Lifesize)
The question of whether the rise of Internet pornography has reduced incidents of rape is nothing new, and something we’ve covered before. Back in 2006, Levitt expressed skepticism over research done by one of his former students that suggests a link, writing at the time:
The kind of variation in the data that gives the result is that states that are quicker to adopt the internet saw bigger declines in rape. He then does a nice thing in the paper, going beyond just this one prediction to test other hypotheses, like do crimes other than rape fall with the internet (he says no) and does other sexual behavior change with the internet (he says yes). The concern is always, with this kind of approach, that there are other factors that might be driving both the adoption of the internet and the decline in rape. The challenge to those who want to refute Todd Kendall’s argument is to identify those variables. The challenge for Todd is to find other kinds of “natural experiments” that support his hypothesis.
Now comes an article in the current issue of Scientific American Mind, which posits that for “most people, pornography has no negative effects—and it may even deter sexual violence.” The article, titled “The Sunny Side of Smut,” is by Melinda Wenner Moyer, a science writer. Here’s a full version of the piece, via Moyer’s website. Though an interesting read, the article adds no new empirical evidence to the subject, and relies heavily on the data showing that rape decreased faster in states that got the Internet quicker. As Levitt pointed out, that’s not enough to go on. Moyer’s article is more of a tour through a handful of studies (and questionnaires) that look at the effects porn has on our behavior and views toward the opposite sex. Here’s a summary of the article from Scientific American Mind editor Ingrid Wickelgren, who is rightly skeptical:
But Wenner’s story goes beyond saying porn is safe. It suggests that it might actually be beneficial. I am not sure I buy this, but some coincidences worth mentioning back up this view. First, as access to Internet pornography grew in this country, rates of rapes and sexual assault went in the opposite direction. Those stats are at their lowest levels since the 1960s. And something similar happened in Japan, China and Denmark. Along those lines, the U.S. states in which rapes rose by 53 percent had the least Internet access between 1980 and 2000—and so the least access to Internet porn. States with the most access saw a 27 percent drop in reported rapes. These opposing trends don’t prove anything. It could be that they are unrelated to each other or that a third factor underlies both. But it makes you wonder.
If porn somehow reduces rape, why would that be? Wenner suggests that pornography may be a safe outlet for deviance. Exposure to it correlates with lower levels of sexual repression, experts say. And people seeking treatment in clinics for sex offenders commonly say that it helps them keep their abnormal sexuality in their minds. Otherwise, maybe these folks, and others, might have been contributing to those rape stats. I don’t really know, but that’s the idea.
Relationship-wise, watching porn could have drawbacks. Guys, if you overindulge and advertise it, you are unlikely to score points with your wife or girlfriend. In a study of female partners of heavy porn users, 42 percent said it made them feel insecure; 39 percent said it had a negative impact on their relationship and 32 percent said it negatively affected their lovemaking.
The prolific rise of Internet pornography over the last 15 years certainly represents a change from the past, and has surely had consequences for our behavior and attitudes. Whether we’ll ever have reliable empirical evidence to study its effect on violent sexual crime is unclear. But one thing is sure, it makes for an interesting debate.
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Porn certainly acts as an outlet for deviancy, but it also exposes one to a whole new level of deviancy never previously experienced. This super-stimulus may well render normal sex unsatisfactory leading people to unacceptable acts. Furthermore the addiction to this may well make the person reclusive and without a partner to explore this with, increasing the possibility of committing , well, rape.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I disagree.
There is no increase in deviancy.
A Murder is a murder, alcoholic is an alcoholic. People don’t start off with one beer and then go out killing people.
Someone who masturbates too often, might need something ‘hotter’ to stimulate them. (also applicable to people who are not stimulating themselves with porn, or people who have frequent sex) But it’s still the stuff you like, it’s not an increase progression of deviancy. For example, If you like lesbians, school girl outfits, and threesomes; you might be easily stimulated by a simple lesbian video one time. The next time you might try to combine to kick it up a notch, lesbian’s in school girl outfits… or lesbians in a threesome in school girl outfits, getting kinkier? Not really, it’s still the stuff you would have liked in the first place, just a better version of it. There’s no progression to bondage or brazilian fart porn, or urination video’s that will ever occour, unless you liked those things in the first place. Sometimes you may stumble across something that you like, that you didn’t know you liked until you saw it. For example, cheerleader outfits. But this hardly jumps us over to fart porn and rape.
for people in a relationship, responsiveness to normal sex (which you make sound incredibly boring btw) will return after abstaining for a day.
rape is an irrational decision made by those who can no longer control their own biological urges.
