Big Porn Inc: Exposing the Harms of the Global Pornography Industry

by Melinda Tankard Reist

  Leftists who take women’s well-being seriously should recognize that pornography, along with other forms of sexualized exploitation – primarily of women, girls, and boys, by men – in capitalism is inconsistent with a world in which ordinary people can take control of their own destinies. This critique focuses our attention on systems. It offers an analysis of the failure of our dominant systems rather than misdiagnosing the problem as individual failures within otherwise healthy systems. It also asks us to critique not only those systems but ourselves, to examine how the values of those systems live within us.

  There is a powerful argument from justice – the obligation to act on the principles we claim to hold – to inspire men to engage in this kind of critical self-reflection. There also is a compelling argument from self-interest – our desire to be fully human. My own experience has been that when I face these questions, no matter how painful the struggle, my life is richer and fuller for that struggle. For those of us socialized to be ‘real men’ in patriarchy – or to be white in a white-supremacist society, or middle/upper class in a society based on economic exploitation – the struggles are always there. If we ignore that struggle out of fear of the pain, we not only impede progressive political struggles but surrender some of our own humanity.

  Bibliography

  Brosius, H.B., J.B. Weaver III and J.F. Staab (1993) ‘Exploring the social and sexual “reality” of contemporary pornography’ Journal of Sex Research, 30, pp. 161–170.

  Dines, Gail (2010) Pornland: How Porn Has Hijacked Our Sexuality. Beacon Press, Boston; Spinifex Press, North Melbourne.

  Dworkin, Andrea (1979) Pornography: Men Possessing Women. Perigee, New York; reprinted 1989 Dutton, Boston.

  Jensen, Robert (2007) Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity. South End Press, Cambridge, MA.

  Jensen, Robert (2011) ‘Pornography as Propaganda’ in Gerry Sussman (Ed) The Propaganda Society. Peter Lang, New York.

  Koss, Mary P. (1988) ‘Hidden rape: Sexual aggression and victimization in a national sample of students in higher education’ in Ann Wolbert Burgess (Ed) Rape and Sexual Assault: II. Garland, New York, pp. 3–25.

  Stoller, Robert J. and I.S. Levine (1993) Coming Attractions: The Making of an X-rated Video. Yale University Press, New Haven.

  Sun, Chyng and Miguel Picker (2008) The Price of Pleasure: Pornography, Sexuality, and Relationships. Media Education Foundation, Northampton.

  Tjaden, Patricia (2004) ‘What is violence against women? Defining and measuring the problem: A response to Dean Kilpatrick’ Journal of Interpersonal Violence 19 (11), pp. 1244–1251.

  Tjaden, Patricia, and Nancy Thoennes (2006) ‘Extent, nature, and consequences of rape victimization: Findings from the National Violence Against Women Survey’ US Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice, .

  Wosnitzer, Robert J. and Ana J. Bridges (2007) ‘Aggression and sexual behavior in best-selling pornography: A content analysis update’. Paper presented at the 57th Annual Meeting of the International Communication Association, San Francisco.

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  1 A longer version of this essay appeared in The Propaganda Society edited by Gerry Sussman (2011).

  Nina Funnell

  Sexting and Peer-to-Peer Porn

  Historically, debates about children and pornography have typically played out in 2 directions: either children are discussed as being the victims used in illegal child pornography or, alternatively, they are constructed as the damaged consumers of adult pornography which they inadvertently or deliberately access.

  Both the ‘exploited victim’ and ‘damaged consumer’ approaches have produced a wealth of research that has contributed to public debates about pornography. However, while these approaches have offered important frameworks for understanding and discussing the harm caused to children, they have not been able to account for a recently emerging trend whereby young people are not merely accessing and consuming pornography, but are now the active producers of pornography.

  Youth, sex and technology

  In recent years, academics have been focussing on the ways in which young people are incorporating technology into their dating, courtship and sexual socialisation practices. While many young people report that technology has enhanced their social lives, girls have also expressed distress over the ways in which technology (such as digital photography, mobile phone cameras and web cams) has contributed to making them feel increasingly exposed and visually vulnerable.

  The ease with which photos are now produced, the speed at which they travel, combined with the permanence of those photos once online, has meant that young people’s private lives are now being shared and recorded in ways never seen or imagined before. The advent of the smartphone which allows users to access the World Wide Web directly from their personal phones also means that young people are now able to upload and retrieve digital information from anywhere and at anytime, with few time-delay barriers that might otherwise give an opportunity for reflective thought.

  Of particular concern is the way in which young people are now uploading sexualised personal content which is then immediately available for peers and others. According to one study1 completed by the ‘National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy in America’, as many as 1 in 5 teenagers have electronically sent a nude or semi-nude image or video of themselves. This statistic which has been widely reproduced in media articles, has alarmed parents and children’s rights groups everywhere. Blended with the concern that young people may be jeopardising their reputations and employment prospects is the fear that such photos could fall into the hands of paedophiles, as once those photos are online it is virtually impossible to control how they circulate or where they end up.

