To "contemplate what is happening" we really have to look at sexual ethics and the legacy of virtue and sin, Adam and Eve, the prevalence of sexual shame, and all that.
Louis C.K., an honest and insightful thinker on the topic of masturbation, is candid about the almost inevitable element of shame and disgust involved. For many males, masturbation is a way to marinate oneself in feelings of unworthiness and guilt. Isn't this a pretty big problem? How does this affect self-esteem, for example?
Frank Zappa made the good point that there's really no sex in the American media -- only titillation.
It's so strange. We plaster every inch of civic space with titillation, yet show a nipple -- let alone sex -- and you're doomed. In Hollywood movies we do this funny evasive stuff with body doubles, careful cutting, etc. God forbid showing three seconds of two human bodies actually having enjoyable sex -- that'd be sinful!
I'd even claim that there's actually no sex in porn, either. It's coitus and fellatio artificially cut off from any emotional context, except daydream-like stagings of extramarital affairs, dysfunctional scenarios bordering on rape. The only situations in porn sex are dishonesty, exploitation, and objectification. Maybe the tragedy is simply that porn is so uniformly bad, tasteless, alienated, joyless, inhumane.
The below is verbatim a post on reddit that I made.
So, I'm a historian of pornography. And while this man is right that pornography "is an industry" dating back to 1800, what he is not aware of is that pre-1800, porn was NOT purely sexual and for the arousal of the viewer. Pornography (obscenity) was used to critique religion and politics. Our modern conception of a closed-door bedroom where the inner drama of sexuality revealing our deepest desires simply did not exist before Early Modern Europe.
I don't disavow the point he is trying to make here entirely, but sexuality, desire, and pornography are not necessary 'human' categories. They are, instead, historical and created ones. These realizations should be essential to a discussion of pornography and its context in the modern world.
I am of the view that the overwhelming access to and use of pornography is rather unhealthy, but that it also breaks down some of the taboo and fear, misinformation around human sexuality, and that it may be, in some ways, beneficial to do so. Of course there are good points on either side.
The below is verbatim a reddit comment that I made:
So, I'm a historian of pornography. And while this man is right that pornography "is an industry" dating back to 1800, what he is not aware of is that pre-1800, porn was NOT purely sexual and for the arousal of the viewer. Pornography (obscenity) was used to critique religion and politics. Our modern conception of a closed-door bedroom where the inner drama of sexuality revealing our deepest desires simply did not exist before Early Modern Europe.
I don't disavow the point he is trying to make here entirely, but sexuality, desire, and pornography are not necessary 'human' categories. They are, instead, historical and created ones. These realizations should be essential to a discussion of pornography and its context in the modern world.
I am of the view that the overwhelming access to and use of pornography is rather unhealthy, but that it also breaks down some of the taboo and fear, misinformation around human sexuality, and that it may be, in some ways, beneficial to do so. Of course there are good points on either side.
Thanks for this perspective. I am definitely writing as a layman. I'm not sure that obscenity is functioning as a critique of anything any more. Indeed it seems to me that it is enabling for people whose sexual practices we all want to remain taboo - and I'm thinking particularly of pederasts. Some taboos are meant to be kept. I think the idea that pornography breaks down taboos (debatable) is outweighed by the negative impact that people are reporting in teenagers - especially in the pressure for girls to participate in riskier sexual activity and acts they are uncomfortable with. I also think the physical effects of porn, such as impotence in men, diminishes any such value.
As for misinformation I think you have this arse-backwards - pornography is misinformation pure and simple.
So while I respect your historical perspective I'm unconvinced by the arguments you put forth. I'm not sure they really take in the reality of internet pornography and it's impact.
I have replied in the reddit thread. Thank you for your engagement, and this post.
The thread is here for whomever would like to follow along: http://www.reddit.com/r/Buddhism/comments/1fe7ze/pornography_desire_and_buddhism/ca9fr3c?context=3
Recently I overheard a person repeating something they read on the internet: "I think it's a good thing that emotional scars are not visible; because if emotional scars were visible porn would be disgusting."
