Male Pornography and Gender Roles

By the age of 11, most individuals have viewed pornography or sexually explicit content, with 64% of people aged between 13 and 24 viewing porn weekly or more. Generally, sexual socialisation develops through interpersonal interactions (Sabina, Wolak, & Finkelhor, 2008; Wright, 2013; Wright, Tokunaga, & Kraus, 2016). Due to technological allowances and readily available porn, the default means of sexual education has been through porn for modern generations. Therefore the norms relating to sexual behaviour and consumption of porn reflect the omnipresent influence of the porn industry

The easy accessibility of pornography and long term exposure to it from an early age can lead to damaging views about women or even correlate with violence and sex crimes. Young males especially are targeted and pressured by peers and society to consume porn and throughout time, may become desensitized to the brutality, violence and degradation depicted in it. Now that does not necessarily mean every male will go out and commit a sex crime, but it has been studied that males who view porn frequently have less empathy for rape victims and may exhibit aggressive behavior and or hold negative opinions about women. In order for these increasingly negative attitudes towards women, the policies and regulations surrounding how easy it is to find porn, very much need to be altered. Pornography can play a major role in affecting the brains of young males who watch it, and by result can influence them to be violent towards women.

Since we have shown that MacKinnon’s paradigm cannot be applied to all pornography, it is more appropriate to understand such expression as ‘pornographies’, rather than grouping them into a singular ‘pornography’. In view of this, wide-ranging criminal prohibitions or rights of civil action against all pornographies cannot be justified. However, since we have shown that some pornographic material can indeed constitute harm, it is equally unjustifiable to disallow any censorship of pornographies. Thus a middle ground must be found, and perhaps it is time to develop a test of harm to be applied when adjudging whether a particular publication should be banned or not. Such a test would enable the banning of pornographic publications that do constitute harm to women, while allowing the continued existence of material that does not cause harm, such as gay pornography.

The pornification (or alternatively pornographication) of the social world has created lasting effects in the lives of people that they must deal with every day (Dines 1998, p. 164). Pornification is the process by which the social and cultural world is sexualised. This occurs through the expansion of media technology and the pornography industry, as well as changes in media regulations and restrictions which allow pornographic imagery to intrude into public spaces (Tyler 2011, p. 79). This essay will offer explanations for why the pornification of the social world is occurring, how the phenomenon differs from a freedom of expression issue and is instead considered a sociological issue, what consequences and harm arise from these explanations, and will offer social measures that can be adopted in order to deal with the issue. Pornification has occurred in almost every realm of the social world, including in its unaltered form on the Internet, social media, marketing, advertising, music, fashion, sport, and art. However, this expansion of easily accessible pornified content is a stark and confronting challenge for our social world.

The research paper explores the following questions: Where do we acquire our knowledge about sex? Where does sexuality originate from? How does the media influence the way we think about sex? Will we ever be able to think about sex without it being effected by the media? What is real and what is not real? If pornography fails to represent real sex, then what does it represent?

MacKinnon believes that pornography maintains male-dominated views of sex and is an extension of the patriarchy and thus, from a feminist standpoint, it should be eliminated. First, it should be established that MacKinnon believes that “male dominance is sexual” (315). From that, it can be established that practices such as rape, sexual assault, prostitution, and pornography “express and actualize the

For the past 30 years, pornography has been a subject that has divided many North Americans as the topic became increasingly controversial with time. The subject makes for a very significant ethical issue mainly because it’s an issue that has the capability of altering our freedom of expression and because it’s a topic that invokes many conflicting values and competing ideas of right and wrong. Furthermore, pornography is also a major ethical issue because many of those that are against feel as though it infringes on societies’ morals as many believe that “viewing even mildly explicit pornography leads to an interest in increasingly deviant material” (McNaught and Renneboog). That said, this essay will illustrate why

Since the accidental discovery of the first pornography at Pompii in 1592 porn has had a bad reputation. It is a Victorian word first defined by Webster as “Licentious painting or literature”. From its very beginning pornography was outlawed and banned from the public. In the beginning of the 20th century one could be jailed for even viewing a stag film. This may of hurt the quality of porn but it the principal of supply and demand stayed intact, and there was always an overwhelming demand. The way that demand has been supplied has changed drastically throughout the 20th century. Porn went from socially unacceptable to a social phenomenon. Public opinion, slowly, overturned government rule. The main reason porn became more acceptable was because masturbation became more socially acceptable (Paul, 2005). In the early 1900’s we see masturbation as an act someone took shame in, because it meant that person didn’t have anyone to have sex with. In modern times masturbation is said to be healthy by health care professionals and although it is not spoken of often, it is accepted. When porn was first discovered by the Victorians within the Roman ruins of Pompii there was a major fear that the lower educated, working class would do nothing all day but sit at home and

