My problem with porn (need some advice)

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by MRT144
youre right, that was a terrible analogy. what i should have said is, this is like a woman's period. we know they have it, and we just endure it and get on with our lives. sure it sucks sometimes but overall we love them.

Nah, I don't buy that. Menstruation is biological. I don't think the "addiction" to porn is on the same level, since there's a great deal of variation in that.

Hm, maybe it's something similar to alcoholism, which is caused by a genetic defect.

[MRT144]

i dont think most guys are addicted to porn or most guys defending looking at porn are addicted. I think that its frankly bizarre for a woman not to understand that a guy likes porn and wants him to get rid of it or share it with them.

masturbation for guys is a personal sexual act built around fantasy and sexual relief. and women dont get that.

[MRT144]

furthermore this is an example of a woman projecting what she wants her man to be and not understanding what he is and getting bent out of shape about it.

1. can you live with him looking at porn without you?
2. can you live without getting bent out of shape about it?
3. do you really want to leave him because of this issue?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by MRT144
i dont think most guys are addicted to porn or most guys defending looking at porn are addicted. I think that its frankly bizarre for a woman not to understand that a guy likes porn and wants him to get rid of it or share it with them.

If you already have an SO and still wants to look at porn, it seems like addiction to me. Like you are already full and still wait to stuff food down your throat.

Originally posted by MRT144
masturbation for guys is a personal sexual act built around fantasy and sexual relief. and women dont get that.

Why would you masturbate when you have the real thing?

[MRT144]

because masturbating and sex arent the same thing even if the end result is the same. its not like i masturbate instead of having sex if i have the option. I do both. at different times. for different reasons.

anyway, i think youre totally out of your element considering that you have no idea how a western relationship works other than the charactitures youve seen in the media and on poly.

[DaShi]

The addiction signs come from the fact that he sneaks around doing it. It's clearly something he feels guilty about doing but can't stop himself.

[Sikander]

I agree with Dis, Jon Miller and KrazyHorse in that I think you are right to be troubled by his behavior. He does seem to have an addiction (the definition of addiction is persistence in a behavior despite consequences that the addict wouldn't accept of his own free will), and the consequences minimally are that he's weirding you out and perhaps wearing himself out while not satisfying you. Skulking about in a not too successful attempt to do his thing in secret sounds miserable too.

Based on what I've heard from you so far, there are several possibilities. One, he has an addiction to masturbation. This is pretty common, and it behaves in many ways like a drug addiction, ie when stressed the addict will feel more pressure to masturbate. One downside of this is that addicts typically develop this addiction before they begin to experience sex with another human being, and they tend to develop sexual habits that are designed to deliver a massive hit of endorophins more or less as rapidly as possible. This confusion between drugs and sex and the bad habits it tends to confer can be a real problem in a relationship, not least because people often find it's hard to seperate the sexual issues from the addiction issues.

If you take him completely at his word (ie he's not masturbating) then he seems to have a compulsion to collect pornography. I'm not sure how healthy this is to be honest, but it does come with some serious downsides, again mainly that he is creeping you out. Most women would be creeped out, and few would see it as a positive.
My advice is to get into counseling with him. Whether or not his porn activities are harmful, neither he nor you seem to be completely happy here. Take a chance on improving your relationship and life together.

[Lazerus]

I'd agree with the stance that aslong as he's not turning down sex with you to go get his kicks looking at porn there's not that much wrong with it. Simple things like him getting a rush of hormones 20minutes after you've left for work or having a biological clock that makes him more active at an odd time of the day could mean he has no other alternative bar sitting in frustration.
The reason he's probably sneaking around to do it is alot of people, even though they do it, still feel pretty taboo about it. In the same way most girls say "oh no i don't have a vibrator" when they've got 3 of different sizes.
Do you know what type of porn he's actually looking at ? it's probably either something daft or something that's filling a fantasy in his head but he wouldn't carry out in real life (maybe more violent then he'd ever be with you, threesome etc)

[Barnabas]

Without porn we use our imagination, porn is irrelevant.