For most serious practitioners, the emotional scars of others are quite visible. So what is the skillful approach? It is metta, karuna, and upekkha. It goes without saying that there will be consequences for those of us who through porn choose to nourish the root asava of desire for sensual craving.
I don't know what "emotional scars" means. And I don't believe anyone can see them. I so hate it when people relate to me like they understand me from glimpses of my exterior. It's just bullshit. Serious practitioners cannot see other people's "emotional scars". They're just less reactive when confronted by uncomfortable interactions at best. Sometimes not even that. I really wish we could drum out of Buddhist practitioners the false view that they understand how other people work. In my experience Buddhists are hopeless amateur psychologists.
You're using that kind of Buddhist jargon all naive beginners rote learn from books in the first few years of getting interested. The kind we use to help us avoid having to think about or feel what's happening - so we can have conversations without ever having to admit we feel anything. Just be yourself. If you don't know your own mind, you certainly don't know the minds of others.
If it goes without saying, then why are you saying it?
Hi Jayarava! Thanks for the post. It seems that porn satisfies a particular drive. How about non-pornographic cinema? For instance, what do you think of people's addiction to series of 5, 7 seasons, highly addictive? I know watching a good series like The Wire is not harmful (I guess). What I mean is the way it works. You have lots of movies and series online, a infinite supply, and people get addicted to this sort of entertainment. Or let's say football. Von Klausewitz said that "war is diplomacy through other means" (or something similar). I think that porn is football through other means. Do you think that's too much? How would you analyse porn in the context of a society addicted to entertainment involving watching other human beings doing something we would like to do, being something we would like to be, etc? Or that's precisely the nature of entertainment, and a society living in abundance is destined to search for infinite and multiform entertainment because there is "spare time"?
The TV series are an interesting case and a live one in my community. Clearly they are a bit more complex. Stimulation is still central to the appeal, and distraction from present experience. I think also the loneliness of modern life plays a role - our fascinations with online personas are called para-social relationships. Ersatz replacements for meaningful relationships. I'm quite scathing of the idea of "virtual communities".
I would think that vicarious experience is definitely a part of the picture. But this provides a kind of artificial stimulation.
Underlying it all is a view about what it means to live well. Fundamentally most civilised people associate living well with pleasure - I believe this goes across cultures. Hence the Buddha's admonishments about addiction to sensual pleasure are still relevant across the world.
To me it seems that civilisations itself - beginning with living in large communities supplied by agriculture - has warped our relationship to our own bodies and appetites by over supplying the things we need; and warped our relationships to each other forcing us to live amongst unrelated strangers. It's an evolutionary argument based on the idea that out genes have evolved much slower than our culture for at least 10,000 years.
I've blogged on these ideas quite a lot and at some point hope to extract them out and make them into a book. Evolutionary Buddhism :-)
thanks for the post and your comments. I especially appreciate your scepticism about what is "natural". It is not the case that everything which may happen in some form in nature is "natural" when it happens in a much exaggerated form, with little or no similarity with its natural one. Nor is it the case that "nature" justifies per se.
(As you might imagine, I am thinking of discussions about "vegetarianism is unhealthy because eating meat is natural", although we now eat meat thrice a day, whereas our forerunners could only dream of our portions of meat.)
Just in case no other woman commented, I agree also with your other point: porn might be a pity, since it is quite hard to enjoy normal women if you are used to porn stars and because it is quite hard to do X in a spontaneous way,if X is so heavily connected with the porn approach to it (can one hear the words "anal sex" without thinking of porn images and of female subjugation?). The only possible comparison I can think of is the abuse of "charmant prince" fairy tales by girls (because no real man will ever be that charming). But, at least, fairy tales idealise men, whereas in the case of pornography part of the fun seems to be the fact of using someone without actually caring for her needs and desires.
