Poll: Porn.

[bobknowsall]

I support porn... I like porn... I think porn is pretty healthy. According to scientists, masturbating is a good thing (every now and again) because it relieves stress and tension. Go porn.

Although I will argue against radical feminists who slam it along with everything else that glorifies the sexualisation of women.

Ironically when books like playboy came out, feminists supported is as a big move forward for women... now look. Very hypocritical.

Well, they had very different views back then. "Sexual liberation of women" was one of the main goals of that era's feminism. Then they realised that sexual promiscuity didn't really liberate them either; it just conditioned them to submit to guys for sex.

So maybe it's ironic, possibly even a little bit sad. But it's not really hypocritical, just a changing of the times.

 

[bobknowsall]

dumb. no one aside of sick fucks actually finds bukkake and cumshots and s&m sexually arousing, but some find it funny. i agree in that the ACTORS are the shells, but the people watching are mostly to my knowledge laughing at someone who is either a sick fuck themselves, or someone who will do anything for $100.

also, i dont give a rats ass if porn is prostitution or not. its enjoyable and fun to fap to. that is all.

p.s. the sheeple thing? dumb.

So what you're saying is, basically, that the porn you watch it OK, but if someone watches any other kind they're a "sick fuck"? I'm having some real trouble getting my head around your reasoning.

 

[lodo_bear]

Porn, like prostitution, is sex with all the joy and intimacy removed from it, and as such it ought to be done away with. Better to have love without sex than sex without love.

And what does this have to do with removing porn? Better to have pleasure than none. Your comparison is pointless unless you really think that everybody is either going to be in love with their soulmate or jacking off, with no overlap and no people who have neither.

Better to have some pleasure than none? Not necessarily. You must consider the cost of said pleasure, and if that cost is breaking your empathy and giving you an addiction, both of which porn does, then it's not worth what you're paying for it.

Now, removing porn is not something that can be done on an official level, because as long as there is demand, there will be supply, and the suppliers will always be more cunning than the censors. However, none of us are under any compulsion to consume porn, and I encourage you all to avoid it.

Walking is like running, but with less speed and no runner's high, and as such it ought to be done away with.

If running gave you an actual addiction and stunted your ability to enjoy walking, I would be against it. Fortunately for joggers everywhere, running is generally beneficial and its downsides are rather benign. Porn, on the other hand, is genuinely damaging.

 

[Monkfish Acc.]

It is an unfortunate necessity, I guess.
I'm not quite sure I understand the concept, though. I mean, I get that other guys need to do that shit as a sort of release, but the whole "watching people have sex" thing strikes me a sort of bizarre.

"OH GEE SHE IS PRETTY HOT HEY YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD BE GREAT SEEING SOME OTHER DUDE PUMMEL HER"

It's kinda fucked up, really.

 

[bobknowsall]

Pornography is prostitution. It's actually the meaning of the word:

The word derives from the Greek πορνογραφία (pornographia), which derives from the Greek words πόρνη (pornē, "prostitute" and pornea, "prostitution"), and γράφω (graphō, "I write or record," derived meaning "illustration," cf. "graph"), and the suffix -ία (-ia, meaning "state of," "property of," or "place of"), thus meaning "a written description or illustration of prostitutes or prostitution."

So keep that in mind when you're viewing porn.

Porn is very much a lie, in that it spins sex as being a consequence-free pleasure in which the human being is little more than a worthless shell that houses the main event: their libido. A lot of people buy into that, which leads to tragic results when suddenly the consequences of making indiscriminate whoopee manifest. Sadly, most of the kids on this forum won't have a clue what I'm talking about until I'm too late - suffice to say, it transcends mere pregnancy or STDs.

Every time you're looking at people involved in desperate group sex or weird-ass shit (e.g bakkake), you're not looking at something sexy as much as you are looking at broken shells of former human beings miming desperate ceremonies to try to recapture their pathetic only pleasure in life: the common orgasm. Like some stupid rats hammering a lever in a Skinner's box to light up their pleasure centers, these people have completely deluded themselves into wasting their lives, and you are inadvertently aspiring to be them in seeking to see more of them.

Well, actually, in most porn, they're not after orgasms. They're after your money. They're faking unachievable orgasms for the camera so desperate dumbasses will drop money on them.

But, hey, even having said all this, even having learned its exploiting you even as they exploit themselves, you can go ahead and say you love porn. After all, it's what all the cool kids are doing. Sheeple.

