Ms Naughty Porn for Women Blog

For years, anti-porn activists have campaigned against porn on the basis that it increases acts of violence against women. In essence, they say that porn causes rape.

Today I thought I might sit down and compile a few resources that refute that claim. Because as far as I’m aware, there is still no reliable evidence to suggest that watching pornography induces men to rape.

I think the biggest piece of evidence against the claim is self evident. In the last 15 years, internet pornography has become freely available to anyone who wishes to view it. Yet there has been no substantial increase in the rape rate in that time. Indeed, US government statistics reveal that in that time, the rate of forcible rate dropped steadily. If the “porn causes rape” claim were true, we would have seen an increase in sexual assault rates. Obviously that is a very simplistic argument but it’s one that anti-porn people need to deal with. And they don’t.

One of the more interesting academic articles dealing with this issue is by Anthony D’Amato from Northwestern University School of Law. His paper Porn Up, Rape Down discusses the idea that there was an 85% reduction in sexual violence over the 25 years to 2003 (and the rate has kept falling since the paper was published). He goes on to posit that not only does porn NOT cause rape, he suggests that it may actually reduce rape, either by serving as a release valve or by demystifying sex. He concedes that the correlation does not equal causality and suggests further research.

A similar 2006 paper by Todd Kendall entitled Pornography, Rape and the Internet points out that rape rates decreased in US states where the internet was rapidly taken up. Interestingly, the growth in internet use had no effect on the rates of other crimes. Slate summed up the research in an article How The Web Prevents Rape. The Register also covers the topic here.

An earlier, pre-internet paper looked at rape rates in countries that had legalised porn and came to similar conclusions. Pornography, Sex Crime and Public Policy by Berl Kutchinsky was published in 1991. He writes:

The aggregate data on rape and other violent or sexual offences from four countries where pornography, including aggressive varieties, has become widely and easily available during the period we have dealt with would seem to exclude, beyond any reasonable doubt, that this availability has had any detrimental effects in the form of increased sexual violence.

Our knowledge about the contents, the uses and the users of pornography suggests that pornography does not represent a blueprint for rape, but is essentially an aphrodisiac, that is, food for the sexual fantasy of persons – mostly males- who like to masturbate

It should also be noted that this same conclusion was reached by Richard Nixon’s first inquiry into porn in 1970. Anthony D’Amato writes about working on the commission in his “Porn Up, Rape Down” paper. He says:

The Commission [on Obscenity and Pornography] concluded that there was no causal relationship between exposure to sexually explicit materials and delinquent or criminal behavior. The President was furious when he learned of the conclusion. Later President Reagan tried the same thing, except unlike his predecessor he packed the Commission with persons who passed his ideological litmus test. (Small wonder that I was not asked to participate.) This time, Reagan’s Commission on Pornography reached the approved result: that there does exist a causal relationship between pornography and violent sex crimes.

It’s not scientific to reach a conclusion and then set out to find data that backs your case, ignoring contradictory information. That is ideology, not research.

If anti-porn activists can give me real evidence that porn does cause rape, I’ll change my mind. But at this stage, based on the simple fact of dropping rape rates, I’m not seeing it.

One more link and quote to finish this post: a summary article from Scientific American which looked at various studies into porn and found that it was not harmful.

Contrary to what many people believe, recent research shows that moderate pornography consumption does not make users more aggressive, promote sexism or harm relationships. If anything, some researchers suggest, exposure to pornography might make some people less likely to commit sexual crimes.

The most common concern about pornography is that it indirectly hurts women by encouraging sexism, raising sexual expectations and thereby harming relationships. Some people worry that it might even incite violence against women. The data, however, do not support these claims. “There’s absolutely no evidence that pornography does anything negative,” says Milton Diamond, director of the Pacific Center for Sex and Society at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. “It’s a moral issue, not a factual issue.”

PS. Even though the sample was far too small, this 2 year Canadian study of men’s porn surfing habits does provide some illumination as to the real reasons why men watch porn. What it does make clear is that porn is clearly only fantasy and that men are easily able to distinguish between porn and real life.