“Sometimes you may stumble across something that you like, that you didn’t know you liked until you saw it. For example, cheerleader outfits.”
You’re saying that whether you like cheerleader outfits or not is innate and fixed? That cheerleader outfits have been around long enough for some people to have evolved a genetic sexual response to them? Obviously whether you like these things depends on nurture, not nature. Since it must depend on nurture, your claim that “you didn’t know you liked until you saw it” doesn’t make sense. It’s clearly AFTER seeing it that you COME to like it – the alternative is essentially to have been born with all these infinite different preferences, which is logically impossible. Since your argument rests on that impossible basis, it doesn’t make sense.
wow your sex drive came from your mother? mine really did come from nature, not kidding
so, in your opinion.. just to be clear, its the way in which someone is raised that makes them gay or not because it’s impossible to be born with particular preferences to certain things?
“If porn somehow reduces rape, why would that be?”
I see a possible reason. If rapists are masturbating several times a day in front of their computer then presumably their sexual desire will always remain fairly low. If they masturbate very often they may be simply incapable of sustaining an erection for rape.
I’m fairly familiar with feminist ideas that rape is “about power”, yet it seems likely that there is a strong sexual aspect too.
No, rape is about sex. Forced copulation is just another sexual strategy, like resource provision is (e.g., dinner, movies, and shiny trinkets from men to women), and is not unique to humans.
Porn transfers sexual bargaining power from women to men (since the male demand for sexual outlets is partly satiated by porn), and feminists hate that. Feminists want to make the argument that porn leads to rape, and because everyone knows rape is bad, we should thus get rid of porn.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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well ya, when a female isnt in the mood, she just isnt in the mood, if a man isnt, thats a dysfunction.. suppose to be ready to go with anyone no matter how ugly at any time or else you’re dysfunctional as a male, and porn contributes to this! sorta, although porn isnt really necessary either
I do have an issue with these studies. I don’t think this type of correlation is something you can necessarily prove or disprove. Sure, reported rapes might have gone down during the same time period and it could be related or not. But I would think that porn influences personal relationships a lot more often, relationships where someone would be far less likely to report a rape. Porn gives people a skewed view of sex, unrealistic expectations. If someone watches sadistic porn with sexual violence + then acts that fantasy out on their partner thinking it’s a normal sexual scenario, chances are that rape is not going to be reported. We already know that the number of reported rapes are far below the number that actually occur. And porn could have more of an influence in unreported vs. reported rapes. When I look at these studies, I see a big gaping hole.
Drifting off topic a bit, but I’ve sometimes wondered also if romantic fiction might also have harmful effects on relationships and sexual expectations. While pornography is more controversial, romance is very widespread and even children are exposed to romantic comedies and the like.
For example the common romantic idea that each individual will find “the one”, another individual whom one is destined to love forever, seems unrealistic, perhaps leading to lazy relationships where couples aren’t willing to compromise because they expect their partner to be a perfect match.
I have no evidence, am just thinking aloud.
Well-loved. Like or Dislike:
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What about looking at the revenue of porn industry pre-internet era? That might have a stronger correlation with usage of pornography rather than adoption of the internet.
decreased. with internet sales (and newspapers ect) the reproduction cost is eliminated decreasing the total net income .
There’s alot more to consider other than the internet though; 32% of Americans, predominantly the poor, do not have any internet access. Of those who do about 10% only have access through the public library or some other service; where I’d assume porn isn’t allowed?
Are only the rich rapists?
Interestingly, Utah until recently had only limited internet access, but dvd sales are at a national high, Utah does not have an exceptionally high rape rate. Even dvd sales across the states can be a poor indication because of the proliferation of piracy over the last few years.
