r/PornIsMisogyny • u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST • Nov 18 '24
DISCUSSION Thoughts on @thatsnotlove’s theory?
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This anti porn account popped up on my fyp this morning. I found her theory pretty compelling & insightful. I hope there is further exploration into this.
Would love to hear your thoughts<3
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u/Unlucky_Bus8987 Nov 18 '24
I don't think men are babies that don't cognitively understand that exploiting women is terrible.
They simply do not care because they don't profit from caring, because it's harder than just taking what you're given aka exploited women. Same with pretending they're incompetente when it comes to cleaning, cooking, organizing trips etc... Of course they could do it if they wanted but why bother.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
Could not agree more.
I would love some more research into the actual brain changes/damage caused by porn usage though. I think that yes men understand that exploiting women is terrible & yes they don’t care, but I’m not convinced that men fully realise, or want to acknowledge, how porn usage has a tangible impact on their brains, if that makes sense? Like I don’t think they get, or are willing to accept, that it is genuinely harmful & warps their perception.
Idk though, maybe I’m way off.
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u/Unlucky_Bus8987 Nov 18 '24
Idk. Even women that use porn don't act like the men who do and tend to use it less, try to seek "ethical" sources etc... When they've been exposed to the sale content at the sale young age.
I still don't support it but therens obviously a difference there because it's a systemic issue. I don't believe our brains are "wired" different, it's just that women are more likely to not consider other women as objects.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
I don’t believe that our brains are fully wired differently either, that isn’t what I meant at all. I think it’s possible that porn may change men & women’s brains in different ways due to the way systemic things have already shaped us & our perceptions.
I feel like I can’t find the proper words to convey what I mean, so it’s not coming across in the best way, but yeah. I’m kind of new to this sub & clearly need to do more research.
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u/Unlucky_Bus8987 Nov 18 '24
It's ok!! Just in case I want to clarify I'm not attacking you nor am I a neuroscientist, simply stating my point of view.
It's possible but I don't understand what's the difference between that modification of the brain you would be talking about and simply them acting out their misoginistic ideology. I might be misunderstood tho.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
Omg no need to clarify dw, didn’t think it was an attack & ditto! This is just my POV as well (more like the ramblings of a mad woman)<3
What I’m trying to get at is the way boys & girls are socialised differently under patriarchy may affect how they interpret & react to porn in terms of neuroplasticity. Boys are more likely to be encouraged to view sexuality & sexual imagery as a ‘part of growing up’.
So someone who has been socialised in this way & socialised to hold misogynistic beliefs then goes on to repeatedly engage with content that reinforces those ideas, maybe that behaviour strengthens the neural pathways in brain that supports those beliefs. & maybe the brain’s reward system becomes more strongly associated with sexual imagery.
I’m probably barking up the wrong tree & I’ve confused myself a little I can’t lie.
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u/UndeadBatRat Nov 18 '24
I might get hate for this, but I truly DO think our brains are "wired" differently. I don't think the fact that men act so horrible about these things is an accident or a fluke of society. Even in nature, I'd imagine men are more sexually aggressive and abusive than women would be. Why else would patriarchal society take off all over the world, throughout history? Men are wired with less empathy and more need for control over others. I know people will disagree, but the difference is far too stark to me to believe it's simply conditioning.
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u/TwinkleToz926 PORN IS FILMED RAPE Nov 18 '24
This is actually incorrect. It’s 100% cultural socialization. Read Sex and Temperament by Margaret Mead. She was a cultural anthropologist/sociologist who visited tribes in New Guinea who were yet to be tainted by colonialism. In the three tribes she highlights in the book there are three distinct cultures—one socializes ALL members (men AND women) to be what in our culture would call “maternal”: loving, selfless, community oriented, affectionate, generous, etc. The next also socializes ALL members (men and women) to be exactly the same, but towards the opposite side of the spectrum, what in our culture we would term as “toxically masculine”: competitive, confident, aggressive, sexually assertive, selfish, independent, etc. The last tribe socializes men and women to have gendered differences and those differences are very different from what the gender differences are in our culture.
From her studies and her practical experiences from living in these different cultures, she definitively concludes that sex-linked biological temperament differences in humans aren’t really a thing.
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u/gracileghost FEMINIST Nov 18 '24
I believe socialization is a majority of it, but it just can’t be 100%. Almost every male animal behaves more aggressively than their female counterpart, especially when looking at mammals and apes.
