Porn and Adultery (II)

So, a question for Will Wilkinson et al (and judging by the commentary, there's a lot of al out there): If your wife/monogamous partner sought regular sexual gratification through watching prostitutes have sex with one another, you would have no grounds on which to feel jealous or perturbed? No grounds for feeling that they were being in some sense unfaithful? Really?

My point here, to be clear, is not that regularly watching hard-core pornography is exactly the same thing as committing adultery. My point is rather that there's a consistent continuum here - as opposed to the sort of inconsistent continuum that Will accuses me of mustering - that links the varying ways that a person who's committed to sexual monogamy can find sexual gratification outside of marriage. And I think that regular consumption of hard-core pornography is closer to the actual adultery end of the continuum (insofar as it involves actual-existing other people and actual physical acts) that it is to the "occasionally entertaining sexual thoughts about that cute girl on the subway" end of the continuum, and as such it's not "insane" to see morally meaningful similarities between porn-watching and cheating on your spouse.

Comments

1) I agree with you that the two have meaningful similarities in a moral continuum.

2) I disagree that the two should be explicitly evaluated in the context of a moral continuum.

The reason for point #2 is that adultery is an interpersonal act with outcomes that affect two (or more!) individuals directly, and any number of individuals indirectly. It should be viewed in this manner.

Consumption of pornagraphy, on the other had, has no objective outcomes related to an individual besides the consumer. Adultery does (see: Fatal Attraction). There is a much more humanistic component to the process of breaking your marriage vows to consummate love with another person, versus regularly consuming porn. I realize that you make this disctinction, but it needs to be emphasized that adultery is not merely a morality issue, but a legal one as well.

Posted by mattc | June 19, 2008 3:46 PM

where does watching a Jessica Alba movie fall along your continuum, Ross? What about not averting my eyes from the beer ads with dripping wet, half-naked chicks on the subway?

I get the "continuum" concept, but what's the point? You seem to be arguing for your preference about where the line of immorality should be on that continuum. There's plenty of people who would argue for advancing the line towards Jessica Alba movies, and plenty advocating the reverse.

This argument seems to be heading for everyone declaring exactly how blatant they prefer their porn to be packaged, whether its Debbie Does Dallas or Into the Blue.

Posted by matthewcc | June 19, 2008 4:01 PM

If you click on the foxnews link in Ross's previous post, you'll immediately notice that the pornography expert is a fetching blonde late 20/early 30-something woman giving the camera a come-and-fuck-me look whilst nibbling provacatively on a pair of glasses and flashing a good bit of cleavage.

I love how Fox News preaches prudery while flashing naughtiness.

Posted by Immoralist | June 19, 2008 4:03 PM

Ross seems unable to properly frame a question. One needs no GROUNDS whatsoever to feel jealous or perturbed; what Ross (apparently) means to ask is, Would one have JUSTIFICATION to feel jealous or perturbed. The answer remains no. As for the continuum: feeling jealous or perturbed frequently leads to murder; are the jealous or perturbed therefore murders? The obviousness of the answer illuminates the flatulence of the proposition.

Posted by Miande | June 19, 2008 4:07 PM

I love how passionately men on these threads have been defending their use of pornography.

I don't agree with Ross on politics, and I'm not a prude by any means, but I've come to be against pornography not only for the reasons that Ross expounds on (and yes, there is a link) but also a number of others:

1) Watching too much porn tends to make guys perform worse in bed. I have only anecdotal evidence for this but there seems to be a direct connection.

2) Women don't like it. We claim we do, but secretly, it makes us feel bad about ourselves and our desirability.

Personally, when I meet a guy who watches a lot of porn, I feel about him the same way I feel about a guy who spends all his free time playing video games -- there's nothing WRONG with him, per se, but that's nothing that I would want.

Posted by C.Michol | June 19, 2008 4:19 PM

Thanks Ross, for fielding this subject, seems you've angered all the people who like their massages with happy endings.

Miande - thanks for the pedantic incoherence.

I know, I know, Ross is a Luddite, and, like, soooo 20th Century, dude. He's also on to something.

That I, as a married man, still see Jessica Alba as hot is human. To seek gratification outside of marriage, be it through pron, or "harmless" platonic relationships, no matter how well rationalized and "minor," is wrong. Just because Ross hasn't defined the exact line doesn't mean it doesn't exist or isn't important.

And, to use pop psych, it also doesn't mean you porn freaks aren't in unhappy relationships.

Posted by Ferrell | June 19, 2008 4:20 PM

Ross seems unable to properly frame a question. One needs no GROUNDS whatsoever to feel jealous or perturbed; what Ross (apparently) means to ask is, Would one have JUSTIFICATION to feel jealous or perturbed.

An excellent instance of the "sure, normal humans all feel that way. what ever made you think 'libertarians' are human?" droid logic of the libertine set on the net. I know some of you people, I work with some of you. But geez, you're all sort of crazy, even when you're very smart.

Posted by The Marquis of Carabas | June 19, 2008 4:21 PM

I don't think it's wise to be too judgemental of other people's sins, but I would make two points.

A)Prostitution has moral, legal and medical issues; you're running a very big health risk to yourself and your spouse if you're indulging in it.

B)Nobody involved in pornography, or prostitution obviously, ever wanted to be involved. There is a huge element of exploitation, of people coerced through desperation on account of a host of reasons, e.g., drugs, domestic violence, etc. So patronizing either is not really entirely victimless.

Posted by anonymous | June 19, 2008 4:21 PM

Ross, you know as well as anyone that silly utilitarians like Will Wilkinson view sex as just another physical activity like taking a dump. So obviously jerking off to hardcore pornography to them is not really that big of a deal, and it's why they are OK with people screwing a horse (as long as it doesn't hurt the horse). It's also why he's able to write a post calling Catholic natural law theorists "silly." That's great, Will, but of course, calling something silly and false does not actually demonstrate that it is those things. But do you really expect a whole lot of intellectual rigor coming from a guy who thinks he's demonstrated that free will exists by saying "go on, pick your nose" or something asinine like that? Oh, Will, when will you utilitarians and your chicken coops (I mean crystal palaces), ever learn?

Posted by Philip Marlowe | June 19, 2008 4:24 PM

Miande, no. Ross's original post was not itself a moral argument, but an empirical prediction about other people's actual reactions.

Will's position is that there's sex with other people (meaning physically touching them), and then there's everything else, and that only the religiously-addled don't draw a strong line between the two. So Will's position, as a predictive matter and as a moral conclusion, is that most non-religiously-addled people would have nothing against their partner's paying prostitutes to have sex with each other in their partner's presence, and that they are right to draw the line where they do. I don't think the line Will draws is particularly defensible. I don't think the "touching someone not your spouse/partner" line Will proposes will hold--it doesn't take much imagination (and I know there's plenty) to come up with scenarios in which even someone who otherwise agrees with Will would think a line has been crossed. But putting that to one side, the question is really empirical. And I'm sorry to say that the internet-poster demographic may be an unrepresentative and unreliable sampling of the actual range of opinion on the question. Maybe we should ask a few women, for example.

Posted by Thomas | June 19, 2008 4:25 PM

Anonymous makes excellent points about these so-called victimless hobbies of prostitution and pornography. Everyone should print out the post, wad it up, and throw it at a nearby libertarian.

Posted by Ferrell | June 19, 2008 4:27 PM

I would also like to co-sign on this point from anonymous:

"B)Nobody involved in pornography, or prostitution obviously, ever wanted to be involved. There is a huge element of exploitation, of people coerced through desperation on account of a host of reasons, e.g., drugs, domestic violence, etc. So patronizing either is not really entirely victimless."

Because it's an important one, and also, the dehumanization of the sexual act that porn encourages leads to the dehumanization not just of the viewed but the viewer. We have to learn how to appreciate each other as whole human beings.

Posted by C.Michol | June 19, 2008 4:30 PM

Ross, I certainly see the continuum between paying to watch pros and watching porn. But the move from watching to sex is the categorical discontinuity that takes watching porn off the continuum to adultery.

Additionally, you seem to be saying that paying to watch prostitutes is to porn what watching a play is to watching a movie. But paying to watch pros is more like financing and producing a play and then watching it. The production is a manifestation of your will in a way that porn is not. A better live analogue to porn would be paying to watch a sex show. It was happening anyway and you just tuned in. The extra step involved in staging a production seems an important source of discontinuity.

Of course, I don't think there's anything wrong with sex work, or with patronizing prostitutes. Whether patronizing a prostitute while married constitutes a betrayal akin to an affair depends on the understanding spouses have with one another.

Posted by Will Wilkinson | June 19, 2008 4:31 PM

My wife watches pornography when I'm not there and I don't mind. If she were to pay to watch two people having sex when I wasn't there, I would feel cheated.

I think the distinction is, when watching two people have sex in person, she is directly participating in a sexual act with others; ie they see her watching, she sees them seeing her watching, etc. etc. She has engaged with those other people in a sexual way.

When she watches porn, it's just her and her computer. I don't get jealous of the computer.

If my wife were to use a pair of binoculars to spy on two people having sex in the building across the street, I would be shocked and think she's a total creep, but I wouldn't feel cheated.

Posted by Dave | June 19, 2008 4:44 PM

I think Will's latest post gets us to the agree to disagree stage. I'll agree w/ Will that Ross is making a jump from watching porn to adultery, and I think it's an important point for Ross to make, just not one that men want to hear. The central question is whether the person watching porn is, in some sense, unfaithful in his heart, or whether it is just like watching a play.

Anyways, thanks Will and Ross for the discussion.

Posted by Ferrell | June 19, 2008 4:47 PM

Ross,

Without weighing in on the larger disagreement, I want to make the narrow point that a cheated upon spouse is upset by the physical and emotional act of their partner -- hence the classic defensive statement of the caught cheater, "It didn't mean anything -- it was just physical." He is trying to claim that though he's guilty of the physical cheating, he isn't guilty of the emotional cheating, making his transgression less bad.

Now consider the person watching hardcore pornography. It's a lot more believable when he tells you, "It didn't mean anything -- it was just physical."

And it's a lot less physical than actual intercourse, of course.

Again, I don't want to weigh in on whether this difference is one of kind or degree, but I think it helps explain why some of your interlocutors reflexively view hardcore porn consumption as dramatically different in some undefined way or other from adultery.

Posted by Conor Friedersdorf | June 19, 2008 4:52 PM

Marlowe: "you know as well as anyone that silly utilitarians like Will Wilkinson view sex as just another physical activity like taking a dump. So obviously jerking off to hardcore pornography to them is not really that big of a deal, and it's why they are OK with people screwing a horse (as long as it doesn't hurt the horse). It's also why he's able to write a post calling Catholic natural law theorists 'silly.'"

