Robert Jensen: Influence of Pornography on Sex Offenders (explicit language)

Robert Jensen interviewed 13 convicted sex offenders in Pornography: The Production and Consumption of Inequality (1998, p.119-134), to investigate how porn influenced their thinking. All of them had viewed “hard-core pornography”–sex presented in graphic detail. The average age of first viewing was 12, with a range from 8 to 19.

From about age 21 on, “Craig’s” pornography use centered on explicit videotapes he watched at home. He said he liked a variety of sexual acts on the screen but preferred that the men in the movies always be in control, fast-forwarding past scenes of women in control: “It was like it was a threat to me, to have a woman [in control].” He said that was also a factor in his use of bondage pornography: “The control you had, to put the women in any position you wanted, to force her to do anything…”

I used a lot of force [on my recent former girlfriend], a lot of direct demands, that in the movies women would just cooperate. And I would demand stuff from her. And if she didn’t I’d start slapping her around…

Once I saw the [pornographic] materials it’s like I got new ideas. It’s like it reinforced my thinking…

A foreman at [“Larry’s”] shop introduced him to pornographic novels, especially ones involving beastiality. “And that’s when it seemed like my appetite really got out of hand. And it never seemed to be enough,” Larry said, describing an escalating use of pornography and an increase of what he called a desire for “deviant sex…” He said that his wife refused to watch [sexually explicit videos] but that he could manipulate his stepdaughter into watching them, which was part of the process of grooming her for abuse that began when she was 8 years old. He used the tapes to break down her resistance, and he played them while he was abusing her…

In fact, when I’d be abusing my daughter, I’d be thinking about some women I saw in a video. Because if I was to open my eyes and see my stepdaughter laying there while I was abusing her, you know, that wouldn’t have been very exciting for me. You know, that would bring me back to the painful reality that I’m a child molester…

[Larry] rejected the possibility that pornography could have been a catharsis:

The pornography actually helped me work into my abuse, I feel. It accelerated that appetite for more. That’s what I feel about it. Because, if I wouldn’t have been introduced to a lot of this, and got my appetite whetted, then I don’t think I’d thought of half the deviant things I’ve done…

“Kevin” said he sometimes bought movies and magazines in discount packs without knowing anything about the content. Although he said he didn’t seek out violent pornography, he occasionally received such material in those packs and watched it…

One that sticks out in my mind right now was really violent. There was pistol whipping and [a man] chained this woman up to a, had her in a doghouse, chained up like a dog in a doghouse, and this guy would come out and stick her head in the dog bowl and then have sex with her from behind… At first, I thought it was disgusting, but then as time wore on I did get into it more. I got excited by it more…

I think the main thing I got out of [pornography] was that sex was good…I also got out of it that women were objects… As long as you got what you wanted everything was OK… If I got what I wanted, that was fine. Whatever they did or whatever they felt was their own business.

Kevin said that when the pornography started to bore him, he began his abusive behavior… “Just masturbating to the thought wasn’t getting it for me anymore. I actually had to be a part of it, or actually had to do something about it…”

“David”…had been convicted of abusing [his] son from infancy…

I think what this really is for me, was pornography was a way to begin violating people’s boundaries. And it kind of went from there. Where, like when you look at somebody engaging in sex, I think it’s a violation of boundaries. That’s something that should be private. So, it’s like I gave myself permission to voyeur on them. And the more I did that, the more liberties I took to actually act this stuff out…

For these men, pornography was in important factor in shaping a male-dominant view of sexuality, and in several cases the material contributed to the men’s difficulty in separating fantasy and reality. Pornography also was used by at least one of the men to initiate a victim and break down a young girl’s resistance to sexual activity. For several others it was used as a training manual for abuse, as sexual acts and ideas from pornography were incorporated into their sex lives.

4 thoughts on “Robert Jensen: Influence of Pornography on Sex Offenders (explicit language)

  1. So now you’re talking about sex education, and NOT the porn shop on the corner near your house. You seem to do this a lot: You take an indirectly-related argument and push it to the point of simplicticness. When you recieve a response asking what your oversimplification has to do with the price of fish in China, you reply with the implication that your reader doesn’t think anything should be done about … sexual abuse, violence to women, the degradation of porn workers, whatever. All I’m saying is yes, we as a society should adress sexual violence, we as a society should have much better sex education, we as a society would be much better off if there were no more degrading porn, etc etc etc, but YOU are not effectively contributing to those issues. Instead, you are grasping at straws to make a case for our town to prevent Cap Video from moving into your neighborhood. Believe me, that’s how your blog reads.

  2. sorry but what is the point here? It sounded senseless.Don´t the porn shop harmnfull? and why this cap video stuff,what dos it have to do?
    Back to the issue,the more i read about the eefcts of pornography,the most i get convinced we do must fight it.I have never seen pronography myself,i could notice through the descriptions so far that it was “erotica”.I am very surprised with the violence content in the discribed material,i start to ask myself wht kind of men we are living with,what kind of men many of us do their best to become attrative and marry.I am surprised that many women still belive in that enchated world showed in female magazines.I gues it would be a good subject,to compare the difference between the female magazines and male magazines.Maybe that´s the answer for the women acceptation of porn,the training in the patriarchal society reforced by female magazines.

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