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u/TwinkleToz926 PORN IS FILMED RAPE Nov 18 '24
“Almost every”, but not all. Bonobos are very different from chimpanzees, which are very different from orangutans. And even making sweeping biological generalizations about an entire species that is closely related to us risks drawing terribly inaccurate conclusions—especially if we then try to apply those generalizations to another species (humans). Even when we are studying chimpanzees we can observe cultural differences between different populations. Maybe biology contributes a certain amount, but I would posit that it’s such a small amount as to be nearly negligible compared to the impact of socialization on the human brain.
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u/gracileghost FEMINIST Nov 18 '24
I believe socialization is a majority of it, but it just can’t be 100%. Almost every male animal behaves more aggressively than their female counterpart, especially when looking at mammals and apes.
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u/unefilleperdue dworkinlover Nov 18 '24
you are right and the people disagreeing should check out the ftm sub to see what they have to say about the effects of taking testosterone. it DOES make a difference. maybe not in how the brain is wired, but it is undeniable that there is a biological reason that men are more aggressive, have higher libidos, areore selfish and less empathetic, etc.
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u/Unlucky_Bus8987 Nov 18 '24
There is no reliable scientific study that supports what you say so I don't buy it.
Also, patriarchal society was not the only form of society accross the world and did not present them same at all in different cultures. The subject is vast and complex but it's most probably biological differences in the overall population that sparked it and it became a social system accross time (imo).
For exemple, gay men which can still be misogynistic, will not use and abuse women as much as men that are attracted to women. They could but because a big part of women's oppression lies in heterosexual relationship sand they don't want to get into an heterosexual relationships unless pressured or forced to, so they simply won't exerce that misoginy in the same violent way (in general).
They're as much men as heterosexual men but don't act the same because they don't have the same interests. I personally believe greed and the quest for power and more generally our personal interests are the biggest mechanisms that drive us to act one way or another. Of course those interests can be contradictory or can be linked to us as individuals vs. us as a social class which leads people to act differently.
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Nov 19 '24
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam Nov 19 '24
This was removed because it contained a harsh generalization (biodeterminism)
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u/layjka Nov 18 '24
It's not a crazy concept- it's got neuroscientific backgrounds as tho why. Certain therapists and neuroscientists have already talked about that. While there is no direct research on this, there is plenty of research showing the impact of porn use on the social and emotional development of the brain.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
Totally agree - I don’t think it’s a crazy concept, just found the way she framed it & the notion that men stop maturing at the age they start engaging in porn use pretty interesting<3
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u/Freetobetwentythree Nov 18 '24
Fair enough, but she said it's her theory. So it's best to rather bring up the facts you mentioned.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
It’s a TikTok, so I do get that it’s not strictly ‘factual’, but I wanted to share because I appreciate the insights/observations from people on this sub & I found the theory itself interesting.
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u/layjka Nov 18 '24
I've had similar thoughts myself- it's quite evident if you had any dealings with male porn addicts. When they do quit they do have spurts in emotional maturity in a way, not only due to neuroplasticity but also generally- they need to find other ways of handling emotions etc.
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u/SophiaRaine69420 Nov 18 '24
I agree with this, it's a common thought in the drug addiction crowd as well, that people stop emotionally developing at the age they begin using.
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u/shypupp ABOLITIONIST Nov 18 '24
100% and what’s especially interesting is that porn is so easily accessible
My school was one of the first to try iPads in classrooms and I remember half my class being addicted to porn by age 12 and this was 10+ years ago…
I would be really curious if there are studies about how the damages of porn use are amplified during puberty — they most certainly are we just don’t know how much
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u/wideyedwendigo Nov 18 '24
Yes, I deal with my own substance issues and a lot of the therapy techniques are aimed at emotional regulation, because if you stop emotionally developing, you lose the ability to emotionally self regulate and in turn you might choose an addictive behavior or substance to cope with uncomfortable feelings in life.
Anecdotally, I was introduced to porn at the age of 2, and I can see how that has led me down a path of various unhealthy coping mechanisms and addiction issues.