1) I am not a utilitarian.
2) Every activity is a physical activity.
3) Different forms of sexual activity have different emotional and moral dimensions, and I don't think any of them is emotionally or morally similar to defecation. (Some of them, however, do involve the gastrointestinal system.)
4) I believe that wanting to have sex with a horse is likely a sign of a psychological problem, but maybe not. In any case, I don't see the point of laws against having sex with horses -- as long as you don't hurt the horse!
5) Perhaps Catholic natural law theory is not "silly" simply because it has a long history and a bunch of stuffy adherents, but it is false in a way intellectually mature people easily grasp. Man has no telos.

Posted by Will Wilkinson | June 19, 2008 4:57 PM

Will--You keep pushing on the "we're not touching each other so it's not "sex"" line. Do you think that line will hold? The line doesn't seem promising to me--I can't imagine it being actually persuasive with a partner or spouse.

I'm also a bit amused by your distinction based on whether one is the capital behind the scene or just a paying customer for the scene. I like a little more Hayek and a little less Rand in my capitalism, but my tastes are kinky.

Finally, I appreciate Will's statement that he doesn't see anything wrong with paying prostitutes for sex. But he apparently does seem something wrong with "having affairs"--but surely the harm there too is entirely contextual and depends on the understanding of the parties, etc. etc. Will, you can be so uptight.

Posted by Thomas | June 19, 2008 5:05 PM

If there isn't anything intrisnically _wrong_ with using pornography, then why is there anything _wrong_ with bestiality? It seems to me that pornography has much in common with bestiality in that both constitute a following away from the essential nature of the idealized context of the act of coition, to an even greater degree than having an affair. An adulterous affair at least involves another person and at best can include some of the affection and feeling of a real relationship. This doesn't make it any less a betrayal of one's partner but it makes it less of a departure from the true nature of the sexual act. Pornography, like bestiality, is not just the misuse of sexual love in a wrong context, but is a corruption and perversion of the act itself.

Posted by Hector | June 19, 2008 5:06 PM

it is false in a way intellectually mature people easily grasp. Man has no telos.

I had a feeling this would quickly reach the Smullyan "that's what YOU say" point of assertion of incompatible axioms.

Posted by The Marquis of Carabas | June 19, 2008 5:14 PM

I've gotta take issue with anoymous and all the people seconding and thirding this comment:

"B)Nobody involved in pornography, or prostitution obviously, ever wanted to be involved. There is a huge element of exploitation, of people coerced through desperation on account of a host of reasons, e.g., drugs, domestic violence, etc. So patronizing either is not really entirely victimless."

Uhm. I took part in a few porn movies (more than one, less than a handful). Got a little pin money for one that barely covered my expenses for the others. I did it because I wanted to. No other reason. And I enjoyed myself.

I know that my positive experience doesn't mean that there is no exploitation. I'm sure exploitation is a factor for most who have a "career" in the industry? But in what industry *isn't* that true of the low-level employees (which is what the people in front of the porn camera are)?

Posted by Maxx | June 19, 2008 5:15 PM

I used to think that Ross was merely a middlebrow scold. Given this set of posts, the posts on Roe, the posts on philandering Republicans, I've realized that Ross is a lowbrow hypocritical scold. Amazing stuff.

Posted by SavageView | June 19, 2008 5:16 PM

Maxx, my opinion is just based on being a writer with friends in low places in New York and L.A. But in my experience, show me a girl(and there may be gender differences for men) involved in pornography, or stripping, or prostitution, and I'll show you someone who's been sexually abused. All the bravado about being in control of their destiny disappears after a few drinks, and you start to hear incredibly depressing stories about runnning away from home, etc. And the ones that aren't so screwed up that they'll be lucky to stay alive or out of jail, are all saving up to get out of the business. I grant the rare exception paying off grad school debts, researching a screenplay, or living with Hugh Hefner.

Posted by anonymous | June 19, 2008 5:24 PM

C Michol follows his applause of anonymous with:

"Because it's an important one, and also, the dehumanization of the sexual act that porn encourages leads to the dehumanization not just of the viewed but the viewer. We have to learn how to appreciate each other as whole human beings."

This is just silly. No one appreciates every person they encounter as a whole human being. I don't care about the private longings of the woman in the tollbooth who took my change today, nor about the sibling rivalry of the boy who bagged my groceries. Even though I love the voice and dry wit of the host of the local morning NPR show, I don't value him as a whole human being, nor would it be appropriate. It's not porn, but the fact that most of the people we meet over the course of a month are walk-on players in our lives, as we are in theirs, that prevents us from appreciating one another as whole human beings.

That said, I think entertaining sexual thoughts about real people around you--people you could actually potentially have a conversation with and perhaps even have sex with--is a far greater betrayal to a monogamous relationship than watching a porn video of people you'll never meet.

Posted by Maxx | June 19, 2008 5:26 PM

Pornography, like bestiality, is not just the misuse of sexual love in a wrong context, but is a corruption and perversion of the act itself.

both constitute a following away from the essential nature of the idealized context of the act of coition, to an even greater degree than having an affair.

Using pornography seems to come quite naturally to a great majority of the young men who stumble upon it, Hector. Bestiality is a distinctly minority taste in comparison. So your appeal to some vision of natural law here seems completely independent of how actual human beings actually behave. It's a heavy world God has created here -- shouldn't sensing, thinking beings make some realistic concessions to its gravity?

Masturbation, after all, (sometimes through pornography, often through imagination, sometimes through both), is just so damn common -- seemingly almost universal for males.

Now, I'm not entirely convinced masturbation is entirely morally harmless -- perhaps it's "sinful" in some way, a use of sexual energy in unproductive ways, short of our creator's ideal design for sex. But how is it in the same category as bestiality in any but the broadest sense? Yes, both may be sins and falling aways -- but so are white lies and serial murder.

(Yes, pornography often, if not always, involves exploitation of some sort, which complicates the issue greatly. Sigh.)

Posted by Ban Johnson | June 19, 2008 5:31 PM

"All the bravado about being in control of their destiny disappears after a few drinks, and you start to hear incredibly depressing stories about runnning away from home, etc. And the ones that aren't so screwed up that they'll be lucky to stay alive or out of jail, are all saving up to get out of the business."

Then it would seem the answer is to remove the illegality of prostitution and extralegal status of pornography that consign them to employment-of-last-resort options for many. There's nothing inherent in the work that makes these professions this way, it's only the legal and economic externalities that create this sort of no-win situation for many.

Posted by Maxx | June 19, 2008 5:37 PM

Ross,
Interpreting porn consumption in moral rather than emotional terms seems to obscure the dangers it may pose for a relationship as well as the benefits it can offer to inhibited people in or out of a relationship. When it essentially competes with or even substitutes for physical and emotional intimacy, porn would make most partners understandably jealous and wondering about what was missing in their connection, and why the other person was relying so much on an impersonal outlet. As a private or shared aid to imagination and expressiveness for partners who want to be close but are overly prone to self-restraint, it can further intimacy considerably.

You really should acknowledge both halves of this equation. Because to refrain from exploring somewhat frightening feelings of sexual curiosity and neediness through a safely impersonal medium like porn can be as deadening and disloyal to a relationship as it would be to rely on that medium to the neglect of the other person.

Maxx ... well-said.

Posted by jason | June 19, 2008 5:45 PM

There's nothing inherent in the work that makes these professions this way, it's only the legal and economic externalities that create this sort of no-win situation for many.

So there's nothing inherently sad or pathetic in giving away the most intimate acts of one's body to strangers or co-workers for money?

So, in some libertarian utopia that has demolished such negative externalities, would parents be wrong somehow to be disappointed if their daughter chose sex-worker as a profession?

Sometimes it does seem as if libertarians have let some pure form of reason block out every other instinct, intuition, and sympathy. Doing so is a useful exercise, I suppose, but doing so habitually makes for some pretty weird human beings with some pretty cold opinions.

Posted by Ban Johnson | June 19, 2008 5:47 PM

This whole introduction of prostitutes nonsense seems needlessly convoluted. What exactly is this adding to clarify the heart of this moral problem? Don't you basically just want to ask those that view porn guilt free whether they would be jealous if their partner also viewed porn guilt free?

I have a feeling most would not.

Posted by Ed | June 19, 2008 5:54 PM

What interests me here is the dog that hasn't barked. Two consecutive posts about morality, monogamy and pornography, with Ross taking a traditional religious/conservative position, and no comments from MoeLarryAndJesus? We need--urgently--to determine if one of Mr. Jesus' many online enemies has done him in.

Posted by Sherlock Holmes | June 19, 2008 5:55 PM

"So, in some libertarian utopia that has demolished such negative externalities, would parents be wrong somehow to be disappointed if their daughter chose sex-worker as a profession?"

There's nothing more inherently sad about getting paid for performing intimate acts than there is for the memoirist getting paid for publishing her most inimate thoughts and feelings.

My parents were disappointed that I went into publishing rather than medicine or the law. Legalizing prostitution and making pornography at least as respectable and well-regulated as other forms of filmmaking will do nothing to affect the outlines or rationality of parental approval or disappointment.

Posted by Maxx | June 19, 2008 5:55 PM

Again, Ross' hypotheticals seem to be quite the stretch.

Would I be bothered if my partner paid to see prostitutes have sex with one another?

Yes. That seems like an awful lot of money to waste on something that can be had more cheaply.

Would I feel *jealous*? No more so than when she says she thinks celebrity X is smoking hot.

Now, if that was the *only* way she achieved sexual gratification -- in other words, at the expense of our sex life -- there might be a problem, but I don't think that's what we're discussing. I certainly don't care that she periodically masturbates, nor am I particularly concerned about the contents of her mind while she's doing it (I'm certain that I'm not the only person who stars in the theater of her mind).

I understand that Ross and folks with a similar moral sensibility have a hard time understanding this, but so long as I'm the primary source of her sexual gratification and so long as she isn't having actual sex with other people, I'm just not especially bothered by the notion of her stimulating herself on the side a bit with images or thoughts of other people, not least because I know for a fact that I'm no Adonis.

That's why the continuum argument seems so thin to me. It tries to draw parallels without considering circumstances.

Does Ross object to couples watching hard-core porn together? Does Ross object to people fantasizing while they masturbate? Does he object to fantasizing about other people while having sex with one's partner?

In my opinion, none of these things, in and of themselves, are remotely approximate to adultry, nor are any of them necessarily unhealthy. I'll freely conceed that sexual fantasizing (with or without visual aids) can become problemating for some people, but I think that's more of a psychological issue than a moral issue.

I respect the fact that Ross does think that there's a moral dimension at play here, but he's not going to convince me of that moral argument simply by trying to say that there are certain simularities between fantasy and adultry.

Whether or not Ross appreciates it, I think that there really is a fundamental difference in kind between enjoying sexual imagry and engaging in actual intercourse.