Thanks for your comments. I hadn't really thought of what I wrote as scepticism about nature, but yes I suppose you are right. I do think that Buddhists have to make distinctions between desires that arise as appetites (e.g. the need to eat for example) and desires which are artificially stimulated (e.g. food laden with sugar, fat, salt and chilli). Because as Buddhists we seek to be free of the compulsion to satisfy our desires.
I'm not sure if you are familiar with the writing of Emma Jung, but she made an interesting point about the Prince Charming story, especially in it's Beauty and the Beast variety. This story is also the plot of *all* romance novels. It represents, according to EJ, the female individuation - a girl coming to terms with her inner masculine in order to integrate that part of herself and become an individual woman. In other words an adult woman strives to have the kind of relationship with her inner masculine (animus) as the Princess has with Prince Charming.
On the other hand men's individuation myths support a very different story. Men who fall in love with their inner feminine (anima) are slaves to their emotions both positive and negative. A man must learn to control his emotions since if he acts them out he can be dangerous - either through anger and violence, or through sentimentality and indecisiveness. Most porn scenarios tend to conform to this more dominant type of relationship as romance novels conform to the Beauty and the Beast story. We could see men consuming porn as acting out inner dramas in a desperate attempt to understand and come to terms with our inner feminine. And mostly failing in the attempt.
Of course not everyone accepts Herr and Frau Jung's opinions about what goes on in the human psyche. But it is one way of understanding both phenomena. At base they represent a craving to mature and become individuals. Until this happens people cannot really take their place amongst the adults of the tribe.
Of course trouble ensues if we project these inner dramas into our real relationships. It's in no one's interests that men and women relate to each other the way they might relate to their animus/anima.
Another part of the problem is that we no longer live as members of a tribe and now lack the rituals and ceremonies to bring this change about in young people. I have a lot of sympathy with this kind of view. It is one of the reasons I sought ordination - a ritual to mark my entry into adult society (though it has not entirely lived up to expectation). I think the PhD process has similar resonances.
Thanks Jayarava. I did not know that Emma Jung had also written about psychoanalysis. If compared to The Beauty and the Beast, pornography seems to me quite "unexpressed" (avyakta). I mean, The Beauty and the Beast (except in its W. Disney's version, I am afraid) tells the story of a redemption, of the possibility of a journey from beastness to humanity (or godness, according to some interpretations). By contrast, pornography probably depict a situation, but possibly does not depict its solution. It is a Beauty and the Beast with the Beast who is never redeemed. At least, I do not know of dynamic pornography.
As for initiatory rites, you are right. Perhaps groups of young boys watching pornography, masturbating, looking at prostitutes are trying to "become adults" but can't stop doing it because of the lack of a real transformative experience on top of these repetitive experiences?
I guess I would see porn use in this context as a projection of unresolved shadow/anima issues. A desire to possess and control that denied inner feminine; which being denied is acted out unconsciously.
I wouldn't want to go too far down this route however as it starts to sound like a justification. I think my conclusion that we'd be better off without it is the main point.
This essay has about 3000 readers now. Which is 10x my daily average. Lots of people interested in pornography!
Tuesday, June 04, 2013
Pornography is much in the news in the UK at the moment as various authorities try to figure out how to respond to the problem of exposing young children to graphic sexual images. When I was a youngster porn was relatively hard to get access to, and relatively benign - pictures of naked or semi-naked women. Today the internet delivers all kinds of sexual imagery to our screens, some of it involving violence. But the other thing that happened recently that made me want to try to write something about it, was a naive post in a Buddhist forum asking if porn was "OK for Buddhists".
I can only write about this from a heterosexual man's point of view. No doubt there are things to say from other points of view and I don't mean to exclude or downplay those other points of view. But it's easier for me to write if I'm able to tap into my own experience. If you have a different view then feel free to add to the picture in a comment.
The first thing to say is that pornography is an industry. It has long roots. William Blake complains about sexually explicit engravings on sale in London in the early 1800s. Being an industry, the primary purpose of pornography is to make money. And it is reportedly a very successful way of making money. This fact alone ought to give us pause for thought.
