*Trigger warning: This blog contains written references to violent, disturbing, and racist sexual scenarios.
It’s no secret that porn is a powerful storyteller. Repeated and regular consumption is proven to form deep neurological pathways in the brain. When paired with the strong hit of dopamine that an orgasm produces, this creates a potent message to the mind and body.
A 2016 Barna study revealed that over two-thirds of 13 to 24-year-old males and one-third of 13 to 24-year-old females are viewing pornography at least monthly. And we know that the average age of exposure to porn is now, conservatively, between ages 7 and 13.
Porn usage is increasing among children at the same time that the most violent and disturbing categories of porn are increasing in prevalence. And the porn of today is eroticizing and normalizing the most traumatic and damaging acts of violence a person could experience in their lifetime.
In a sample study from Italy, 42% of males and 32% of females were watching porn that included violence against women, including extreme degradation, rape, torture, and murder.
Yes, murder.
Violence pervades pornography. In violent porn, women are most often the subjects of it—nothing more than bodies or body parts to be used, humiliated, subjugated, and degraded, by the strong, sexually aggressive, self-fulfilling man. The man is the embodiment of power and he uses this power to dominate the woman.
the porn of today is erotisizing and normalizing the most traumatic and damaging acts of violence a person could experience in their lifetime.
One violent porn category, known as “Gonzo” porn, is a genre in which women are routinely slapped, strangled, spat and peed on, beaten, verbally abused, and raped for the pleasure of the viewer. In our new film, Raised on Porn, Dr. Gail Dines explains, “When the average 12-year-old boy puts ‘porn’ into Google, he’s directed immediately to the porn tube sites such as YouPorn and Pornhub. And the most accessible is actually called Gonzo porn—that’s the shorthand term for the violent porn that has no storyline.”
We did some searches of our own to see what kind of content was most accessible.
With a quick search on Google using the term, “rape porn,” we found 494 million results, revealing page after page of websites advertising not just violent, but racist, underage, and incestuous rape porn.
Some of the first titles and descriptions to be displayed in our search included:
“Real rape videos,” “Cruel rapes,” “Paralyzed girl abused and forced,” “Girl ambushed and gang raped,” “Helpless teen rape,” “Father rape daughter forcefully,” “Raping African Maid”, and “Young girls get raped hard.” A click into any one of these sites would bring up literally thousands of videos to be consumed, one after the other, with absolutely no age verification required for the site visitor.
Regardless of whether these videos are being acted out by “consenting” adults or are real rape on film, there is something distressingly wrong with this picture and the message it’s sending to our children about what is acceptable, desired, or expected in physical intimacy. Violent porn is incredibly destructive for both men and women.
Sign our petition to require age verification, with ID, on every site that hosts porn.
In males as young as 14, a correlation was confirmed in several studies between frequent pornography viewing and an accepting stance toward raping a girl. Another Swedish study found that 70% of high school boys who were frequent viewers of pornography, including that which features violence and the sexual abuse of children and animals, reported that porn made them want to try out what they had seen.
To be clear, we know that not everyone who watches violent porn becomes a perpetrator of physical sexual abuse. However, studies show that most people who commit sexual abuse watch porn.
It is also a known strategy for traffickers to show their victims violent porn to groom them and also to demonstrate what is expected of them. If this content is being used by predators to groom children, we must acknowledge that violent porn is also grooming children who come across it online. It’s the same content.
One of the main problems with children watching this content is that the porn narrative is one with no consequences and zero repercussions for one’s actions. Porn presents no risk of prison sentences for rape, no hospital visits for girls who have been physically damaged during violent sex, no relational backlash, no saying “no,” and zero compassion. Porn glorifies self-satisfaction at the expense of another and teaches children they can get away with criminal acts against a person.
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Even if the argument is made that adults can decipher between fantasy and real life, children certainly don’t have that fully developed capacity. And it’s far more difficult for children to distinguish the difference, let alone the possible consequences, of acting out what they’re seeing.
Violent porn also creates a more intense sexual appetite, rendering “normal” (non-violent) sex dissatisfying. Through extensive research, the Gottman Institute concluded that porn is a “serious threat” to relationships because “…much more of a normal stimulus may eventually be needed to achieve the response a supernormal stimulus evokes. In contrast, ordinary levels of the stimulus are no longer interesting. This may be how normal sex becomes much less interesting for porn users. The data supports this conclusion.”
Let’s be real. Women’s empowerment and violent porn can’t coexist.
When the “me too” movement swept the world several years ago, the severity and prevalence of rape culture and sexual abuse was brought to light with a particular focus on the rampant abuse from men in positions of power (e.g. wealthy film producers). Women in great numbers bravely began to raise their voices, sharing their stories of sexual harassment and abuse that had remained hidden for too long.
Alongside the justified outrage of this movement, the celebration and glorification of women in porn also gained momentum, with some of the same people who were lamenting “me too,” in the same breath, praising women for their “empowered” choice to enter the porn industry.
Let’s be real. Women’s empowerment and violent porn can’t coexist. Exalting the normalization of violent porn while taking a stance against sexual violence is a contradiction.
Violent porn isn’t a harmless “kink.” Freely available content that glorifies the utter humiliation and subjugation of women poses a brutal and unrelenting threat to the minds of our children. Rape and sexual assault are shaping the sexual templates of an entire generation of children, and lives are being destroyed as a result.
With your help, we can build a formidable movement that demands age verification on porn sites and challenges the predatory porn giants that are harvesting the innocence of children everywhere.
1. Join 50,000+ others by signing the petition demanding age verification, with ID, on every single porn site. Then share it.
2. Watch Raised on Porn, free on YouTube, then like, comment, and share it with 5 friends.
3. Give. The more resources we have the more people we can reach with this film and campaign.
