We Are The Porn Generation

http://thoughtcatalog.com/2012/we-are-the-porn-generation/

by airnomad • 14 years ago

70 104 14 years ago

Is it just me or do I find it ironic that the article is surrounding by the things the author seems to dislike? The twitter/facebook tie ins on the site are one thing, but the recommended content made me laugh.

>Why You Should Start Smoking

>6 Rules For Increasing Your Chances Of Getting Laid At Parties For The Chronically Alienated, Interspersed With Songs I Like Right Now, Vol. 1

> Paid Distribution What Your "Drink" Says About You on a Date

It's a great way to unintentionally strengthening the authors argument.

icebraining12• 14 years ago

Agreed; I smiled when I got to the end and reached the big fat "You should follow on Twitter".

jcfrei• 14 years ago

currently a lot of the market players are focused on grasping a part of your attention. essentially there is a constant battle raging inside of you trying to figure out which of all those mental stimuli you should give in to. if you as an individual don't learn to refrain from such distilled indulgence (social media, fast food, pornography) you might as well get lost in the 21st century (and end up void of any free will)... and that's a dangerous outlook (remember Huxley's brave new world?)

evincarofautumn3• 14 years ago

You do look glum! What you need is a gramme of soma.

Drbble2• 14 years ago

Does not distilled indulgence save time, which is a modern person's most heavily spent resource?

joejohnson• 14 years ago

Good article. I just skimmed it for the interesting parts, but I think it looked pretty thought provoking.

fferen• 14 years ago

Personally I think I'll wait for the movie adaptation.

r0s2• 14 years ago

The attitude towards pornography here is immediately dismissive and negative. By far the biggest movement in porn since the internet is 'amateur'. Unrecognized here as direct reflection of human sexuality, movement away from fantasy to authenticity.

I think the point of the article is that all media is entertainment, and journalism has lost it's informant pretense. A legit point, I don't care for porn bashing though.

kiba6• 14 years ago

Most actors/actress are ugly. I don't really care for amateur because they are often ugly too. It'll get the job done, but it's like watching a really badly done horror movie. Not scary or sexy at all.

The manga world is often in stark contrast to the reality tubes. Some of them will make you angry and some will make you fell in love with the characters. They are also often beautiful.

Even though they are high quality, they might as well be mass produced. The reality tubes is mass produced but is of bad quality.

kiba6• 14 years ago

I am not sure why I get downvoted.

mattgreenrocks• 14 years ago

I see this attitude so often on the Internet: where porn is practically sacrosanct. It's way more complicated than that, and it seems intellectually dishonest to oversimplify matters.

However, the real point I'd like to make is this: you are right when you mention that the author was actually discussing the perils of everything being entertaining. He'd do well to read Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves To Death. It is downright chilling to read when you realize it was written in the eighties as the cultural impact of pervasive television was beginning to become apparent.

philwelch2• 14 years ago

I wouldn't say it's dismissive and negative to point out that porn is inherently reductionist. The main difference is that things like nutrition, music, and intellectual enrichment need a degree of sophistication. Porn is just a method for physiological release, not a proper art form.

Swizec• 14 years ago

But why is porn not a proper art form?

I think we can all agree that erotica is a proper art form. It's nudes in tasteful poses, usually with artistic intent. Hell, one could argue that most art produced in the renaissance was erotica. Or the Statue of David for instance.

Ok so that's art.

Similarly, we all consider most types of drawings to be art. People drawing on canvas to produce emotionally and visually stimulating stuff has always been art.

Then take Pollock for instance. He is the complete bastardization of visual art. Pure colour and emotion with wanton disregard for any "form".

That is still considered art.

However, when you do the same to erotica and come up with porn ... it suddenly isn't art anymore?

Why?

