Rethinking the effects paradigm in porn studies

Abstract

It has been an assumption of most anti-pornography discourse that porn damages women (and children) in a variety of ways. In Porno? Chic!, the author interrogated this assumption by examining the correlation between the incidence of sexual violence and other indicators of misogyny, and the availability and accessibility of pornography within a number of societies. This article develops that work with a specific focus on the regulatory environment as it relates to pornography and sexual representation. Does a liberal regulatory regime in sexual culture correlate with a relatively advanced state of sexual politics in a given country? Conversely, does an illiberal regime, where pornography and other forms of sexual culture are banned or severely restricted, correlate with relatively strong patriarchal structures? A comparative cross-country analysis seeks to explain the correlations identified, and to assess the extent to which the availability of porn can be viewed as a causal or a consequential characteristic of those societies where feminism has achieved significant advances.

Keywords:

• pornography
• sexual violence
• misogyny
• comparative

Notes

1. Beyond the moral conservative and feminist critiques of pornography, there is a long-standing tradition of elite distaste, even disgust, at the perceived excesses of pornography and the impact these have on morality and aesthetics. Having critiqued this reading in previous work (McNair 2002, 2013), I will note here only that amongst the many harms associated with the pornographication of mainstream culture seen in the liberal democratic societies since World War II is a sincere anxiety about what we might think of as its coarsening or degeneration under the influence of ever more explicit and transgressive forms of sexual representation.