This... This isn't even cynicism. It's a tangle of metaphors and generalizations that ends by calling its readers "Sheeple". I'm not sure what you're trying to do here, but if you're looking for agreement or support, your methods seem a bit counter-productive.

There is no need to complicate the simple message that "Porn is not real, and you are pathetic if you watch it", and insulting anyone who disagrees with you is just an unpleasant and unnecessary tactic.

 

[USSR]

Technically, aren't they getting paid to act?

 

[milskidasith]

Porn, like prostitution, is sex with all the joy and intimacy removed from it, and as such it ought to be done away with. Better to have love without sex than sex without love.

And what does this have to do with removing porn? Better to have pleasure than none. Your comparison is pointless unless you really think that everybody is either going to be in love with their soulmate or jacking off, with no overlap and no people who have neither.

Better to have some pleasure than none? Not necessarily. You must consider the cost of said pleasure, and if that cost is breaking your empathy and giving you an addiction, both of which porn does, then it's not worth what you're paying for it.

Now, removing porn is not something that can be done on an official level, because as long as there is demand, there will be supply, and the suppliers will always be more cunning than the censors. However, none of us are under any compulsion to consume porn, and I encourage you all to avoid it.

Walking is like running, but with less speed and no runner's high, and as such it ought to be done away with.

If running gave you an actual addiction and stunted your ability to enjoy walking, I would be against it. Fortunately for joggers everywhere, running is generally beneficial and its downsides are rather benign. Porn, on the other hand, is genuinely damaging.

Cite sources please, because I have never heard of porn being "addictive" but anything besides religious groups who advocate that it's immoral, and the people they bring out who claim to have been addicted to it.

 

[Therumancer]

A controversial subject indeed.

Some consider it prostitution, after all the actors are getting paid for sex.

Some want to shut it down, for whatever reasons they may have. Mostly religious.

Some enjoy it and want to see more of it. Mostly teenage boys.

And some are indifferent on the subject.

In any case, I want to hear your thoughts on pornography.

EDIT: My personal opinion: I don't care. It's porn, you watch it or you don't. So I'd give it a "Meh."

EDIT 2: I'm NOT opposed to porn. That is all. So stop quoting me and saying I am.

By legal definition porn has nothing to do with sex, something that is offensive and without redeeming value is considered to be pornographic. Most adult films get away with what they do by not being porn in the literal sense, but "art films" which is why there is a plot, so they can be defended as having redeeming value. Putting sex on film and such is also defended artistically due to the fact that artwork has been sexually oriented since the dawn of time, going back to the greeks and romans and such. You start saying you can't have two people have sex on film at all, and that opens the door to have things like classical statues and pantings declared obscene and destroyed. It's an interesting area of law, I learned about it over a decade ago even though it was hardly a focus.

The issue of prostitution is skirted around by the fact that the people having sex are paid by a third party to do so for "artistic reasons". Neither of the participants are paying the other one for the sex. What's more even if the point was argued, there are issues about things like porn movies made in say Nevada where it's not illegal to begin with.

For the most part what we call "porn" is something that everyone is interested in at some point. As you get older the urgency goes out of it for a lot of us however.

I tend to see "porn" mostly through the eyes of my beliefs on free speech and expression, where very little, if anything, should be banned. While I'm deeply against child pornography and such things, at the same time I believe the shotgun that people take to it goes too far, since by definition many of those attacking kiddie porn are not going after assaults on presexual humans, but simply the innuendo of kids having sex. By many definitions things like "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" (Buffy is 15 or 16 when she does it with a Vampire who is physically 30 years old, and actually much older) would be banned, as would "Harry Potter", due to all the "Snogging", and of course a lot of books by people like Piers Anthony... and then we have the entire "teen experience" genere of films like "Porky's" and "American Pie". As things stand now, I do not trust most of the legislators we have in power at the moment, because any regulation in this area has to be VERY careful. In the US at least free speech is not supposed to be regulated morally (either on subjects like sex, or things that are more contreversial like hate speech). While children need to be protected from exploitation, careful distinction has to be made to single out someone raping a 9 year old on film, from "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" or "Porky's". By the same token when it comes to works of fiction, I become very wary of people making rulings against things that might be contreversial, but harm noone. Looking at things like "Lolita" (the book) it's moved in and out of being banned many times, but in general I feel that it's a bad sign when a society starts banning books for any reason.