Mz3• 14 years ago

Porn is just a method for physiological release

I don't think that holds true for everyone. My observation is that some people are primarily seeking emotional release, which may or may not lead to or involve "physiological release". It seems to me that emotional appeal is a large factor in much of what we call art.

zerostar0711• 14 years ago

Well, what's the benefit of porn? To be a glass where you can look but cannot touch? To compensate for some oversexuality that is not freely expressed? To turn everyone into proud voyeurs? Most animals see amateur porn among their conspecifics every day and frankly don't give a damn. I bet only masturbating animals would ever buy porn. I know the internet is generally proud of its porn, but general opinion equates porn with masturbation and thus all the negative attitude. What's so positive about porn otherwise?

Tichy3• 14 years ago

I remember reading about a study that showed looking at boobs raised men's self esteem. There is also a study that showed that apes (or monkeys or some animal like that) likes to pay for porn (ape/monkey porn of course).

Also the sex drive is quite important for the human species. It's a huge motivator.

r0s2• 14 years ago

You can say the same about any art. Is a still life of fruit subject to such complex valuation?

icebraining12• 14 years ago

Most animals see amateur porn among their conspecifics every day and frankly don't give a damn.

And most animals would see a Miró and pee on it. I don't see how is that helpful in determining whether porn is beneficial or not.

jaredsohn4• 14 years ago

For women, porn can be beneficial because it provides information.

(from "A Feminist Defense of Pornography"; can be found by Googling it; originally included the link but post became dead immediately after submitting and I think that's why.)

* It gives a panoramic view of the world's sexual possibilities. This is true even of basic sexual information such as masturbation. It is not uncommon for women to reach adulthood without knowing how to give themselves pleasure.

* It allows women to "safely" experience sexual alternatives and satisfy a healthy sexual curiosity. The world is a dangerous place. By contrast, pornography can be a source of solitary enlightenment.

* It offers the emotional information that comes only from experiencing something either directly or vicariously. It provides us with a sense how it would "feel" to do something. "

I'd think the same would also be true for men.

evincarofautumn3• 14 years ago

Agreed. The article is definitely an oversimplification. Sure, anything with informational or entertainment value can be optimised, so to speak. Fast food optimises for taste at the expense of balanced nutrition, and so on. But just because a thing can be optimised does not mean it’s not also subtle and nuanced. Besides, pornography does not work well in the analogy: the variety in human sexual tastes reduces its vulnerability to optimisation.

The fact that there is a significant movement toward legitimacy and depth in pornography is a testament to that fact. And I have considerable respect for sites that encourage amateur content, in the (perhaps naive) hope that it will encourage more realistic expectations among the sexually inexperienced.

horsehead2• 14 years ago

What I find very humorous (read: ironic) is that this comment thread (edit: ENTIRE comment thread) has been sidelined by discussion of porn, when the article actually referenced porn very little.

probably a good indication that the article is pretty spot on.

foxit• 14 years ago

By far the biggest movement in porn since the internet is 'amateur'.

That's because the internet has stripped profits away. It's like reality shows being the trend in television because expensive productions don't have as much profit margin as they used to.

My view of porn is essentially what Naomi Wolfe's was in 2003: http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/trends/n_9437/

The only thing I'd add is that as we become more saturated in stimulation, it takes more extremes to get the dopamine hit. This goes for porn or anything else he mentions in his article.

SpaceDragon4• 14 years ago

The way I look at it, anyone who indulges in porn isn't going to be a competitive threat to me or take my job. Why? Because they're preoccupied, lack self control and settle for fantasy over reality.

SpaceDragon4• 14 years ago

And overly sensitive to criticism.

icebraining12• 14 years ago

I haven't downvoted your first comment, but I think you have a very prejudiced (and wrong) view of porn.

Firstly, (almost) everyone watches porn: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/relationships/6709646/All-men-wat...

Second, nothing in consuming porn inherently means the person "lacks self-control" (there's certainly porn addicts, but they're not the majority) or "settles for fantasy" - in fact, many couples watch porn together and use it to improve their own sex life.

Thirdly, porn is a highly competitive industry with a lot of talent in producing, managing and distributing content, both online and offline. They run very big websites and serve huge amounts of video traffic per minute. Xvideos alone has twice the page views of Reddit.

petercooper• 14 years ago

What about people who "indulge" in TV, movies, and books?