Posted by Andrew Lias | June 19, 2008 5:56 PM

Assuming that there is some moral continuum that includes both adultery and pornography, the moral transgression must be deriving some sort of erotic pleasure in a way that would constitute a betrayal of marital fidelity. The question then is one of contract between spouses and whether marital fidelity precludes erotic arousal from pornography or any source other than the spouse and just what behaviors are permissible.

This of course leaves aside the unrelated question of whether the sex trade industries are corrupt morally or otherwise.

Posted by Not cheatin, just beatin. | June 19, 2008 6:13 PM

If your wife/monogamous partner sought regular sexual gratification through watching prostitutes have sex with one another, you would have no grounds on which to feel jealous or perturbed?

...never thought i'd imagine kerry howely in that context. now have i cheated???

Posted by razib | June 19, 2008 6:37 PM

If your wife/monogamous partner sought regular sexual gratification through watching prostitutes have sex with one another, you would have no grounds on which to feel jealous or perturbed? No grounds for feeling that they were being in some sense unfaithful? Really?

As others have touched on, I would be perturbed in the sense that this would indicate that she was not satisfied in some way with our sex life together, NOT in the sense that I'd be jealous or angry over a perceived form of infidelity. In fact, on some level I think I'd feel somewhat relieved that she was seeking gratification just from watching videos or some other voyeuristic erotica. After all, she could easily choose to start sleeping around or just leave me entirely and seek satisfaction with someone else. The fact that she hadn't would indicate that she was committed to our relationship.

But this is something of a moot point, because if my gal was into porn, I'd just watch it with her.

Posted by Jeff | June 19, 2008 6:46 PM

If you watch porn, you are a sick person. End of conversation.

Posted by Tom | June 19, 2008 7:01 PM

Re: It's a heavy world God has created here -- shouldn't sensing, thinking beings make some realistic concessions to its gravity?

Ban Johnson,

You raise a good point. Of course it's a heavy world, and I fully acknowledge that it's impossible to lead a sinless life. That's why we are in need of a Mediator, and of salvation by grace. As Luther said "Sin boldly, repent more boldly." That doesn't mean however that we should accept things like jerking off or adultery, rather it means that we should try to avoid them, acknowledge that they will happen because of our human frailty, and we should seek forgiveness for them when they do.

Posted by Hector | June 19, 2008 7:02 PM

It sounds a little like Ross is trying to have it both ways here. When it's a matter of prostitution, sex is so unique that it's off the normal moral continuum, if you will, and cannot be treated like any other transaction.

Yet now sex, as in sex between two people, is being confused with masturbation.

Isn't a big part of reason why sex (again, two people) is so different is that that's where babies come from. Hence the sex act is bound up with human mortality and limitations and has all kinds of meaning -- whether you like it or not, whether causual or not -- about who one is and, as a result, profound emotional, spiritual, and physical ramifications (you might have a baby, you might get attached, etc.).

How can you confuse that with masturbation, even if you throw in pornography? Is that act pregnant with the possiblity of reproduction, does it tells us deep things about our origin and our ultimate end, does it inspire possessiveness and sexual jealousy for the girls in the girlie magazine?

Put side by side like that, you can see why masturbation is for most people, unless one is overly attached to it, usually a matter for giggles and not the feelings of shock and betrayal caused by adultery.

Posted by rex | June 19, 2008 7:32 PM

The first time I smoked a cigarette I coughed like crazy. The first time I saw porn I felt ashamed. In both cases, those first instincts were telling.

Also, several years ago Will Wilkinson's mom and I got busy in a Burger King bathroom. I said "I can't believe we're doing this!" She said "It's okay; my son thinks that man has no telos."

Posted by Joe Magarac | June 19, 2008 8:45 PM

I think it’s generally useless to judge the act of one partner of a couple watching pornography outside the context of the relationship. For one couple it's an act that adulterates their union, for another it's a way maintaining an uneasy homeostasis upon which they coexists (could they reach another level?), and yet for another, it may be an act that energizes their passion. From my perspective adultery is an act that violates the covenant (explicit or implicit) that the couple has agreed upon. What ALWAYS worries me are those who, looking from the outside, believe they know what is right and intervene. It is their objectification, usually born out of a moral absolute, that hardens positions and leads to war (domestic or otherwise).

Posted by steve | June 19, 2008 10:39 PM

Steve, is that meant to be a criticism of Ross, or of Julian? I mean, only one of them said that those who disagreed were crazy.

Posted by Thomas | June 19, 2008 11:06 PM

Oh well, I am an intellectually immature person. I never realized that my life has obviously no telos. This is too bad, because that's the one thing I really would like, even more than sex.

(The last sentence is a ripoff from Plato, by the way: "truth is the only thing that can interest us even more than women")

Posted by Carlo | June 19, 2008 11:33 PM

Thanks for reading the comments, Ross.

Also, my bedrock principle that all allusions to "The Humpty Dance" are to be encouraged is sorely tested by Magarac's personal insult.

Posted by Elvis Elvisberg | June 19, 2008 11:33 PM

My point is rather that there's a consistent continuum here

I see apples and oranges.

For one thing, there isn't any potential for sane physical contact between a man or woman and a magazine or television set. There can be no reciprocation. The porn viewer never meets the person on the page or screen. The same cannot be said for a situation in which a man or woman habitually hires two prostitutes and secludes his or herself alone with them for a period of time.

The difference between viewing porn and committing adultery is the difference between reading the Count of Monte Cristo and actually getting one's self convicted of Treason. Hiring prostitutes to perform sex acts (on each other) would be like voluntarily spending all free time at a prison, which doesn't make one a criminal, but is certainly suspicious and strange.

You'd be much better off comparing porn viewing to something like drinking alcohol than adultery or this weird prostitute hypothetical. Alcohol can be a problem for some people, but in most situations, for most people, in moderation, it's probably harmless.

would have no grounds on which to feel jealous or perturbed

Sure, but the issue with adultery is betrayal of a contractual (or sacred if you prefer) agreement, not jealousy or perturbation. One could feel jealous because one's spouse is aging better than one's self. One could feel perturbed because one's spouse is not. That doesn't equate better or worse genetics with the commission of adultery.

Besides, the impression I get from married friends is that jealousy and perturbation is, basically, all that marriage is, infidelity or not.

Posted by Shinyk | June 20, 2008 3:53 AM

Matt,

I usually think your insight is bright....but here you must just have nothing else to talk about.

Your theory is basically: A is a step away from B; and B is a step from C; and C is a step from D; so A is a lot like D.

Under this theory 4 degrees is squashed into one without even considering the cumulative effect.

Wow, I could go from Ginger Lynn Allen to Kevin Bacon without even going through Apollo 13, Kevin Ellis or Devils Rejects. Well thats only 2 degrees of Mr. Bacon, but you get the point.

Posted by Tom | June 20, 2008 4:19 AM

"2) Women don't like it. We claim we do, but secretly, it makes us feel bad about ourselves and our desirability."

This is likely an age thing. A female friend of mine from college was into watching gay porn. Another friend of mine from college, an observant Muslim woman, invented our year's version of the pornathon drinking game.

The main problem with bestiality is one of consent. How does an animal who cannot speak voice consent?

Posted by Reality Man | June 20, 2008 6:35 AM

Joe Magarac,

You raise a good point. Our body is sometimes wiser than our reason, and sometimes rebels against those things that it was not designed for. Our natural instinct is to feel ashamed and embarrassed when we see pornography, and that should tell us something.

Pornography is by the way "unnatural" in a much more literal and obvious sense than other sexual sins. Simply put, our minds and souls were not designed (by God, evolution, nature, or what have you) to deal with images of other people f---ing each other, or to deal with large quantities of images of naked women whom we do not know. Until the late twentieth century these were things that a normal person would go through his entire life without seeing.

In the same way that deer were not designed by evolution to deal with fast cars. Deer and cars do not mix well, and neither do our souls and porn. Pornography warps our minds and souls, whether it be in an abvious way or in a subtle one.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 6:41 AM

Reality Man,

It's pretty depressing to see that not only do some of today's young men use porn themselves, they also find it necessary to corrupt women into doing the same. Pornography is even more a rebellion against women's essential nature than it is against men's. A healthy and normal womam despises pornography. But then again, we all know that the ultimate pleasure of evil is the corruption of the innocent.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 6:46 AM

I'm always both impressed by the range and depth of comments posted on here, and surprised that most people seem to take you at your word when you frequently come of the mount to proclaim.

Why exactly they should, given that when morality connects with reality (i.e. the moment a stand means something), your principles go out of the window.

It's clear in your archive. You are a Janus - when facing the past or the abstract, you can be balanced and reasoned and moral; yet the face which faces the present and reality is consistently hard-nosed, partisan and mercenary.

And yet, somehow these two faces never seem to realise they are the same person and are contradicting each other consistently.

I wonder if it is a scam on your readers, or perhaps you are deluding yourself most of all.

Posted by James | June 20, 2008 6:49 AM

Considering your opinions, as those of a Christian Stalinist, are a joke, who cares what you say? I bet you're a virgin - or someone who couldn't control themselves before they had to convert in order to pretend they had changed and found some sense of self-control.

"It's pretty depressing to see that not only do some of today's young men use porn themselves, they also find it necessary to corrupt women into doing the same. Pornography is even more a rebellion against women's essential nature than it is against men's. A healthy and normal womam despises pornography. But then again, we all know that the ultimate pleasure of evil is the corruption of the innocent.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 6:46 AM"

Except that no one actually made them sat down and watch porn. They are both intelligent women capable of making their own decisions. Women aren't a collection of unthinking, pure porcelain dolls without their own sense of agency who are then sullied by the grubby hands of men. Do you actually think when you write this crap? How do you take yourself seriously?

Posted by Reality Man | June 20, 2008 8:17 AM

It seems to me that watching porn is a lot more analogous to watching Sex and the City than to hiring prostitutes and not touching them.

Ross is usually smart enough to grasp that the medium by which titillation is purveyed makes a big difference. I don't really get this series of posts.

Posted by DivGuy | June 20, 2008 8:46 AM

Through centuries of scourges and disasters, brought about by your code of morality, you have cried that your code had been broken, that the scourges were punishment for breaking it, that men were too weak and too selfish to spill all the blood it require. You damned men, you damned existence, you damned this earth, but never dared to question your code. Your victims took the blame and struggled on, with your curses as reward for their martyrdom - while you went on crying that your code was noble, but human nature was not good enough to practice it. And no one rose to ask the question: Good? - by what standard?

Posted by Jeff | June 20, 2008 9:01 AM

I thought that commenter "Bad" on the last thread had this pretty well wrapped up. In any case, I agree with Bad that:

1) All of the activities involved are on a continuum, so the Fox commentator wrong to say that the pron and affairs are obviously identical, and whoever Ross was originally responding to was wrong to say that they are not alike in any way.

2) As for where you draw a line in the continuum, that really is an issue for the spouses in any given marriage.

