Pornography, An Intellectual Perspective

Pornography is rapidly becoming or already is a significant cultural feature of the late twentieth century and, for those attracted to sociology, it must be analyzed to gain a general understanding of one aspect of the state of the human experiment. From insignificant beginnings in the early fifties, to the Hugh Hefner led charge against sexual repression to the explosion that has resulted from the popularization of the internet, it has reached the stage of an ubiquitous presence and therefore requires each member of society to settle upon some attitude towards it. Those attitudes range from enthusiastic endorsement to absolute rejection with most adopting a more or less middling attitude. I recently read a review of a pornographic movie in National Review (the flagship magazine of conservatism), in which the reviewer said that to the extent that pornography was intended to produce sexual arousal, it was OK. My exposure to pornography is typical, I suppose, movies, The Playboy Channel, Internet home pages, and Internet News, in order of declining restraint. Internet News is an interesting case, since it falls between private communications and public publishing. It becomes more difficult to restrain as you approach private communications. Also, the internet is international, so who has jurisdiction?

The Rev. Wildmon in Tupelo is the most active antipornographer around here, and many fundamentalist Christians support him. Fundamentalist Muslims also seem to be strongly against it. Certainly it is much more in evidence, everywhere in the world than ever before, but that has something to do with media potential. Anyone can publish on the internet. On the other hand it also is part of the ideological movement in progress for centuries. It is an expression of free speech, which is a founding principle of the US. It is also a rejection of masculinist sexual repression and therefore must be viewed as an aspect of feminism even though many feminists are very uncomfortable with it due to the perceived exploitation of women, especially the frank presentation of male dominance in bondage photographs.

Since the main condemnation of pornography is coming from religion, and since both Christianity and Islam are male dominance religions, we will expect that the loss of dominance is the perceived threat. This is entirely realistic since, as can be seen from chess, the female is the most powerful of the sexes and this comes from her ability to close her legs. So, pornography is seen as an opposing force to sexual repression, which it is, and since sexual repression occurs in male dominance societies to limit the power of the female, it is seen as a revolutionary threat. Of course these aren't the reasons identified by the preachers, but humans seldom know why they do what they do. I am confident that this is the reason for the characterization by Iran of America as The Great Satan in the West.

Pornography is not totally unrestrained. Significant efforts are aimed at apprehending child pornographers, both consumers and producers. Whether or not this is compatible with the First Amendment isn't clear. But people seem more accepting of limitations on free speech where children are concerned. Interestingly, there is a good deal of female homosexuality being distributed, from what I have seen, and very little male homosexuality. I suppose this reflects the fact that males are most attracted to pornography and therefore react positively to two women and negatively to two men.

If we can take Playboy as an expression of the general mood, then erect penises and penetration cannot be displayed, though they can be discussed at length. This apparently marks the dividing line between "soft" and "hardcore" porn.

The controversy, of course, lies in the question about damage it might do, presumably to the psyches of the viewers. On the one hand, psychologists have long recognized, beginning with Freud, that sexual repression damages the psyche and in extreme cases, at least, leads to violence. The Speck, Daumer, and Jack the Ripper cases being examples. On the other hand, viewing pornography, unless a shared experience, is sterile, rather like masturbation. So, we appear to have yet another spectrum, producing damage at the extremes and leading to the inevitable identification of the middle as the most healthy. A little porn is OK, preoccupation with it or militant opposition will be symptoms of adaptation problems. It should be noted, however, that the worst behavior occurs on the side of repression. Sexuality, being provided by nature, has its own built in safeguards and would only be expected to be abused by people already damaged psychologically by repression.

There is a taste issue here, but, it isn't of great interest sociologically. Taste generally follows class, so that sexual expression will change for taste reasons as one traverses the classes of society. Since class is not officially recognized as a suitable goal for citizens (a feminist rejection), its impact on pornography isn't of much interest.

The next question is how extreme portrayals should be allowed to be (to the extent there is any way to control it). There are many restraints here, mainly imposed by the consuming public. If nobody will look at it, it quickly disappears. So, it would appear that bestiality is out, child pornography is controversial and tending to be out as the age goes down, male homosexuality is uninteresting to most, feces is out, urine has a certain following, bondage is OK if it is staged and not too grotesque. Vaginal, oral, and anal sex between heterosexuals is favored. Multiple partners is fine. Anything more extreme than these, like sex with the dead, is definitely out. I have heard though, that a new Canadian movie explores the question of necrophilia.

It should be mentioned here that the largest segment of material in this general category is devoted to feminine nudity, which isn't even considered to be pornography by many. Also the quality of photography is much better in this category.

A couple of generalizations become apparent. Among the participants, the females are much better looking than the males, by and large, and pornography disassociates the sexual function from procreation. I suppose that the first point relates to disapproval between the sexes. Males disapprove of pornography, as a generality, but are attracted to it, while females view it as viable employment sometimes leading to great success, especially for the most beautiful.

The second point is much more important, since it leads to causality. Some general statements can be made about humanity on this date. There are too many of us for the environment to support in the long term and human creativity is the most glaring problem in a high density population. Feminism, since it will tend towards uncreativity can be viewed as a solution to these problems. Additionally, disassociating sex and procreation has potential to alleviate these problems if it cuts down the birth rate without cutting down relationships. In those countries where pornography is most noticeable, mainly the industrialized West, it seems to be working, though the causality isn't clear.

In the area of psychology the results aren't clear either due to the intersection of many problems. Sex crimes seem to be up, especially against children. So this could be taken as an indication that pornography is doing harm. On the other hand, this is a time of transfer of power over the timing of sexual contact from males to females. This can easily be the source of the motive for sexual violence.

Finally, it is inescapable that pornography informs humans regarding the nature of human sexuality and how it manifests itself. In the past, each could imagine his own model of human sexuality and then try to put it into practice in whatever way he could devise. Obviously, the second approach is more dangerous. The church controlled excess as well as it could, but complete control isn't possible, so many strange examples of human sexuality, from the Marquis de Sade to Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde to Bonnie and Clyde emerged.

Pornography will reduce human creativity in the sexual field dramatically.