the same time painfully aware that their only salvation from isolation comes in being sexually acceptable to women. This sense of neediness can provoke intense anger that, all too often, finds expression in porn. Unlike real life, the pornographic world is a place in which men find their authority unchallenged and in which women are their willing, even grateful servants. “The illusion is created,” as one male writer on pornography puts it, “that women are really in their rightful place and that there is, after all, no real and serious challenge to male authority.” Seen in this light, the patently ridiculous pornography scenario of the pretty female flat-hunter (or hitch-hiker, driver with broken-down car, or any number of similar such vulnerable roles) who is happy to let herself be gang-banged by a group of overweight, hairy-shouldered couch potatoes makes perfect psychological sense.
The porn industry, of course, dismisses such talk, yet occasionally comes a glimmer of authenticity. Bill Margold, one of the industry’s longest-serving film performers, was interviewed in 1991 by psychoanalyst Robert Stoller for his book Porn: Myths For The Twentieth Century. Margold made no attempt to gloss over the realities. “My whole reason for being in this industry is to satisfy the desire of the men in the world who basically don’t care much for women and want to see the men in my industry getting even with the women they couldn’t have when they were growing up. So we come on a woman’s face or brutalise her sexually: we’re getting even for lost dreams…”
Lost in a world of pornographic fantasy, men can become less inclined, as well as increasingly less able, to form lasting relationships. In part, this is due to the underlying message of pornography. Ray Wyre, a specialist in sexual crime, says pornography “encourages transience, experimentation and moving between partners”. Morgan goes further: “Pornography does damage,” he says, “because it encourages people to make their home in shallow relationships…”
The cycle of addiction leads one way: towards ever harder material. Morgan believes “all pornography ends up with S&M”. The now-infamous Carnegie Mellon study of porn on the internet found that images of hardcore sex were in far less demand than more extreme material. Images of women engaging in acts of bestiality were hugely popular…
The mechanics of the pornographic search–craving, discovery of the “right” image, masturbation, relief–makes it, says Morgan, work like “a sort of drug, an antidepressant”. The myth about porn, as a witness told the 1983 Minneapolis city council public hearings on it, is that “it frees the libido and gives men an outlet for sexual expression. This is truly a myth. I have found pornography not only does not liberate men, but on the contrary is a source of bondage. Men masturbate to pornography only to become addicted to the fantasy. There is no liberation for men in pornography…
Wyre, from his work with sex offenders, says, “It is impossible not to believe pornography plays a part in sexual violence. As we constantly confront sex offenders about their behaviour, they display a wide range of distorted views that they then use to excuse their behaviour, justify their actions, blame the victim and minimise the effect of their offending. They seek to make their own behaviour seem normal, and interpret the behaviour of the victim as consent, rather than a survival strategy. Pornography legitimises these views…”
As a former daily reader of The Guardian some context seems in order. TG (and to a lesser degree The Independent) are noteworthy because of their literary orientation and independent political stance. An article such as the above from TG is not so much ideologically or even methodologically noteworthy, rather the literary style is of primary interest. I recall an article linking marijuana to schizophrenia with rather dubious methodology. The point is- a scientific journal TG ain’t.
Further, I the view of female sexuality expressed above seems sexist. The perception of women as sexually disinterested evaporated once I blossomed into a strapping young lad and started getting acquainted with women in an intimate sense. I would argue that finding an entire gender “frigid” represents a sort of sexual dysfunction that prevents one from giving and accepting pleasure (viz. W. Reich).
Take a note from our closest cousins genetically, sociologically, psychologically, etc. Binobo chimpanzees have a reputation hardly worth recounting here. Sexual violence is present in most (all?) primate species. However, so is the free expression of sexuality, unhindered by shame and guilt. Indeed, shame specifically tied to non-heteronormative, non-monogamous sexual activity has a tenuous history as “the norm” in human society. The sexual shame experienced by an ancient Israelite or Greek aristocrat would seem to bear little resemblance, if indeed they can correctly be termed “shame.” (viz. Korzybski)
Porn, however is sex & commerce. Simply put, binobos do not have to pay to watch other binobos having sex. Pornography not only introduces the concept of tacit prostitution, it also revels in it, indeed fetishizes it. If anything, porn seems to exploit shame and guilt.
In the final analysis, however, this seems irrelevant. Pornography seems no more exploitative, dangerous or immoral than the greatest excesses of industrial capitalism. Ho hum. Perhaps all these people need is a good union. Perhaps we should build a world where human fantasy is not to ripe for exploitation of Christian guilt complexes about “sinful” thoughts (or, for that matter, “sinful” psychodramas) equivalence to legitmately anti-social activities. Perhaps we should not treat sexually transmitted infection as some terrible curse.