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In February I met Dr Clarissa Smith who told me about the massive research project into porn that she was undertaking with collegues Feona Attwood and Martin Barker. Not long after they put out the call for porn users to participate in their survey which aimed to look at porn use in a non-judgemental way.

They received 5,490 responses to their questionaire and a heap of extended emails. They’re currently working their way through a mountain of information (over 1.2 million words) and expect it will take some time to reach any extensive conclusions. Nonetheless, they’ve put out a preliminary report of the survey, with some useful statistics and information.

Naturally I was interested in their demographic data, particularly when it came to women. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the survey threw up the same “one third” figure that repeatedly appears in statistics about porn. In this case, 31.6% of respondents were female, a figure that is pretty similar to the Nielsen Netratings’ 2003 report which is regularly quoted in the media (and on this blog). What’s really interesting is how much age is a factor in porn use for women:

As you can see, women aged 18-25 are far more likely to use porn than their older counterparts.

The authors make this interesting point:

What we can’t tell,from this snapshot, is whether this is simply a ‘passing phase’ for them, or whether it signals that wider generational shift we think we have identified – something which over time will reduce the overall differences between male and female interest in pornography.

It’s only an opinion (and largely anecdotal) but I think they’re on the right track. From what I’ve seen online, today’s young women have no problem with porn and a lot of them embrace it just as easily as their male friends. Previously there’s been a cultural difference in how women were brought up – there was no entrenched culture of sharing porn among the women of twenty or even ten years ago. Now, with the ubiquity of online porn, the male-female divide has weakened.

Of course, the majority of porn is still aimed at men and I think that partly accounts for the disparity in usage rates between men and women.

The report goes on to say that men attach more importance to porn and use it more frequently. When it comes to why people use porn, simple sexual gratification was the most popular reason. A user feels horny, they satisfy the urge with porn. Interestingly, they also found that a lot more women used porn to induce arousal than men.

Among the other results: DVDs are on the way out, tube sites are hugely popular and pop-up ads don’t convince people to look at porn. Also, amateur porn sites are far more popular than a lot of upmarket studio-produced porn sites.

I can’t wait to see the extended results. It will be incredibly useful to have this kind of research available, especially as there really isn’t enough unbiased information about porn use out there.

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Gail Dines is doing the rounds and she’s back in Australia promoting censorship of porn, saying that “there is no room for porn in a just society.” The response to that is a whole other blog post (although I have 2 comments on that story).

Today Joel Tozer, a freelance writer, offers his reply to Dines’ piece here. And while it’s mostly OK, I’ve got a problem with his basic assumption that porn is “addictive” and his use of a University of Sydney study to back it up.

Firstly, there is no scientific consensus on the topic of “porn addiction”. There is no diagnosis of pornography addiction in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). Porn is not inherently “addictive” although some people may develop behavioural compulsions with it. The phrase “porn addiction” has become widespread thanks to its use by fundamentalist Christian organisations offering “cures” and anti-porn conservatives. It’s not helped by the numerous pseudo-psychological articles found online and the media’s constant unquestioning use of the term.

The whole dirty ball of lint will then be expanded by a piece of research which has been conducted by Gomathi and Raj Sitharthan at the University of Sydney. I can see that their preliminary statistics are about to propagate throughout the media and become a new “truth” about porn, even though their research doesn’t come close to being the whole story.

To quote from the Joel’s article:

A world-first study in Sydney has found that almost half of all adults first watched pornography between the ages of 11 and 13…

Preliminary results from the University of Sydney study show many men, and women, are spending massive amounts of time and money viewing porn. Of more than 700 adult Australians surveyed, about one-third looked at internet porn three to five times a week, while 28 per cent look at it almost every day – half of them for between 30 minutes and three hours. A few are spending up to 14 hours watching porn.

Co-researcher Professor Raj Sitharthan says many are becoming addicted to the safety of online pornography to the point where some are unable to achieve orgasm during intercourse.