I think Ross is on to an interesting moral intuition -- why do we feel that it's worse to engage in live voyeurism than to watch recorded pron? I'm not sure what the answer is, though.

Posted by J Mann | June 20, 2008 9:34 AM

Elvis Elvisberg -

Please don't let my prior post strain your commitment to "The Humpty Dance." My intent was not to insult Mr. Wilkinson.

I was trying to say that porn is not like most things we encounter. It inflames passions. When we ask if it is good for us, we need to acknowledge this fact. But Wilkinson doesn't: he compares porn and kittens.

I thought a your-mama joke might be a clever way to make the point that sex is serious business: the relationship between porn and adultery is not like the relationship between kittens and cotton balls. Where I grew up, your-mama jokes were ironic and not personally insulting. But if you or anyone else (especially Mr. Wilkinson) say the joke as insulting, my apologies.

Posted by Joe Magarac | June 20, 2008 9:50 AM

"I was trying to say that porn is not like most things we encounter. It inflames passions."

So does baseball and the smell of baking cookies. Think of how often people all over the world riot over sports. Or do only carnal passions count?

Posted by Reality Man | June 20, 2008 10:20 AM

A huge problem with this discusion is that it takes place under some unchallanged assumptions about what the collision of sex and photography can and should be, and what the experience of viewing sexually explicit photography (stills, film, video) can encompass. It would take too long to recount the legal and economic reasons for this misunderstanding here, but anyone who thinks it's interesting and/or important to discus what pornography is or isn't, or what watchign it is or isn't would do well to eductate themselves.

With regard to adultary and prosititution, I've spent a lot of time thinking about how sexually explicit images can rendered photographically in a way that is de-commodified and de- transactionalized, without nulifying a sense of eroticism and preciousness; and how idealized sexual beauty can be rendered in a way that invites reflection and celebration instead of comparison. If my films are understood as somethign new or interesting, a lot of that is because they cut against the covetousness that people simply assume will be a part of seeing arousing depictions of explicit sex.

That's also probably why everyone – from critics, to censors, to viewers – have such a hard time categorizing these films. They are frank, they are explicit, but they are not adulterous. Instead of adultery, each film offers a vignette of erotic joy, wrapped in the most normative and pro-social context: loving, mutually pleasurable sex between committed partners.

Also, I'm pretty sure that thinking about sexuality as a "continum" ranging from monogamous to adulterous, or for that matter, from healthy to perverse is a mostly useless way to parse questions of sexual morality. Kraft-Ebbing has been rejected through out the theraputic community, but the shadow of his misbegotten view of sexuality lives on; on this blog, and elsewhere.

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 10:21 AM

Reality Man -

You're right. Porn, sports, and the smell of baking cookies all arouse passions. You imply that because we don't worry too much about the effect that sports and cookies have on people, we shouldn't worry about the effect that porn has, either.

I'm not so sure. I don't think that someone's low-grade, casual love for the Pittsburgh Steelers or for chocolate chips should concern us. But the sorts of Pittsburgh Steeler fans who murder people for wearing opposing teams' jerseys (you can look up a murder at Tom's Diner in Dormont, Pa. a couple years ago) aren't healthy people. Neither is Cookie Monster.

Does porn arouse healthy, causual passions or the less healthy kind? I would argue the latter. It's not an argument I can win - people who watch porn argue the contrary. But I suspect they protest too much.

Posted by Joe Magarac | June 20, 2008 10:48 AM

Question for Will. What if religion makes people happy?

Also, I commend Joe Magarac for his indictment of Cookie Monster. It's by far the bravest -- and probably the truest -- thing anyone has said on this thread.

Posted by Zenobia | June 20, 2008 11:06 AM

Pornography is simply an aid to masturbation for (mostly) men. Masturbation is not adultery. Using images to assist with masturbation is similarly not adultery, any more than it would be adultery for a woman to masturbate after reading a bodice-ripper romance novel, or while she is thinking about that hot guy she saw on the bus who is not her husband.

Adultery = sex with a person other than the one you are married to. Pornography is simply a masturbation aid. There is no physical or emotional connection between the viewing man and the women whose images he is viewing. Therefore, unless masturbation is in itself considered to be an adulterous act, then viewing porn should also not be considered an adulterous act.

The fact that some women get jealous and insecure about their partners viewing porn reflects more on their insecurity than any real basis for jealousy. It's akin to a man being jealous of the vibrators his wife uses as a masturbation aid. People need to grow up and not be jealous of the masturbation aids that their faithful partners use.

Posted by Novaseeker | June 20, 2008 11:18 AM

I hate the pornography argument, because it always has me siding with conservatives against my fellow liberals.

Pornography is a dangerous narcotic for the consumer, and a dark, twisted, slave trade for the performer. In the past, its dangers were limited by its medium. But internet pornography has made an unlimited amount of free drug available, and it is not a pretty site. Look at young college men today. I would say habitual pornography use (I would call it addiction, but habitual use is something we can all agree on without opening that can of worms) is probably something like 90%, as they all have tons of hormones and free ethernet connections. By habitual, I mean at least daily masturbation to hard core pornography.

I never believed there was anything wrong with pornography. I am as socially liberal as they come, and enjoy drinking to excess, and believe sex with whatever partner you want whenever you want is just fine and dandy. But pornography isn't sex. It's the constant training and retraining of your brain to respond to a certain kind of stimulus. It's why men with porn addictions suffer so frequently from ED: after endless, free variety of visual stimuli provided by porn, and after years of training themselves to respond to their own hand, suddenly real sex is problematic.

I've "used" plenty of pornography in my day, but I found it utterly incompatible with a real relationship. When I was heading towards cohabitation with my partner, I decided to give it up. The only problem was that giving it up was INCREDIBLY difficult.

Now I'm about two and a half years removed from having quit, and it has improved so much about my life. My sex drive is higher, my relationship is better, my self esteem is better, and I just feel healthier, like I purged something awful from inside of myself. I know I won't go to my deathbed thinking "Gee, i wished I'd jerked off more to internet porn," so I don't really feel like I'm missing much. I don't judge people who use it and who don't see a problem with it. I hope it never adversely affects them the way it has affected me. But I for one am, hopefully, barring a relapse, done with it forever.

As for the purveyors and performers, "mainstream" pornography is no longer silly movie parodies with campy plots and escalating sex scenes. "Mainstream" pornogarphy is gonzo porn of the most exploitative, misogynistic, racist, dehumanizing variety.

Posted by Barnabe Googe | June 20, 2008 11:28 AM

"The fact that some women get jealous and insecure about their partners viewing porn reflects more on their insecurity than any real basis for jealousy. It's akin to a man being jealous of the vibrators his wife uses as a masturbation aid. People need to grow up and not be jealous of the masturbation aids that their faithful partners use."

I'm sorry, but this is an incredibly ignorant comment. First off, a man would NOT be crazy to be "jealous" of a vibrator if his wife was using it every day, seemed to have more interest in it than him, and seemed to waste hours of potentially productive time with it.

And pornography is more than just a masturbation aid. It changes the entire process of masturbation . It trains to brain to respond to that combination of visual image/hand. A 13 year old boy needs no masturbation aid. A 40 year old man whose been jerking off to porn for 20 years probably can't get it up without some serious hardcore shit. Porn destroys the normal sex drive. At least in some.

Posted by Barnabe Googe | June 20, 2008 11:36 AM

"The fact that some women get jealous and insecure about their partners viewing porn reflects more on their insecurity than any real basis for jealousy. It's akin to a man being jealous of the vibrators his wife uses as a masturbation aid. People need to grow up and not be jealous of the masturbation aids that their faithful partners use.

Posted by Novaseeker | June 20, 2008 11:18 AM"

That or have sex more. If your partner, male or female, is consuming a lot of porn, especially when you are nearby, something is wrong with your sex life. If they would rather watch porn than have sex with you, either they have issues, you have let yourself go or you are just not fun to have sex with. If they are using it when you are apart (extended business trips, etc.), then at least they aren't actually cheating. However, if you get mad that they watched some movie when you weren't around to have sex, then your insecurity is your own problem and you are looking for a way to channel it. If you don't just like having sex in the first place, then you have no real basis for complaining that your partner is looking for other outlets.

"You're right. Porn, sports, and the smell of baking cookies all arouse passions. You imply that because we don't worry too much about the effect that sports and cookies have on people, we shouldn't worry about the effect that porn has, either."

What does "concern" mean here in this context? I'm not really sure. We've already taken several precautions to make sure children cannot see porn (not letting them in porn theaters, not letting them buy or rent porn), with the exception of the internet, which not even the Chinese government can completely control. By the same token, there does appear to be a line of causality running from having access to porn and a reduced incidence of rape (most famously in the late days of East Germany). The bigger problem here is addiction, which in all three cases can be problematic (reduced social contact with porn, obesity in cookies, becoming emotionally unstable and having your mood for extended periods of time determined by box scores in the case of sports).

"I'm not so sure. I don't think that someone's low-grade, casual love for the Pittsburgh Steelers or for chocolate chips should concern us. But the sorts of Pittsburgh Steeler fans who murder people for wearing opposing teams' jerseys (you can look up a murder at Tom's Diner in Dormont, Pa. a couple years ago) aren't healthy people. Neither is Cookie Monster."

Why should someone's porn viewing habits matter to society at large (assuming they aren't watching child pornography)?

I could care less whether people watch porn or not. However, the idea that watching porn can come anywhere near to cheating strikes me as both silly and a bit creepy. If you are going to make a stink in your relationship over this, your relationship has a lot more other problems and you are probably just looking for a reason to break up.

Posted by Reality Man | June 20, 2008 11:43 AM

"seemed to waste hours of potentially productive time"

If a woman enjoyed masturbating with a vibrator for many hours each week, how would that be any more a waste of time than other avocational pursuits she might have?

Would you hold the enthusiastic pursuit of golf, or knitting, or fishing in the same contempt? How about reading and commenting on blogs? Would you be less comtemptuous if she used her fingers instead of a tool?

I find most of what's commonly refered to as "pornography" both banal and unctuous, and I have deep reservations about the manner in which it's produced. But to smeer the enjoyment of one's own sexuality as a "waste of potentially productive hours" reveals a contempt for our capacity to experience joy that rivals the contempt expressed by most producers of pornography.

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 11:49 AM

"I'm sorry, but this is an incredibly ignorant comment. First off, a man would NOT be crazy to be "jealous" of a vibrator if his wife was using it every day, seemed to have more interest in it than him, and seemed to waste hours of potentially productive time with it.

And pornography is more than just a masturbation aid. It changes the entire process of masturbation . It trains to brain to respond to that combination of visual image/hand. A 13 year old boy needs no masturbation aid. A 40 year old man whose been jerking off to porn for 20 years probably can't get it up without some serious hardcore shit. Porn destroys the normal sex drive. At least in some."