There is an offensively large numbers of sex offenders in Massachusetts, which is often considered a central hub of technology where everyone is online. Unlike Minnesota where strippers have to remain in their underwear, Massachusetts does allow fully nude near contact dancers in strip clubs, but has outlawed those movie booths where homeless people go to relieve themselves..
As Clive James put it when commenting on certain porn that was claimed on parliamentary expenses in the UK,
“Porn is what you use to keep your mind off sex.”
Seriously, how hard is it to conclude that if there are competing goods and one becomes easier to get for free, people will consume less of the others? Sorry to reduce rape to a good but from one perspective everything is a good. It’s just one that thankfully few have a demand for.
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As for other experiments that support this hypothesis, is the youth violence and violent video games another natural experiment that supports the hypothesis, or is it merely independent?
As the argument goes, as games have gotten increasingly more violent, graphic and realistic, the crime rate has dropped sharply. It probably does nothing for the internet / porn – rape hypothesis, other than a parallel example of a similar phenomenon.
“good old fashioned” porn (e.g. “Debbie does Dallas”) probably does not lead to rape. Heck, it makes my husband horny.
But you know, there is a lot of very vial hate filled stuff out there, and there are a lot of R rated “shasher” movies that associate violence with sex that are a lot more worrisome than Debbie’s antics.
The high amount of sexual abuse, coerced sex, and violence reported in this CDC survey of teenagers suggests most cases of sexual assault aren’t reported. So maybe the rape data isn’t accurate.
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss6007a1.htm?s_cid=ss6007a1_x
Have you actually watched “Debbie Does Dallas”? I have. The plot revolves around a bunch of underaged schoolgirls who want money for a cheerleading trip and the adult men who coerce them into unwanted sex with promises of money.
There’s one scene where a husband and wife catch the teen employee of their store masturbating and ignoring her “no, no, no” PHYSICALLY pull her down and sexually force her.
Porn messed me up big time about sexuality as a child. I don’t even want to imagine what today’s kids are being deliberately fed by pornographers who hawk pink Playboy merchandise to little girls and take no precautions to keep their product out of children’s reach.
nobody was arguing about the effects of under aged kids watching porn illegally, I’m pretty sure even porn creators don’t recommend that
On the contrary, I rather think that we should include the effects of children watching porn illegally. Unless someone hasn’t got the memo yet, just about every child of mid-primary school age (elementary school in the US) who has a computer in his or her room has access to porn. And for the most part, pretty unregulated access at that.
And porn makers are hardly concerned with children’s welfare. I remember a line from a stand-up comedian:
“If all girls grew up with good self-esteem, where would we get our strippers and porn stars from?”
I’m sure that as far as the pornographers are concerned, rape is good for business.
okay we can talk about kids if you want. to the last thing you said, “as the pornographers are concerned, rape is good for business.” i dont see how raping people gets them anymore or any less business, seems unrelated.
so “Debbie Does Dallas” , i saw bits of that when i was maybe 16-17, i thought it sucked and walked away after a couple minutes.
in holland, where the age of consent (can view porn ect) is 16, prostitution is legal, and parents answer their childrens questions. there is a very low rate of teen pregnancy, rape, human trafficking, abortion, and std transfers. futhermore many more dutch teens use protection than their american counterparts.
on the other end of the spectrum is china, where pornography is illegal and may carry the death penalty. they also have a very low rate of reported rapes (rape may also carry the death penalty). it may indicate that people are not reporting rapes, or that rape victims are less likely to survive, or that the threat of the death penalty for rape is a deterrent.
in either case there isnt enough data on specifically if porn causes teens to rape in america, you can only debate your own point of view and support it with correlations. my view was that, porn producers do not explicitly claim that porn use is healthy for children
but no one would choose to watch a porn about sexual abuse unless there was something wrong with them in the first place, I also do not believe that movies and music that are not related to porn cause people to go out killing, but thats a discussion for another topic
I think there will always be a fundamental problem in these statistics; mainly that the definition of rape changed radically during the 90′s (for example, I believe the idea that a husband could not rape his wife basically died; “date rape” was considered actual rape, etc) and the odds of reporting a rape went way up.