Why have pornography and government funded brothels?

[Mr Rayon]

What good does it serve society and why is demand for these things growing?

 

Each year, younger teens are by collateral being exposed to free online pornography, they are getting addicted by it and enjoy it. As adults of the free world we are enabling this and I'm afraid this may have long-term psychological repercussions for everyone as we head into the future.

 

To name and shame, here in Australia (where I come from) we've had quite a few politicians who have gotten into the habit of watching pornography in places they shouldn't be.

 

http://express-advocate-wyong.whereilive.com.au/news/story/mp-paul-mcleay-resigns-over-porn-and-gambling/

 

But lastly, are these things immoral and should they be made illegal as it doesn't benefit society in any significant and meaningful way?

Edited March 19, 2011 by Voltman

[ajb]

But lastly, are these things immoral and should they be made illegal as it doesn't benefit society in any significant and meaningful way?

 

I personally do not see pornography as immoral. That is of course with the usual proviso of the age limit and the understanding that everyone involved knows what is going on.

 

Do we not think that watching pornography is simply entertaining and a good stress releaser?

[swansont]

Freedom of speech/expression. One man's art is another man's porn, which makes it really hard difficult to draw the line and you end up censoring people.

[Mr Rayon]

Do we not think that watching pornography is simply entertaining and a good stress releaser?

People’s sense of entertainment can become perverted. Think back to ancient Greece where people were forced to fight one another in colosseums for other people’s entertainment.

 

Remember:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”- Edmund Burke (1729-1797), Irish philosopher

[Sisyphus]

Government funded?

 

People’s sense of entertainment can become perverted. Think back to ancient Greece where people were forced to fight one another in colosseums for other people’s entertainment.

 

You're thinking of Rome, and in that case it's pretty clear that the people forced to fight to the death are victims. Since I don't think anyone here is defending sex slavery, how is that related?

 

Remember:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”- Edmund Burke (1729-1797), Irish philosopher

 

What's at issue is whether it's evil in the first place.

 

EDIT: Also, why is this in the religion forum?

[Mr Skeptic]

What's at issue is whether it's evil in the first place.

 

EDIT: Also, why is this in the religion forum?

 

He thinks porn is evil for religious reasons?

[Ringer]

How exactly do you believe that seeing sex harms a child? Do you have any evidence what so ever to support this.

 

Not to mention that just because something is immoral doesn't mean it should be illegal. Different people have different morals and by your standards damn near anything could be arbitrarily deemed illegal. Things like polygamy aren't necessarily illegal because it is immoral, a large part of the polygamy laws came into effect because of tax deductions for multiple marriages. If it were to be illegal for moral reasons than cheating would be a legal offense as well.

[lemur]

Her work is/was controversial but I recommend googling Andrea Dworkin, the feminist who most strongly opposed prostitution and pornography. To sum up her view, she saw sex as being generally appropriated within a "rape culture" where consent is mostly coerced, when it is even sought. This basically has to do with the social-economic position of women and the fact that they feel under threat not to refuse sex for various reasons, especially repercussions for how they will be viewed and treated if they do. Dworkin herself was accused of being everything from a prude to a sex-hater to just being jealous, which sort of demonstrates what happens to people who don't salute or at least quietly accept the culture of mixing power with sex.

 

Imo, it doesn't matter if pornography/prostitution are legal or illegal. Either way, how are you going to stop men from trying to impress women by spending money and spoiling them - and how are you going to convince women to stop enjoying and being flattered by men spoiling them?

 

As for pornography's effect on those who consume it, why are people so hungry for sex except because it is withheld from them? Then, why is it withheld from them except because of the culture that promotes sexual power through control for women (and men to some extent)? I.e. people resist sex until they find someone "irresistible." This scarcifies sex and causes people to select their partners carefully. What other effect can this have except creating a large number of people who are sexually deprived and/or people who aren't totally deprived but are much less than free to express their full sexuality? Then, what does pornography do except flaunt that pornographers with the money and power to produce sex are doing so while the viewer isn't or can't? If food was being withheld to starve people and then there was money being made by selling the starving people pictures and videos of food and people eating, wouldn't that seem somewhat cruel?

[mississippichem]

I don't see a moral dilemma with pornography as long as all the participants are adult and willing. If parents don't want their child looking at certain things, then they certainly have the right, both legally and morally, to put a content filter on their computer. I've always been an advocate of allowing individual families decide what is appropriate for their children.

 

I think it is ridiculous to expect the government to enforce moral standards in entertainment media. Such things always get decided by panels of legislators or bureaucrats and we get strange or silly results. For example, on American TV, it is lawful to say "ass", it is lawful to say "hole", but if you say "asshole" then the audience hears "ass****". One would think that sticking two allowed words together results in an allowed word.

 

Back on topic, sexually explicit material should be labeled as such and individual parents or guardians should decide whether or not they mind their children watching pornography.

[Fuzzwood]

ONOEZ people see that other people have sex. What is the issue here again?

[Marat]

With respect to Andrea Dworkin, it is worth noting that eventually she wound up wildly accusing all the male service personnel in some high class Parisian hotel of having raped her while she was unconscious, and even though the French police couldn't find a shred of evidence to sustain her claims, which were so contradictory and readily disprovable that they didn't even merit investigation, she persisted in her increasingly hysterical and preposterous rape assertions. She eventually declined into total insanity, much to the embarrassment of her feminist defenders.

