Porn Essay, Research Paper

Does the mass media cause undesireable social consequences with specific reference to

pornography

It started by way of messengers and scribes, evolved through the presentation of newspapers and

radio, brought us together with television, and now serves us world-wide via the ever-popular

Internet. It is the mass media, and even from the earliest days of its existence, it has contributed

greatly in ways that both enlighten and enrich society, and ways that deteriorate and perplex it. It

is not a surprise to learn, then, that the mass media is the most powerful source of information

we have, and nothing else in today??s world influences public perception quite as heavily.

Unfortunately, however, most of what is broadcast or transmitted in the news today is with

reference to the chaotic condition of our planet, or something else that society as a whole sees as

detrimental or damaging. But the news on television is not the only type of media taking the

criticism of society. Other forms of mass media, specifically movies and television programs

containing pornography and violence have been heavily criticized. The underlining concept to be

debated here is that society is negatively influenced, specifically, by these images of

pornography and the result is increased violence against women. This assumption, and it is

indeed only an assumption, is completely fallacious, however, as no concrete and completely

conclusive evidence has ever been formulated in support of the theory. The key premise here is

that the mass media does not cause undesirable social behaviour and in actuality, the media

people should not be dubbed as the ??bad guys??. They simply use their power in the most

constructive ways possible in order to promote their ratings and popularity. One way to do that is

to concentrate on what sells: sex, violence and disaster.

Having said this, why is it then, that many in society still believe otherwise; why do they

continue to believe that pornography is ??evil?? and is a major cause for violence against

women, specifically rape? There are many reasons for this misinterpretation and through the

following few points, an attempt will be made to show that pornography has very little to almost

no correlation with violence against women (of course nothing is ??absolute?? in society). In

order to demonstrate this, it must be made evident that pornography is not ??evil?? and does not

cause undesirable social behaviour by displaying nude women in sexually explicit

circumstances. Thus, it is important to indicate that women are not treated only as sexual objects

through the media. This is done in an attempt to quash any traces of ??evil?? in pornography.

Subsequently, a second point, that some may consider to be completely bizarre, can be

addressed; that pornography actually reduces the amount of violence against women.

For thousands of years, sex itself has been considered ??evil?? and revolting. This is exactly why

the concealment of the sex organs and teaching feelings of shame toward human sexuality is so

common worldwide (Christensen 1990:4). These same feelings of shame are the chief reasons

that sex is considered a personal and private matter. Contrary to the beliefs of many, the mass

media did not create these settings; society creates this image. In some societies, women have no

reservations with regard to living their entire lives completely naked, while in other societies,

females cover themselves from head to toe, only revealing their eyes. The media has been

bombarded with criticism, overwhelmingly from the female community, relative to the amount

of sexually explicit material that is published in magazines and that appears on television and in

the cinemas. A common argument against pornography is that the media portrays women as

being nothing more than sexual playthings and objects to satisfy male sexual desires. As before,

the media once again, is not to be held responsible for creating this image; these views are

products of society.

It would be downright absurd to assume that women in this society are treated as sexual objects

only because the media releases or broadcasts pornographic material. A magazine associated

with make-up and skin care, for example, will quite obviously not be concentrating on much

else. Such a magazine would not display pictures of women who mountain-climb or women who

water-ski; only images of make-up and text referring to skin care would be relevant. Clearly,

society does not consider women to be beings who??s only purpose in life is to worry about

make-up and skin care; but why are the complaints only directed towards pornographic media

then? The answer to this question may be more complicated, however, what remains obvious is

that the media does not portray women as only being able to fill male sexual desires. To say that

pictures featuring nudity, etc, are making objects out of women is foolish. One should consider

females who pin-up posters of male rock stars or children who collect hockey or baseball cards.

Society, however, does not say that objects are being made out of these rock stars and sports

heroes; pictures of clothed people are no less objects than pictures of naked people.

Many complaints are also made to the effect that pornography only offers a one- dimensional

view to life; that women are seen as nymphomaniacs who are hysterically addicted to sex. It

should be pointed out that events such as hockey games, boxing matches, horse races and operas

all offer a one-dimensional view of life. One does not attend an opera hoping to see a horse race.

