Girls dealing with boys' sexual behavior

[Jarhyn]

I think Jarhyn's post is basically the #3 to Toni's list.

1. Teaching people to treat all others with respect (which absolutely must include "'no' means 'no'" & that anything less than an enthusiastic "yes" still means "no")

2. Teaching basic sexual education

3. Teaching that humans are and like an entire spectrum of stuff, and that none of it is wrong as long as #1 is being followed.

And specifically teaching that, if you want to do porno style stuff, ask, and roleplay it honestly, don't just assume and do.

Exactly! (Likewise, if you want to do plain vanilla stuff, ask, don't just assume and do)

It really all comes down to genuinely respect the other person. I've never understood why that is so difficult for some people

To be fair, it took me a long time, too... Largely because nobody ever discussed this with me, I just had to figure it out.

I mean shit, there's a whole CARTOON about this now called Big Mouth! What it took me 20 years to learn could all be learned in a weekend worth of binge watching Netflix, and people STILL aren't educating their fucking spawn.

 

[Gun Nut]

Care to respond to the following (from the OP)?

“The Impact of Internet Pornography on Adolescents” found that adolescent consumption of internet porn was linked to attitudinal changes, including acceptance of male dominance and female submission as the primary sexual paradigm, with women viewed as “sexual playthings eager to fulfill male sexual desires.” The authors found that “adolescents who are intentionally exposed to violent sexually explicit material were six times more likely to be sexually aggressive than those who were not exposed.”

The proliferation and globalization of hypersexualized imagery and pornographic themes makes healthy sexual exploration almost impossible. Sexual conquest and domination are untempered by the bounds of respect, intimacy and authentic human connection. Young people are not learning about intimacy, friendship and love, but about cruelty and humiliation.

I thought I did. The impact of viewing "underground" porn has been researched and this quote speaks to some findings. My response was that putting it underground has caused it to be such as to have that impact.

 

[Toni]

Care to respond to the following (from the OP)?

“The Impact of Internet Pornography on Adolescents” found that adolescent consumption of internet porn was linked to attitudinal changes, including acceptance of male dominance and female submission as the primary sexual paradigm, with women viewed as “sexual playthings eager to fulfill male sexual desires.” The authors found that “adolescents who are intentionally exposed to violent sexually explicit material were six times more likely to be sexually aggressive than those who were not exposed.”

The proliferation and globalization of hypersexualized imagery and pornographic themes makes healthy sexual exploration almost impossible. Sexual conquest and domination are untempered by the bounds of respect, intimacy and authentic human connection. Young people are not learning about intimacy, friendship and love, but about cruelty and humiliation.

I thought I did. The impact of viewing "underground" porn has been researched and this quote speaks to some findings. My response was that putting it underground has caused it to be such as to have that impact.

So you really believe that the ill effects of porn is entirely based on the underground/verboten aspects rather than the fact that virtually all porn depicts sex as detached from any meaningful relationships, depicts unrealistic responses from the female performers and shows zero regard for the prevention of pregnancy or STI’s?

Or have I misunderstood? Do you think that young girls should just learn early on that their existence is only to fulfill the needs of random men? Or men?

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I was really kind of waiting to see if anyone was going to address the negative effects that porn seems to have on young girls who must deal with the porn informed expectations of the boys in their lives.

Or whether the expectations and norms seen in pornos are harmful or potentially harmful to boys.

It wasn't as though I had high expectations here but this is extremely disappointing.

To me, Loren hits closest to the mark with noting that there is a lack of realistic information about sex made available to adolescents.

Well yeah. I thought that the solution was quite easy. In sex education, teach "Porn is as real and realistic as an Avengers movie."

Comparing porn to an Avenger's movie will not move the needle towards more realistic expectations here.

How so? It is part of the problem. The realism. If you were in a metal suit and took the kinetic hits Ironman took, you'd be dead. The people in porn are having the same sort of fake realism, but in this case, it is the woman or man that is taking the brunt of unrealistic expectations.

Yes, unfortunately, we live in a world where "a woman is not a sex toy" is necessary to explain. Sex can be casual, romantic, hard, etc... but despite any of those things, it must be consensual, and that consenting to sex isn't a blank check.