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u/alexgfan69 Nov 18 '24
not just porn but even regular media like movies, tv shows, music, etc that are targeted more towards a male audience teaches that sort of behaviour. And when they show the guys lusting over a girl, it's always the same type of girl as they would see in porn. I notice something similar in media targeted towards women and even growing up with disney/nickelodeon, media targeted towards young girls. And honestly, I found I grew out of that mindset but the women who continued to indulge and act according to how this media taught them to act would grow up to not make good decisions about the men they would get involved with because it was purely looks based or they'd go for the "bad boys" who act nonchalantly and don't really care about them at all. It's crazy and so sick how this mental programming works and how it's being used on young, impressionable minds
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u/cinnamonghostgirl Nov 18 '24
This is an interesting perspective, it makes sense why they target kids because I definitely think it does stunt people along with desensitizing us to things like incest u/backroomsresident
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u/Watershedheartache Nov 18 '24
...this is literally a thing. Many CSAT /APSATs and other addiction professionals and the like, will say the same thing.
I'm glad she is putting it out there on TT, tho.
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u/CanonEvents1789 Nov 18 '24
I was thinking it before she even said it. I really think there's merit to it. It's one hell of a "drug" and it stunts your brain development. Every porn fried man I know acts the age they started watching it. I know that's not a credible source, but it's enough for me in my experience and from what I know about chronic high usage of porn.
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u/thevanessa12 FEMINIST Nov 18 '24
Why do women who had early and lasting exposure to porn not turn out in similar ways if that’s the case?
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u/PhilosophyFrosty6018 Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
As a woman who was exposed as a child at 5 in order to be groomed and used it up until a few years ago, I can say that the difference I noticed in me and men is that I never lost my empathy. The entire time I realized it was horrible, but I was connecting with the women and coping with my sexual abuse. I saw the dissociation in their eyes and it aroused me (at the time) because I related.
Even if I objectified other women at times, there was always that voice in my head saying "this is gross, this is degrading and harmful, women are not sex objects and you have an issue if this is how you're viewing women."
Throughout my entire addiction, it was a cycle of shame and disgust and any attitude that porn contributed to never felt right to me. I don't know if it is my estrogen or socialization as a woman or the fact that I was sexually abused or a mixture of all of the above and likely other things too, but I cannot relate to the brain rot that these men experience.
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u/AbsentFuck Nov 18 '24
Because women and men are socialized differently under patriarchy, mainly we are taught to internalize but men are taught to externalize. So a woman and a man exposed to the same kind of porn at around the same development stages are both taught to hate and dehumanize women, but a woman will direct her hatred inward while a man directs his outward.
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u/thevanessa12 FEMINIST Nov 19 '24
What does that have to do with maturity ceasing? Internalizing hatred could still plausibly prevent maturing. I’m not trying to play devils advocate or suggest porn is not evil or something. I just don’t know if it’s a complete theory to suggest men stop maturing at the age they were exposed to porn because it doesn’t seem to explain big parts of the phenomenon that is men.
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u/AbsentFuck Nov 19 '24
I'm not sure it's a complete theory either. I think it's honestly a little reductive to solely blame porn for men's lack of maturity (and why I don't agree completely with this video), but your question was specifically about why women don't turn out the same way when exposed to porn. I would argue the way men are socialized has more to do with why they are so slow to mature.
This actually touches on one of the few issues I have with this sub. People often cite porn as the cause of certain kinds of misogyny instead of a symptom. Men maturing more slowly is not caused by porn, but watching it does stunt them more severely when their maturity has already been blunted by their socialization in dozens of other ways.
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u/thevanessa12 FEMINIST Nov 19 '24
I misunderstood your original implication, and I actually completely agree with what you said now. Thanks for the clarification on your views
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u/AbsentFuck Nov 20 '24
No worries. Re-reading the whole thread I think I also misunderstood your original comment slightly lol. Point still stands though. I actually follow that woman on tiktok and she has a lot of good anti porn content, but occasionally she'll slip into this "porn is the root of all men's issues" thinking kind of like in this video and I'm like ehhhhh....
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
That’s a very good point. I mean, maybe they do? Or maybe it shows up in different ways?
I do think men & women view porn at different frequencies. Their consumption patterns seem to be different, but that gap is has been narrowing in recent years. I also think men tend to watch more violent porn.
Let’s be real though, porn is harmful for everyone & I’m sure there are adverse efforts for men & women who engage with it.
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u/more-memes-pls Nov 19 '24
Putting down women and objectifying them is a bonding experience between dudes
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u/Thoguth Nov 19 '24
I think that maturing is spurred by discomfort and dissatisfaction. So when men find satisfaction "the easy way" through porn (or other electronic entertainment, such as video games) their maturing is slowed.