The underling problem here is that the above mentioned events are socially acceptable; media

displaying pornography is not. It is also said that the media reduces women to a collection of

body parts through pornography (Christensen 1990:74). But why then are their no complaints of

advertisements in magazines displaying only ears, for example, or a nose, or feet? The reason is

a simple one; society considers certain body parts to be ??shameful?? or disgusting and once

again, the media can be ??let off the hook??.

Realistically, the only way to prevent women from being seen as sex objects is for them to be

seen as other things as well; but to say that women are not sexual beings would be misleading

because both men and women are very much sexual (Christensen 1990:42). Similarly, to say that

women are singled out in the media is fallacious due to the many examples of media where men

are seen catering to the needs of women; something known as chivralic sexism (Christensen

1990:42). Take, for instance, a recent television ad portraying young men groveling at the feet of

supermodel Cindy Crawford, almost begging to be the ??one?? to cater to her needs. There were

no lineups of men aching to announce their displeasure with the sexist ad; and this is precisely

why male stereotyping in the media often goes unnoticed. Similarly, it is pornography in the

media that is noticed and shunned by anti-pornographic and censorship organizations because it

seemingly singles out females for their bodies. It should be well noted, however, that paperback

romance novels, which make up an incredible 40% of total paperback sales (Gerbner 1988:15),

depicts males as sexual objects, performing what is called ??Sweet Savagery?? (rape), just as

pornography depicts females as sexual objects. But once again, this goes unnoticed.

It is fundamentally important to realize that the media does not deliberately create images of

hate or disagreement (Howitt, Cumberbatch 1975:80). They just influence the more appealing

things in society (thus directly increasing their ratings). Although it is obvious that pornography

is largely a male interest, a noted increase in female interest would certainly cause an increase in

the amount of pornographic material geared for women; this relates to the laws of the business

world (Christensen 1990:50).

Having discussed the untruthfulness of the claims against pornography and showing that

pornography is not ??evil??, it is now possible to consider the violence issue. Are men who are

exposed to pornography likely to commit violent acts, such as rape against women, more so than

men who are not exposed to pornography? It is tempting to believe that media influences males

and overstimulates them through pornography to the point that they become aggressive towards

females. But this is completely baseless; just as pornography arouses or stimulates, it also

satisfies. The American Commission on Obscenity and Pornography performed a study in which

several college students were asked to spend one and a half hours in an isolated room with a

large volume of pornographic media, as well as a large volume of non-explicit media such as

Reader??s Digest (Howitt, Cumberbatch 1975:80). The study was conducted over a three week

period over which time it was discovered that the males involved in the experiment began to

lose interest, or become desensitized to the erotic media nearing the end of the experiment, even

if new material was added. To address the argument that males are pushed over the ??brink??

into committing rape because of pornography, one may point to the evidence above; to cover the

female body would theoretically only increase male sexual desires. Four more separate

experiments were conducted of which the above was one. Three other experiments came to the

conclusions that pornography does not cause violence against women and reported that the

number of sex offenders that had been exposed to pornographic material were smaller in number

than the amount of sex-offenders that had not been exposed to pornography (Christensen

1990:130; Harmon, Check 1988:28-30). These results can be offered as evidence against the

claim that males become overstimulated and thus dangerous when exposed to pornography.

Other experiments conducted in the early 1980s by the Williams Committee in England,

reported that as the availability and abundance of sexually explicit material increased, the

number of violent sex crimes such as rape did not increase, but in fact decreased in many areas

(Christensen 1990:128-129).

So what is it about pornography that women and anti-pornography organizations do not like?

Violence! One of the greatest myths about pornography is that it contains an excess of violence

against women inevitably resulting in real-life violence against women. Anti-pornography

groups release propaganda that the media approves of violence against women through

pornography. In actuality, however, the total amount of violence in sex-related movies was

found to be approximately 6% in a study by T. Palys in the early 1980s in Vancouver, Canada.

