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E-PrinceToday, for the second time in as many semesters, Princeton University is welcoming pornography producer and self-proclaimed “anal sexpert” Tristan Taormino to campus at the behest of the student group Let’s Talk Sex. This time, Taormino comes armed with ...(back to the article)
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What a breath of fresh air on a topic bedeviled by misunderstandings and errors.
You are absolutely right. There is no justification for pornography. Anyone who can't admit that porn facilitates the objectification of women and promotes sexual violence against women is engaging in colossal cognitive dissonance. There are few legal things that are more destructive to society.
While Brandon goes a little heavy on the life-expectancy aspect (which isn't strictly about the morality of porn, but only the attitudes and working conditions that it seems to engender), he still makes the good point that all this talk about "feminist porn" is practically worthless. Even less degrading, softcore porn is a gateway into more degrading, hardcore forms. And even in less degrading forms, there is, in ovo, the same sort of detachment of sex from reality that leads to dissatisfaction with one's real-life partners.
Where the hell did that statistic come from?
For that matter, where the hell do his assertions on the effects of pornography come from?
While I'm not sure off hand who conducted the life expectancy study, I do know that it was of 129 porn performers over a 20 year period.
For the effects of pornography on one's sexual satisfaction with one's partner, see: Zillmann, Dolf and Jennings Bryant. 1988. "Pornography's Impact on Sexual Satisfaction." Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 18 (5): 438-45.
For evidence that pornography makes one believe that women desire and enjoy being raped, see: Ohbuchi, K., Ikeda, T., and Takeuchi, G. 1994. Effects of violent pornography upon viewers’ rape myth beliefs: a study of Japanese males. Psychology, Crime, and Law, 1, 71-81.
For the fact that exposure to pornography is associated with committing sexual assault and harassment oneself, see: Boeringer, S. B. 1994. Pornography and sexual aggression: associations of violent and nonviolent depictions with rape and rape proclivity. Deviant Behavior, 15, 289-304; and Baron, L. and Straus, M. 1984. Sexual stratification, pornography, and rape in the United States. In N. Malamuth and E. Donnerstein (eds.) Pornography and Sexual Aggression. New York: Academic Press.
These are just some of the studies; but there are many more.
The source McGinley used for his article is most likely this site: http://danielrjennings.org/TheAverageLifeExpect...
Now, I won't go into depth as to how this "study" is flawed in terms of sampling error, but the author isn't the most educated in his field, so you really shouldn't be expecting a scientific study anyways.
Of course, one can also seem the same statistic here (http://www.shelleylubben.com/porn) and here (http://www.thepinkcross.org/page/help-porn-addi...).
The life-expectancy statistic was also cited last week in a lecture on pornography by Dr. Mary Anne Layden, Director of Education at the Center for Cognitive Therapy at UPenn.
If that's the "study" McGinely is citing, he really shouldn't be allowed to graduate. The study's author makes a pretty clear error - he only counts the dead porn stars, not the ones who are still alive and will live on to a much older age. Since there was an explosion of porn production with the creation of home video and premium cable in the 80s and 90s, most of the former porn stars out there are younger than 50, still alive, and thus aren't included in Rev. Jennings numbers.
Using the same methodology, we'd probably come up with the statistic that students from the class '90 have a life expectancy of about the same figure. At the maximum, we'd come up with a life expectancy of 42, since most members of the class of '90 graduated at 22 and are 42 now. That isn't because Princeton is a dangerous place. It's because the statistic we're calculating isn't "life expectancy among members of the class of '90," it's "life expectancy among members of the class of '90 who die by 2010."
Can we get a retraction for writing a column based on this "study?"
Mr. McGinley, do you call yourself a journalist? The basis of your argument is a "study" with conclusions drawn from bible verses, conducted by a religious figure, who obviously has no scientific or statistical training. You are an embarrassment to The Daily Princetonian and Princeton University.
"They’re being abused — physically, sexually, psychologically. They’re subject to experiences of degradation unique to their profession."
I could say the same thing about the sex abuse victims of the Catholic church. I'm not condemning you for your beliefs or your writing. I just find it strange that you are choosing to write a column condemning adults for their sexual choices, but didn't write one about the nonconsensual abuse of minors within your own religion.