Pornography demeans and objectifies women, and as a result degrades the perception most male porn consumers have about women. Prolonged consumption of pornography by men produces stronger notions of women as commodities or as ‘sex objects’. “The diffusion of such a distorted view of women’s nature in our society as it exists supports sexist (i.e., male-centered) attitudes and thus reinforces the oppression and exploitation of women” (Longino 48). Many males believe that females should be submissive to them. Porno reinforces these preexisting inclinations and perceptions males already have about women, increasing the likelihood of males sexually harassing females. Aggressive and violent behaviors and sexually hostility to women are not only tolerated but encouraged in porn. Thus, excessive viewing of porn alters many males perception about women, and increases the likelihood of aggression,

The analysis of gender differences occupies considerable space in the analysis and discussion. However, a rationale is largely lacking why such differences need to be investigated. There is sufficient evidence that females use pornography less often than males do (i.e., gender as a direct predictor), but it is crucial to outline why the processes hypothesized may differ by gender (i.e., gender as a moderator).

Pornographic images have been around for years, archeologist throughout the world have found images carved in stone. Within the last 30 years, how pornography is viewed has changed, from having to travel to a rough part of town to personally purchase a magazine or video, to the ability to obtain explicate videos on your phone. With the Internet, users are now able to access pornography anonymously, having access to millions of images, mostly for free. The accessibility, affordability and anonymity takes the effort, cost and public judgment out of the equation. In the last twenty years, pornography has moved into mainstream society.

As pornography gained a larger audience, the effects on its viewers and those around them, male and female, became increasingly more contentious. In an article in Time magazine by Peggy Orenstein, who has previously written about the effects of sex on young women, she explains how pornography is all about men’s pleasure. She begins by saying nearly 90% of pornographic videos display physical and/or verbal aggression toward women and in almost all instance the women accept the aggression and in some scenes, even seem pleased (par. 1). Orenstein continues to argue the negative effects of female viewers by saying they “are less likely to intervene when seeing another woman being threatened or assaulted” and they are also less likely to notice when they are in danger themselves (par. 4). She also notes that males who view pornography are more likely to “measure masculinity, social status, and self-worth by their ability to score with ‘hot’ women” (par. 3). Bridges and Bergner acknowledge such effects on males by saying they are: more likely to develop sexist attitudes, more likely to lose attraction to their partner, less likely to feel that a woman is the victim during sexual assault, and less likely to communicate romantic feelings to their partner (1263). Many people argue that pornography gives society unrealistic ideas of what a woman’s body should look like; Bridges and Bergner address this as well by noting women who view pornography soon feel physically inadequate in

In a world populated by people who are driven by sexual desire, pornography is inevitable. Throughout history, erotic work has progressed alongside society, and has climaxed, it seems, in the information age with almost unlimited access to any manner of pornographical work on the internet. In most forms, Pornography is legal within the United States, and is widely used despite its taboo nature. While statistics differ, it is likely that a majority of Americans have used pornography, and the industry is undoubtedly enormous. Despite it 's ubiquity in American culture and the ease at which it can be obtained, the ethicalness of pornography is still widely debated. And, while it seems impossible, some even call for the censorship or criminalization of porn. In this essay, I argue that pornography is a harmful to the identity of both user and the person who is objectified. The arguments primarily use deontological and teleological assumptions which are influenced by, but not circumscribed to, Christian ethics. All People have the legal right to portray themselves to others in any way they choose because of this, Pornography will never be eradicated from society, but the actions associated with Pornography are unethical and damaging. Since pornography reduces participants to sexual objects, in order for others to act upon, it is an unethical practice which all should avoid.

The introduction of pornography dates back to 5200 BCE, when early German hunter-gatherers created a statue of a man and woman having sexual intercourse. Over time, forms of pornographic expressions have evolved from rudimentary cave drawings and paintings to the inventions of the camera and cinematic film. (2) However, it was not until the ideological and methodological progression that occurred throughout the 20th century that pornography became widely commercialized and found itself existing in nearly every aspect of society. The catalyst of this dramatic change is likely the growth in sheer number of advertisements over time, and the increasing accessibility to the internet recently. The past two decades specifically have experienced a tremendous jump in the prevalence of porn. In 2003, it was reported that 25% of internet searches were related to sex; today, that number has doubled to become a staggering 50%. According to research published by JAMA Psychiatry, 66% of men and 41% of women view pornography at least once a month. (3) Dr. Adi Jaffe, the executive director of Alternatives Behavioral Health, has stated, “Humans are drawn to rewards, both natural and manufactured. Pornography

Through out the last 20 years the subject of porngraphy and how its portrayed in society has changed dramatically. I wanted to find out how society views the subject nowadays, how the material is distributed, and lastly how it has affected our younger generation.