SpaceDragon4• 14 years ago

Nelson Mandela indulged in books: http://m.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/oct/17/nelson-mandela-con...

zerostar0711• 14 years ago

That's a different beast. Not that there isn't TV movies and books that are a waste of time, but in general people who read and watch the right movies become quite a bit wiser. Porn is always the same. Frankly, if you 've read De Sade your knowledge of the genre is complete. In contrast to good culture, porn is addictive like a drug: it doesn't get you anywhere.

SkyMarshal4• 14 years ago

Books require focus and self-control. Non-fiction are obviously not fantasy, but even much of fiction is soundly rooted in reality or science (fiction).

As for TV and movies, mostly true.

drumdance3• 14 years ago

It worked out for Hugh Hefner.

icebraining12• 14 years ago

It's funny; I started thinking about his examples and except for the TED talks (which for me complement but haven't replaced reading), the only kind of porn I'm exposed to is actual pornography. I don't really spend a lot of time with the others (commercial radio and MacDonalds are particularly unpleasant).

I also don't get when he says

    If you’re a vegetarian… Well, you’re shit out of luck.

and then two paragraphs later he inverts that by saying the other stuff is still out there. And, in my opinion, it's not just "still out there" - there's actually more of such content available.

sreyaNotfilc• 14 years ago

" If you’re a vegetarian… Well, you’re shit out of luck. "

Ya, I'll just skip this rant of his and wait for the full length film of this article.

Its funny how the author is using a medium in which he describes as fading to convey his distaste in another medium which "everyone" is using. But, expects us to use the fading medium to understand his "vegetarian" ideas.

Yes, this article was THAT confusing.

buntar• 14 years ago

Using 'porn' in the title is also kinda porn.

Edit:

Seriously though, I would replace 'the porn generation' with 'the porned generation'.

"Corporations are not looking out for your best interests; they’re looking to make as much money as possible."

That's the obvious part. But the interesting part is how all this big corporations managed it to finally break into our lives. Not only the sell us all kinds off stuff we don't need. They also very actively comment our consume behavior. Something is always wrong with our lives. We are too fat, too boring, our relationships are not thrilling enough, we don't manage to get what we deserve.

Corporations are not longer selling stuff to us in the traditional way, from producer to consumer. For them, we are gigantic consumption mass, trained to buy and to be evaluated from day one.

We are not consumers, we are here to be consumed. We get porned.

quinndupont• 14 years ago

It's very curious that there is no discussion of affect or feminism in general in this post, both of which are useful to this discussion.

tmh88j• 14 years ago

I agree with this article, however, it overlooks one huge aspect; porn has been popular long before America became fat and obsessed with the "I want it now" massive $1 cheeseburgers.

why-el6• 14 years ago

Ok, so I have a point to make. I don't quite understand how, whenever porn is discussed, all the HN community gets very rational about it and we start discussing it as if it was a normal product. It is absolutely not. It is not what human beings are and it degrades women (And increasingly, trends in porn change only in one way: How they degrade women). It is also dull, and repetitive, despite their sad attempts to innovate; there is a finite number of sexual positions, and you can only go past that once you establish the fact that women will choose to degrade themselves and go with it, which the makers (men, always) happily decide its the case. So yes, as a hacker, there things to learn from the porn industry (scaling, traffic analysis..),but its effect on society and its subjugation of half of said society far outweigh those few technological insights.

kiba6• 14 years ago

You said it degrade women, but you don't explain how.

zerostar0711• 14 years ago

Looks like you don't watch porn lately.

why-el6• 14 years ago

You can always go to a porn website and search for words that convey degradation (rape, rough, bad words men call women,..). Nowadays they are quite explicit about it, not even bothering with visual metaphors.

icebraining12• 14 years ago

There's an increasing number of women watching porn - 1 in 3 porn viewers according to Nielsen - or making porn without receiving financial compensation (so, not because they need the money). Who are we to say that we know better than them what does or doesn't degrade them? That feels extremely patronizing.

capsule_toy• 14 years ago

I would like to hear the numbers behind your arguments. I would be very surprised if highly degrading porn is more popular compared to amateur or gonzo. Simply because it exists does not mean it represents a popular trend emerging in pornography.