But I still think for guys, the Avengers parallel is viable. Because porn is just as fake.

 

[ronburgundy]

I say the following as someone who watches porn and is highly resistant to restrictions on it or to any "information"/"art"/"speech people want to share on the internet.

Several people have suggested a need to provide realistic information about sex, as though just telling the kids "Hey, that stuff is fiction." would eliminate any negative impact. If the kids are still watching the unrealistic and often violent porn, that information will have minimal impact. The brain does not process fiction and non-fiction in fundamentally different ways. They are both processed as sensory information about events, and in this case, about social interactions and sex. The kind of conscious meta-awareness like "This is just actors on a set." is rarely in active awareness when a person is actually watching fiction and plays a limited role in how the visual scene is processed or in the ultimate impact on the viewer. If an entire context of the scene is highly unrealistic, such as a whole fantasy world where everything down to how things look differs from the viewers everyday experience of the real world and constantly reminds them that this is not real, then it might be processed as something more compartmentalized without association to real life. But that doesn't apply to 99% of porn out there (or other forms of fiction).

Basically, the impact of the porn will be the same as it would if the videos they were watching were real unscripted sex acts with the same type of interactions and violence as the porn they are watching. To argue otherwise presumes fundamentally different brain systems are activated for the same visual scene, just because one is scripted and acted. Nothing in neuroscience or psychology supports that.

Notice, I didn't claim that watching violent porn will make you a rapist, b/c watching an actual rape won't make you a rapist either. But clearly watching other people interact is a major source of information for kids and adults that shapes our attitudes, expectations, etc..

A lesson that tells kids with abstract hypothetical how real life sex usually works will do next to nothing to outweigh the hundreds and even thousands of hours of visceral, engrossing sexual acts they are watching, hearing, and getting emotionally and physically involved with. Even if you showed them actual real respectful sex acts, that would have more impact but still be a drop in an ocean against the amount of porn many boys and young men are watching.

And hell, much of modern porn isn't even easily identifiable as being scripted and acted vs. actual authentic sexual interactions between partners or even random hook ups. Most of it is short snippets of sex without any kind of narrative story and filmed on phones and computers, looking just like it would if someone filmed their actual sexual acts and just uploaded them like people do with video-blogs on youtube to get hits and maybe some advertiser $, which is in fact what a lot of modern porn is. And even when the people are doing it professionally, they are not really "actors", so much as people having sex on camera for money, which allows for the possibility that are "making a living doing what they love." Regardless of how probable/common that is among the participants, it's something that viewers could and would want to tell themselves while watching, and it all makes the divide between fiction and non-fiction even more blurred and thus not plausible that the brain is processing them as different things.

Some of Toni's suggestions make sense, b/c they go beyond just teaching "Hey, that stuff is fiction." and try to instill values that counter the messages inherent to what is in that type of porn. But that messaging won't magically eliminate the effects of the porn, so much as introduce a counter-force. IOW, kids will still have a more twisted view of sex than they would if those messages were given and they weren't exposed to such porn. And we probably should teach kids about the possible harmful impact of that type of porn. Changing the message from "Sex is bad and thus all porn is bad." to "Consensual, respectful sex is good, and people are influenced by the things they observe, so some porn is probably bad for that kind of sexual relationship and thus for relationships."

 

[Toni]

Comparing porn to an Avenger's movie will not move the needle towards more realistic expectations here.

How so? It is part of the problem. The realism. If you were in a metal suit and took the kinetic hits Ironman took, you'd be dead. The people in porn are having the same sort of fake realism, but in this case, it is the woman or man that is taking the brunt of unrealistic expectations.

Yes, unfortunately, we live in a world where "a woman is not a sex toy" is necessary to explain. Sex can be casual, romantic, hard, etc... but despite any of those things, it must be consensual, and that consenting to sex isn't a blank check.

But I still think for guys, the Avengers parallel is viable. Because porn is just as fake.

Yeah: for the guys, porn is perfectly plausible and desirable—and attainable.

Unfortunately for both boys and girls but as unbelievable as this seems to be to a lot of posters, this thread is supposed to be about the affects on the girls. Who actually are real, living, breathing, thinking and feeling human beings. As surprising that may be to some. Not you, but some.

