people still buy magazines to look at naked people?
i can't really sympathize with the whole "no naked men" mag thing. the body-type range of guys i find hot is rather narrow, and i generally don't find naked pictures of guys alone that appealing--but i also think guys are usually only hot when they start saying intelligent things, especially long explanations about quantum theory or lesser known cannibals of the 18th century. i'm a brain girl, not a visual one. though i would much rather look at naked girls cos, ya know, girls are beautiful (and even hotter when they also go on technical diatribes). i believe women are less visual in their stimulation, as opposed to men. not to say that both sexes are not stimulated visually, i just think most girls require a bit more than that; whereas men are naturally wired to try and spread their seed to the greatest extent possible and are subsequently fairly easy to amuse. :P most girls i know aren't really turned on by looks alone in regards to men (e.g. being shown a random picture of some hot guy all nekkie). when they *are* pleased by what they see, they tend to need some kind of context to make it sexy. but the demographic of people i'm in touch with probably deviate from the norm. ;) anyway, women are more appealing to *everyone* on average, as women themselves tend to be bisexual in their arousal (not necessarily in practice).
i admit, i didn't read both articles in full, but the author of the first one seems pretty close to my view of pornography and the supposed "subjugation of women" or whatever. i think most pornography, stripping, and legal prostitution (we need more nevadas) are *empowering* to women; they clearly have something someone else wants. seeing a woman in some subordinate position in porn and coming to the conclusion that she's clearly being dis-empowered or whatever implies a lack of grasp of the power dynamics of sex in its varied and sundry forms. and/or they're uncomfortable with the truth that a wide range of behaviors are enjoyed by other human beings.
i read the first half of the second article and got kinda irritated with it and stopped :P. i've yet to see any "pornography causes violence! sex violence even!" study that was remotely convincing. what, sex offenders watch more porn than other criminals?! amazing! i wonder if soccer players/fans watch more soccer than normal sports fans? even that kind of correlation is pretty weak, as it doesn't really prove to be causal instead of symptomatic (though i have not thoroughly read the study that was referenced in the article). but i mean, even when the government set out specifically to prove there was a correlation between violence and pornography, they pretty much failed.
i do however think that if we were a less puritanical society when it came to sexuality, the general affinity for fetish porn of the non-consensual type (the type they seem so concerned with as it has women supposedly being "raped", which is silly because, unless you think you have an authentic film of a real life event that happened to be caught on tape, that woman is actually the one in control) would be less common. but that's far too much more to go into in this comment as it's becoming quite long! sorry!
i basically think any judgment of pornography outside of things that are truly *morally* abusive and/or *authentically* (as opposed to consensual role-play) illegal (e.g. child pornography--i don't mean those states where sodomy is illegal etc) is purely a culturally-relative evaluation (what besides math isn't though? :P). people are funny monkeys and sex has especially weird associations that aren't going to go away or be invented because pornography is one way or another. blaming pornography is a way to avoid the incurable root cause: people's brains get really weird associations with sex and our DNA begs us to fulfill the desires that we've formed. as long as no one's getting hurt in a way they don't want, then there isn't anything wrong with it. imho at least.
anyway, i assumed those articles were up for discussion ;). k i'm stopping now, really.
Most importantly, in an environment where people have strong convictions and moral beliefs that frequently clash with cultural changes, people frequently confuse causation with correlation because they're so desperate to be correct.
The whole porn = sex offender thing reminds me of the entire video games = violent crime argument. While there is certainly correlation, there is usually evidence contrary to causative theories.
yeah, that's not what the article is saying. In fact it's saying exactly what you and Kat are saying (and what I tried to say): that causality is complex and impossible to demonstrate. Please see comments below about accountability.