[Lorizael]

Yes. Men will always want to masturbate. Then again, almost all of my female friends masturbate on a fairly frequent basis, too, so who knows.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Lorizael
Then again, almost all of my female friends masturbate on a fairly frequent basis, too, so who knows.

Now that you've announced it on Apolyton, every Geek in Geekdom.

[Lorizael]

Fortunately, only two posters on this board know who I am in real life, and neither of them have posted in years.

[Q Classic]

I know you live in NY at the UN building...

[Lorizael]

Damn, foiled again.

[badams52]

I rarely post here anymore, but I could not let the "everyone does it" to continue to dominate the conversation here. The everyone does it and those who don't lie is just a coping mechanism for those who do to not feel bad about what they do. I'm not going to say everyone here who looks at porn is a porn addict, but here are some interesting sites to look at and an article in Time Magazine. Notice how the reason for divorce has increased because of internet porn. Also of note is how the younger college crowd of women are more accepting of porn.

http://www.sexualcontrol.com/

http://www.pureintimacy.org/gr/intimacy/understanding/a0000133.cfm

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Family/tst111405a.cfm

and the time article: http://www.time.com/time/2004/sex/ar...n_the_01a.html

n a Friends episode titled "The One with Free Porn," Chandler and Joey discover to their delight a free pornography TV channel, which they leave on and watch endlessly for fear it will go away. Later, a startled Chandler reports to Joey, "I was just at the bank, and there was this really hot teller, and she didn't ask me to go do it in the vault." Joey describes a similar cold shoulder from the pizza-delivery woman. "You know what?" Chandler concludes. "We have to turn off the porn."

Chandler may be on to something. Call it the porn factor. Whereas pornography was once furtively glimpsed at dimly lighted newsstands or seedy adult theaters, today it is everywhere. It pours in over the Internet, sometimes uninvited, sometimes via eagerly forwarded links (Paris Hilton, anyone?). It titillates 24/7 on steamy adult cable channels and on-demand services (the pay-per-view reality show Can You Be a Porn Star? made its debut this month). It has infiltrated mainstream cable with HBO's forthcoming documentary series Pornucopia: Going Down in the Valley. And in ways that have only begun to be measured, it is coloring relationships, both long-and short-term, reshaping expectations about sex and body image and, most worrisome of all, threatening to alter how young people learn about sex.

In recent years, a number of psychologists and sociologists have joined the chorus of religious and political opponents in warning about the impact of pervasive pornography. They argue that porn is transforming sexuality and relationships—for the worse. Experts say men who frequently view porn may develop unrealistic expectations of women's appearance and behavior, have difficulty forming and sustaining relationships and feeling sexually satisfied. Fueled by a combination of access, anonymity and affordability, online porn has catapulted overall pornography consumption—bringing in new viewers, encouraging more use from existing fans and escalating consumers from soft-core to harder-core material. Cyberporn is even giving rise to a new form of sexual compulsiveness. According to Alvin Cooper, who conducts seminars on cybersex addiction, 15% of online-porn habitues develop sexual behavior that disrupts their lives. "The Internet is the crack cocaine of sexual addiction," says Jennifer Schneider, co-author of Cybersex Exposed: Simple Fantasy or Obsession?

Yet most users say sex online is nothing more than good (if not quite clean) fun. According to a 2001 online survey of 7,037 adults, two-thirds of those who visit websites with sexual content say their Internet activities haven't affected their level of sexual activity with their partners, though three-quarters report masturbating while online. The vast majority of respondents—85% to 90%—according to Cooper, who heads the San Jose Marital and Sexuality Center, which conducted the study, are what he calls "recreational users," people who view pornography as a curiosity or diversion.

The question is, Can even recreational use be unhealthy? A 2003 online study by Texas Christian University found that the more pornography men watch, the more likely they are to describe women in sexualized terms and categorize women in traditional gender roles. Mark Schwartz, director of the Masters and Johnson clinic in St. Louis, Mo., says porn not only causes men to objectify women—seeing them as an assemblage of breasts, legs and buttocks—but also leads to a dependency on visual imagery for arousal. "Men become like computers, unable to be stimulated by the human beings beside them," he says. "The image of a lonely, isolated man masturbating to his computer is the Willy Loman metaphor of our decade."