  But beyond reputational and personal safety fears, there are additional concerns regarding why these images are being produced in the first place, and what motivations underscore the actions of those who make them. In the above study it was found that 51% of teen girls say “pressure from a guy” is one reason girls send sexy messages or images, and 52% of girls who had sent images said they did so as a ‘sexy present’ for their boyfriend.

  When considering the enormous pressure placed on young women to appear attractive and to participate in a hypersexualised culture which rewards exhibitionism, it is not surprising to learn that so many girls and young women are producing nude or sexualised images of themselves. These photos then become the currency that young women use to gain access to a culture that affords social approval to those who are willing to perform within tightly constructed sexual scripts that privilege the male gaze.

  But while girls are often taught to equate their self-worth with their sexual desirability, paradoxically, they are also taught that women who seek out and enjoy lots of sex (or lots of sexual partners) are somehow ‘dirty’ or ‘slutty’. The result is that girls learn that they must appear desirable, but be lacking in any desire of their own; they are taught that male sexual pleasure is considered the goal, while female sexual pleasure, desire and sexual expression are often pathologised as polluting or dangerous.

  Deborah Tolman, a professor of human sexuality at New York’s City University, suggests that rather than enjoying their own erotic pleasure, girls are becoming most concerned about how they looked during sex.

  By the time they are teenagers, the girls I talk to respond to questions about how their bodies feel – questions about sexuality or desire – by talking about how their bodies look. They will say something like, ‘I felt like I looked good’.2

  And it is against this cultural backdrop which devalues sexual intimacy and female pleasure (while excusing and promoting the objectification and commodification of female bodies) that young women are being culturally groomed to produce sexual representations of themselves as ‘sexy presents’ for the gratification of others.

  While there is a need to continue to discuss the compe
ting pressures bearing down on young women, there is another set of risks of an entirely different nature facing young people who produce such images; namely that sending or receiving a nude photo could result in a conviction or jail term for a teenager.

  The Pennsylvania Case Study

  In 2009, 3 teenage girls in Greensburg Pennsylvania took nude and semi-nude photos of themselves on their mobile phones before reportedly sending those photos on to 3 boys. When the images were discovered on the boys’ phones, the girls (for photographing their own bodies) were threatened with charges relating to the production and distribution of child pornography, and the 3 boys were threatened with charges relating to the possession of child pornography.

  In the media commentary that followed, a debate erupted over the definition of child pornography and the application of the law in cases involving teens who ‘willingly’3 photograph their own bodies. On the one hand, some claimed that prosecution was an appropriate response that would serve to deter other teenagers from engaging in a behaviour now known as sexting.4 But others raised a series of probing questions: Why are laws which were initially intended to protect children now being used to criminalise teenage sexuality? Is it appropriate to group sexually curious teenagers in with convicted paedophiles? How can a girl be both the victim and the perpetrator of the same crime? And what possible good can come from labeling these teens as sex offenders and putting them on a sex offender registry for the rest of their lives?

  Eventually the Pennsylvania case was dismissed after the American Civil Liberties Union launched a countersuit against the District Attorney for threatening to lay the charges against the teenage girls. But the significance of the case was clear: the law had been utterly outpaced by the speed at which the technology had evolved and was now woefully ill-equipped to respond to the current paradigm. Clearly, at the time when these laws were first developed, no one had comprehended the possibility of children (or young people) themselves being the ones to produce the pornography. Beyond this, the case also demonstrated a need to differentiate between cases of ‘agreed’ sexting (where a photograph is willingly produced and does not travel beyond the intended recipient) and situations where images are produced and/or distributed without the permission of the subject.

  Just kids being kids?

  There is a long history of children expressing curiosity over bodies and sex. While there is nothing inherently unnatural or dangerous about expressing an age-appropriate interest in bodies and nudity, there is growing evidence that technology has accelerated the rate at which young people access and consume sexualised material with added concern that this material is more sexually graphic, violent and exploitative than ever before. Against this backdrop young people are now emulating and authoring their own pornographic images and movies, simultaneously performing the roles of porn star, director, producer, distributor and audience.

  While authorities are dealing with the legal dilemmas arising around sexting, there is another far darker side and set of consequences to this behaviour which needs urgent attention.

  In May 2008, a young woman named Jesse Logan appeared on a Cincinnati television station to tell her story. She had sent nude photos of herself to her boyfriend who sent them on to other classmates after the relationship ended. Logan was harassed and repeatedly labeled a ‘slut’ and a ‘whore’. She became depressed, withdrawn and avoided school. Two months after agreeing to talk about her experience on television Jesse was found hanging in her bedroom. She was only 18.

  In 2010, another 18-year-old student, Tyler Clementi, committed suicide by jumping from the George Washington Bridge. Clementi, who was not openly gay, had recently had a sexual encounter with a man in his dorm room. His roommate, Dharun Ravi, and another student had secretly filmed and streamed the footage of the encounter. Clementi’s Facebook status at the time of his death read: “jumping off the gw bridge sorry.” His body was found a short time after.