You seem to believe that women deciding to be dominated sexually must be subjugated, and that her choice is a result of the oppressiveness of our society. Many women would find that view very offensive.

why-el6• 14 years ago

I actually agree with your first part, and as I said, its an increasing trend, not necessarily the most popular. But that still worries me.

But I disagree when you say women deciding to be dominated. I don't see how one can decide to be dominated. If we follow this argument that we can say that men and women in a China factory decided to work 16 hours a day, conveying the idea that there is nothing wrong with it.

moe• 14 years ago

It is not what human beings are

It seems about 30% of all internet traffic disagrees with you. Yes, that's bigger than youtube.

but its effect on society and its subjugation of half of said society far outweigh those few technological insights.

Then our society is doomed!

Or perhaps it's just you being a little prude?

derleth5• 14 years ago

Pornography reduces sex crimes:

http://www.springerlink.com/content/v046j3g178147772/fulltex...

> it degrades women

But not men?

Also, how do you decide when someone else is being degraded? Should they also get to decide when you're being degraded?

why-el6• 14 years ago

Men also, but to a far lesser degree.

seanp2k2• 14 years ago

Let me keep in style with this article and TL;DR it for you: instant gratification is awesome, and it's easier than it's ever been. I embrace this and look forward to a day when I can just go into dreamland in my mind while my body is controlled by a computer to do space mining that robots can't. Then I can spend more time doing exactly what I want.

Drbble2• 14 years ago

Spending more time doing what you want is the opposite of instant gratification. You can't be instantly gratified all day long in a 24hour orgasm.

HeyImAlex• 14 years ago

Not yet

waveman• 14 years ago

Porn = porn that men like

Erotica = porn that women like

horsehead2• 14 years ago

We were just talking about this in an IRC channel. I think the article is saying that we've cut everything down to the common denominator. I've also heard it called the 'fast food' generation. We want the quick hit, the down and dirty. We live in an incredibly fast paced society. But in that context, how can you not chop everything down to the kibbles and bits, in order to get people even interested? (or in other terms: tl;dr)

airlocksoftware• 14 years ago

Isn't this rehashing PG's essay, The Acceleration of Addictiveness? http://www.paulgraham.com/addiction.html

naner• 14 years ago

The comparisons he made reminded me of something I read not too long ago:

http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2011/02/hes_just_not_that_int...

In other words, online porn isn't a drug, it isn't an addiction, it isn't a sign of deviancy or a trigger for disease: porn is junk food. It is a bag of potato chips you eat when you aren't even hungry, and once you start and the initial "mmmm!" passes you're all in, may as well finish the bag, you've ruined your diet/night already, start over clean tomorrow.

After a while potato chips just figure into your routine, there's a passing thought that perhaps you shouldn't but since there aren't any obvious and immediate consequences... And now it's part of who you are.

But no one would ever say that "other foods don't measure up", no one says that potato chips taste better than steak not because they don't but because no sane person makes those kinds of comparisons. If you did, if you played it all out in your head and now deliberately avoid eating a steak in order to get to potato chips-- then you have a problem that is deeper than steak or potato chips.

Junk food is stripped of the essentials of real food, leaving just the vulgar, the simple, the obvious of taste: sugar, salt, fat, repeat. It is the pornographization of food. The mistake people make is that they think it is delicious, but it's really just easy, comforting, reliable, satisfying. And that's where we are now: online porn is the pornographization of porn.

waterhouse• 14 years ago

Oh man, I wrote a giant post, but it was too big to post here. Essentially I disagree with the author, and I probably have said some interesting things in my rant. Here it is: http://pastebin.com/EV64mvm8

rsanchez1• 14 years ago

This article made me think of the foodgasm:

http://foodnetworkhumor.com/2009/12/the-top-10-biggest-food-...

We Are The Porn Generation

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