Here’s the thing the article doesn’t tell you: that university study was created specifically to study “porn addiction”. It’s basic premise was that porn addiction is real and it sought to find participants who felt they had a problem with porn.

Here’s the abstract, taken from this University of Sydney Page:

The Impact of Internet Pornography
The purpose of this research is to further our understanding of Internet Pornography Addiction/ Problematic Internet-Enabled Sexual Behaviours .The study is exploring the support / treatment currently available for internet pornography addiction. The investigation is also exploring help seeking behaviour for internet pornography addiction and the barriers to seeking assistance.

When you click through to the survey, the questions are very specific in their tone. Under the heading of “The Impact of Internet Pornography”, the questions are:

How often do you find that you stay on-line longer than you intended?
How often do you neglect household chores to spend more time on-line?
How often do you prefer the excitement of the Internet to intimacy with your partner?
How often do you form new relationships with fellow on-line users?
How often do others in your life complain to you about the amount of time you spend on-line?
How often do your grades or school work suffer because of the amount of time you spend on-line?
How often do you check your e-mail before something else that you need to do?
How often does your job performance or productivity suffer because of the Internet?
How often do you become defensive or secretive when anyone asks you what you do on-line?

And that’s just the first page of questions. There’s another page of very similar questions before things get specific about first use of porn, what kind of porn is used etc.

I actually wanted to take part in this survey because I thought it might be about porn use. When I encountered those first biased questions I realised that I did not not fulfil their criteria – or their agenda. So I filled it out anyway, hoping to at least even up their figures a little bit.

By the way, question 41 is “Would you like to seek professional assistance to manage your dependence viewing pornographic materials?”

Question 42 says “If you answered Yes to question 41, how would you like to receive assistance to manage your dependence on pornographic materials:
* send me booklets
* via the internet
* face-to-face individual counselling
* group counseling

So, it’s pretty clear that this is not research about porn use. It’s research about porn “addiction” and one of its aims is finding the best way to cure that “addiction”.

The problem with today’s SMH article is that the figures produced by this survey are being quoted out of context. The statistics are being used to imply that ALL Australians accessed porn early and that lots of people have some kind of problem with it or use it constantly. The article doesn’t acknowledge that the survey was designed to find people who already thought they had some kind of problem with it.

Now, watch the truthiness propagate out. These figures will start to pop up in mainstream media outlets without any fact checking. They’ll be repeated ad nauseum until it becomes The Truth.

Unfortunately, this is often the problem with a lot of research into porn. It often approaches the subject as if porn use is a problem that needs to be solved, or it has an anti-porn slant. This is why I’m really looking forward to the results of the Pornography Research Online study being conducted by Clarissa Smith, Feona Attwood and Martin Barker, three UK academics who are interested in studying porn use. They want to be as objective as they can with the results.

If you haven’t already, I recommend you take their private and confidential survey.

I also recommend the Sexademic’s excellent debunking of the “addiction” myth here.

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It’s becoming increasingly apparent in the debates surrounding porn that statistics are being used like weapons. At the recent Cambridge debate, data, or the lack thereof, was an important factor in how points were presented. And dodgy statistics and studies about porn seem to be everywhere.

Now we have a chance to help create some unbiased research into the topic of how people use porn.

Pornography Research Online wants to talk to porn users and get an idea of how people interact with porn. I’ll let them do the talking:

In the past, pornography has overwhelmingly been assumed to be a ‘problem’, and the only really important questions to ask about it are – how much do people (and especially children) encounter it, and how great is the ‘harm’ that it does? This research is different.

Our project is concerned with the everyday uses of pornography, and how the people who use it feel it fits into their lives. Pornography is of course a highly topical issue, subject to many opposing views and ‘strong opinions’. And we are not saying that there are no moral or political issues. But we are saying that the voices of users and enjoyers have been swamped. In fact, there is very little research that engages with the users of pornography, asking how, when and why they turn to it.

