# Were we feminists wrong? Rape is down 85 % while porn use is up and up..... **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 7, 2009, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151 "2009-09-07T08:36:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Susanann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2009, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/41 "2009-09-07T20:54:26Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Then again, I understand the prostitution industry has shrank drastically in recent decades. Its very difficult to sell a product when most of your competition is giving it away for free. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2009, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/42 "2009-09-07T22:47:55Z")
> [@gaffa](#): > > Cite? > > I’ve never heard any estimation of the size of the tiny and furtive child porn “industry”, and that number seems pulled out of your ass. Check it out for yourself ,doofus, before you get started with accusations like that. Easy to find on Google. ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2009, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/43 "2009-09-07T23:15:45Z")
> [@Maastricht](#): > > Interesting, but I don’t get it. What is the opposite problem of sexual frustration/agression? Exhaustion and chafing. > [@Cat\_Fight](#): > > There’s no denying the change has been massive, from Playboys hidden under a bed to 10-year-olds Googling ‘bestiality’ and 'bukkake. And 11-year olds trading nude photos by Bluetooth on their cell phones. (My nephew – so reports SIL… errmmm not 11-year olds **in** the photos mind). > [@Susanann](#): > > If you were perverted enough to want to see porn prior to the second half of the 1990’s, a single photo would have taken forever just to load via a telephone modem. Does no one remember BBS? 🙂 And yes, it took ages for a single picture to appear… and I was lucky enough to have a 2400 baud modem. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2009, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/44 "2009-09-07T23:17:35Z")
Radical feminists (thought not all feminists) are _ **WRONG** _ on abortion! ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2009, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/45 "2009-09-07T23:24:47Z")
> [@Curtis LeMay](#): > > Radical feminists (thought not all feminists) are _ **WRONG** _ on abortion! Start your own thread. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/46 "2009-09-08T00:31:44Z")
> [@Captain\_Awesome](#): > > Japan provides an interesting test case, having had sexually explicit material prohibited following WWII up until 1951, and restricted into the 1980s. It is now freely proliferated. This massive increase in available pornography has, contrary to certain feminist expectations, been correlated with a ‘dramatic _decrease_ in sexual crimes and most so among youngsters as perpetrators or victims’ (Diamond and Uchiyama 1999). Japan is interesting in more ways than you might realize. I used to live in Japan and I like Japan and the Japanese very much, but I would never want to be a Japanese woman in Japan because the country still has what would strike most Westerners as very old-fashioned attitudes towards both gender roles and sex crimes. Many victims of sex crimes are too ashamed to report them, and those that do are often not taken seriously. See for instance this 2003 [New York Times article](http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/29/world/victims-say-japan-ignores-sex-crimes-committed-by-teachers.html) on schoolgirls who were molested by teachers (free article but may require registration). Here’s a choice passage for those of you who don’t want to register: > [@](#): > > Experts say molestation and statutory rape are commonplace in schools across Japan, and that victims rarely come forward. To do so would violate a host of powerful social conventions, said Akiko Kamei, a retired teacher who is the country’s only nationally known expert in classroom sexual abuse. > > ‘‘In Japan there is a rape myth, which says that the victim of a rape is always to blame,’’ Ms. Kamei said. ‘‘Moreover, women are told that if you suffer molestation or groping, you have to be ashamed. If you talk about it to anyone else, you are going to be tainted for the rest of your life.’’ > > Beyond that, even when they are identified and caught, molesters rarely receive more than a slap on the wrist. > > Speaking at a public symposium, a member of Parliament, Seiichi Ota, recently made light of reports of gang rapes at a Tokyo university. ‘‘Boys who commit group rape are in good shape,’’ Mr. Ota said. ‘‘I think they are rather normal. Whoops, I shouldn’t have said that.’’ (The legislator’s comments were carried in many Japanese newspapers.) I’m not saying any of this is because of the availability of porn in Japan, but the availability of porn in Japan definitely hasn’t turned the nation into a utopia of sexual equality either. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/47 "2009-09-08T00:56:18Z")