Even this material was almost entirely composed of verbal threats and spanking (Christensen

1990:59). In addition to the above, studies in Ohio also found that the amount of violence in

??G??-Rated movies was a staggering two times more than in ??X??-Rated movies. In fact,

major films such as Die Hard: With A Vengeance and Terminator 2, contain extreme violence

85-90% of which is directed solely at men. There are, however, exceptions; the slasher genre of

movies contain much more violence towards women, possibly due to the desensitization to

violence in other genres of films. Because women are involved, violence against them could

create a true sense of horror. However, this does not suggest that men should go into society and

rape a woman any more than it suggests that men should go out and kill other men. Horror

movie fans choose to watch these movies because they enjoy portrayed violence. Needless to

say, no sane individual would wish for this violence to become a real-life conception. Similarly,

sex also excites people and because these two elements offer the most thrills in movies, they are

often combined.

It should be pointed out that women, and not just men, also enjoy these thrills based on

numerous studies. When discussing pornography, it is scarcely noted that men are not the only

ones who enjoy fantasizing about sex. Women also enjoy pondering sex; just not through

pornography. In fact, most of these fantasies involve some degree of violence or force and are

largely driven by the romance novels discussed earlier (once again supporting the evidence that

romance novels prove to be the female equivalent to male-geared pornography). Recent reports

published by Nancy Friday, show that the number of female fantasies involving rape far

outweigh the number of male fantasies involving rape. What comes as a surprise to many is that

in male fantasies, the woman rapes the man and conversely, in female fantasies, the man rapes

(??Sweet Savagery??), the woman! (Christensen 1990:66). Friday??s reports also provided some

interesting reasoning for the female fantasies. Her reports find that females fantasize about rape

to show that they are not acting in accordance with such ??sinful?? actions; to show that sex is

being ??forced?? upon them. Any other feelings towards the fantasized rape would prove to be

??undesirable social behaviour?? and amazingly, the media is not even involved! Actual

laboratory experiments (Hawkins, Zimring 1988:103) have shown that when groups of women

were shown erotic scenes involving rape, their reactions to the scenes were as or even more

stimulating than less violent consensual lovemaking scenes. This is not to say that all women

want to be raped; far from it. This is to say that if women can fantasize about rape but not wish

to experience it, then men, too, can fantasize about rape and not wish to commit it.

In addition to the many other accusations against pornography, many in society believe that there

is definite connection between organized crime and pornography. Although this may be true, the

idea is largely over-exaggerated. The reasoning behind this theory is very simple, yet very

shallow. Consider, that pornography is created by organizations and contains sexually explicit

material that may be thought to be legally obscene in some areas. To make the connection, these

anti-pornography organizations assume that the organizations (hence organized) that produce the

legally obscene (hence crime) material, are operating illegally. It is obvious why pornography is

attractive to criminals; just as anything that is banned or is made illegal, there is always someone

who will pay the high black-market price for it.

Having considered the issues at hand, it can be said that since there is no concrete evidence to

support otherwise, pornography in the media does not cause undesirable social behaviour. As

mentioned before, sexually explicit movies and magazines do not just arouse, but also satisfy. It

is an undisputed fact that feelings of love and happiness cancel out violent feelings (Zillman,

Connections Between Sex and Aggression) and to say that pornography endorse violent feelings

fails to make sense; if it did, why would men want to be exposed to it. To suggest that

pornography causes men to ??go over the edge?? and commit rape is as ludicrous as suggesting

that pictures of food cause the hungry to steal more food. It has even been said by some women

that rape is the fault of women who dress provocatively; ??they ask for it??. According to this

logic, in the event that pornography is banned, then an attempt should be made to force women

to cover their skin and wear clothing that completely hides the shapes of their bodies so as not to

provoke rape. Absurd.

As members of society, we recognize the power of the mass media. We understand that public

perception can be easily persuaded. But it should be clearly understood that pornography in the

media alone cannot persuade men to cause harm to women; it cannot cause men to do things that

are socially unacceptable. As was mentioned earlier, pornography only causes feelings of

excitement and satisfaction and these feelings overpower those feelings of violence. For these

reasons, it can be said that until a positive link can be found between pornography in the media

and violence against women, it will remain that sexual violence such as rape is the result of

sexual frustration, and not of sexual arousal.

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