At the Erotics Conference last week I was privileged to meet Clarissa Smith, the author of One For The Girls, a look at how UK women interacted with For Women magazine. We had a great chat about porn for women and she told me about the porn research project. I said I’d help get the word out.

So, here’s your chance to be heard. The survey may take half an hour of your time but it will be worth it. The result should be something that actually reflects our own experiences with porn, without the judgemental nonsense or “addiction” paradigms built in.

Please participate.

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I remember when I stopped reading Cosmopolitan in my first year of university. It was one of the best things I ever did. The endless fashion, diets and super-skinny models always left me feeling bad about myself so I decided that it would be best if I just disengaged from that aspect of “women’s culture.”

It’s 20 years on and Cosmo hasn’t changed. Still, it’s a hugely popular magazine that many women do enjoy and when they come up with a sex survey, I can’t help but be a little curious. If you can get past the very first question which reveals that absolutely none of the respondents identified as gay, there’s some interesting titbits in there.

Naturally I leapt on this statistic:

Have you ever watched porn?
37% said yes, I love it
23% said yes, but only with a boyfriend
15% said yes, once – but I didn’t like it
14% said no, but I’d be open to it
8% said no, I hate the idea.
3% said no, because it’s exploitative

That’s statistically larger than a lot of other surveys suggest. The average figure seems to be 30% (a la Nielsen Netratings) but UK Cosmo women are keener on their porn – whether enjoying it by themselves or using it as a tool within their sexual relationship. That’s 60% right there. Add the other 14% who didn’t have a problem with the idea and you’re pretty much saying that 75% of Cosmo readers are OK with porn. Quite the impressive statistic.

Also, I think I’ll gloat a bit that not a lot of Cosmo chicks are into Dworkinesque anti-porn feminism – a measly 3%. Seems the Stop Porn Coalition have a long way to go to win over your average woman into their “all porn is bad” campaign.

OK, so this was an online self-selected survey done by a commercial women’s magazine. The page doesn’t say exactly how many women did the survey (beyond “thousands”) or what the demographics were, so it’s not the most scientific bit of research out there. Nonetheless, if we consider the sheer numbers of women who do read Cosmopolitan, it certainly suggests that more and more women are openly enjoying porn.

Just to give an idea of some of the other trends, based on what was most popular:
Your average Cosmo woman has sex 2-3 times a week in the missionary position, doesn’t have an orgasm as often as she would like and rarely has an orgasm from penetrative sex alone (oral sex or manual stimulation is better). She will still fake orgasms occasionally, will rarely have sex on the first date and prefers men who make her laugh.

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This is too amusing to not blog about: figures from the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research show that more assaults, thefts and sexual assaults occurred in churches than in adult entertainment premises in Australia in 2008.

A breakdown of the figures showed that 85 people were assaulted in places of worship, compared to 66 at an adult entertainment premises.

According to the report, places of worship include churches, synagogues, monasteries, mosques, convents, cathedrals and chapels.

Premises listed under adult entertainment included strip clubs, sex shops, brothels, massage parlours, homosexual clubs, gaming houses as well as gambling clubs.

Places of worship were also ahead on sexual offences (16), theft from motor vehicles (33), resisting arrest (7) and liquor offences (10).

Harassment and threatening behaviour at places of worship (30) was more than double that of adult entertainment (13).

Funnier still, 20 people were charged with possession of marijuana in a church in 2007.

I’m looking at these figures and wonder whether our current laws have it right after all; you can’t have a strip club within 500m of a church. Maybe because it’s so dangerous in them thar churches and may cause offense to strip club patrons.

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Women are watching more porn than ever. At least, that’s the conclusion if you read The Sun’s latest survey (and I will admit, The Sun must be taken far less seriously than other newspapers).

Around 76 per cent of women now admit* to using porn – a ten per cent rise on the two-thirds of girls who admitted to watching porn with their partners in a survey last year.

The most popular format is online porn, which is watched by 61 per cent of couples. Just one couple in 20 looks at magazines, while 18 per cent get their kicks watching porn DVDs on the telly.