It could be that the reduced incidence of rape in America is due mostly to declining social acceptance of it. I.e., feminists have there been successful in propagandistic or, if you prefer, educational terms. What once was viewed (by men, at least) as a peccadillo is now viewed as evil and shameful – even “date rape” and “mate rape” no longer are winked at as they once were. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/48 "2009-09-08T01:06:18Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It could be that the reduced incidence of rape in America is due mostly to declining social acceptance of it. I.e., feminists have there been successful in propagandistic or, if you prefer, educational terms. What once was viewed (by men, at least) as a peccadillo is now viewed as evil and shameful – even “date rape” and “mate rape” no longer are winked at as they once were. Honestly; given human nature if sex & porn wasn’t more available than it used to be I don’t think that would have been very effective. Men under intense sexual frustration with no sexual outlet are likely to do what’s necessary to find relief and rationalize an excuse afterwards. Men who can read some porn and aren’t brainwashed into thinking that masturbation is evil are going to be far more willing to restrain themselves and listen to moral arguments. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/49 "2009-09-08T02:04:01Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > “American women generally prefer men who have good jobs and are physically fit. So trying to have a good career and working out are bad things for men to do since it’s totally selling out to the Matriarchy.” (looking at self and career prospects) BOO-YA! I’m TOTALLY sticking it to the Woman! Er, or not. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/50 "2009-09-08T03:11:45Z")
> [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](#): > > Check it out for yourself ,doofus, before you get started with accusations like that. Easy to find on Google. Ah, so that would be translated as “No, I don’t have a cite, I just pulled it out of my ass” then. You’re the one who made the claim, you’re the one who has to provide the proof. You just made a claim that there is a child porn industry, that is, porn featuring people under the age of 18, is worth billions. The entire US legal porn industry was estimated to be worth $13 billion in 2006 by Adult Video News. That’s video stores with hundreds or thousands of titles on the shelves, multiple channels of 24 hour porn, pay-per-view channels, movie sales in hotels, the whole US porn business estimated at $13 billion. You said “billions” with an S, so that’s at least $2 billion. You’re claiming that CHILD PORN is two sevenths of the ENTIRE PORN BUSINESS? How the hell is that money made when it is completely illegal to buy, sell or own it? Perhaps Great Debates is not really for you. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/51 "2009-09-08T03:12:40Z")
Those are some compelling arguments, **Der Trihs**. I wonder if the same holds for the demand that women dress demurely, from burqua’s to headscarves to not wearing mini skirts. Porn offers men private release; but doesn’t seeing half naked women (either IRL or on public billboards and TV commercials) create more need for that release then would otherwise be the case? So maybe feminists were wrong about porn, but right in their objections against the public billboards of lingerie models. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/52 "2009-09-08T03:18:57Z")
I googled [Andrea Dworkin](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Dworkin). That is one fucked up lady. She made it sound like she had to go into prostitution to earn enough money for a plane trip to leave the Netherlands and return to the USA. She makes it sound like some “Not without my daughter” kind of exodus. That just can’t be right, and must be a lie, an excuse. ---
**Author:** ![AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/22d042/32.png) [@AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/53 "2009-09-08T04:26:51Z")
> [@](#): > > wish we could say the same for child molestation. I understand that since the internet started, Americans have supported a child porn industry worth billions of dollars, and the news appears to indicate an explosion of convicted sex offenders being registered at the same time. Well I think it would depend. I wonder how much of the child porn is young teens/kids vs. older but not legal yet teens. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/54 "2009-09-08T06:15:20Z")
Another growing problem is growing global slavery – including the sexual slavery of women and children. Sometimes this involves selling human beings to be used as objects of torture. This is just the saddest thing I’ve ever heard of. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/55 "2009-09-08T12:19:25Z")