I've written about pleasure before - see particularly The Science of Pleasure. In many ways sexual pleasure is no different from other forms of pleasure. On the other hand we all know it's much more loaded. Sex involves other people (real or imaginary) and thus it partakes of relationship dynamics. Some will characterise relationship dynamics purely in terms of power, but I'm wary of this post-modern analysis. Certainly issues of power and status come into play in relationships, but relating is about more than this as well.
Being like other pleasures, sex has a similar dynamic. Sensual stimulation produces a response which involves many bodily systems. We experience appetite, anticipation and arousal, seeking out, engaging, and satiation. All of these stages produce particular kinds of pleasure. However if we seek pleasure as an end in itself, if we short circuit the process, then we find we get diminishing returns. If for example we over-ride a lack of appetite and just have sex for pleasure, we will, generally speaking, enjoy it less. If we do this frequently and habitually, we will get diminishing returns. Similarly if we ignore signs of satiation and go back for more. As with eating, there are many motivations for having sex: procreation, intimacy, pleasure, loneliness, seeking favours, financial gain, etc. Stimulated we become sexually aroused. The problems, if there are problems, relate to seeking out stimulus in order to experience the pleasure of orgasm.
The naive post I referred to above spoke about having a high sex-drive and using porn to self-stimulate in order to facilitate masturbation. I believe this person has fallen into a false view. Firstly the purpose of viewing pornography is to stimulate sexual desire. It may or may not be present to start with, but my guess is that with most men it's often absent. So this person who regularly views pornography claims to have a high-sex drive. My response is to wonder how much sex drive he might have if he stopped chronically stimulating himself with pornography. I asked are you masturbating in response to sexual arousal, and porn is just an adjunct to that process; or are you using pornography to stimulate arousal in order to masturbate and achieve orgasm. My hunch is that he views pornography with a view to achieving orgasm when he is not in fact sexually aroused to begin with. And this I think is neurotic or potentially harmful.
Responding to bodily appetites is not a problem. We breath, eat, and have sex, all other things being equal, because we are responding to natural urges. I've argued on several occasions, however, that we no longer live in the natural surroundings to which our genes are accustomed. We're furnished with drives optimised for scarcity, but live in abundance (at least in the developed world). Thus the characteristic health problems of our societies are not communicable diseases on the whole, but problems brought on by over indulging in salt, fat and sugar, along with problems caused by synthetic chemicals. And also problems associated with not coping with our environment - stress related anxiety, depression, and other neuroses. Our main problem in the developed world, in other words, is lifestyle. The main thing we could do something about is our lifestyle. And yet our societies are characterised by the pursuit of increasingly empty and unsatisfying lifestyles.
And thus it is with sex. Where food is concerned "we" (meaning we in the developed world generally) have become obsessed with eating vast quantities of food, laden with ingredients that give us the most intense experience of eating: fat, sugar, salt, and chilli. We crave more and more intense experiences because we keep over-riding our appetites and eat for reasons other than staying alive. And it is making us sick. In the case of sex, for men in any case, we turn increasingly to porn. And to more extreme forms of porn. More or less any sexual act you can imagine is available as a video on the internet. These days you don't really even need to pay. But pay men do. And pay and pay.
Because feminists have identified the pornography industry as a battleground we are probably all aware of the arguments against pornography from a feminist perspective. Porn objectivises and degrades women. Women are exploited by the porn industry. I've just been listening to a teacher on the radio describing the effects on relationships between teenage boys and girls at her school and how she thinks porn has degraded those relationships. This is understandable because teenage boys are consuming vast amounts of porn. By the time they come to relate to flesh and blood girls and boys as potential sexual partners their sexual appetites are so dull as to require extraordinary stimulation to feel anything. They are so used to over-riding their natural sexual urges that they probably wouldn't recognise sexual attraction if it bit them. Research has shown that daily porn use can result in impotence - in other words men can become unable to become sexually aroused with real sexual partners because they've inadvertently set their own arousal threshold so high by hyperstimulating themselves with pornography. This is probably an exaggeration. No doubt there is a range of behaviour and responses to the availability of internet porn. But still the impact of boys using porn is quite negative, both on themselves and their partners. Girls in particular are often rushed into more risky sexual behaviour than they are comfortable with because the boys can't respond to anything else. Girls get treated like objects. It's not helping with issues that they already are socialised into. With young gay men, the potential for a positive feedback loop is frightening to contemplate.