So basically, I guess you can say that even when it comes to things I find distasteful, I am against goverment regulation. Heck, for that matter I'm so extreme here that I'm against the power many people have to limit each other's free speech by private ownership of communications platforms. A concern that has become very large with so much information going through "The Internet" all of which is owned by one private person/interest or another. The whole issue with Ted Turner a long time ago, was perhaps when the issue "peaked" but it's still there, and on the rise.

Apologies for the rambling, but the bottom line is that I see porn as being an extension of an overall free speech issue. I've long since outgrown "Wow! Porn movies!" (however when I was in college it was something else entirely), but I see them as part of a much bigger issue.

-

Now if you want to get contreversial (and have read this far) when it comes to pornography one area that is hard to defend is shock productions, despite the fact that being shocked can be entertaining. Things like "Funnel Girl" (look it up), Something Awful's "Swap.Avi", or the more famous "Two Girls One Cup" (which was actuall a trailer for a scat movie). There being no purpose to such things except to be shocking, disgusting, and offensive for the simple sake of being shocking, disgusting, and offensive.

Having argued a free speech platform quite a bit, I'm oftentimes at a loss to be able to defend things like that. Entertaining in a sick way at times, but really how does anyone claim something like "Funnel Girl" has any redeeming qualities at all? Mostly it exists to make people go "OMG, I can't believe I just saw that... I can't believe that really happened".

 

[Plazmatic]

A controversial subject indeed.

Some consider it prostitution, after all the actors are getting paid for sex.

Some want to shut it down, for whatever reasons they may have. Mostly religious.

Some enjoy it and want to see more of it. Mostly teenage boys.

And some are indifferent on the subject.

In any case, I want to hear your thoughts on pornography.

EDIT: My personal opinion: I don't care. It's porn, you watch it or you don't. So I'd give it a "Meh."

Prostitution is not evil, your an idiot if you try to use it in a negative connotation here, and besidse its not prostitution becasue like captain pancake said,

Sometimes it's just good to relieve stress. Judge me if you want, but it's been medically proven to relieve stress, doing that.

It's prostitution

It's also not immoral

In prostitution, the only person making money is the prostitute. In porn, everybody involved is getting something, but it's the producer who's getting the biggest share, despite not having anything to do with the sex part that you believe to be prostitution.

Look the rich have naked women drawn in their homes and call it art, the poor have pictures and videos of naked people on the internet and its called porn.

I am curious to know. Different countries have different ages of consent for sex ergo you can be in porno/watch porn at differnt ages. I liv in the uk where the age of consent is 16 but in countries like Germany the age of consent is 14. Ergo if someone who is german comes to the uk it seems inane that If they watch porn involving people younger than 16 it's considered peddophilia. So I want to know what peoples views on what the age of consent thy think should be set for porn as lots of you talk about consenting adults and yet this duffers greately country to country. Btw I think personally 14 is too young and 16 is about right.

Actually the legal age for porn in the UK is 18 not 16 even thought it is the legal age of concent.

Peadophilia is always considered to be 0 - 12, having sex with a 15 year old in the UK would simply be rape

sorry this is me being tierds and I wasn very specific. I meant 16 is right for the age of consent and I thought it was also the age at which you can be In Porn thou feel free to corrrect me if I am wrong. What I meant to point out is yeh age someone can be in a porn video differs and I was asking what age ppl thought was alright for someon to be in a porn video in which case I think 17 is about right. Given In the uk at 16 you can live alone and legally hav sex.

in missouri its 17 (thats in the US)

These are not necessarily my opinions. I merely stated some reasons why some folks are opposed to it.

Sorry, I wasn't directing anything at you, just to the general people who posted here, I know they weren't necessarily your opinion, I was just quoting you because you were OP.

 

[diablo523]

I have no problem with it other than getting really bored with it.
I also asked my girlfriend to respond to this post.

Diablo523's girlfriend: Hi Escapist! Umm, I don't really have a problem with it. I do watch porn on occasion, and the only stuff I don't think should be around is the really fucked up stuff. You know, torture porn and weird shit like that, just for the sake of the girl being tortured. My mom thinks it's the worst thing in the world, and so I pretend to hate it when it comes up in conversation with mum, but other than that I don't mind it. Good porn is fun to watch.

 

[razer17]

Eh. I don't care if people watch it.

I stick with hentai personally, but real porn just...kinda creeps me out.

I'm not prudish but the idea of fucking people on film for thousands of people to watch is freaky to me.

Kinda ironic that that's the argument that people who watch "real" porn would have on Hentai.

OT: I don't care really. It's up to them, if people want to pay for it.