**Zoe** , do you have a cite for that? I really hope you don’t. I suppose it has happened marginally for ever, (see [here](http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,543060,00.html)for a recent example, of a 10 year old Indian girl sold as wife to an 80 year old Saudi) but how is that practice _growing_? ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Awesome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a698b9/32.png) [@Captain\_Awesome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Awesome)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/56 "2009-09-08T12:39:22Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > I’m not saying any of this is because of the availability of porn in Japan, but the availability of porn in Japan definitely hasn’t turned the nation into a utopia of sexual equality either. Part of the reason why Japan was chosen for the study was due to the ‘traditional male prerogative and female subservience’, which provided some contrast to research carried out in Europe and North America. The study is available in full [here](http://www.hawaii.edu/PCSS/online_artcls/pornography/prngrphy_rape_jp.html). I certainly wouldn’t hold Japanese gender attitudes or those concerning rape as in any way desirable. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/57 "2009-09-08T14:52:46Z")
> [@Maastricht](#): > > On the other hand, a new wave of feminism claims that porn does have a detrimental effect, in that more and more women take their standards of beauty and attractiveness from porn. Hence all the boobjobs and pole dancing classes. What standards are those exactly? I cannot recall what the thread was here some few years ago but the women and men on this Board were going back and forth on what men found “attractive” in a woman. It was a remarkable thread because the women seemed very hooked on the idea that men like big boobs on painfully skinny women. The men, on the other hand (and speaking for themselves) were showing that what they found attractive was all across the board. There was no simple, fast rule that men find “X” attractive and all the other women are ugly. Faaaar from it. Anecdotal as that may seem I think pornography bears this out. There is a bewildering array of porn out there to appeal to just about anyone. Blonds/brunettes, large/small, this race/that race, big boobs/small boobs, young/old and so on. There simply is no definition of “beauty” when it comes to porn. Women who may look at Playboy and decide that is somehow representative of “what men want” and adjust themselves to fit that narrow image are not paying attention. ---
**Author:** ![Susanann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/58 "2009-09-08T14:58:08Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It could be that the reduced incidence of rape in America is due mostly to declining social acceptance of it. I.e., feminists have there been successful in propagandistic or, if you prefer, educational terms. What once was viewed (by men, at least) as a peccadillo is now viewed as evil and shameful --. Ummmmmm, I was thinking just the opposite. 150 years ago, if a rapist was caught, he was probably hung, or worse. If a woman was raped in the old town my family lived in, the whole darn town would have formed a posse and that guy would never ever be able to do it again (or do anything ever again for that matter). Today, the average actual time served in prison for someone convicted of rape is only 73 months. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/59 "2009-09-08T15:05:52Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > …maybe a man cant be in 2 places at once… if a guy is at home sitting in front of his computer watching porn for 12 straight hours, then he is not out on the street raping real live women. Isn’t it also important to look at what kind of rapists are being affected? That is, there are different motivations for rape–some guys may be at home watching porn instead of raping. But for others that might not be enough. Maybe the rapist who targets strangers isn’t going to be as affected but the date rapist who rapes because he’s horny and just doesn’t want to hear no might be more influenced by availability of porn. Or I don’t know, maybe it’s the opposite way around. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151/60 "2009-09-08T16:34:16Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > 150 years ago, if a rapist was caught, he was probably hung, or worse. “Hanged.” And 150 years ago, he likely would not have been caught. The problem with rape as a crime is that most rapes are committed by acquaintainces and aren’t formally reported in time to act on them, or are difficult to prove. Back in the olden days most women wouldn’t have admitted to being raped, and when a woman was raped it was often more convenient to just hang the most convenient black guy than going to the trouble of finding the actual rapist. As recently as World War II hanging was the preferred method of discipline for black soldiers, whether or not there was much evidence against them, for rape. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-we-feminists-wrong-rape-is-down-85-while-porn-use-is-up-and-up/509151.md?page=4)