First, beware of projecting your own problematic use of porn onto others. Not all men use porn problematically. I agree that if someone's sexual activity outside of masturbation is suffering from the use of porn, then that is an issue that needs addressing. However, that does *not* mean that porn viewing as a masturbation aid is problematic for all people. That's like saying that because some people become alcoholics, that alcohol is bad. It just doesn't follow -- sorry.

Second, again if the wife is using vibrators to the exclusion of sex with her husband, then there is an issue. But if she is not, then there isn't one. For a spouse to get jealous about their partner masturbating when there is an otherwise healthy sex life between the two of them reflects a rather high degree of insecurity.

In sum, you're assuming that all use of masturbation aids is going to be excessive, because that was your own experience with porn use. Sory, but you don't get a free pass to universalize your own problems.

Posted by Novaseeker | June 20, 2008 11:50 AM

I can't believe some people find it odd that a woman might be put off by her partner spending hours using porn. Is it really so mind boggling?

Posted by Barnabe Googe | June 20, 2008 11:52 AM

Reality Man and others,

You say you could "care less" whether people watch porn or not, but you seem to care enough about a spouse's (usually the wife's) reaction to porn consumption to pronounce that anyone who "makes a stink" about porn consumption is demonstrating that the relationship "has problems."

Spouse 1 prefers to watch porn. Spouse 2 prefers that Spouse 1 *didn't* watch porn.

Spouse 1 picks his nose. Spouse 2 prefers that Spouse 1 *didn't* pick his nose?

What's the difference between those two scenarios, in your view of the world? Spouse 2 has just as much right to his/her preferences as Spouse 1, doesn't he/she?

Posted by Zenobia | June 20, 2008 11:53 AM

Really, the boundaries that a couple establishes for its own relationship should be the guidelines here,and nothing else. Both parters ok with it? Great. The problem is, many women have been shamed by a desire not to appear prudish into silently accepting what they find distasteful in a relationship. The porn industry has done an excellent job legitimizing itself in that regard, I must say. Yes, from the consumer side, my personal feelings and experiences won't necessarily be everyone's. But even if harmless to the consumer, do we have no regard for the performers?

Posted by Barnabe Googe | June 20, 2008 12:05 PM

But the sorts of Pittsburgh Steeler fans who murder people for wearing opposing teams' jerseys (you can look up a murder at Tom's Diner in Dormont, Pa. a couple years ago) aren't healthy people

I live in Pittsburgh and remember the murder at Tom's Diner in Dormont. It wasn't over the Steelers. The dead guy was local and not a football fan. He wasn't wearing another team's jersey or engaging in football discussion.

My father was in law enforcement at the time. The version of the story told to him by the Dormont police is that two drunk assholes from Brentwood decided to "stomp a queer" and, when he died, the assholes claimed he had started an argument about the Steelers.

Christmas eve. One of the more tragic and embarassing incidents in this area's history.

If there's any lesson to be learned from Tom's Diner, it has to do with living and letting live, not with the "healthiness" of porn.

Posted by Shinyk | June 20, 2008 12:08 PM

"But even if harmless to the consumer, do we have no regard for the performers?"

That's a point, but it's a separate issue from the adultery issue, which I thought was the main focus of these two threads.

I see the exploitation issue as akin to the level of awareness of exploitation that may be associated with the production of whatever products we may be consuming -- such as our food, clothes, appliances, personal services and the like. There's a *lot* of exploitation that goes on in connection with the production of much of what we consume.

Posted by Novaseeker | June 20, 2008 12:19 PM

Barnabe Googe,

I'm glad that you were able to kick the habit and I appreciated your sharing of your thoughts. That said, I don't think anywhere close to 90% of men use porn. I was a college student not very long ago, of fairly left-wing politics, and I've never used or watched pornography. I don't think my life choices in that regard are that atypical.

I have heard that Cookie Monster, by the way, no longer exists, I think his new name has been changed to "Carrot Monster" (in order not to encourage addiction to sweets among children).

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 12:33 PM

It certainly takes gumption to criticize porn on the largest free porn dispenser ever invented. I appreciate Ross' efforts.

The liberals disdainful of porn shouldn't be ashamed to line up with conservatives. This needn't be a partisan issue.

Also I think the defenders of self-abuse here aren't thinking things through. They're treating their own body as a substitute for their spouse's. This is an assertion of self-sufficiency in what should be a complementary relationship, physically and mentally.

It also treats one's body as interchangeable with a body of the opposite sex. This is one reason why moralists used to contemn male masturbation under the name "effeminacy."

Posted by Kevin J Jones | June 20, 2008 12:36 PM

Also I think the defenders of self-abuse here aren't thinking things through. They're treating their own body as a substitute for their spouse's. This is an assertion of self-sufficiency in what should be a complementary relationship, physically and mentally.

So any unmarried man or woman is in an abusive relationship? Who isn't thinking things through, here?

Posted by Shinyk | June 20, 2008 12:49 PM

"So any unmarried man or woman is in an abusive relationship? Who isn't thinking things through, here?"

I take it that he meant that people who are unmarried or otherwise unattached should not resort to masturbation, but should use their sexual needs as an impetus to get attached to someone.

Ultimately all of that leads to a pretty radical limiting of personal choice.

In any case, in the context of a relationship, it is for the partners to decide whether they are comfortable with each other masturbating.

Posted by Novaseeker | June 20, 2008 1:47 PM

I think Tony Comstock @ 11:49 am hit the nail on the head - but didn't pursue it:

But to smeer the enjoyment of one's own sexuality as a "waste of potentially productive hours" reveals a contempt for our capacity to experience joy that rivals the contempt expressed by most producers of pornography.

The droning scolds on this thread have no concept of 'enjoying one's sexuality'. To them sexuality = sex = biological act of procreation, preferably (and with limited frequency) within the union of a faithful husband and dutiful wife.

I can guarantee you that they would have far more of a problem hearing their copulously copulating, porn-free, married neighbors (just loud enough that the activity is clear) than they would with the same frequency / volume coming from their college-aged neighbors playing Madden Football.

All their blather about masturbation / porn / prostitution is just camouflage for their inherent inability (refusal?) to grasp that sexuality can be healthy and fun. With that in mind, it's no surprise to find out where they stand on the moral / immoral continuum. And there's no way to have a sensible discussion with them on the nuances of sexuality - to them it's pretty much all bad.

Cheers,

Posted by Rofe | June 20, 2008 2:01 PM

"I think Tony Comstock @ 11:49 am hit the nail on the head - but didn't pursue it:

But to smeer the enjoyment of one's own sexuality as a "waste of potentially productive hours" reveals a contempt for our capacity to experience joy that rivals the contempt expressed by most producers of pornography."

Is this "enjoyment of sexuality" really about masturbation? I see there are novels, operas, popular songs, and poetry about the sexuality and other things experienced by two people in marriage, romantic love, and adulterty. If masturbation is such a profound experience of one's sexuality, why isn't it the subject of great art?

Or even if you're talking about pornography. I can't help but think of the scene in the Odyssey where the gods watch Ares and Aphrodite have at, after they've been pinned down by Hephaistos ... and they break out laughing.

There is something funny about the act of sex itself, when you watch it as an outsider as opposed to participating in it oneself. It has to do with the fact that one is overcome by and enthrall to a bodily function, just as one is when one defacates, dies, or eats. That's why we typically have sex in private, close the bathroom door, cover corpses, and cover our mouths when we eat.

There really is something painful about seeing these things unveiled, as it were, and perverse in seeking pleasure, let alone any kind of joy or fulfillment, in that.

Posted by pwc | June 20, 2008 2:27 PM

Ross, your analogy doesn't work because a man who orders prostitutes to put on a sex show for him is interacting with them, whereas a man watching porn has no relationship with the actors. That interaction changes the act from masturbation to sex, or at least to something very close to sex.

A better analogy would be, watching strip shows. As to that, you're also conflating two very different questions when you use the phrase "jealous or perturbed." There are many reasons other than jealousy that a woman might feel perturbed about her SO watching porn or strip shows. She might worry that he was imbibing coarse values about sex and/or women that would harm their sex life and relationship, that he was spending too much time and money on it, that he might resent her for not looking or acting like the fantasies presented, that he wanted something she could not give him (although the same might be true if he went to a good restaurant), etc. None of that means it's the same kind of problem as adultery.

She also might worry that the "next step" would be adultery. And indeed, it might. But it's difficult to say, because most men at some time or other watch porn, and most men at some time or other commit adultery. Common causation seems likely, direct causal relationship less so.

Posted by trilobite | June 20, 2008 3:12 PM

"why isn't it the subject of great art?"

I think that either you must be very stupid, or you must think that I must be very stupid to employ this sort of rhetoric, but for the sake of continuing the discusion, I'll assume you think I'm the dumb one.

If you'd like an answer to your question, first spend a little time woodshedding on the history of harmonic development in Western Music. Pay special attention to the interception of church dogma and technology.

Once you're up to speed on that, spend sometime thinking about the fairly recent advent of the modern novel, and the roll that the ordinary detail of life play in this genre.

After that, spend some time thinking about photography, espeically cinema, and how that intercects with our conception of the ligitimate interests of the state in the regulation of its citizen's sex lives.

Then go read US v. One Book Called Ullyses.

Then maybe spend sometime thinking about Lawrence v Texas.

Then maybe spend some time with California v Miller.

Take a break for lunch. While you chew (mouth closed please) gloat about the impending collapse of ThinkFilm.

Done?

Good. Now tell me again why you think seeing a dead body is anything like watching two people make love?

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 3:26 PM

Novaseeker has it right. Pron is simply self-love fantasy for the uncreative.

If you have a problem with pron, you have a problem with fantasy (the image simply moves from the screen/page to the inside of the eyelid), and therefore a problem with any self love.

Oh, and if you're jealous of your partner's pron or device, your problem isn't with the pron/device; they're inanimate objects, unlike paramours.

Posted by Aultimer | June 20, 2008 4:16 PM

So, a question for Will Wilkinson et al (and judging by the commentary, there's a lot of al out there): If your wife/monogamous partner sought regular sexual gratification through watching prostitutes have sex with one another, you would have no grounds on which to feel jealous or perturbed? No grounds for feeling that they were being in some sense unfaithful? Really?

Really, as long as I had reasonable assurances nothing else was going on. I confess that I find it baffling to even try to understand the mindset where someone would find that offensive.

Posted by Brendan Moran | June 20, 2008 4:17 PM

"I confess that I find it baffling to even try to understand the mindset where someone would find that offensive"

Let me see if I can help you, Brendan.

Let's suppose your spouse paid to prostitutes to have sex for her (his?) enjoyment.

Now let's suppose that one or both of these prostitutes were to be injured or sick as a result of this encounter? In your mind, would your spouse have any legal, eithical, or moral obligation to that prostitute?

How about if one of the prostitutes were to become pregnant? In your mind would your spouse have any legal, ethical, or moral obligation to the prostitute.