Why do men consume porn? As far as I can tell, it seems that men respond to images more than women. No doubt some women do like porn, but the vast majority of consumers are men. Looking at women's bodies is arousing for hetero men. I can't even describe it. I just respond. As I would respond to music. It's an aesthetic response as much as a sexual one. I find women beautiful and attractive. Not in an overpowering way, not in a way that I can't control, but certainly in an unconscious and unmediated way. And men can get sexually aroused looking at pictures. It's an interesting fact taken in isolation - the unmediated response to certain visual cues resulting in arousal (I'm sure it's been studied).
Getting aroused and coming is some of the most fun a man can have. So there's not much point in telling every one that porn is just bad when it's aimed at getting aroused and coming. It's like drugs. If someone tells me that drugs are totally bad, I know they haven't tried them. Drugs are fun. Especially when you're young and resilient. But they have a down side. And young people are less good at evaluating risk, or assessing long term consequences. I think honesty is important when criticising these things. Boys look at porn mainly out of curiosity and fascination with women. Men consume porn in order to become sexually aroused and have an orgasm. We do it for the fun of it; out of loneliness or boredom; out of habit; as a way of sublimating desire etc. Maybe we retain a measure of fascination with women.
And so although women are degraded by porn, men are too. Men are targeted by porn makers precisely because we respond to the product and are willing to pay for it. Like other stimulants it's a profitable product because of diminishing returns the demand for it stays high. We soon stop responding to one image. If we want to be aroused we have to get a new one. This is because in looking at pictures we are to some extent over-riding our lack of arousal. If we use that artificially stimulated arousal to achieve orgasm we're actually worse off. The pursuit of pleasure is like an addiction in many ways, particularly in the way we build up tolerance. Men (collectively) spend a fortune on porn. The answer would be to just relax and experience whatever it is that we are experiencing. But for most adults there's an uncomfortable period of cold turkey that produces some terrible cravings to fill the gaps left by not pursuing pleasure. It's not simply sex, but all of the areas in which we are over-stimulated.
A further problem is that pornography exists in a context. Every other product we see has a female model attached to it. Women's products and services as much as men's (which I don't really understand). Advertising is ubiquitous and very often overtly sexual. Our films and television have joined in with the zeitgeist of displaying sex more openly. In the UK we have a great comedian, Reginald D Hunter, originally from South Georgia, USA. One of the things he says he likes about the UK is that "women dress like hookers on the weekend". Or in other words many young women are choosing to express themselves by dressing in sexually provocative clothing. This is portrayed as empowering for women, though I find it hard to imagine how being a hooker is empowering. I suspect is that it has more to do with creating desire in men, and the sense of power that comes with that, than expressing liberation in women. And men are much less responsive these days precisely because they use porn, so young women out to attract men have started to dress like porn stars and prostitutes. I find it quite disturbing. I'm an advocate of a gentle modesty - for men and women. I don't feel comfortable in a world where everything is sexualized. I have interests other than sex. When everything is sexualized it drowns out other aspects of human relationships (it's like pouring corn syrup on everything until you can't taste anything but sweet).
I'm not convinced that having sex in public is quite the same thing as being more open about sex. It is certainly a good thing that we are more open about sex. After all sex is only natural and everyone does it, and my parents generation (and their parents) were woefully ignorant of sex and their bodies. But there's nothing natural about the sex in adverts, on TV, in the movies and in porn. What some people in the UK fear is that young people are growing up to think that the sex they see in the media is in some way natural. That left to their own devices people have sex like porn stars.