The survey of 4,200 women also revealed four in five women like to dress up for their other halves and indulge in role play.

The most popular outfit is a French maid, used by 42 per cent, followed by nurses, chosen by a quarter of women.

The survey was actually by a site called Netmums which gives you an idea of the demographics. Apparently women have a lot less time and energy for sex at the moment but they’re putting more effort into it when they get the chance.

* I hate how newspaper use the word “admit” like porn use is a crime. It casts the whole thing into a negative light. Thankfully the article includes interviews with (and photos of) three typical porn-loving women. This is a really positive thing to include because it shows that women who like a bit of porn are just everyday, normal chicks who want to enjoy their sex lives using whatever tools are available to them.

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Thanks to Ell I’ve been reading an amazing article at Libertus called Statistics Laundering: False and Fantastic Figures. It carefully and comprehensively dismantles the myth of an “explosion” of child porn on the internet.

Essentially, it’s saying that the vast majority of child porn statistics quoted in the media and elsewhere are either inaccurate, wildly exaggerated or simply made up. The author has taken the standard figures quoted by politicians and drilled down to find the original source of the statistics. In far too many cases, the statistics are just plain wrong.

“it is estimated that 100,000 commercial websites offer child pornography”
This 100,000 number originated in 2000 and has often been attributed to “Canadian Police”. However, in April 2005 the officer-in-charge of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s National Child Exploitation Coordination Center said it is not their estimate and that they obtained it from a January 2002 magazine article which attributed the 100,000 number to the U.S. Bureau of Customs. Further, the alleged U.S. Custom’s estimate did not include the words “commercial” or “offer”. Considerably more recent estimates/statistics (2007-2008) place the number of commercial websites between 150 and 2,204, most of which remain ‘live’ for less than 50 days.

“child pornography is one of the fastest growing online businesses generating approximately $US3 billion ($3.43 billion) each year”
This ‘$US3 billion’ figure has no credibility and even if it had credibility in 2008, then it could be regarded as ‘good news’ because it would mean (based on previously promulgated ’statistics’) that there had been no increase at all in the five years to 2008, therefore ‘child pornography’ could not be “one of the fastest growing online businesses”. The ‘$US3 billion’ figure has been promulgated far and wide since at least mid 2003, when Jerry Ropelato, a Utah-based anti-pornography crusader and content filtering software promoter, commenced publishing it on his web site InternetFilterReview.com, without citing a source for that or many of the other scary numbers he promulgates.

It’s quite a shocking thing to read, especially when you consider that child abuse and child porn are the premiere cause of sex panics in Western society.

Now let me say that, in posting about this, I am not for a minute saying that child porn isn’t a problem or that it doesn’t exist.

What I do want to say is that these inaccurate statistics are being used by politicians to whip up fear in people’s minds, beyond the scope of any real danger. And that fear is then being used to push censorship and encroachment on civil liberties.

Thus, you get the Australian government planning to censor the entire internet and labelling anyone who disagrees as a child pornographer.

By the way, I’ll say it again, like I did in this post. I hate writing about this subject on my blog and I also hate the idea of using the dreaded “CP” phrase which is anathema to most people who make adult websites because of the negative traffic it might attract. But I’ve got to post this up. People need to know this stuff.

Every time I hear of some guy arrested for CP “and police found 500,000 images on his computer” I always wonder if it’s the truth. Were there really 500,000 CP images? Or were there only a couple and the rest were just legal porn pics? It won’t make him any less guilty of course, but why does the media feel the need to exaggerate the numbers?

Child abuse is a problem in our society and we all want to work together to prevent it. Unfortunately exaggerating figures is counterproductive in the long run. I’ll end with a quote from the article:

The writer is of the view that public policy should be evidence-based, not based on myth, fiction, fantasy, exaggeration, or misrepresentation of academic research findings, promulgated by advocacy organisations (whether overseas-based or Australian-based) no matter how well intentioned any such organisations may be.