 

[Novania]

It doesn't matter to me. Other people go around yelling "You shouldn't watch this!!" or some crap like that, but its just like anything else in our society. Just because the option is available, no one is forcing anyone to pay attention to it, so it just comes down to the choice of the viewer in the end.

I basically live by this statement: "Hate the Player, Not the Game"
It works well in this case...and before anyone starts yelling at me about this, I'm talking about the retarded parents who sue the TV service provider because their child watched something violent, or in this case....yeah....that they didn't want their kid to see.

 

[bobknowsall]

Also, it's a great way to learn about some things about sex (positions, pleasure zones, etc) that you probably wouldn't learn otherwise because it can be awkward asking parents which position gets people off best...

Dude, porn is possibly the worst place to learn about sex. It's all idealised and rehearsed, and the positions are chosen for how visually appealing they are to the viewer, not how fun they are.

If all of your sexual knowledge comes from porn, prepare to be disappointed, and to disappoint (And possibly injure) others.

 

[geldonyetich]

This... This isn't even cynicism. It's a tangle of metaphors and generalizations that ends by calling its readers "Sheeple". I'm not sure what you're trying to do here, but if you're looking for agreement or support, your methods seem a bit counter-productive.

Apparently so, if two people are telling me that now.

It seems I've underestimated the potency of the world "Sheeple." I actually specifically meant to refer that to the mindset that would call porn good just because everybody else is doing it.

There is no need to complicate the simple message that "Porn is not real, and you are pathetic if you watch it", and insulting anyone who disagrees with you is just an unpleasant and unnecessary tactic.

Did not say. Yes to, "Porn is not real." However, "you are pathetic if you watch it," is not exactly what I was going for... more like you're being naive if you call it great thing as you're unaware of all the human misery that does into it.

 

[BonsaiK]

Porn is fine. Ever since the first caveman drew a picture of a stick figure with a penis and another stick figure with boobs on a wall with some charcoal, there has always been porn. There will always be porn. People are hard-wired to like sex, therefore people will always want to see representations of sex in media.

Some consider it prostitution, after all the actors are getting paid for sex.

Well, in the cases where porn involves actors, what they're really getting paid for is for someone else to film or photograph that sex - not the actual sex itself. This is of course assuming that you're watching porn with actors where "sex" in the traditional sense is involved.

Some enjoy it and want to see more of it. Mostly teenage boys.

That's quite a presumption, I doubt it's true but I don't know for sure. Got any statistics relating to this?

I stick with hentai personally, but real porn just...kinda creeps me out.

Most people would see it the other way around. Porn can influence people's sexual tastes. It's probably healthier for you to train your brain to be aroused by something that could actually happen, as opposed to something that could not happen, such as a sexual relationship with a cartoon character.

stuff and things

You raise some interesting points, and I don't doubt your experiences and opinions. However what you are saying is definitely not true in every case. The fact is that the porn industry and sex industry work in general requires someone to be pretty mentally strong going into it, contrary to popular belief it's not a job that everyone can do, and yes, it can certainly do people's heads in. Suicides are quite common. However, for someone with the right mindset, who has no illusions going into the business, it's a good way to make a lot of money while working very few hours, and in many segments of the industry a lifelong career is absolutely achievable. But it's not for everyone, certainly not an industry that I'd recommend to just anybody, hell no. You have to really want to do it, and be the right kind of person, but make no mistake, there are plenty of people who are in that boat. I've dated sex industry workers, in fact I'm dating someone right now who gets paid to do things in front of a camera which would definitely be classified by some people here as "pornography", and she loves it, there's nothing she'd rather be doing. But that's her - she's a no-bullshit tough cookie, with no illusions, who only does exactly what she wants, has full control of everything that happens in front of that camera and when I say full control of everything I really do mean absolutely fucking everything (pun intended). The idea of women in adult entertainment being naive drug-addicted fools being led down the garden path by evil porn producers is a stereotype, and while all stereotypes do certainly have a grain of truth to them (this, of course, is how they are created), they are never the complete picture, and it's always wrong to judge an entire industry or activity on the basis of the most common cliches.

 

[milskidasith]

I have no problem with it other than getting really bored with it.
I also asked my girlfriend to respond to this post.

Diablo523's girlfriend: Hi Escapist! Umm, I don't really have a problem with it. I do watch porn on occasion, and the only stuff I don't think should be around is the really fucked up stuff. You know, torture porn and weird shit like that, just for the sake of the girl being tortured. My mom thinks it's the worst thing in the world, and so I pretend to hate it when it comes up in conversation with mum, but other than that I don't mind it. Good porn is fun to watch.