 

The fact is that the enjoyment of pornography is natural, and thus the frustration of that enjoyment is a sexual perversion, and thus a sadistic sexual perversion, since frustrating that natural desire is painful to those denied that outlet. The naturalness of pornography is evident in the fact that female mammals which walk on all fours and thus do not display their breasts all have very small breasts, since this suffices for nursing, given that the padding of the breast with fat has nothing to do with the degree of the capacity to nurse. But once mammalian species begin to walk upright, their breasts become prominent in order to attract a mate pornographically. So when society seeks to repress this, it is suppressing what is natural and calling the unnatural restrictions of society natural, which is absurd.

 

Similarly with sex generally. Our nearest ape cousins are constantly promiscuous, as are primitive human tribes like the Kalahari Bushmen, who sleep around so much they have never discovered the connection between intercourse and pregnancy. Repressing that natural activity by monogamy is a sadistic sexual perversion, so no wonder it causes people pain, frustration, misery, and ultimately, neurosis. When strongly held social rules are so obviously harmful and rationally ungrounded, they have to call up strong artificial supports to preserve their dominance, which is why these insane rules of enforced sexual frustration attach themselves to 'god,' 'religion,' and various other mythological supports such as the notion that all premarital sex causes pregnancy or AIDS, or masturbation causes impotence, blindness, and hairy palms.

[lemur]

With respect to Andrea Dworkin, it is worth noting that eventually she wound up wildly accusing all the male service personnel in some high class Parisian hotel of having raped her while she was unconscious, and even though the French police couldn't find a shred of evidence to sustain her claims, which were so contradictory and readily disprovable that they didn't even merit investigation, she persisted in her increasingly hysterical and preposterous rape assertions. She eventually declined into total insanity, much to the embarrassment of her feminist defenders.

 

The fact is that the enjoyment of pornography is natural, and thus the frustration of that enjoyment is a sexual perversion, and thus a sadistic sexual perversion, since frustrating that natural desire is painful to those denied that outlet. The naturalness of pornography is evident in the fact that female mammals which walk on all fours and thus do not display their breasts all have very small breasts, since this suffices for nursing, given that the padding of the breast with fat has nothing to do with the degree of the capacity to nurse. But once mammalian species begin to walk upright, their breasts become prominent in order to attract a mate pornographically. So when society seeks to repress this, it is suppressing what is natural and calling the unnatural restrictions of society natural, which is absurd.

 

Similarly with sex generally. Our nearest ape cousins are constantly promiscuous, as are primitive human tribes like the Kalahari Bushmen, who sleep around so much they have never discovered the connection between intercourse and pregnancy. Repressing that natural activity by monogamy is a sadistic sexual perversion, so no wonder it causes people pain, frustration, misery, and ultimately, neurosis. When strongly held social rules are so obviously harmful and rationally ungrounded, they have to call up strong artificial supports to preserve their dominance, which is why these insane rules of enforced sexual frustration attach themselves to 'god,' 'religion,' and various other mythological supports such as the notion that all premarital sex causes pregnancy or AIDS, or masturbation causes impotence, blindness, and hairy palms.

Marat, this post is totally one-sided. You don't seem to want to even consider views that dissent from yours. You call Andrea Dworkin insane to dismiss her work. You completely brush off the possibility that there could be any validity in repressing sexuality in at least some forms and promoting monogamy.

 

I can agree with you that at the level of base desire, monogamy is an obstacle to free sexual expression. But you completely ignore the problem of fathers arguing over whether children are theirs or not when a promiscuous partner gets pregnant. You also ignore the fact that it is difficult to have sex as a form of devoted love when you are prone to switching teams whenever something more interesting sways you.

 

Whether Dworkin was gang raped or hallucinated that she was or who knows what, does it really negate any of her points about sex being part of a culture of power and domination? Don't you think there's more going on with sexual negotiations like pornography and prostitution than people just sharing their bodies and erotic experiences freely?

Edited March 19, 2011 by lemur

[Marat]

I think the general point has to be that any form of free expression which society permits is subject to certain abuses and power imbalances. In free speech, for example, eloquent, smart people who are good at thinking on their feet may well gain an excess of power over those who are less slick in public verbal duelling and thus become able to dominate others' thinking. Better art work may cause very good but still less than genius quality art work to be ignored, which is unfair to the second-class artists whose work is still worth something. But in all these instances, we don't worry in the least about domination or power imbalance, lack of true consent in all forms of human speech cooperation (someone pressuring me to 'enjoy' his holiday photos), because we have no irrational fears about the intrinsice nature of the subject matter of these conflicts and tensions. All the standard complaints about all the problems that would arise from free sex really just point to exactly the same problems that arise in every other area of human freedom, and these same problems are imagined to be unendurably harmful in sex (do we ever worry about young chess grandmasters being 'too young' to consent to chess matches?) just because we hate and fear sex for neurotic reasons our reflections fail to address, but which probably have a lot to do with our cultural inheritance of these neuroses from one of the sickest sexual neurotics of all time, St. Paul.

 

With respect to the generally assumed right of parents to impose the equisite sexual torture and perversion on their children of deprivation of access to the child's natural interest in sex, I can't see why there should be a right of the partnets to impose sexual starvation on their children, any more than any other kind of objective harm, such as ordinary starvation, deprivation of water, clothing, shelter, warmth in the winter time, etc. Humans have certain fundamental physical needs, and the notion that other people have a right to deny them access to those needs just to satisfy the opinions of those others about what needs people should have fulfilled and which they should not have fulfilled is ridiculous.

 

It all somehow seems more acceptable that parents have the exclusive right to derive pleasure from this sexual torture of their children than other people, but if you consider this claimed right historically, it is really not much different from the old claim of the legal head of the household, the husband, to beat his wife with a stick as thick as his thumb but no thicker when she disobeyed him. The real question has to be, why should anyone have the right to harm anyone else physically, either through sexual starvation or physical beating?

[Mr Rayon]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ebezjhl5ARM