The Porn Problem

The bio-flick: The Notorious Bettie Page was on IFC last night.

A decent movie, but Gretchen Mol does an outstanding job portraying the 50's pin-up queen.

There was a scene in the movie -- that really got me thinking -- about the evils of pornography and the depictions of women being bound, degraded and otherwise subjected to whatever was sought. Aside from that imagery causing me to grin, smile and otherwise daydream -- I considered the perception of how the depiction of porn in movies, in books, in stories basically admonishes porn to be the root of evil for all men.....

Is porn really that evil?

The movie took the stereotypical route of how morally damaging it was for a few souls who "happened to have" porn in their custodial at the time of whatever mis-deeds they were doing. Which just sends me over the edge in a barrel because I simply don't subscribe to the flawed logic of the "association" crime game that constantly plays out in everyday life. The "association" crime basically says: "as long as you are within a certain radius of the said *thing* ... that must've been the reason why you flew off your rocker...." Many of these said characters were also religious in one form or another. So if they were in the same proximity of their Bibles too -- then why don't we blame the word of God as being a catalyst in their behavior?

That's why the "association" card gets a little sticky sometimes...

Does this mean that porn is harmless then?

In the grandest scheme of life - it is harmless. Seriously.... Porn is a graphic expression of sexuality. If the argument that porn is vulgar, then so are our movies, our music, our poetry, our books, our TV programs -- literally anything out there can conceivably be considered vulgar as well. But we measure what is acceptable and what isn't and the problem with that comparison is that it's completely subjective. Not every piece of porn grabs my fancy, but I respect that it very well could be somebody's else's kink -- even if it just doesn't happen to be mine.

But people use pornography as some sort of all-encompassing lynch-pin in the failure of marriages and relationships -- while blatantly ignoring that maybe the marriage or relationship was in peril long before porn entered into the fray. Porn gets a bad rap while the real reasons continually get ignored, overlooked and held in contempt.

Men being accused of "cheating" on their wives using porn -- when very little has probably been done to EXPLAIN the reason why the man may have felt compelled to look at porn in the first place. Do they no longer have a very satisfying love life? No more spark? No more sexual energy between them? Have they talked about it? Have they worked at trying to do more things together or explore alternatives side by side?

The problem is: we change and evolve over time. What turns us on today wasn't the same thing that turned us on 10 years ago (for the most part...) So for a couple that got married and they're now 4, 5 or 12 years in their marriage, one or both of them might be bored with how things have been going. So then why not just come out and say that? Why not call it for what it is and work at resolving it together?

Porn gets blamed for relationship crises when the reality is -- there's probably at least a half dozen other things at play.

If you find such material objectionable, then you
don't ....
have ...
to ....
look ....
at ....
it.

Period.

End of story.

If you find it offensive - then you can absolutely exercise your right not to look at it. And don't try to use the argument: "kids today have more access to porn than...." Kids today are not unlike the kids of yesterday or the week before. If they WANT to find something out, they will find out about it. At best, as a parent - your best alternative is to educate your children and instill the values you think are important and let THAT be the guiding principle that they will use in life. Trying to hide something isn't going to work. Trying to pretend it doesn't exist is simply crazy.

Porn isn't to blame ... for once, it would be nice if folks looked at their own personal responsibilities rather than trying to blame someone else for their own shortcomings ... but then it would be nice to see pigs fly sometimes too....