Sexual repression and guilt seems to feed the need for pornography by marginalizing sexual behaviors into paraphilias. Take, for example, the phenomenon of bugchasing among certain layers of the queer community. Are we really to believe that the “safe sex” moralizing of the 1980s is completely unrelated to the backlash?
Finally- how is sex different from eating or money lending? Take a cue from Europe. It’s time we dropped our ancient tribal taboos. Indeed, it’s necessary for our spritual evolution (viz. Crowley, RA Wilson).
Agape,
NP (formerly of TBN)
you guys know that anecdotal evidence isn’t really evidence, right? You’re lawyers, after all.
Do you have permission from the Guardian to republish that much of their work? I suspect you don’t. Cutting and pasting that much text is far past the amount generally allowed for citation, and falls more into the legal realm of theft of intellectual property.
Jendi (lawyer) has reviewed this post and feels it falls within the bounds of fair use.
Would you care to respond to the substance of The Guardian’s article?
Catching a disease that can make you blind, sterile or dead does indeed strike me as a problem that should be addressed. The porn industry could protect their female performers better. It generally chooses not to. That is not satisfactory to me.
When anecdotal evidence in one place conforms to that found by scientific studies elsewhere, and is in fact logical, then I think it has value. Or, to look at it another way, the actual experience of people living next to a Capital Video porn shop to me has at least as much value as abstract speculations about the future from websites like Talk Back Northampton, especially when those speculations are supported by little or no evidence of any kind.
You know, sex isn’t actually scary.
Wait, lemme go check… brb…
Nope. Not scary at all.
I agree that businesses (including Wal-Mart) have a responsibility to provide safe working conditions for their employees. However, some perspective seems in order. Miners get black lung. Truckers get the piles like you wouldn’t believe. My father’s vocation (ironworker) has a higher rate of work-related fatalities than American soldiers serving in Iraq. How do sexually transmitted infections substantially differ from other occupational hazards?
The symptoms you mention above represent an advanced infection (these sound like syph, or possibly gonorrhoea, not the herpes you claim to be “endemic” without reference) which has gone untreated. The likely reason for lack of treatment is your beloved sense of shame. The incidence of a disease routinely spikes when a cure is found. This is not because there are more cases, rather people are more willing to report diseases for which there is treatment. Similarly, if the sexual shame and aura of immorality surrounding STIs dissipated more people would likely seek early treatment and there would be lower rates of transmission. The Christian right’s attempts to keep human papilloma virus vaccines off the market seems far more troubling to me than anything the adult film industry has ever done.
I have dedicated a good deal of my life to studying moral panics. In the 1980s we heard tell of vast satanic abuse networks of the super powerful building tunnels underneath day care centers. Reasonable people (such as Gloria Steinem) were hoodwinked by a far right agenda based on smoke and mirrors and a lot of hot air. The reality of reasonable people being led to madness by their sexual anxieties is well-documented (The Mass Psychology of Fascism being a personal favorite of mine, or Howard Bloom’s unpublished masterpiece “Return of the Middle Ages: Sexual Terror and the Fear of Knowledge”). In this context, I question the methodology of your statistics and the veracity of your anecdotal evidence. The pliability of statistics is known to anyone who has ever taken STAT 240 at Umass. It is only a fool that accepts evidence without skepticism, particularly evidence which relies upon the accuracy of human memory.
Finally, it seems that you would be well-served to engage opposing concerns more thoughtfully. Rather than using “See Our FAQ!” as a mantra, why not try to patiently address the concerns of those who disagree with you? Even if we are in the minority (which your petition does not convince me we are) doesn’t a minority have a right to have its concerns addressed? Your response to community conerns about your project- from the non-consensual pictures (as an aside, are clinic blockers who take pictures of women merely “journalists” as you claim to be?), to free speech objections, to questions about heteronormative assumptions- have been dismissive at best, arrogant at worst. I mention this because you seem capable of better. I hope that we can engage more on this issue and bicker less.
Agape,
NP.
Porn is not all sex. It’s a subset that tends to be about power, domination and submission. For many people, it has addictive qualities that damage their lives. Guess that doesn’t bother you.
Sure, you could view STDs as an occupational hazard for porn workers. Our point is there are many things that could be done to improve that situation, but they generally aren’t being done and people just seem to care less about porn workers than most other groups. Even prostitutes in Nevada enjoy better protection. In this light, it’s entirely reasonable to ask Capital Video to not sell movies that involve sex without condoms, and to criticize them if they don’t respond.
It’s not a “moral panic” if the evidence behind the concern is real. The evidence for the secondary effects of adult businesses, for example, has been thoroughly hashed over in American courts and found sufficient to justify adult-use zoning. This is a far cry from worrying about satanic tunnels under day care centers.