  In 2011, an 18-year-old female cadet in the Australian Defence Force engaged in consensual sex with a fellow cadet. Unbeknown to her, the sex was being streamed live via Skype web cam to 6 male cadets in an adjacent room. Still photos were also taken and distributed to other people. On learning what had transpired, the cadet known as ‘Kate’ stated that her “whole world came crashing down”5 and that she was physically ill. After speaking out publicly, Kate was then subjected to further harassment from fellow cadets who labeled her a ‘slut’ and a ‘whore’. Meanwhile, those who produced, distributed and consumed this non-consensual pornography continued on for a month before being charged, and, at the time of writing (May 2011), were still attending classes with their peers. Kate, meanwhile, was excused on ‘compassionate leave’.

  When these various stories broke, the public responded with a mix of shock, disgust and outrage. Commentators struggled to make heads or tails of each situation, describing the events as utterly incomprehensible. And to an extent they are.

  But when we look further afield, the practice of individuals filming or distributing sexually explicit footage of individuals without their knowledge or consent has a longer history and one that, in certain spheres, has gone largely uncontested.

  Captured girls in popular culture

  Twelve years before the ADF web cam scandal, the teen hit comedy American Pie (1999) was released. In it, the main character, Jim, is convinced by a fellow student to set up a web cam in his room to film a female exchange student changing her outfit. As the girl strips down, unaware that she is being filmed, Jim and his friends watch on in jocular amusement from a neighbouring home. Jim then returns to the room and attempts to have sex with her. At no point in the film is there any consideration of the legal or ethical issues or the likely emotional ramifications for the girl. Indeed, in the sequel American Pie 2 (2011), the girl returns as a love interest for Jim.

  There is a long history of boys in films bonding through the collective consumption of naked women. In Milk Money (1994), three 11-year-old boys who watch pornography after school go on a mission to see a naked woman. They achieve this by paying $100 to a sex worker in exchange for seeing her breasts. In Sleepers (1996), pubescent boys bond by spying on naked women through a hole in a wall of a female change room. In The Virgin Suicides (1999), teen boys take turns on a telescope spying on a teen girl having sex across the street. In Dead Poets’ Society (1989), male students gather in a cave and collectively pore over a pornographic image of a nude woman. In these ‘coming of age’ movies, the collective consumption of female nudity is depicted as a type of rite of passage that all heterosexual boys are expected to go through in their journey into adult male sexuality.

  Likewise, in films about adult male sexuality, the collective consumption of nude women is depicted as a means by which men maintain and entrench their homosocial bonds. In Knocked Up (2007), Seth Rogen’s character and his mates spend their days sitting on a couch trawling through movies looking for female nudity. Their dream is to run a Website that states the exact point in a movie that you can expect female nudity. In The Hangover (2009), and various other films, men bond on a bucks’ night filled with nude women.

  While such movies seek to naturalise male bonding through shared sexual desire, these films also serve to normalise bonding processes which exclude women. That is, a woman’s body may be served up as an object that men can bond through, but an integral feature of this bonding process is the assumed absence – and agency – of all other women.

  Similarly, while ostensibly these films set up male pleasure as something tied to nudity and titillating images of women, arguably male pleasure is really derived from the power imbalance which results from the voyeuristic consumption of nude women without their knowledge or consent. Of course, this isn’t limited to film.

  In 2009, an ESPN (worldwide leader in sport) reporter named Erin Andrews was surreptitiously filmed nude while alone in her hotel room. The videotape soon surfaced online showing various video grabs of Andrews as she put on make-up and walked aroun
d nude. The video quickly became one of the most searched Google items. Video-blogging on Feministing, US writer, Jessica Valenti, made the following comment:

  You know you can see plenty of hot naked ladies on the Internet. It’s not that hard to find. But folks want to watch this and people are interested in this precisely because Erin Andrews doesn’t know she is being filmed. I think that reveals something incredibly fucked up about the way American culture views women. That what we consider hot and sexy is looking at naked pictures of women without their consent.6

  Looking further afield again we can see many other examples where Internet users have swarmed to download sex tapes of women which have been produced or distributed without the consent of the women involved. Aside from the infamous Paris Hilton sex tape (which was released in 2004 without her consent), in 1995 a sex tape of Pamela Anderson and husband Tommy Lee on their honeymoon was stolen from their home and released online. Model Katie Price, and her then boyfriend, Dane Bowers, had a sex tape stolen from their flat and leaked during their 2-year relationship between 1998 and 2000. Severina Vučković, a Croatian pop star, had a tape of her having sex stolen and released in 2004. Mexican-American singer, Jenni Rivera, also had a tape stolen from her home and released in 2008.

  Then in 2010, a non-authorised sex tape featuring former Playboy Playmate, Kendra Wilkinson, was released. The film had been made in 2003 when she was 18 years old and before she had breast implants. In the footage it is clear that she doesn’t want to be videotaped and she says so on a number of occasions. In virtually all these cases, the women have been subjected to vicious character attacks, while those responsible for distributing and consuming the images have gone largely uncommented on.