a few things: 1) I don't know if women are so much "less visual" as they are socialized to be less visual. 2)I agree - naked women are WAY hotter than naked men. Are we surprised? we see images of sexy naked women everywhere, but not men. Again, I think socialization plays a big role. 3)I like brainy guys too, and I can sympathize with the context thing. But the fact that before I found naked men ugly, and now I can appreciate it after a little exposure, points again to the role of socialization. 4) If you continue reading the article that irritated you, you will find that it is in fact critiquing the view that porn causes violence against women. It starts out by giving the Pro-censorship feminists their views, but ultimately debunks them. Keep reading, it's interesting. 5) Therefore, I don't think violent porn causes sex against women and neither does the author of that article (sorry it was unclear) PS - thanks for replying! :)
i can't really sympathize with the whole "no naked men" mag thing. the body-type range of guys i find hot is rather narrow, and i generally don't find naked pictures of guys alone that appealing--but i also think guys are usually only hot when they start saying intelligent things, especially long explanations about quantum theory or lesser known cannibals of the 18th century. i'm a brain girl, not a visual one. though i would much rather look at naked girls cos, ya know, girls are beautiful (and even hotter when they also go on technical diatribes). i believe women are less visual in their stimulation, as opposed to men. not to say that both sexes are not stimulated visually, i just think most girls require a bit more than that; whereas men are naturally wired to try and spread their seed to the greatest extent possible and are subsequently fairly easy to amuse. :P most girls i know aren't really turned on by looks alone in regards to men (e.g. being shown a random picture of some hot guy all nekkie). when they *are* pleased by what they see, they tend to need some kind of context to make it sexy. but the demographic of people i'm in touch with probably deviate from the norm. ;) anyway, women are more appealing to *everyone* on average, as women themselves tend to be bisexual in their arousal (not necessarily in practice).
i admit, i didn't read both articles in full, but the author of the first one seems pretty close to my view of pornography and the supposed "subjugation of women" or whatever. i think most pornography, stripping, and legal prostitution (we need more nevadas) are *empowering* to women; they clearly have something someone else wants. seeing a woman in some subordinate position in porn and coming to the conclusion that she's clearly being dis-empowered or whatever implies a lack of grasp of the power dynamics of sex in its varied and sundry forms. and/or they're uncomfortable with the truth that a wide range of behaviors are enjoyed by other human beings.
i read the first half of the second article and got kinda irritated with it and stopped :P. i've yet to see any "pornography causes violence! sex violence even!" study that was remotely convincing. what, sex offenders watch more porn than other criminals?! amazing! i wonder if soccer players/fans watch more soccer than normal sports fans? even that kind of correlation is pretty weak, as it doesn't really prove to be causal instead of symptomatic (though i have not thoroughly read the study that was referenced in the article). but i mean, even when the government set out specifically to prove there was a correlation between violence and pornography, they pretty much failed.
i do however think that if we were a less puritanical society when it came to sexuality, the general affinity for fetish porn of the non-consensual type (the type they seem so concerned with as it has women supposedly being "raped", which is silly because, unless you think you have an authentic film of a real life event that happened to be caught on tape, that woman is actually the one in control) would be less common. but that's far too much more to go into in this comment as it's becoming quite long! sorry!
i basically think any judgment of pornography outside of things that are truly *morally* abusive and/or *authentically* (as opposed to consensual role-play) illegal (e.g. child pornography--i don't mean those states where sodomy is illegal etc) is purely a culturally-relative evaluation (what besides math isn't though? :P). people are funny monkeys and sex has especially weird associations that aren't going to go away or be invented because pornography is one way or another. blaming pornography is a way to avoid the incurable root cause: people's brains get really weird associations with sex and our DNA begs us to fulfill the desires that we've formed. as long as no one's getting hurt in a way they don't want, then there isn't anything wrong with it. imho at least.
anyway, i assumed those articles were up for discussion ;). k i'm stopping now, really.
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Most importantly, in an environment where people have strong convictions and moral beliefs that frequently clash with cultural changes, people frequently confuse causation with correlation because they're so desperate to be correct.
The whole porn = sex offender thing reminds me of the entire video games = violent crime argument. While there is certainly correlation, there is usually evidence contrary to causative theories.
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1) I don't know if women are so much "less visual" as they are socialized to be less visual.
2)I agree - naked women are WAY hotter than naked men. Are we surprised? we see images of sexy naked women everywhere, but not men. Again, I think socialization plays a big role.
3)I like brainy guys too, and I can sympathize with the context thing. But the fact that before I found naked men ugly, and now I can appreciate it after a little exposure, points again to the role of socialization.
4) If you continue reading the article that irritated you, you will find that it is in fact critiquing the view that porn causes violence against women. It starts out by giving the Pro-censorship feminists their views, but ultimately debunks them. Keep reading, it's interesting.
5) Therefore, I don't think violent porn causes sex against women and neither does the author of that article (sorry it was unclear)
PS - thanks for replying! :)
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