If not to the prostitute, then how about the child? If you do not feel your spouse has an obligation, then what about the other prostitute? Does he have a legal, ethical, or moral obligation to the impregnated prostitute, or to her child?

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 4:35 PM

Wasn't it Hobsbawm (or some other Marxist historian) who said something like, "History is to nationalism what the human body is to pornography?" I'm not fond of over-quoting that because I think that as a Marxist, Hobsbawm was overly critical of nationalism which is not always an evil thing. (Was Vietnamese nationalism a bad thing in 1968?) But it would be salutary for us to pause a moment to consider the truth of those words, as Hobsbawm understood them.

The point of that quotation is that, for the Marxist historian, history is the story of class struggles, not of struggles between nations. Nationalists of all stripes claim that they are simply trying to get people to pay due respect to History, and to acknowledge the historical drama- but according to Hobsbawm in order to do this they must distort, mutilate and maim the facts of history. The British nationalist warps history to say that Albion never did any wrong, and the Russian nationalist cannot acknowledge that Peter the Great or Stalin did any wrong. Therefore in claiming that they are glorifying and celebrating history, the nationalist in reality is distorting history such that what should be a chronicle of fact becomes a tissue of lies and half truths.

Whether you agree with this interpretation of nationalism or not doesn't really matter. What matters is that we see exactly the same rhetorical falsehoods employed by professional pornographers like Mr. Comstock. They claim to be celebrating sexuality, romantic love and the human body. But they distort and maim the true nature of all of these things by reducing human sexuality to the purely physical and specifically to its most degrading form. Gone are all specifically human feelings, ideals, and affections- the pornographer's understanding of human sexuality is no higher than the sexuality of an ape or a horse. In pretending (unconvincingly) to celebrate love, sexuality and the body, men like Mr. Comstock are in fact sapping human sexuality of all that makes it worthwhile.

Kevin Jones,

I would not consider myself a social consrvative and disagree with Catholic conservatives on many issues related to human sexuality, nevertheless I think what you say here is almost inarguably true.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 4:36 PM

Pray tell, Mr. Hector, which of my films have you seen, and how did you come by them? I don't see "hector" in our customer database...

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 4:56 PM

I don't have to watch porn to know that there's something wrong with it, just as I don't need to taste rotting meat to know that it is bad for you.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 5:14 PM

Um. Okay. Another question:

You said "They claim to celebrate They claim to be celebrating sexuality, romantic love and the human body."

Certainly I make that claim, and hope that my films (at least in some small ways) live up to that claim.

I am, however, unaware of anyone else making such claims, most especially not the "romantic love" part; at least not in the context of sexually explicit films.

Perhaps you are not willing to give such claims, whether by me or anyone else the benefit of the doubt. But I would very much like to see such a film, or at least an attempt at such a film.

If you know of someone who is making such claims about their film, I would very much like a name. Any information, names of directors, titles, studios that "claim to be celebrating sexuality, romantic love and the human body" would be very appreciated!

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 6:15 PM

Hector,
Stop and think: if you don’t offer reasons and just rely on your feeling that porn is “bad for you,” you will convince zero people even if you’re correct.

You’d have a hard time in any case, because some of us don’t think pictures and video of the living, sensual human body should be analogized to rotting meat. And since most porn focuses particularly on the female body, you might really want to reconsider your use of that analogy. No,, really.

But if you offer reasons for your position, you have at least a chance of convincing those of us who think porn, like television or literature, is a medium of wildly varying quality and that not be condemned wholesale.

Posted by jason | June 20, 2008 6:19 PM

...that should not be condemned wholesale.

Posted by jason | June 20, 2008 6:24 PM

I would offer that "pornography" really isn't a genre, subject matter, or intent. Pornography is simply a business model that assumes certain relationships of economy of scale, access to markets, and distribution methods.

The end result, how porn looks, how it feels to watch, has very little to do with any creative or social concerns on the part of the producers. It is simply demand set against an extremely constrictive set of business parameters, with a rather niggerly result.

This is why we have some very wonderful erotic literature, but nearly no wonderful erotic movies. If my spouse spent a lot of time masturbating to video pornography, I would be concerned; but not because I felt she was cheating on me. I'd be concerned that she felt the need to subject herself to such distressingly poor material for the sake of having an orgasm.

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 6:49 PM

What a horibly embarrassing typo:

"niggardly"

Apologies.

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 6:53 PM

Jason,

It seems to be like my interlocutors in this thread are, subconsciously, assuming a certain set of axioms on which they argue. For example these axioms seem to be implicit in the discourse:

1) The rightness or wrongness of an action is to be determined by the benefit vs. the harm that it causes.
2) An action is beneficial if it conduces to pleasure and malefic if it conduces to pain.
3) Our identity as humans is up to us to create.
4) Marriage is whatever the two married partners decide it should be.
5) Consent is the ultimate standard to determine whether a sexual act is good or bad.
6) Human sexuality can be shaped into whatever the participants mutually desire.
7) There is no pre-existing Final End to which all morally correct human behavior must tend.
8) There is no pre-existing ideal to which sexual and romantic relationships should tend and against which they can be judged.
9) The state should not seek to cultivate virtue among its citizens.
10) Existence precedes essence.
11) Sexual intercourse need not be tied to love and affection.
12) Male and female are not essentially different.
13) Gender is a social construct.
14) Sexual satisfaction can be legitimately enjoyed by oneself instead of as part of a complementary pair.

And so forth, and so on. The problem is that as I see it each of these propositions is clearly false, and a pernicious moral error. It is difficult for me to argue successfully with anyone who is deluded into accepting the errors listed above. Pornography is wrong in its essential nature, not just because it is generally accompanied by addiction and exploitation. However, the legacy of the porn industry which we see in social and emotional damage it creates is a hint as to Who or What is really proposing the propositions I listed above.

To put it bluntly, I do not think that human sexuality and the human mind and spirit were designed for the purpose of whacking off to "Debbie Does Dallas" or I don't know what. Our sexuality is intended to be used as an expression of love and affection, or for the creation of new life; it was assuredly not meant for stimulation through commercial media and for solitary release. Pornography separates sexuality from its proper context and is thus intrinsically wrong. Is that enough of an argument for you?

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 7:02 PM

Hector, that's a circular argument, and therefore not persuasive. You have just asserted that:

1) Human sexuality was "designed" with some kind of concrete goals and intents, specifically those which you believe are morally correct, so

2) Sexual practices which are outside of your personal definition of morality therefore go against the "intent" of human sexuality, therefore

3) Those practices are immoral.

What's the point of doing that much typing when your conclusions are identical to your assumptions?

Posted by also | June 20, 2008 7:21 PM

"What's the point of doing that much typing when your conclusions are identical to your assumptions?"

My guess would be that if you believe masturbation is unvirtuous, and you don't smoke, you have to find something to keep your hands busy.

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 20, 2008 7:38 PM

Our sexuality is intended to be used as an expression of love and affection, or for the creation of new life; it was assuredly not meant for stimulation through commercial media and for solitary release.

The coffee bean is intended to be the reproductive vehicle of the coffee plant and the creation of new life; it most assuredly was not meant to be ground up and filtered with hot water through thin paper membranes and drunk with sugar and/or cream in order to increase alertness in the human brain. The cultivation of coffee beans for consumption by homo sapiens is therefore immoral.

The skull is intended to house and protect the brain from injury and to give shape to the human face; it most assuredly was not intended for stimulating the brain by using its hardness to deflect soccer balls into metal-framed nets. The use of the skull for directing soccer balls into such nets is therefore immoral.

The teeth are intended for the rending and tearing of food to facilitate it's passage through the esophagus; they most assuredly were not intended for the trimming of finernails. The use of the teeth as a tool in hygenic practices such as self-regulation of fingernail length is therefore immoral.

Seriously, I could go on like this for weeks.

Posted by Jeff | June 20, 2008 9:14 PM

Tony Comstock and others,

Feel free to keep calling me names, if it makes you feel good to do so. If every additional minute that you spend calling me names on a blog means one less minute spent introducing innocent young women to sexual degradation, then I would consider that a good bargain.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 10:13 PM

Also,

You haven't answered my question. Do you or do you not accept the 15 false propositions which I listed above? I could supply more if you like.

I would suggest you begin your consideration of these matters by a thorough reading of the Platonic dialogues. After that, come see me for some more reading suggestions.

Posted by Hector | June 20, 2008 10:17 PM

Hector:

you are dealing with the products of a certain type of US college education: people who think that the highest form of rationality is embodied in a high-school debating society, namely formal logical argumentation without any serious attempt at reflection about one's personal experience (say of sexuality, affection, longing etc.). Thus, you get people like also, Jeff etc., who delight in logically deconstructing your argument, without considering for a second that perhaps what you are proposing is not a formal deduction from axioms, but a reflection on your most personal experience of what it means to be a human being. In other words, nobody ever taught them that rationality requires lots of observation, not lots of abstract reasoning.

The disaster is that in this country the smarter among these people go to law school, and by the time they are in they are forties they have lost every contact with reality just when they are ready to reach positions of great power.

In this context I can only remind you of Jesus's suggestion about not casting pearls to those who cannot appreciate them (politically correct version of Matthew 7:6)

Posted by Carlo | June 20, 2008 10:54 PM

Searches, traffic and sales are up overnight. Google analytics suggests this "debate" is at least partially to blame, so I'll bite:

1) The rightness or wrongness of an action is to be determined by the benefit vs. the harm that it causes.

I do not believe that the ends justifies the means. I do believe that if the ends are questionable, then the means should (at the very least) be questioned.

2) An action is beneficial if it conduces to pleasure and malefic if it conduces to pain.

I believe this is a manifestly and demonstrably false statement.

3) Our identity as humans is up to us to create.

This would seem to speak to a belief in what AA people call "a higher power." I am not certain of what my beliefs regarding a higher power. I am quite certain I have never met a human being who was an authority on what any such higher power wants me to be. And certainly not you, Hector.

4) Marriage is whatever the two married partners decide it should be.

Are we talking about marriage as a civil contract or the religious institution? If we are speaking of it as the religious institution, then it would seem that the partners have no say in the matter at all. God decides what a marriage is or isn't.

5) Consent is the ultimate standard to determine whether a sexual act is good or bad.

This statement is too vague. My chief concern is the intrusion of the state into the lives of it's citizens' private affairs. I believe that the state has a rather poor track record of parsing good and bad, so I favor consent (usual legal definition) as a standard for determining whether or not the state should intrude.

6) Human sexuality can be shaped into whatever the participants mutually desire.

I think you mean "should be allowed to be" not "can". Human sexuality can and is shapes into whatever the participants mutually desire. It happens everyday. Allowing for the usual legal standard of consent, the state should butt out.