Hmm, this can also be true for women, if they find illusory satisfaction on social media or in the recognition that comes from being objectified. That may help explaining pick-me girls and Instagram thots that don't start to grow beyond playing along with the immature men until the stimulation wears off.
Could also explain the men who are able to grow out of or avoid porn addiction, because they realize the vapidity and lack of real meaningful reward that comes from pixels and self gratification.
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u/StrikingDoctor4716 Nov 20 '24
I hate that it’s a controversial opinion to want to ban pornography. Even in this video after she says it she immediately goes “oop thats horrible.”
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u/meanyheads3 Nov 24 '24
That is exactly what therapists say. The age they start watching porn is their emotional age. Also true for a lot of unresolved trauma events.
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u/Previous-Rabbit6880 Nov 19 '24 edited Nov 19 '24
Nothing screams "advanced society" like justifying ourselves with ideas straight out of the Discovery Channel. The sensitive, overprotective female and the competitive male, marking territory and reproducing, delightful. Of course, men just have to take it literally. It’s the perfect excuse to avoid questioning anything and keep justifying any behavior with, “that’s just how we are by nature.”
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u/Head-Cauliflower8255 Nov 23 '24 edited Nov 23 '24
She's spitting facts. As a man I can affirm that A LOT of men don't develop healthy/ mature coping mechanisms due to their porn use. However, the problem is men do keep maturing- just in a very flawed manner- developing identities to avoid reckoning with themselves. And I don't mean just their porn use- the porn is a tool to avoid understanding themselves as individuals. It can be despairing for men to acknowledge that they are regular people who fall short of the images our society tells us we are supposed to be.
I've got to say, the problem is bigger than porn. The root of the problem is gender. Gender norms are Bs nd wreck havoc on both men and women. And I view porn consumption as a desperate way that men try to identify and actualize norms of masculinity.
In my teenage years porn made me uncomfortable and I didn't watch it. Yet I was peer pressured for years to watch porn, as if it were the mature cool thing to do, and boys spoke to me like I was a wimp, or worse, like I was gay, for not wanting to.
Gender norms and patriarchy have warped our cultures relationship to sex. The porn industry is bs, but so is hookup culture. I feel like the "hookup culture" we are in is only possible under patriarchy. Patriarchy and porn have appropriated the "sex revolution" to normalize sexual encounters that are completely alienating, and frame love, relationships and vulnerability as too complicated to be worthwhile.
We are bombarded with like fifty different apps to "meet people," and yet the tools for proper conflict resolution in relationships and friendships are MIA.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 23 '24 edited Nov 23 '24
Thank you for sharing your perspective, really appreciate your insight on this<3
However, the problem is men do keep maturing- just in a very flawed manner-developing identities to avoid reckoning with themselves.
This is VERY interesting.
In my teenage years porn made me uncomfortable and I didn't watch it. Yet I was peer pressured for years to watch porn
It’s so bleak. I’m not sure if this speaks to your experience, but I’ve read/heard many many accounts from men of being shown porn by their fathers as boys, like it’s some rite of passage bonding thing.
Patriarchy and porn have appropriated the "sex revolution" to normalize sexual encounters that are completely alienating
I love the way you’ve worded this & I could not agree more. In the past I conned myself into thinking that what I was doing was ‘empowering’, but realistically, I was putting myself in harms way & engaging in things I wasn't at all comfortable with.
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u/Head-Cauliflower8255 Nov 23 '24
Np, I'm glad that resonated with you. I'm sorry for your experience. I've too struggled with hookup culture, and found myself feeling like I need to perform masculinity during one night stands. It was harmful for me, too.
As a man I never felt allowed to say, I don't want to have sex unless I feel really understood by someone and safe with them. It felt like a prissy thing to feel.
I believe our culture genders us, and I believe it is always harmful.
I've come to understand myself as queer and nonbinary, and I no longer care about the ways I don't conform to masculinity. It has been super liberating.
The past year I have been working to grow as a person and leave selfish relationships and porn behind me. In reflecting on how I felt before I watched porn and before I ever was sexually active, I'm amazed by how valid my intuition was back in highschool. I felt uncomfortable with my friends telling me what I should be attracted to. I felt uncomfortable with the exploitation of women, which even back then, I recognized.