Other psychologists are more tolerant. Most men use pornography in secret, and as long as it doesn't affect their relationships, some say that's O.K. "If a client is enjoying a healthy use of pornography without his wife's knowledge, I would counsel him not to tell her," says psychiatrist Scott Haltzman, who studies men and relationships. Yet many therapists say such behavior creates a breach of trust. Spouses often view porn as a betrayal or even as adultery. The typical reaction when a woman discovers her husband's habit is shock and "How dare he?" According to therapist Lonnie Barbach, based in Mill Valley, Calif., many such women "feel like they're not good enough. Otherwise, why would their mates be seeking this?"

Sometimes pornography tears couples apart. At the 2003 meeting of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, two-thirds of the 350 divorce lawyers who attended said the Internet played a significant role in divorces in the past year, with excessive interest in online porn contributing to more than half of such cases. "This is clearly related to the Internet," says Richard Barry, president of the association. "Pornography had an almost nonexistent role in divorce just seven or eight years ago."

Still, couples therapists sometimes suggest pornography as a way to refresh relationships or spark desire. Increasingly, women are game. Sociologist Michael Kimmel has found that each year more of his female college students approve of porn, which may reflect women's increased sexual empowerment. Nonetheless, he says, "their attitude is surprising to those of us who think it an impoverished view of liberation to construct your sex life the way men do." The key, therapists say, is for mutual consumption to be seductive to both partners and for material to be "erotic" rather than "pornographic." Most describe the difference this way: porn is objectifying and derogatory while erotica depicts mutually satisfying sex between equal partners. Others say it's a matter of taste.

Trouble is, often the taste is not shared. Jessica (not her real name), 28, a product manager in New York City, tolerates her boyfriend's pornography habit, but his admiration for bodies like that of porn queen Jenna Jameson has made her insecure, so she plans to get breast implants. "My boyfriend told me lots of his friends' girlfriends have done it," she says. "He said to me, 'Imagine what an awesome body you'll have!' I can't blame him for his preferences." But Jessica isn't sure that surgery will improve their sex life. "He tends to be selfish sexually," she says. "I think pornography has a lot to do with it. For him, porn is easy."

Jessica's experience is pretty typical, says Aline Zoldbrod, a sex therapist in Lexington, Mass. She says men's use of porn for undemanding relief often distracts them from the task of trying to please their real-life partners.

Porn doesn't just give men bad ideas; it can give kids the wrong idea at a formative age. Whereas children used to supplement sex education by tearing through National Geographic in search of naked aboriginals and leafing through the occasional Penthouse they stumbled across in the garage, today many are confronted by pornographic images on a daily basis. In a 2001 poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation, 70% of 15-to 17-year-olds said they had accidentally come across pornography online. Older teens may be aware of the effects of such images: 59% of 15-to-24-year-olds told the pollsters they believe seeing porn on the Internet encourages young people to have sex before they are ready; 49% said it promotes bad attitudes toward women and encourages viewers to think unprotected sex is O.K. "Pornography is affecting people at an increasingly young age," says sociologist Diana Russell, who has written several books on the subject. "And unfortunately for many kids growing up today, pornography is the only sex education they'll get."

Because children learn sexual cues early, boys may train themselves to respond only to images shaped by porn stars, while girls may learn that submission and Brazilian bikini waxes are the keys to pleasing men. Recent studies show a correlation between increased aggressiveness in boys and exposure to pornography, and a link between childhood use of porn and sexually abusive behavior in adulthood. "It's not easy to shock me," says Judith Coche, a therapist in Philadelphia who has been in practice for 25 years. "But one 11-year-old girl's parents discovered their daughter creating her own pornographic website because it's 'cool' among her friends." As such incidents multiply, more Americans—parents especially—may come to Chandler's conclusion: We have to turn off the porn.