Assuming the S&M porn is consensual, I don't have a problem with it, though I don't really like it.

Also, it's a great way to learn about some things about sex (positions, pleasure zones, etc) that you probably wouldn't learn otherwise because it can be awkward asking parents which position gets people off best...

Dude, porn is possibly the worst place to learn about sex. It's all idealised and rehearsed, and the positions are chosen for how visually appealing they are to the viewer, not how fun they are.

If all of your sexual knowledge comes from porn, prepare to be disappointed, and to disappoint (And possibly injure) others.

Or get yourself injured... any of the "girls on top" positions just make me weep because I know at some point they didn't mount correctly.

 

[Sovvolf]

Snip

Before I go to sleep (I'm up late... 4:30 in the morning here in England) I would like to point out one thing. You don't choose to be insulted... I didn't choose to be insulted... I read what you said and I simply was insulted. I don't think it's even possible to choose whether or not your insulted, you read, hear or see some thing and if that hit's your buttons... Your insulted. I do find it a little disheartening that despite the fact that I could admit to my mistake and say I was wrong... you, a much smarter and more experienced man, can't admit to yours and instead blame my reaction to being called stupid purely on me and take no responsibility your self.

By your logic... I could go around telling people to go fuck them selves, and it's there fault if they get offended or not. I could go to a random black man in the street and shout racial slurs at him and it's his fault for being offended and not mine.

No my reaction is not my fault, I didn't choose to be insulted, however you choose your words. You as an (apparent) English teacher should know the power and effect of words and what reaction they would cause. You wouldn't even apologise for that, even blaming it on me.

 

[geldonyetich]

You raise some interesting points, and I don't doubt your experiences and opinions. However what you are saying is definitely not true in every case. The fact is that the porn industry and sex industry work in general requires someone to be pretty mentally strong going into it, contrary to popular belief it's not a job that everyone can do, and yes, it can certainly do people's heads in. Suicides are quite common. However, for someone with the right mindset, who has no illusions going into the business, it's a good way to make a lot of money while working very few hours, and in many segments of the industry a lifelong career is absolutely achievable. But it's not for everyone, certainly not an industry that I'd recommend to just anybody, hell no. You have to really want to do it, and be the right kind of person, but make no mistake, there are plenty of people who are in that boat. I've dated sex industry workers, in fact I'm dating someone right now who gets paid to do things in front of a camera which would definitely be classified by some people here as "pornography", and she loves it, there's nothing she'd rather be doing. But that's her - she's a no-bullshit tough cookie, with no illusions, who only does exactly what she wants, has full control of everything that happens in front of that camera and when I say full control of everything I really do mean absolutely fucking everything (pun intended). The idea of women in adult entertainment being naive drug-addicted fools being led down the garden path by evil porn producers is a stereotype, and while all stereotypes do certainly have a grain of truth to them (this, of course, is how they are created), they are never the complete picture, and it's always wrong to judge an entire industry or activity on the basis of the most common cliches.

Hint: if you have to backpedal back an forth with every point you're making in support of a thing, maybe trying a bit too hard to justify something that shouldn't be justified.

Because, while I appreciate your efforts here, I'm really not going to jump aboard the, "it's a terrible thing that has hurt a lot of people... but not every single person, so that's aaaaaaallllriight" train. That'd be great argument if you're trying to legalize crack cocaine or a banned extreme sport.

 

[Riven Armor]

Sophomoric sentiment runs rampant on this forum, most of the posters are of a kind of age they really want to prove they're right, even if they're not, and misinterpretation is usually their primary mode of operation. A flame war can last forever when both parties aren't really reading what the other one is saying... more often than not, that's the case on an Internet forum.

I was reading through the discussion, and regardless of the talk about pr0n I liked this paragraph. There are a lot of uninformed sentiments expressed here.

However...as your exchange shows, it's very hard to have a civil conversation with strangers through text. It doesn't help that a lot of people have a weird conception of what "civil" means. Honest dialogue to one person can be insulting...oh well.

 

[razer17]

It is prostitution.
It is immoral.
It is exploitative.
It is dangerous.

I'd quite like you to justify any or all of those statements. You tell me how porn is dangerous? And why one earth is it immoral. It certainly isn't exploitative. Being exploitative suggests that one party has no choice in the matter, whereas they actually do. Derogatory? Maybe, but not really. Men tend to be in control, but at the same time their is still lesbian, gay and femdom which counterbalances it.