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Comment by aliasxneo | Hacker News Reader

I'm curious what defines morally acceptable. I disapprove of it on the grounds personal convictions, but more importantly because I've done a lot of volunteer work in the anti-sex trafficking world. Knowing many of these victims were abused for the purpose of producing pornographic content is enough to sour my stomach on the issue. I just wonder if that's being made a part of the moral argument.

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The opposition to pornography is multifaceted. In particular, most women are opposed, and there’s a significant philosophical basis to that opposition both among conservative feminism but also a significant category of liberal feminism. Even secular people have objections to how porn represents women, and how it socialized young men to think about sex and what normal sexual activity looks like. In the Gallup poll (linked above), the only group where a majority find pornography morally acceptable is men 18-49. Only 1/3 of adult women find it morally acceptable. Among married people it’s only 1/3. Half of women also think sex work should be illegal, compared to only 36% of men: https://www.vox.com/2016/3/11/11203740/prostitution-legal-me....

That's changing imo. There are a lot of women that identify as liberal who are morally conservative, but it can be reasoned that this is just the effects of patriarchy that they haven't chosen to prioritize addressing because it doesn't directly benefit them. Freedom from modesty will not be won overnight.

When your partner can't get it up because they've been abusing porn, you're incentivized to not like it just for personal reasons. And that's without even touching the fact that your partner is getting off to images of someone else.

There's nothing "liberal" about porn. Porn is neither conservative nor liberal, it is libertine.

> When your partner can’t get it up because they’ve been abusing porn, you’re incentivized to not like it just for personal reasons.

If your partner prefers interacting with porn to doing so with you, the porn use is a symptom, not the source of the problem.

Maybe at first, but just like alcohol or any other addiction it becomes its own problem over time.

Anything enjoyable (and many things that are not even that) can be addicting and in some cases enought to be a problem. That however is not an argument for banning it altogether or that it is morally unacceptable.

And most additictions really are just a symptom for other problems.

I think a lot of people blame porn for erectile dysfunction, but that's far from a leading cause: https://www.samhealth.org/about-samaritan/news-search/2022/0... and https://www.goodrx.com/conditions/erectile-dysfunction/top-1...

I guess this is also a good time for vulnerability since we're talking patriarchy. I've had periods of erectile dysfunction and they almost always overlapped with periods of intense stress or depression. Other times it had to do with my diet. That didn't stop some people at the time bringing up my porn use, which feels really nasty and humiliating when it happens to you.

That isn't to say there aren't men who desensitize themselves, but I suspect that's more prevalent in young men and more of a minority in general. It is a provocative thing to bring up in conversation.

Fine, then "can't last as long", or "isn't as in to it".

I just find all of this really problematic, but maybe that's just me. I'd never make these assumptions or say these things to a woman.

I strongly suspect the actual relationship is the other way around--it's a problem with their relationship that drove them to porn.

Maybe for some, but for people who start with porn before they ever have a relationship, this cannot be the case. At least not entirely.

I wonder why there isn’t more support for replacing possibly the entire industry with generative AI. Pornography is such low entropy content.

Similar to legalized prostitution, this is where I often find myself at odds with my otherwise libertarian and personal freedom leaning beliefs. Should one be allowed to do with their body as they wish? In theory, yes, if it doesn't hurt others, but the reality is legalizing these things has a far greater capacity for harm at the hands of others who would exploit them.

isn't it the other way around? criminalizing prostitution taskes away options to seek help by those who are exploited or abused.

It's already criminalized, so the only thing that could change is legalizing it or decriminalizing it.

By legalizing it, you effectively add cost, or tax, and the illegal component continues to remain (unlesss you simply make it stop being illegal, and unregulated, which most people agree is a bad idea) and the market segregates the workers into legal and illegal workers. The illegal workers lives get even worse, and the legal workers end up losing a lot of their money.

Look at legal marijuana, or hell, even legal prostitution in places that allow it and you'll see that's been the real effect.

By legalizing it, you effectively add cost, or tax, and the illegal component continues to remain

but that's the point, legalizing or decriminalizing the actual act enables the people involved to seek protection from the illegal components.

Look at legal marijuana, or hell, even legal prostitution in places that allow it and you'll see that's been the real effect

at least in germany the opposite effect seems to be the case:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_Act

"Sexual acts in the context of a prostitution contract are now valid to establish claims for compensation since the law came into force. This has not only significance for civil law, but also criminal law (property offences). In addition, prostitutes can now regularly insure in the statutory health, unemployment and pension insurance."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitutes_Protection_Act

"effective protection for prostitutes is only possible if this work is legalised"

in addition to that, the issue i see is, how much control is necessary to enforce a ban on prostitution. i would argue that it is not possible without a serious reduction of personal freedom. legalizing it enables to focus the control on those engaged in such activities whereas the rest of us won't be bothered.

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