If you, Hector, or anyone else wants to offer a vision "proper sexuality", inspired by your understanding of a higher power, sacred book, or deep reflection or whatever else, I absolutely defend your right to do so. I may even agree with some or all of what you believe. But I will fight with my last breathe to prevent your beliefs from being enshrined into law.

7) There is no pre-existing Final End to which all morally correct human behavior must tend.

I disagree with this statement. I am also quite certain that you, Hector, do not know what this Final End is.

8) There is no pre-existing ideal to which sexual and romantic relationships should tend and against which they can be judged.

Without including whom shall be the judge and what shall be the result of such a judgement, this is a meaningless statement that can be either agreed to, or disagreed with.

9) The state should not seek to cultivate virtue among its citizens.

In this context "virtue" can only be understood to mean "civility", so I would have to say I disagree with this statement. I believe the state should seek to cultivate virtue among its citizens.

10) Existence precedes essence.

Are you asking if I believe I have a soul? I am quite certain I have a soul.

11) Sexual intercourse need not be tied to love and affection.

Need? By whom? I need sexual intercourse to be tied to love and affection, both in my marriage and in my films. I have trouble understanding people who profess to enjoy sexual intercourse in the absence of love and affection.

12) Male and female are not essentially different.

I disagree. Vive la difference!

13) Gender is a social construct.

Gender is a combination of things, including a social construct.

14) Sexual satisfaction can be legitimately enjoyed by oneself instead of as part of a complementary pair.

I agree! Absolutely!

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 21, 2008 11:41 AM

Also, I've read and re-read my comments, but don't see any name calling, at least not on my part.

I do see you saying some very uncharitable things about me and my films, and comparing me to a horse and an ape, all, by your own admission, without knowing thing one about my work.

Additionally you seem to take great satisfaction in saying these cruel things about me, and by extension, about the men and women who are generous enough to share the best part of themselves by appearing in my films.

I can only imagine why you feel a need to express yourself in this way, but it's ugly and uncalled for.

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 21, 2008 12:09 PM

Carlo,

Very true. As the example of Buridan's ass points out, pure and unaided reason can never be a sufficient guide to action or to life, and is in fact self-refuting. Casting pearls before swine may be worthless, but then again you never know where you might find someone ready to be changed. St. Paul was something of a swine before the road to Damascus, after all.

Mr. Comstock,

I'm not sure why the accusation of incivility from a professional pornographer should bother me, but maybe you have a different opinion.

Posted by Hector | June 21, 2008 1:27 PM

I'd suppose the ecstatic bliss of two safely married and procreatively loving partners and the cheapest, most degrading sexual act, compelled under constraints of overt coercion and distributed for commercial purposes, can be construed as occurring on a "continuum" as well. What follows from that? Sanity? Ah, well.

Posted by praxis | June 21, 2008 1:38 PM

Hector, your "15 propositions" are merely your own moral code. Where you have gone wrong is in thinking that they are universal or somehow codified into nature or evolution.

Please just do us all a favor and say that your beliefs are faith-based, and therefore 1) universally true, but 2) unprovable by logic.

It always goes terribly wrong when people like you try to justify a fundamentally religious outlook with rational argument. From your point of view, your assumptions / propositions / conclusions are unassailable, because they are all true and support each other. To an outsider who takes you at your word that you're trying to make sense, it comes across as an endless repetition of "it's true because it's true because it's true."

I just feel a little sorry for you that you'll never experience a normal sex life with all tha guilt and shame about the act. It really can be quite lovely. And masturbation's better than nothing, too :)

Posted by also | June 21, 2008 10:16 PM

If your wife/monogamous partner sought regular sexual gratification through watching prostitutes have sex with one another, you would have no grounds on which to feel jealous or perturbed? No grounds for feeling that they were being in some sense unfaithful? Really?

Nope. That'd make me wanna jump her even more to be honest. "Hey, what say we film our own porn, eh?"

Posted by b-psycho | June 21, 2008 11:35 PM

Hector wrote -
"Casting pearls before swine may be worthless, but then again you never know where you might find someone ready to be changed. St. Paul was something of a swine before the road to Damascus, after all."

I'm gathering up Mr Comstock's pearls and making them into a necklace...

Posted by Wilmot | June 22, 2008 9:20 AM

"You say you could "care less" whether people watch porn or not, but you seem to care enough about a spouse's (usually the wife's) reaction to porn consumption to pronounce that anyone who "makes a stink" about porn consumption is demonstrating that the relationship "has problems.""

It depends on the relationship itself, which I outlines above. However, my main point is with people thinking watching porn = cheating. There is something sick in that construction. Think through the differences between the actions someone takes to download a video of bittorrent vs. someone who takes the pains of picking someone up at a bar discreetly, having an affair, paying for a prostitute, etc. while still married. The latter cases involve the risk of getting a third party pregnant, frequent lying to one's spouse and passing STD's onto one's spouse. It is just about the highest form of disrespect and betrayal of trust you can show your spouse short of killing their parents. Jerking off for five minutes to a video is simply not in the same ballpark and anyone who sees these as equivalent has severe emotional issues and is not connected to reality.

Posted by Reality Man | June 22, 2008 9:34 AM

Reality Man,

Neither Ross nor anyone else on this thread (as far as I can remember) ever claimed that those two things were *equivalent.*

But you haven't really addressed my main point. You and others here have seemed to suggest that watching and getting sexual gratification from porn is "no big deal" and "not anyone else's business." Your non-judgmental attitude, however, doesn't seem to extend to those people who -- while not considering their spouse's porn habit to be the equivalent of adultery -- are nevertheless made very uncomfortable by the habit (for reasons that some others on this thread have explained very well).

You seem to live in a world in which "prudes" are fair game for judgment and condemnation, but pornographers are not.

I prefer things the other way around. Very "prudish" of me, I know, but, then again, who are you to judge?

Posted by Zenobia | June 22, 2008 12:10 PM

Zenobia,

I've written more than a few words about dismissive attitude towards "prudes" that people who think watching porn is "no big deal" often seem so eager to display.

The problem is that when Ross equates watching porn with adultery, he is creating a premise that ultimately dismisses the very legitimate pain that a spouse might feel.

Watching porn is sexual. Adultery is sexual. That does not mean that watching porn is adultery, or even on a continuum with adultery.

But the fact that watching porn is not on a continuum with adultery doesn't mean the pain a spouse might feel is something to be dismisses with "Get over it, you're a prude." There are ways that our spouses can disapoint, wound or betray us that involve sex, but have nothing to do with adultery.

A man might refuse his wife oral sex, but that's not adultery. A woman might refuse to have sex in one position or another, that not adultery either. Whatever pain these might cause in a marriage isn't going to be solved by calling someone a prude or telling them to get over it.

Watching pornography has the potential to be harmful to a relationship in all sorts of ways, or it may be entirely benign. But either way, it's nothing to do with adultery. By suggesting that is, Ross and other muddy the waters. So do the people who say "You're a prude. Get over it."

Posted by Tony Comstock | June 22, 2008 5:04 PM

Also:

there you go again: "unprovable by logic," as if that was the . Your last post testifies that you are gold standard of rationality! What about "provable by experience?" Without experience and observation (in the case of sexuality: the well-reflected-upon experience of being a person in relationship with another person) logic is just the intellectual equivalent of masturbation. According to your last post you seem to be willing to settle for both of them.

Posted by Carlo | June 22, 2008 6:58 PM

Also:

there you go again: "unprovable by logic," as if that was the gold standard of rationality! What about "provable by experience?" Without experience and observation (in the case of sexuality: the well-reflected-upon experience of being a person in relationship with another person) logic is just the intellectual equivalent of masturbation. According to your last post you seem to be willing to settle for both of them.

Posted by Carlo | June 22, 2008 6:59 PM

But the fact that watching porn is not on a continuum with adultery doesn't mean the pain a spouse might feel is something to be dismisses with "Get over it, you're a prude."

This is about right. Perhaps a spouse or SO objects to and is hurt or annoyed by any usage of porn. Perhaps a spouse or SO objects to and is hurt or annoyed by only excessive usage of porn. In either case, the appropriate comparison is alcohol, which can be a seen as a weakness, not adultery, which is a willful, purposeful betrayal (and breach of contract to boot).

Carlo,
"unprovable by logic," as if that was the gold standard of rationality! What about "provable by experience?"

In discussions such as this one, logic is the "gold standard" of "rationality" because logic is largely objective, universal. "Experiences" are not objective, universal or shared. How is something "provable by" subjective "experience" when the very existence of disagreement in this thread is, itself, proof that experience doesn't hint towards any one particular conclusion, let alone prove anything?

Posted by Shinyk | June 23, 2008 3:17 PM

Shinyk,

Wrong. Logic is of no value in determining the truth or falsity of your fundamental axioms. Logic is a great tool for reasoning _from_ your axioms to a conclusion, but it can't get you _to_ your axioms in the first place. Those axioms can only be arrived at through non-logical pathways such as native intuition. For example, what good is it if you manage to persuade me that liberal-democratic values require us to tolerate pornography, if I don't share the idea that liberal society is a good thing in the first place? If we disagree on the final end to which society should be striving, then logic cannot bring us to agreement on the means.

It is very true that my experience is very different from that of a habitual user of pornography. However, that poses few problems for a serious person's moral reasoning. A habitual user of pornography has maimed the voice of his conscience, either through malice or (more likely) through ignorance. I wouldn't listen to an alcoholic's opinion of the relative merits of drunkenness vs. sobriety, either.

I don't think I am going to convince you but I'll take a shot anyway. What do you think the _natural_ reaction of a person seeing pornography for the first time is? I'm not asking about the experience of a habitual user- time and familiarity will wear away a lot of our instinctive reaction. Is it the case that we _naturally_ like pornography and society tells us that it's something shameful? Or is it the case that we _naturally_ are embarrassed, ashamed and vaguely repelled by it, the same way as we are with tobacco, and social pressure gradually acclimatises us to it? Based on everything I have experienced up to this point, I would place my bets on the latter. What would you say?

Posted by Hector | June 23, 2008 11:18 PM

A habitual user of pornography has maimed the voice of his conscience, either through malice or (more likely) through ignorance...Is it the case that we _naturally_ like pornography and society tells us that it's something shameful? Or is it the case that we _naturally_ are embarrassed, ashamed and vaguely repelled by it, the same way as we are with tobacco, and social pressure gradually acclimatises us to it?

This is why logic (hopefully in concert with data) is a far more useful than any one person's experience. Logic is objective. Each of these sentences is subjective and contains assumptions that are suspect. For instance:

You seem to be suggesting that shame is a natural mechanism that points out the inherent wrongness of an act by the participant. What about the shame often felt by a rape victim? What was his or her wrongdoing?

How does one prove porn causes shame? If proven, how does one quantify the level of shame? How does one find causality in the unquantifiable?