I agree there is appropriate shame and inappropriate shame. It is not at all desirable for people to avoid medical treatment or counseling because of shame about sex. We do, however, think it’s shameful to profit from unsafe sex, exploitation of people and communities, and non-consensual sex. We will continue to try to make these distinctions clear.
As for clinic blockers, we don’t support the physical harassment or intimidation of anyone for any reason. This is not the same as raising awareness about an issue.
As for being “heteronormative”, we are not anti-gay. We favor gay rights and gay marriage. If you’re referring to the value of marriage in general, we do want people to be aware of the hazards of divorce and single-parenthood with respect to children. We are concerned that Capital Video’s products dangerously trivialize marriage.
Assuming the store opens, do you plan to continue your presence outside up to and including photographing the patrons entering and exiting the premises?
When I speak of “heteronormative” I refer to an entire set of sexual conventions which marginalize (for example) plural marriage, transgenderism, single parentage, etc. Your attitude toward single parent families seems incredibly dangerous to me, and I suspect (though I’m not terribly committed to the premise) that your support for gay rights is born out of a desire to “normalize” (bring into middle class white America aka the enemy) homosexuals. While supporting the right of anyone to enter into any social relation they see fit, it seems worth noting that homosexual relationships in contemporary (post-Stonewall) America have given rise to a diverse palate of alternative family structures. Gay marriage has been attacked by some as being a backdoor for assimilation of one sector of the homosexual and queer communities and inreasing marginalization of others. The first signs of this can be seen in HIV+, leather and s&m groups being denied representation in pride parades.
It seems fair to ask you to stake a position on (for example) a trio of parents raising children together, or even several couples living in a community raising their children in common. These seem to be far fairer examples of alternative family structures than polygyny, which is essentially a code word for female slavery and a biologically untenable system which produces “surplus boys” who must be turned out of the community.
People gaining a sexual thrill from power plays involving domination and submission doesn’t bother me, nor should it you. Is it really that hard for you to stop judging consensual behavior between adults?
If the store opens, I can’t predict what our response will be. That depends on the size of the store, the nature of the products sold, the attitude and responsiveness of the owners and managers, and other factors. We will try to ensure that all our actions are fair, reasonable and proportionate.
We don’t want to stigmatize single-parent families unnecessarily, but people should be aware of the possible consequences of their choices. Some of these consequences are severe, long-lasting, and have broad implications for the quality of American society. This is not just our “attitude”. These are facts backed by a large body of research.
In general, we think that two adults making a public commitment to be faithful and monogamous is wise, praiseworthy, and will probably lead to increased happiness for themselves and those who depend on them, as compared with most alternatives. We believe this holds for both heterosexual and homosexual couples.
We know of families that have experienced infidelity. The consequences were devastating and affected multiple generations. This is the kind of real-life ugliness that Capital Video leaves out of its movies, suggesting to its viewers that cheating is natural and no big deal.
If the alternative family structures you suggest can be shown to lead to good outcomes, we would be happy to consider the evidence.
In what way do you find the following consensual?
“The look in her eyes tells us that she would like this bondage session to be over pretty soon. Forget it, girl!”
Martin Amis, “A rough trade”:
A single issue of Adult Video News (April 2000) yields the following. Last October porno star Vivian Valentine attended the XXX-Treme Adults Only vacation in Mexico sporting the black eye she copped from Jon Dough on Rough Sex (Anabolic Video).
“I have no regrets or bad feelings about it,” she said. Regan Starr who worked on the second film in this “line”, Rough Sex 2, had a different take. “I got the s**t kicked out of me,” she said. “I was told before the video–and they said this very proudly, mind you–that in this line most of the girls start crying because they’re hurting so bad…. I couldn’t breathe. I was being hit and choked. I was really upset, and they didn’t stop. They kept filming. You can hear me say, ‘Turn the f***ing camera off’, and they kept going.”
And there’s more. We believe many people aren’t aware of how porn can alter their attitudes, or become dangerously addictive. We believe many aspiring porn actresses aren’t aware of their slim odds of a lucrative career. If people are going to consent to porn, we want it to be informed consent.
I find it quite instructive to view the lengths that some will go in order to defend the indefensible.
To J: “sex isn’t all that scary”. Oh yes it is if by sex you mean the vile exploitative nastiness portrayed in much of porn. Yes it is, it is very, very scary indeed.
Nice blog here! Also your website loads up fast! What host are you using? I wish my website loaded up as fast as yours lol
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Good post, but much too much.
Good post, but much too much.
Then someone versed in radio? Need a colleague who spoke to briefly on the transistor T2 (not clear how to check the condition = gv1). I hope hams here “deep”. If not quite on, sorry. Forced to write out just do not see. PS: if the spelling is not correct that, too, sorry, I’m 13 years old only.
Yet, much remains unclear.
Excellent:)
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