I haven't mentioned Buddhism much because I'm wary of those people who proclaim "a Buddhist view on X". I don't think there is "a Buddhist view" on pornography. There are the views of Buddhists, and my views are certainly informed by 20 years of Buddhist practice and study. So this is more like the view of a Buddhist, than a Buddhist view.
My approach to porn is informed by what I understand to be the nature of experience, especially with respect to the pursuit of pleasure. I don't get it so much now, but people often used to ask me "are Buddhists allowed to do X". My response was usually that Buddhism has no rules as such, it's just that we have to live with the consequences of our actions and as Buddhists we do try to pay attention to those consequences. I don't want to be preaching "porn is bad" because I think people just switch off to that kind of narrative, but porn has consequences. Personal consequences, and social consequences. I understand men's attraction to porn, and I've given some thought to the various issues involved.
Obviously one Buddhist saying 'porn will screw you up' is not going to sink a multi-billion dollar multinational industry whose consumers are often addicted (more or less). Just as the tobacco industry continues to make profits in the developed world despite our certain and widely disseminated knowledge that smoking causes diseases of various kinds, including many which leave the smoker maimed or dead.
What I will say, is that many of our personal and societal problems come down to lifestyle. They are not genetic or environmental per se, but down to choices we make. In theory we could all just choose to live a better way. But in practice there are constant forces trying to distract us from thinking clearly; trying to hyperstimulate our desires; and generally keeping us ignorant. It is so difficult to know what is best. We live in a cacophony of lifestyle advice, most of which is produced by sincere but equally confused people.
We are very much in the position of the Kālāmas who could not make out who was telling the truth about how to live. And the Buddha's advice might be summed up as "pay attention to what is happening". Interestingly one of my secular guru's Marshall McLuhan said just this:
There is absolutely no inevitability as long as there is a willingness to contemplate what is happening.
The question is do we have the courage let alone the willingness? And do we have compassion when we honestly answer "no"?
~~oOo~~
posted by Jayarava Attwood at 07:00 on 31-May-2013
15 Comments
Close this window Jump to comment formTo "contemplate what is happening" we really have to look at sexual ethics and the legacy of virtue and sin, Adam and Eve, the prevalence of sexual shame, and all that.
Louis C.K., an honest and insightful thinker on the topic of masturbation, is candid about the almost inevitable element of shame and disgust involved. For many males, masturbation is a way to marinate oneself in feelings of unworthiness and guilt. Isn't this a pretty big problem? How does this affect self-esteem, for example?
Frank Zappa made the good point that there's really no sex in the American media -- only titillation.
It's so strange. We plaster every inch of civic space with titillation, yet show a nipple -- let alone sex -- and you're doomed. In Hollywood movies we do this funny evasive stuff with body doubles, careful cutting, etc. God forbid showing three seconds of two human bodies actually having enjoyable sex -- that'd be sinful!
I'd even claim that there's actually no sex in porn, either. It's coitus and fellatio artificially cut off from any emotional context, except daydream-like stagings of extramarital affairs, dysfunctional scenarios bordering on rape. The only situations in porn sex are dishonesty, exploitation, and objectification. Maybe the tragedy is simply that porn is so uniformly bad, tasteless, alienated, joyless, inhumane.
Friday, May 31, 2013
The below is verbatim a post on reddit that I made.
So, I'm a historian of pornography. And while this man is right that pornography "is an industry" dating back to 1800, what he is not aware of is that pre-1800, porn was NOT purely sexual and for the arousal of the viewer. Pornography (obscenity) was used to critique religion and politics. Our modern conception of a closed-door bedroom where the inner drama of sexuality revealing our deepest desires simply did not exist before Early Modern Europe.
I don't disavow the point he is trying to make here entirely, but sexuality, desire, and pornography are not necessary 'human' categories. They are, instead, historical and created ones. These realizations should be essential to a discussion of pornography and its context in the modern world.
