Know About It

Men’s propensity to rape; does pornography increase the likelihood?

What I have read seems to be consistent in regard to the relationship between pornography and sexual violence. Much of what I’ve read and found, discussed there is at the very least a casual relationship between pornography and sexual violence. Casual being described as most men who commit a sexually violent act(s) toward a woman had a history of pornography. This disturbing number was 88% (ICASA, 2006), “with the majority admitting direct imitation of pornographic scenes in the commission of their sexual crimes.” That same article stated that 66% of rapists in one study “used pornography and often mimicked it in their crimes.” (ICASA, 2006). It would appear from the reading that there is at least a casual relationship between the two from some of the qualitative research.

“Since some men who use pornography don’t rape, and some men who rape don’t use pornography, pornography is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for rape. There is no way to make a convincing claim that pornography, if not but for cause of it; if not but for the use of pornography, this man would not have raped.” (Jensen, 2004)

As if the numbers were not already alarming, “between 25 – 30% of male college student selected at random admit that there is some likelihood they would rape a woman if they could be assured of getting away with it” (ICASA, 2006). That number increases to 57% when you exposed those men to sexually violent images, especially of those women shown as enjoying being raped(ICASA, 2006).

We need to consider the thought beyond a cause and affect mentality, because if we use a simple construct I’d have to say no, pornography does not cause sexual violence. Could pornography condition men to not identify acts that would be considered sexual violence? Yes. “It is generally believed that pornography alone does not cause rape or child sexual abuse, but it does lower inhibitions in men already inclined to committing sexual violence” (ICASA, 2006). Dr. Diane Russell states that pornography contributes to sexual violence because of the following four preconditions developed by David Finkelhor:

1. someone must want to abuse;
2. internal inhibitions are undermined;
3. social inhibitions to acting out are underminded;
4. the perpetrator must undermine or overcome the victim’s ability to resist (by using pornography with victims.

Does sexual violence cause pornography or sexual addiction? One woman quoted on xxxchurch.org, that she was raped numerous times by her father and brother and that when she grew older developed a sexual addiction which stemmed around “submissive fantasies where a gang of men dominate and rape her.” You be the judge.

When discussing pornography in relation to sexual violence we need to talk about it from a larger view. We need to look at it from the perspective that it is a contributing factor in many instances, but not the direct cause. When you think about it, sexual violence was around long before pornography. Although one might argue that pornography has been around just as long; for thousands of years depending on what you’d define as pornography and looking at the various medias for such. However, getting rid of all pornography in the world would not make sexual violence obsolete. But we still can't ignore the fact that both co-exist and have an established relationship.

To sum it up:
- there is reason to believe that someone who is sexually violent may have some history of pornography, but a history of pornography does not guarantee someone is going to be sexually violent;
- viewing pornography has been seen to lower inhibitions as to what would be considered violence to a reasonable person;
- there are many contributing factors as to what causes a person to develop a pornography addiction in both men AND women;
- both men AND women can be sexually violated.

Illinois Coalition Against Sexual Assault. Pornography. Retrived July 28, 2006 from http://www.icasa.org/uploads/pornography.pdf

Jensen, Robert. (2004). Pornography and Sexual violence. VAWnet. National Resource Center on Domestic Violence.

Peters, Robert. (2004). The Link Between Pornography and Violent Sex Crimes. Mortality in Media, Inc. New York.

Russell, Diane. (1994) Pornography as a Cause for Rape. Retrived July 28, 2006 from http://www.dianarussell.com/porntoc.html

http://www.xxxchurch.org

September 1st – Religion and Sexual Violence