Pornography is one of the most pervasive forces in media. Some estimates put there being almost 250 million web pages with erotic material in some shape or form, and that just the US. The industry as a whole brings in around 3 billion dollars a year, by some more conservative estimates. Yet despite its prevalence in our society, a lot of people hate the industry. A lot of people flat out refuse to admit (and lets be honest, some one is watching or reading all this crap, and its more than just a few perverted old men) that they have any form of porn. I think this is in part due to what amounts to a smear campaign run by, admittedly well meaning but misguided, feminists in the 80’s and 90’s and religions conservatives (see, there is something that they can agree on). The major arguments against porn seem to be that one, it’s degrading to women, and two, it leads to rape or sexual crime.

Feminism, as far as I understand it, is the thought that women have the same rights as men, including the rights to their bodies and to controlling their own destinies. I am going to assume that every one (at least every one sane) can agree with this definition. Now, is it degrading for a woman to have sex for money? To fuck for fun and funds? Maybe; maybe not. Maybe it was; that being said, times are changing. Hell, porn stars write books and get interviewed by CNN. They have their own version of celebrity, and their award shows. So how exactly are they being degraded? Really, how are they different than actors or musicians? In all cases you have some one willing to do something for our entertainment in exchange for money. Said activities can lead to a loss of privacy, to people who don’t know you judging you, and often enough, people blaming you for the downfall of morality. So again, where is the difference? Furthermore, if porn is so damn bad, why not go after gay porn too? Is that just as degrading, or is it ok to degrade men? Is all porn bad, or is some of it ok? Who gets to decide? In any case, this point is the hardest to argue, for or against. Some people will always see porn as degrading, not just to people on the screen, but to women as a whole. Never mind the fact that while porn has been increasing in popularity, we are seeing more equality between men and women. I am not trying to suggest causation; I am however saying that there doesn’t seem any reason to draw a negative correlation between the treatment of women and the popularity of porn.

Now lets talk about the fun stuff: rape. Many, every one from psychologists to women studies professors to cops, have said that porn leads to rapes. One of the editiors of Ms. Magazine, a Robin Morgan, can be quoted as saying: “Pornography is the theory; rape is the practice”. Of course, she is an honest to god feminazi, having also said that “ 'man-hating' is an honorable and viable political act….”, so lets not take her to seriously. Now rape is a serious crime; possibly worse than murder really, so I take any evidence linking a raise in rape and some other thing pretty seriously. Here in lies the problem with argument number two: there isn’t any evidence linking an increase in rape to the increase in popularity of porn. Not one single good study. What Ms Morgan and company fail to consider, or just ignore for the sake of a good sound bite and to advance a cause, is that there are always Z factors. For those of you who are not all hip to statistics, specifically correlation statistics, a “Z factor” (it goes by other names too) is a third, out side factor that explains what otherwise appears to be a correlation. For instance, there is a 100% positive (meaning that as one goes up, the other goes up) correlation between those who drink water, and those die. Does that mean that drinking water is what killed you? Of course not; the initial appearance of a rise in rape cases in regards to the rise of porn also probably has a Z factor. That factor: increased reporting.

Way back in the day, if you got raped, it was your damn fault. If you reported it, you might have gotten laughed at, and even if the bastard got caught and prosecuted, you would have a good deal of stigma attached to you. Thankfully attitudes changed, and rapes get reported more often, and as such we have a higher report rate, but not necessarily a higher incident rate. Of course, I might be wrong. There maybe another Z factor, or none at all. So lets take a look at 1993 to present. The rise of the almighty internet. Porn for all, and much of it free, if you know how to do a good Google image search or use a torrent system. One would suppose, with all this porn, of all varieties, being so easily available and increasing in amount that rapes would increase, if porn causes rapes or sexual assaults. That’s not what we are seeing though. Since 1993, according to the FBI, sexual assaults as a whole are down 68%, and rape itself is down 72%. What does this show? Well for starters, it shows that Morgan and company are not only wrong, but as wrong as one can be with being so wrong as to be parody and satire.

Now lets take a broader, and probably more controversial step back for a second, and talk about something related. Women have tons of magazines directed at them, many of them that seem to feature stories talking about what they, the magazine editors, think men want. I would dare say that few if any women have ever understood men, as a whole. If you did, you realize most of the previously referenced articles are crap, but that’s a different story. Also, touching on the issue of degradation, much of what is taken as “degrading” that men do to women, we do to each other, in one form or the other. The things men call each other or do to each other would get them shot or arrested if they didn’t do them primarily to their friends. What I am getting at here, is that you can tell feminist theory doesn’t understand men, not even a little, by this one statement: rape is always about power. It’s wrong on so many levels. First point of evidence on for my side: in places with legalized prostitution, there is less, but it still happens, rape. The desperate have an outlet. The second point of evidence, and this comes from what seems to be the majority of statements made by rapists as a whole “She wanted it, look at the way she was dressed” or some variation. Most rape isn’t violent. There is a lot of rape that involves drugging up a person or getting them drunk or some such. Where is the power in that? Speaking as a person who definitely leans on the D and S ends of the BDSM spectrum, I can safely say that there really isn’t a lot of domination or taking power from a victim when they are passed out. Its still rape if you do it, but it’s about sex. Until researchers are willing to look at that aspect of rape, we will never start to fix the problem, and researchers will never be able to look at this side of the problem until feminists sit down, shut up, and stop pretending that they know men better than men do.