 

[Gun Nut]

I thought I did. The impact of viewing "underground" porn has been researched and this quote speaks to some findings. My response was that putting it underground has caused it to be such as to have that impact.

So you really believe that the ill effects of porn is entirely based on the underground/verboten aspects rather than the fact that virtually all porn depicts sex as detached from any meaningful relationships, depicts unrealistic responses from the female performers and shows zero regard for the prevention of pregnancy or STI’s?

No, but close... I believe that both assertions are true, and that the second follows from the first. That is to say, if it were not underground then it would be less detached from depicting meaningful relationships. So being underground in itself is not bad, but that situation creates the content that is harmful.

 

[Toni]

I thought I did. The impact of viewing "underground" porn has been researched and this quote speaks to some findings. My response was that putting it underground has caused it to be such as to have that impact.

So you really believe that the ill effects of porn is entirely based on the underground/verboten aspects rather than the fact that virtually all porn depicts sex as detached from any meaningful relationships, depicts unrealistic responses from the female performers and shows zero regard for the prevention of pregnancy or STI’s?

No, but close... I believe that both assertions are true, and that the second follows from the first. That is to say, if it were not underground then it would be less detached from depicting meaningful relationships. So being underground in itself is not bad, but that situation creates the content that is bad.

I don't even think one can say porn is 'underground' anymore. It's easily accessible to anybody with an internet connection. Before the internet, it was also easily accessible in the magazine racks at convenience stores and underneath the sofas of the parents kids babysat for--and on film, too. Lots of porn theaters around when I was a kid and lots of porn available for a nickle or a quarter at the back of the dirty book stores, etc.

It's more pervasive now than it was before but it's not at all underground. Not in the slightest.

What is different today than when I was 15 is that today, 15 year old girls will be expected to perform blowjobs in order to get a guy to maybe like her. Maybe. And maybe he won't even bother to know her name.

Now, I know that happened when I was 15 but it wasn't common.

 

[Gun Nut]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?
Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?
Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?

Not nearly competitive with cute kitten vids.

Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?

What, the old fashioned adage that at some point they'll give up in resisting?

Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

That dates back to Beowulf and is nothing new.

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

I'm not certain that is true.

 

[Toni]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?
Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?
Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

The fact that there are 12 million views on one site suggests it's not 'underground.'

It's just not 'mainstream.' Going 'mainstream' would lose it a big chunk of its viewership.

 

[ronburgundy]

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

But you're assuming that if porn were generally out in the open legal market and accepted as normal that this kind of deviant, violent, humiliation porn would be less prevalent. That is a dubious assumption contradicted by the marketplace changes in the last 30 years. Porn has been an easy click away for every teen for decades. In 1990 I could see more porn than I could spank it to, limited only by slow download times. But the porn was far more tame and less violent and degrading to the women. As porn became easier and easier for anyone to supply it and anyone to get it, a greater % of the porn has become more and more of the violent/degrading sort. This is evidence directly against your hypothesis that this type of porn is a product of porn being in the "underground". It suggests that the technology that allowed males to so easily select from various porn allowed them to select what they wanted, and many of them wanted aggressive porn. IOW, this sort of porn satisfies long-standing general desires in a large % of men that is, if anything, enhanced the more porn they consume and the easier it is to access. It suggests that either most modern cultures where online porn is widely consumed either promote these tendencies in their males or these tendencies are innate in a sizable % of males.

Which is not an attempt at man-bashing, b/c women have played and enormous role is shaping both the socialization and evolutionary tendencies of males. `

 

[ronburgundy]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?
Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?
Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

The fact that there are 12 million views on one site suggests it's not 'underground.'

It's just not 'mainstream.' Going 'mainstream' would lose it a big chunk of its viewership.

And let's not get derailed by that kind of specialty video, where very few of it's views are people seeking sexual gratification and more just about wanting to see the train wreck of human depravity everyone at the watercooler is talking about. I bet the majority of people (like me) couldn't even bring themselves to watch the most chunky parts, and most people don't get off with shit-eating videos no matter which gender is doing to eating.