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I’ve accumulated a number of interesting links regarding Australian censorship, statistics and hot websites so I thought I’d cheat and just whack them all in one post.

Firstly, Catharine Lumby, one of the authors of The Porn Report, has given a fascinating talk about the history of censorship and porn to the Sydney Institute. You can find a video of the event here.

While despairingly contemplating the state of Australia when it comes to censorship and moral panic, I found Somebody Think Of The Children, an excellent pro-free speech blog. Writer Mike Meloni casts a wide net. At the moment he’s discussing the crazy censorship of computer games and the looming threat of government ISP filtering. Worth checking out.

While the politicians and conservatives outdo each other to protect us from ourselves, a poll reveals – once again – that Aussies love their porn. A Newspoll survey found that 70% of Australians want bans on X rated films overturned. This figure rises to 82% of 18-24 year olds. Interestingly, 80% of people with children are in favour of legalisation compared to 69% of those without. I’m wondering if priests were included in the latter group.

Meanwhile, Sexpo has just finished in Sydney, attracting 50,000 or so visitors. The organisers say nobody is shocked by it anymore, Australians are really relaxed about sex.

Given this information, I’m now speculating on the previously mentioned plan to place mandatory filters on ISPs to block porn. I’ve seen a suggestion that this scheme will be even worse than first thought. The plan is that if you want to look at porn, you give your name to the government to “opt out.” That’s unappealing enough, but what if the “unfiltered” feed only allows access to very small number Australian R-rated sex sites pre-approved by the OFLC?

Cue the revolution, perhaps? Because I think if you do try and take away unfettered internet porn from Australians, they’re not going to be as apathetic as they have been in the past. Either that or I’m moving to Amsterdam. Perhaps both.

So, here’s a couple of examples of sites that don’t have the government’s tick of approval and may be filtered out.

Fancies and Fuckeries blog offers the personal musings of a rather sexy Melbourne guy plus plenty of cock pics. The author starred in Anna Brownfield’s upcoming erotica film The Band and he also does a bit of nude modelling on the side. Nice.

He led me to Aaryon, a truly delightful nude art photography site. There’s not a lot of info about who’s behind it, but the pics are glorious.

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Just wanted to add a further post about the recent survey of the sex lives of Australian women (previous post here)

News.com.au has an article unfortunately titled “The sad sexual secrets of women” which is rather misleading since the survey has plenty of positive aspects to it, including an increase in masturbation, a desire for more consideration from male partners and a general urge to explore one’s sexuality.

I wanted to quote this part of the article, which hearkens back to the various discussions about “why women hate porn”.

But, overwhelmingly, we’re bored in the bedroom, causing many of us to stray in search of sexual thrills – which might explain why more of us are watching pornography to spice up our sex lives.

One respondent was so disappointed with the quality of porn movies available, she starred in her own.

“A lot of women described how porn is OK, but they would like it a lot better if it was made by women for women and then they would like to look at it with their partners and use it as a stimulant,” Sauers said.

On the downside porn, while titillating, had added “a whole new level of anxiety, not just about the body but about performance”, Sauers said.

She said that, while porn does carry risks because a small percentage of men become addicted, “to dismiss porn out of hand as an enemy of sexuality and an enemy of relationships is a mistake”.

I found it refreshing to read a relatively pro-porn comment like that in a News Ltd media outlet.

The aforementioned sad aspect of women’s sex lives is that one in three women have experienced some form of sexual assault.

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Another day, another book, another news item and survey that says that women like porn.

A book called The Sex Lives of Australian Women says that 1 in 4 Aussie chicks will look at porn at least once a month. The book is based on a survey of 2000 self-selected internet participants.

Naturally, I’m not surprised at this 1-in-4 statistic, which seems to be the similar to the 27-30% figure that pops up regularly in most research.

One in five have also had a go at making their own sex tape, according to the report here. I liked this quote:

“It was fine, but to tell you the truth … watching it again was hilarious … not erotic … my arse was NOT ever meant to be on a tape,” responded a 33-year-old mother from Western Australia.