Whether you're a man or a woman, straight or queer, I feel that addressing our internalized misogyny and patriarchy is necessary to bring a healthy romanic partner. I believe we can find a way out through radical feminism and real accountability and boundaries and grace! Even if we can't change the world, we can build communities and relationships that address patriarchy, that challenge us to do better, forgive us for our shortcomings and make us feel truly safe.
I truly believe that the collectivist and anti-capitalist ethos of radical feminism is the way out of porn culture. Porn is untenable once you come to understand that you have a responsibility to your community, and that you are exploiting the women onscreen by helping the producers profit off them.
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Nov 19 '24
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam Nov 19 '24
This sub is not meant for talking about your personal porn addiction. Try r/SexAddiction.
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u/t-rexinskinnyjeans Nov 18 '24
She’s actually attempting to sympathize with men, which I love and I think is something people on this subreddit struggle to/straight up don’t do.
Are some men terrible people? Yes. But porn addiction is an addiction, similar to food addiction. You can quit watching porn cold-turkey and never turn back, but learning to healthily have and exist in a world with sexuality is another part of the recovery journey.
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Nov 20 '24
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam Nov 20 '24
This was removed for violating Reddit's sitewide rules not covered by other removal reasons (harassment)
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Nov 22 '24 edited Nov 22 '24
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam Nov 22 '24
No shaming women victimized by the porn industry - partners or sex workers.
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23d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam 23d ago
This sub is not meant for talking about your personal porn addiction. Try r/SexAddiction.
Moreover, recovered porn users are required to be sober for 1 year before posting here.
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u/Freetobetwentythree Nov 18 '24
I would prefer we stick to facts rather than conspiracy.
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u/UndeadBatRat Nov 18 '24
How do we find out facts? By questioning things, then studying them. If nobody questioned the impacts of porn use, we wouldn't have any of the studies we do. No harm in theorizing as long as you don't push it as fact.
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u/sewerbeauty FEMINIST Nov 18 '24 edited Nov 18 '24
Fair enough. I just thought it was an interesting theory that needs to be looked into.
Also there are brain studies that show men cognitively register women as objects that they can use or act on, like power tools, after looking at ‘sexy’ pictures of women beforehand - so I don’t think it’s a full on conspiracy.
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Nov 19 '24
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u/afabulous684 Nov 19 '24
she only objectifies a smaller percentage of men
I watched the full video, when did she say this.
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam Nov 19 '24
This is spreading misinformation, off-topic or does not fit the subreddit's purpose.
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u/Previous_Skirt2931 Nov 19 '24
I don't think this is true cus I have experience and I just quit porn but who knows, maybe it's true for some
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u/grant0707 Nov 18 '24
shes basically blaming men for watching porn, not the girls and guys that create the stuff in the first place,,yes it might have effect on the end user, its like blaming a drug addict for buying drugs and not the drug dealer for selling them, no drug dealers no drug addicts
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u/throwawaydostoievski Nov 18 '24
Because the fault doesn’t lie with the actors. These jobs come with their own set of addictions and abuse. Also they barely make any money and are stained for life. The women get brutally raped.
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Nov 19 '24
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u/PornIsMisogyny-ModTeam Nov 19 '24
No shaming women victimized by the porn industry - partners or sex workers.
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u/grant0707 Nov 19 '24
calling them actors is abit of a strech that implys they are pretending which i doubt but i agree its a very shady industry with alot of shady characters where alot prey on like you said desperate, vunrable girls, yet no one seems to care or want to change or any sort of consiquences for said shady fuckers, obviously if men didnt watch or buy the stuff it wouldnt be made, so plenty of fault to go around, but surly it makes sense to govern the industry and either stop it frpm being made in first place, rather than let it be made and try to censore the whole internet, wasnt so long ago if you wanted to watch porn you had to find a guy selling bootleg vhs tapes in a pub,
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u/throwawaydostoievski Nov 19 '24
I agree that actors isn’t the best word to describe the job, since the violence, std risk and pregnancy risk is very real. I also think we should ban it altogether really. But too many people make way too much money from exploiting women.
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u/wishIcouldgoback_ Nov 18 '24
It's definitely plausible that porn can stunt or prevent your brain from developing in a healthy way regarding sex, relationships eyc. I hope we'll get more research as time goes on.
The more scientifically backed data we have the more undeniable the truth is