What we're really trying to understand is why there are literally billions of views on porn sites every single day (100 million on Pornhub.com alone), with a huge % of the views being of videos of sexual acts without excrement or stylized BDSM stuff, but still a level of aggression that most women would not consent to and would find frightening.

 

[Toni]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?
Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?
Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

The fact that there are 12 million views on one site suggests it's not 'underground.'

It's just not 'mainstream.' Going 'mainstream' would lose it a big chunk of its viewership.

And let's not get derailed by that kind of specialty video, where very few of it's views are people seeking sexual gratification and more just about wanting to see the train wreck of human depravity everyone at the watercooler is talking about. I bet the majority of people (like me) couldn't even bring themselves to watch the most chunky parts, and most people don't get off with shit-eating videos no matter which gender is doing to eating.

What we're really trying to understand is why there are literally billions of views on porn sites every single day (100 million on Pornhub.com alone), with a huge % of the views being of videos of sexual acts without excrement or stylized BDSM stuff, but still a level of aggression that most women would not consent to and would find frightening.

Actually, what I thought we were trying to understand how the porn viewing habits of adolescent boys affects adolescent girls. Reading just the quotes in the OP, without even reading the article linked, it is impossible to not acknowledge that adolescent girls are being harmed.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?
Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?
Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

The fact that there are 12 million views on one site suggests it's not 'underground.'

It's just not 'mainstream.' Going 'mainstream' would lose it a big chunk of its viewership.

And let's not get derailed by that kind of specialty video, where very few of it's views are people seeking sexual gratification and more just about wanting to see the train wreck of human depravity everyone at the watercooler is talking about. I bet the majority of people (like me) couldn't even bring themselves to watch the most chunky parts, and most people don't get off with shit-eating videos no matter which gender is doing to eating.

What we're really trying to understand is why there are literally billions of views on porn sites every single day (100 million on Pornhub.com alone), with a huge % of the views being of videos of sexual acts without excrement or stylized BDSM stuff, but still a level of aggression that most women would not consent to and would find frightening.

I'd say there are probably a few reasons.

1) They like seeing it

or

2) They see it as consensual

 

[Toni]

And let's not get derailed by that kind of specialty video, where very few of it's views are people seeking sexual gratification and more just about wanting to see the train wreck of human depravity everyone at the watercooler is talking about. I bet the majority of people (like me) couldn't even bring themselves to watch the most chunky parts, and most people don't get off with shit-eating videos no matter which gender is doing to eating.

What we're really trying to understand is why there are literally billions of views on porn sites every single day (100 million on Pornhub.com alone), with a huge % of the views being of videos of sexual acts without excrement or stylized BDSM stuff, but still a level of aggression that most women would not consent to and would find frightening.

I'd say there are probably a few reasons.

1) They like seeing it

or

2) They see it as consensual

Sure, some see it as consensual. Others are turned on by the idea that it isn’t consensual. But I’d wager that for the vast majority, consensual or not is simply not a consideration at all. It just doesn’t occur to them to consider it.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I couldn't say. I only know my experience.

 

[Toni]

I couldn't say. I only know my experience.

It’s mostly men on this forum. I get that people can speak of their own experiences.

But isn’t there a possibility of finding a way to empathize with girls who must deal with hormonal boys who are inspired or deluded into believing that girls are happy or st least willing to service them just like in the pornos—and it’s their right to expect it and demand it.

 

[repoman]

Best thing is to have boys watch 1950s era behavior films, Clockwork Orange style if need be:

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Why does the clip known as "Two Girls, One Cup" have over 12 million views on one popular site alone?
Where did the old expression "No means Yes" come from?
Why does such a large segment of women like "bad boys"?

The answers to these questions may also help to understand the nature of porn as it stands today.

as for why being underground is meaningful? What do you suppose Siskel and Ebert would say about Two Girls? ("Two thumbs up my eye sockets", prolly)

I strongly suspect the 12 million views is to a large degree people seeing what it's all about and people deliberately tricking others into watching it. I seriously doubt there's actually 12 million people in the world into such stuff.

As for liking "bad boys"--that's wired into us. Bad boys are better at spreading their genes around, thus women will favor having children by them. (Although contraception has mostly made this just for fun.) Note that this is different than who they will favor for a long term partner.