Cloud32,

I am sure, according to your belief, it is a great website. That does not change the fact that it suffers from selection bias and that MaggieH is being quite dishonest when she states that she came to her conclusions on the basis of accumulated evidence. Further, it is thick on rhetoric and lacking large scale evidence. These are simply facts.

Regarding the bukkake rape, the 'blogger is confused. They are condemning a specific sexual act rather the circumstances of participation. If people voluntarily engage in bukkake there is nothing wrong with it whatsoever on a moral level. It is it forced onto others that's another matter. It is not the content of the act, but the consent of the participants that moral judgements are determined by.

eye of the newt,

Your erroneous analogy suggests that all pornography is the equivalent of "trash food". I have no doubt that a great deal is, but that's the same with all mass media (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeons_Law). I refer you, as I have others, to the works of Candida Royale, Nina Hartley and others and the Annual Feminist Porn Awards (http://www.goodforher.com/Feminist_Porn_Awards.html). There are people out there making a genuine improvements to mass erotica.

In other words, criticise what is bad, support what is good but most importantly, allow people to make their own choices on the matter.

All,

I am still yet to encounter any empirically sound study which correlates an increase in sexually explicit material with an actual increase of sexual violence. I suspect I will be waiting a long time.

Let me put this simply; if you support a woman's right to control her own body, that means that yo must also:

a) Support her right to seek an abortion AND
b) Support her right not to be raped AND
c) Support her right to participate in sexually explicit media of her own violation AND etc.,

Either you support a person's right to control their own body or you don't. If you don't then you're not better than the nine men in the original article.

I totally agree with you, MaggieH. It's so sickening that some people are valuing pornography over women and girls' lives and safety!

In other words, to pro-porners: the pornographic images *do* matter (*women don't*) and these images are *more important* than the women and girls who are raped or gang-raped. And there's a clear link to porn. I want to scream in rage!

BTW, I love your website http://www.againstpornography.org/ and your blog. Great anti-porn resources. Keep up the good work! Pro-porners don't believe you and other feminists, but we don't have to go along with what they say.

MaggieH, you said: "Obviously, being a radical feminist in a pornified culture, I am fully aware that whenever a woman speaks out against pornography, she is hated, rejected, even called names (on other webspaces)."

You forgot to mention that when a woman opposes pornography she is also often refered to as a liar, as somebody here implied that you were lying about the research you've made for your site -- saying that you reached your conclusion before searching that amount of resource that's on it or something similar, but I *can* see that you've definitely made the conclusion that pornography's harmful after gathering all the informations.

That poor girl (in Brisbane). Pornography fosters misogyny!

MaggieH, frankly, you're being quite dismissive of other views.

You continually label your adversaries as 'pro-porners.'

I already explained, I've no particlar desire to watch porn.

I just hate the idea of censorship.

Intead, you're just labelling anyone who disagrees with you, a 'pro-porner' instead of actually engaging on the issues being raised.

This gives me no faith whatsoever in the idea that you're actually considering the issue.

What's more, Cloud32's explanation only confirmed Lev's point.

He said that it was clear you had adopted a stance, and only received information that confirmed it.

Cloud32 jumps in to defend it, but makes the point (no-pro-porners there).

Which proves that you're only receiving the information you want to hear and you won't allow any dissenting views.

Dissenting views are crucial in our society.

The fact that you're not taking in other views at all, or even remotely addressing the issues of censorship, makes me think you're the last person in the entire world who should have any say over what is censored, as I don't trust you in the least to make a reasoned judgement.

But go ahead. Continually label those who hate your censorship platform as 'pro porners.'

But if you're going to keep doing that, I reserve the right to call you a moralising fascist.

Firstly, does anyone spot the irony in Lev’s claim that pornography prevents rape…on an article such as this, which reads as a typical porn scene of a filmed gang rape?

Anyway, Lev’s first link is to an abstract. The other two (which I am familiar with) suggest a correlation between porn use and the decline in rape ‘reporting’ and ‘convictions’ - can you see the disconnect here? Unless a rape follows the stereotypical narrative many women are reluctant to report rape as rape as we are assured that once we get to court we will be disbelieved.

Maybe too many judges and juries are numbed by their porn use.

Reflected of course by stormys’s UK figures.

If you bothered to read Maggie’s links to Diana Russell’s research, you would find that there is a direct link to pornography use and the desensitisation of men towards sexually abusing women. I will leave you to check them out.

Now that aside, if folks need pictures of women being degraded violated and harmed to achieve orgasm - then what is that saying about you?

Moreover, even let us suppose that porn did prevent rape…so what? Is a steady stream of sexually degraded women necessary in order to prevent men from turning into rapists? What is that saying about men?

Moreover do not patronise me with the assumptions that I am unfamiliar with porn and that I need to ‘educate‘ my self with the likes of ‘Nina Hartley‘ - far from it.

Pornography is Hate Speech and propaganda against women as KKK literature is to African Americans and on some level you know this and that is why it gets you off.

ALL oppression is linked.

In addition, no one is mentioning ‘censorship’, which would be futile anyway as this, would do nothing to challenge the mindset of misogyny.

It’s attitudes towards the female that needs to change and that is what feminism and the likes of this article are about. No one is trying to take porn away all we ask for is to admit that it is fuelling woman hating

MaggieH

I never thought I would find common ground with a feminist pro abortionist. You however are spot on when it comes to the damage the pervert industry does to women and men.

Co-posters -

Apologies for my absence. Been busy. Lev when I came back to post some links to studies I see that it's already been done.

Col I see that you have jumped on the oppose-censorship-bandwagon. Apart from the fact that I, nor anyone else I think, has asked for censorship (maybe if I thought it would work I would though), you really want us to believe that you're using porn to do your bit to prevent censorship? Well that's a knee slapper.

Are you saying that you can't stop without censorship stopping it for you? How about men just decide not to use violent images that hurt women to stimulate themselves sexually.

If one cares so much about avoiding censorship; why not just say, "NO!" to violent and degrading images of women and sex ? Wouldn't that satisfy everyone's concerns ? Why can't that be done?

You wanted me to explain the counter to evolution of the species. My key argument is that we as a species have progressed to ideas about individuals having the right to personal safety; protection from oppression; human dignity; equal access to society's resources and so forth. We know this because such ideas are enshrined in law and in agreements such as the UN Declaration of Human Rights.

When someone's person is invaded against their will (as in rape) or they are coerced by economic necessity; immediate force or whatever into surrendering their body to people who have greater power - that is counter to what we have all deemed as good for society. It is counter evolutionary.

Porn is also counter evolutionary when people who use it perceive it as some sort of 'need' (instead of a selfish 'want') that is comparable to or more important than the exchange of emotional care that occurs in a relationship with another adult. Some of the studies cited by another poster show that men who used porn were less inclined towards long term, stable relationships - the very foundation of all society.

Btw Col, have you ever seen a movie called Idiocracy ?