Also, you assume a universal identicality that I don't accept. Where is the evidence of a "we," as featured in your notion that "we human beings will have identical reactions to each specific stimuli?" Haven't you known someone who loved, let's say, roller-coasters from the very first hill and someone else who vomited?

How do you know that "consciousness is maimed" by porn? Because you just know? You've never looked at porn, and dismiss the opinion of anyone who has by saying they've been irreparably altered by it.

I am glad you brought up the metaphors of alcohol and tobacco, because they are far more appropriate than Douthat's adultery analogy. No, I wouldn't very well trust an opinion on pornography given by someone who spends 15 hours a day looking at it. That parallels the behavior of addicts closely enough for me to comfortably call it addiction.

However, I would also not take seriously a description of alcohol's taste by someone who has never, his or herself, imbibed.

I would not take seriously a warning about alcohol's effects from someone who has never personally known or seen anyone who has ever had a drink, and who presents no data. Such a person would be making blind, alien speculation, which is of no use to anyone.

You asked me my personal, subjective guess as to the cause of feelings of shame associated with porn. The short answer, which I've already given, is that I think you are, without evidence, assuming as fact an arguable reaction, then extrapolating that arguable reaction over every member of the human race. Your question implicitly includes the premise: "There exists, therefore all," when "there exists" is improvable and the rest is fallacy. Since the question, as premised, is fallacious, I can't give a proper answer. The question doesn't merit one, anyway.

I will, however, tell you my own subjective, general opinion of porn. It's not my cup of tea. I've not spent one red cent on porn magazines, videos, DVDs, websites (etc.) in my entire life. I'm not uninterested in porn because I find it "shameful" or "immoral," but because I find it boring and pointless--a half-assed, insincere, low-quality approximation of something that's much more enjoyable in person. For me, watching porn is to having sex what watching a decade-old, pre-recorded game of Pong is to going on a court and playing tennis.

I've also never had a friend who was demonstrably, noticeably, or even arguably damaged by taking a greater interest in porn than my own.

Do I think porn has any value? The only value porn has for me is that it's a frequent target by people with nebulous vendettas against it, and who wish to subject others to the terms of those vendettas for no discernable reason other than something I suspect is a form of subconscious, judgmental megalomania (I think ____ is ____, therefore all must abide). In that sense, I think porn is worth defending. Then again, I'll also defend pot use on the same grounds and, unlike porn (which I'm merely "not into"), I positively despise pot, pot use and pot culture.

Would I be concerned if a lover liked porn? Since I've never had a lover who obsessed about porn enough to be a day-to-day, week-to-week element in my life, no, but, then again, I'm a straight male. Maybe some straight women or gay men, with lovers who like porn more than me, have a different experience or a different idea about how much of something that doesn't interest them they want in their lives (despite the fact that I will defend pot use in the objective sense, if my girlfriend starts smoking pot tomorrow, the two of us have a problem). That's why individual couples work such things out on case-by-case bases.

If, however, a lover found me looking at porn (which would be unlikely), and accused me of adultery or cheating, I would be outraged enough at the illegitimacy of that accusation to walk out the door, probably for good.

Posted by Shinyk | June 24, 2008 2:49 AM

Hector:

Is it the case that we _naturally_ like pornography and society tells us that it's something shameful? Or is it the case that we _naturally_ are embarrassed, ashamed and vaguely repelled by it, the same way as we are with tobacco, and social pressure gradually acclimatises us to it? Based on everything I have experienced up to this point, I would place my bets on the latter. What would you say?

I also remember my first exposure to porn. It excited me--and not just below the waist. My skin felt suddenly more alive. My brain lit up: "Oh, that's it!" And it wasn't a matter of learning the facts of reproduction. I had already been through sex ed in school, so I already knew the mechanics, but it was like I had suddenly pried open a door to beginning to understand the ways in which sexuality integrated into the rest of an adult life. The only anxiety I felt was over the fact that it was someone else's pornography that I was looking at without their permission.

So definitely the former. We instinctively understand that our sexuality and that of others is something to be celebrated, like the joys of eating well and cooking well for others. It is only society that enforces the notion of shame.

And I am confident that most people share my experience of it that way, and that your shame-based reaction is both unnatural and unusual.

Posted by Maxx | June 24, 2008 3:52 PM

Or another way to put it: The first time I viewed porn was the first time I really understood that, while sex could result in pregnancy and reproduction, the desire to have sex and the desire to have children were two separate things. And the sudden unlocking of that knowledge, that understanding, excited me tremendously, both intellectually and emotionally.

There was no sense of shame in having come to that realization, just the excitement in having unlocked a secret that made previously unfathomable things suddenly make sense.

Posted by Maxx | June 24, 2008 4:30 PM

"Is it the case that we _naturally_ like pornography and society tells us that it's something shameful? Or is it the case that we _naturally_ are embarrassed, ashamed and vaguely repelled by it, the same way as we are with tobacco, and social pressure gradually acclimatises us to it?" Hector

TR: I don't think it has to be an either/or proposition.

It's possible to be repelled and pleased at the same time. It's like when I watch some Adam Sandler movies. I'll laugh and yet feel a sense of revulsion at the same time.

That said I don't think this is somehing social pressure creates, at least not for everyone. There clearly has been times when social pressure was against it and yet it existed. Looking at attractive naked people is sexy for most people. Watching people have consensual sex is generally arousing for most anyone I know. (Including me, older devoutly religious people, etc) What makes porn potentially repulsive is that, what little I've seen of it, it's clearly just dead-eyed people doing mechanical things to make a living. Their bodies might also be as artificial as the set-up. If done right sex is well sexy. This almost just seems logical.

Posted by Thomas R | June 24, 2008 4:42 PM

Thomas R.,

I'm not talking about the frank portrayal of human sexuality and the naked human form. Not all portrayal of naked people is pornography. The Cherubim in medieval art, for example, are not pornography. Yes the portrayal of sex "done right" is sexy. But being "done right" means being tasteful and above all true to human nature. It means in the interest of taste, leaving some of the more graphic details up to our imagination, and above all it means, in the interest of truth, portraying sex in the way that it naturally occurs in a healthy human life, that's to say in the context of a loving and committed relationship, and with all the emotional complexity and affections that are associated with such a relationship.

When you artificially separate the physical and emotional aspects of human intimacy, for the purpose of inflaming lust, then that becomes pornography. Our natures and our aesthetic sense rebel against such a separation. Until of course we deaden that aspect of our nature by repeated abuse, and build up a tolerance to it.

And no, actually, pornography didn't exist until the modern era- it quite clearly _couldn't_ exist in an age before the rise of the mass media. It certainly was never the staple of popular culture that it is today. Neither God nor evolution designed us to be exposed to graphic images of people engaged in the most impersonal and degrading sexual activities. We are in fact embarked on a major assault on the human faculty of discrenment.

Posted by Hector | June 24, 2008 5:16 PM

Re: I had suddenly pried open a door to beginning to understand the ways in which sexuality integrated into the rest of an adult life.

Max,

If you think that pornography has anything to do with "the ways sexuality integrate[s] into the rest of an adult life," then I truly feel sorry for you. As I implied in my post to Thomas R. above, pornography does precisely the opposite. A healthy adult does not engage in the kind of promiscuous, degrading, and impersonal encounters depicted in pornography.

Posted by Hector | June 24, 2008 5:24 PM

1. I never said that sexuality portrayed in porn (or specifically in the first porn I viewed--an old silent 8mm loop, that, unlike others I have seen since, had participants who seemed to really have desire for one another rather than simply going through the motions for money) replicated any actual behavior in life. And even then I realized that it had less relationship to sex-as-lived than soap opera has to life-as-lived. But still, it offered me the real revelation that the desire to have sex and the desire to have children were two separate things. So you may feel sorry for the strawman you have built from my response, but not for me.

2. Your claim that a healthy adult never engages in promiscuous or impersonal behaviors is utter bullhockey. Some healthy adults do, others don't. Some who engage in such behaviors do so in an unhealthy, even addictive way; others do not. Others can wield their monogamy or even their chastity as a weapon, cling to it like an addiction or lean on it like a crutch, rather than relying on it in a healthy supportive manner.

Indeed, your addiction to absolutist pronouncements seems decidedly unhealthy.

Posted by Maxx | June 24, 2008 5:51 PM

On the contrary, Hector, your "addiction" to "absolutist pronouncements" seems decidedly sane and healthy. I'm not so sure about your addiction to casting pearls before, um, porcine creatures, though.

Posted by Zenobia | June 24, 2008 7:44 PM

"But being "done right" means being tasteful and above all true to human nature. It means in the interest of taste, leaving some of the more graphic details up to our imagination, and above all it means, in the interest of truth, portraying sex in the way that it naturally occurs in a healthy human life, that's to say in the context of a loving and committed relationship, and with all the emotional complexity and affections that are associated with such a relationship." Hector

TR: Yeah I think you're being unrealistic. I didn't think we meant what humans should ideally find sexy or good. I was discussing more what actually can turn them on by nature as I thought that was the question.

And I think lusty sex outside of a loving and committed relationship is naturally seductive for many to most people. If not in reality than in a fantasy. If you never have had any desire for such a thing good for you, but I don't think the Bible even indicates that's the norm. I think Jesus's statement about "lust in the heart" was a reminder that we're all sinners and inside even a virtuous man is a capability inside the sinner. That our virtue is tested. I think we are to become better than our base nature, but that doesn't mean our base nature doesn't exist or is created by peer pressure.

And in some ways not having such a nature may not be such a good thing. It might be harder for you to understand that many have to struggle with desires that are beyond their control.

This is coming from a guy who's more against fornication than you. Although possibly that's because you see fornication as just being people in committed and loving relationships, well exempting promiscuity. Still even with people who aren't promiscuous I'd imagine many had one pre-marital encounter that was casual and not in any committed relationship. They may regret it later, but I don't think that means it was necessarily unpleasurable at the time.

Posted by Thomas R | June 24, 2008 9:35 PM

"Now let's suppose that one or both of these prostitutes were to be injured or sick as a result of this encounter? In your mind, would your spouse have any legal, eithical, or moral obligation to that prostitute?"

No, of course not. Sex workers are independent contractors. They are responsible for their own health and safety concerns.

"How about if one of the prostitutes were to become pregnant? In your mind would your spouse have any legal, ethical, or moral obligation to the prostitute."

No, not at all.

"If not to the prostitute, then how about the child?"

No.

"If you do not feel your spouse has an obligation, then what about the other prostitute? Does he have a legal, ethical, or moral obligation to the impregnated prostitute, or to her child?"

Trickier, but I would say no, unless such responsibility was pre-negotiated. It's a transactional relationship akin to sperm donation.

"Do you or do you not accept the 15 false propositions which I listed above?"

I do not accept that they are false propositions, no. I agree with all fifteen propositions and I find it disturbing, though not surprising, that anyone else doesn't.

Posted by Brendan Moran | June 30, 2008 2:25 PM