Strawman argument.
I don’t necessarily accept the OP’s argument, but this response is not germane to the argument he makes. He says:
So his argument is, at least in part, that it’s not personal distaste that motivates him, but concern that the movies may lead to actual harmful events.
Address that.
I’m not sure that technology and mores are interdependant. I think technology does advance on pretty much on its own. (Now there’s a whole 'nother thread 
) Morality has always existed, and the ‘goodness’ of it is relative to how it’s viewed, both in its time and by future generations. Morality self serving? I’m not sure: I think part of what makes it ‘morality’ is the consideration of the effect it will have on others.
I can’t speak for Illu, but I was indeed being sarcastic. You’re basically asking people to justify their tastes. Your request for an answer can’t ever be satisfied. You may as well have started a thread along the lines of:
In any case, if you don’t like the so-called torture-porn genre, don’t watch it. Nobody is forcing you to, just as nobody is forcing us to watch whatever it is you like.
What I was intending was to start a debate on the morality of watching people’s intense suffering, and the ‘satisfaction’ of those who do it and watch it. If you feel ‘justification’ is what it deserves, and that you can’t answer it, that’s your prerogative.
To your second point: no, I don’t want to watch it, and I never intimated that you should stop. I just wanted to know why you watched it. (And back to point one, hopefully not ad infinitum.)
Maybe it does and maybe it doesn’t. This is a strictly empirical question. If the OP is asserting that there is causality, then he can show us. Otherwise we end up with dueling assertions. While it is not the worst way to spend a Friday afternoon, I’d rather be watching torture porn.
I like it. And since I know it is ficiton, I don’t see it as a moral issue.
It’s existed since people created it, if that sheds any light on my point. People make their own moral codes and they make their own technology, and both reflect the people who do the making.
If technology evolved on its own, I think we’d have a lot more completed research into human cloning and stem cell research, to name two areas. But I agree that the two things influence each other. People more or less don’t start thinking about whether or not something is right or wrong until it seems possible.
The fact that it’s self-serving isn’t a bad thing: it’s in my self interest not to harm other people in part because, if they are sticking to the same rules, they won’t harm me either.
I hate the “torture porn” movie genre. I think anyone who watches these kind of movies, or makes them, should be tied up, naked, and slowly, slowly dragged over a bed of nails, and then have lemon juice poured on the open cuts while they scream and beg for mercy. Especially if they are women, about 18-19 years old. With big boobs.
Regards,
Shodan
Returning to the point I made in my first post - the people who watch this stuff know that suffering isn’t real. I really don’t think that can be stressed too much.
I think with all thrills it is the emotional intensity and attachment. When those who like “torture porn” (a great description of “House of 1000 Corpses” by the way) they do it to feel revolted, to feel angered, to feel frightened, to be sickened in the most God awful of ways. This overload of emotion is like any other overload of emotion, some like it hot and some like it cold.
Although “House of Wax” was so worth it to see Paris Hilton impailed.
That sounds like a great idea. I bet if we filmed it we could make a fortune.
Really?
I thought the UK government banned the film or effectivly banned with it’s “ratings” system.
One could ask the following.
Why are you such a goody goody? Why can’t you sit back, watch something you know is not real, and enjoy yourself? “Wow! That part when they pulled that guys arm off looked real!”
Ultimately, many people who watch horror films, (horror = fear + disgust) do so to ‘feel safe’. Like lightnin’ above, they place themselves in the role of the victims and wonder what they would do in that situation. They always figure a way out of it. Just like after 9/11, many many people wondered what they would have done if they were on one of those fatefull flights. I’m sure many of them figured out ways to defeat the terrorists and land the plane safely.
That was on your bucket list, was it?
The OP is being a major poooossssaaaayyyyy.
Any “copycat crimes” that would happen because of these kind of movies are NOTHING compared to all the robbery, murder and rape that is already happening just because there are a lot of sick, sociopathic fuckers out there. Whether or not there are violent movies, they’re going to happen anyway. Crazy people will always find some justification for what they’re doing.
John Hinkley shot President Reagan because of Jodie Foster…should we outlaw Jodie Foster movies?
There’s another reason why torture porn is made: so those that don’t watch it get to feel morally superior to those who do, and can look down their noses upon them, which is generally desirable for most people. 
(I’m joking, of course, but in a way, anything that’s polarizing in a similar fashion does fulfil that purpose – there’s a certain truth to the saying that everybody always seeks out a pedestal from which to look down upon other people.)
Anyway, I don’t think this can be answered any more than it has, that some people want to get their adrenals stimulated, or seek out the catharsis associated with a gruesome experience-by-proxy, or, perhaps in the broadest sense, that since there is a wide spectrum of human experience to be stimulated, there exists stimuli for every part of it.
Well, yes, but not because of the Reagan/Hinkley thing.
Agreed - and a very valid point. But my point (all the way through this) has been what I said to Bryan Ekers: What I was intending was to start a debate on the morality of watching people’s intense suffering, and the ‘satisfaction’ of those who do it and watch it in the film, and in the movie theatre.
Does the fact that it is fiction negate moral issues? (Note well: this is a question.) Bryan Ekers has said (and please correct me if I’m wrong, Bryan) that it is fiction, he enjoys it and he doesn’t think that it needs to be justified. I know that (on the rare occasions) I have seen scenes like that it disgusts me, it make me feel queasy - because it offends my moral codes (partly of what should constitute enjoyment.) (Please note well again: I am not telling you what you should do. It’s the reasoning I’m after.) People in this thread, including yourself, Marley, have said it’s the fictionality that excuses it. I’m not so sure.
And a justification of mine: I am not a moral prude. (in case I’m coming across as one.) I just have my limits (as all moral prudes would say ). It’s that I don’t understand, and want to. Hence this post.
At last - something I can cite
It doesn’t answer the question of why people like to watch it, but I think it’s worth noting, that’s all. I won’t say the fictionality is a cast-iron defense. Certainly fiction can be used to promote actual harm, like The Turner Diaries.
But we’re not watching people’s intense suffering. We’re knowingly watching actors pretend to suffer intensely. Your question only relates to people who seek out “real” scenes of suffering (“real” in quotes because a lot of footage that claims such is actually staged).
In fact, real images of people suffering intensely aren’t to be found in torture porn, but in World’s Wildest Police Videos and similar shows in which people are indeed being injured or even killed in car crashes and gun battles.
Actually, this makes me curious about a side issue - I can imagine being angered or saddened when encountering something that offends one’s moral code, but nauseated? That sounds a little too instinctive to me, and moral codes are endlessly flexible and socially determined. It’s only a tangent, though.
You may as well ask for the reasoning behind a preference for strawberry ice cream.
Can you explain the reasoning behind your uncertainty?