The Courier Mail article is also rather stunned that more women have orgasms via masturbation than any other method. This piece of information is always treated as if it’s an affront to men, somehow, and I’m a bit sick of that attitude. Of course you’re going to orgasm easily when masturbating! That’s the whole point. It’s a purely selfish activity aimed at creating an orgasm. Sex with a partner has a lot of other things going on, not least of which is the ongoing misconception that the penis should create an orgasm by moving in and out of the relatively non-sensitive vagina!

OK, just had to get that off my chest.

Meanwhile, in other unrelated statistical news, I’ve just realised I’ve now passed 700 posts on the Wordpress version of this blog (not counting the old blog). I installed WP in January 2006 so it’s taken me 2 and a half years to reach this point. Hurrah.

I’m still not sure if I should move the blog to a new domain. One of my tweaks seems to have worked with Google, a bit. I have a couple of other things planned to see if it helps.

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Another statistic to add to my collection. A survey of Swedish women by “yummy mummy” magazine Mama says that 28% of them have looked at online porn. This tallies with numerous other surveys which seem to always conclude that around a third of all women like to indulge in a little smut occasionally.

The survey also found that just because women become mothers, it doesn’t mean that they’re not also keen on sex.

43 percent of mums under the age of 29 own a dildo… 31 percent of those surveyed think their man’s freshly showered body is the greatest turn-on… 39 percent of the Swedish mums surveyed have had anal sex and 23 percent fantasize about other men or women during sexual intercourse. 37 percent of the younger mums (under age 29) have had lesbian fantasies. 2 percent have had group sex and 23 percent of mums under the age of 29 use handcuffs as part of sex play.

Ah, the freshness of Scandanavia! Cue the numerous cliches about blondes and jacuzzis and saunas and such.

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The Porn Report seems to be making waves at the moment, with most newspapers giving the story a relatively positive spin. The Courier Mail, for example, gives Alan McKee plenty of column space here, with only lip service paid to the conservatives who argue against porn, albeit without any proof, by the sounds of it. I think that’s the cool thing about this book – it offers good, well researched statistics that can be used to counter all the usual hysterical arguments against porn.

The Australian has an excerpt from the book here.

The authors have also set up a site for the book, including a blog by Kath Albury that is already making for great reading. I’m going to include it in my blogroll because I think Kath has a lot of really worthwhile and intelligent things to say on the topic.

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I’m a bit late with this but it’s worth blogging about anyway. Three Australian researchers have released The Porn Report, the result of several years of research and surveys. The finding that the media have jumped on is that – gasp! – women like porn.

17% of those interviewed for the book were women and the authors say that women make up an increasing percentage of the porn market.

That newcomer, says author Catharine Lumby, is likely to be a woman aged under 35 who lives in the suburbs, votes for a progressive party like the Greens, is in a monogamous relationship with a man and earns slightly more than average.

Lumby says research indicates that women who consume pornography favour watching DVDs on a laptop in the privacy of their home and also like to watch porn with a partner.

I actually participated in that survey and I’m pleased to see the book is finally out. I hope their findings are useful in reducing the stigma surrounding porn in this country and that it can be used to remove the ridiculous censorship laws in place here.

There’s a blog post and numerous comments on the topic here.

Most porn films these days (and I’m not talking about the frightening XXX types which are just wrong) seem to make the women’s needs as important as the man’s. (NB men). There is a big difference between the hardcore porn that could only possibly do things for dirty, disgusting pervs, but more the soft porn variety, which is not as, um, intrusive.

That’s probably one of the reasons more women are embracing it these days. It’s about having the choice and realising that porn comes in lots of different forms, from movies, to books, to even the naughty text message.

Nice to see a positive comment on porn in a News Ltd publication.

Related Posts:

• More On Australian Women, Porn and Sex
• Women Are Watching More Porn Than Ever
• “Why Women Hate Porn” (And Why They Like It)
• This Is Post 701: Aussie Chicks Like Porn