I am of the view that the overwhelming access to and use of pornography is rather unhealthy, but that it also breaks down some of the taboo and fear, misinformation around human sexuality, and that it may be, in some ways, beneficial to do so. Of course there are good points on either side.
Friday, May 31, 2013
The below is verbatim a reddit comment that I made:
So, I'm a historian of pornography. And while this man is right that pornography "is an industry" dating back to 1800, what he is not aware of is that pre-1800, porn was NOT purely sexual and for the arousal of the viewer. Pornography (obscenity) was used to critique religion and politics. Our modern conception of a closed-door bedroom where the inner drama of sexuality revealing our deepest desires simply did not exist before Early Modern Europe.
I don't disavow the point he is trying to make here entirely, but sexuality, desire, and pornography are not necessary 'human' categories. They are, instead, historical and created ones. These realizations should be essential to a discussion of pornography and its context in the modern world.
I am of the view that the overwhelming access to and use of pornography is rather unhealthy, but that it also breaks down some of the taboo and fear, misinformation around human sexuality, and that it may be, in some ways, beneficial to do so. Of course there are good points on either side.
Friday, May 31, 2013
@ Mockingbird - and here is my reply:
Thanks for this perspective. I am definitely writing as a layman. I'm not sure that obscenity is functioning as a critique of anything any more. Indeed it seems to me that it is enabling for people whose sexual practices we all want to remain taboo - and I'm thinking particularly of pederasts. Some taboos are meant to be kept.
I think the idea that pornography breaks down taboos (debatable) is outweighed by the negative impact that people are reporting in teenagers - especially in the pressure for girls to participate in riskier sexual activity and acts they are uncomfortable with.
I also think the physical effects of porn, such as impotence in men, diminishes any such value.
As for misinformation I think you have this arse-backwards - pornography is misinformation pure and simple.
So while I respect your historical perspective I'm unconvinced by the arguments you put forth. I'm not sure they really take in the reality of internet pornography and it's impact.
Friday, May 31, 2013
@Mikael
Thanks for your comment. Yes, I agree with FZ on many matters.
Pornography compared to sex would seem to be like table sugar compared to a mango. And these days sugar, like sexual titillation, is in everything.
titillation is a good word for it, eh?
Friday, May 31, 2013
I have replied in the reddit thread. Thank you for your engagement, and this post.
The thread is here for whomever would like to follow along: http://www.reddit.com/r/Buddhism/comments/1fe7ze/pornography_desire_and_buddhism/ca9fr3c?context=3
Friday, May 31, 2013
Recently I overheard a person repeating something they read on the internet: "I think it's a good thing that emotional scars are not visible; because if emotional scars were visible porn would be disgusting."
For most serious practitioners, the emotional scars of others are quite visible. So what is the skillful approach? It is metta, karuna, and upekkha. It goes without saying that there will be consequences for those of us who through porn choose to nourish the root asava of desire for sensual craving.
Friday, May 31, 2013
The Mockingbird thread link is here: http://www.reddit.com/r/Buddhism/comments/1fe7ze/pornography_desire_and_buddhism/ca9fr3c?context=3
Friday, May 31, 2013
@Bicycle Nomad.
I don't know what "emotional scars" means. And I don't believe anyone can see them. I so hate it when people relate to me like they understand me from glimpses of my exterior. It's just bullshit. Serious practitioners cannot see other people's "emotional scars". They're just less reactive when confronted by uncomfortable interactions at best. Sometimes not even that. I really wish we could drum out of Buddhist practitioners the false view that they understand how other people work. In my experience Buddhists are hopeless amateur psychologists.
You're using that kind of Buddhist jargon all naive beginners rote learn from books in the first few years of getting interested. The kind we use to help us avoid having to think about or feel what's happening - so we can have conversations without ever having to admit we feel anything. Just be yourself. If you don't know your own mind, you certainly don't know the minds of others.
If it goes without saying, then why are you saying it?
Friday, May 31, 2013
Hi Jayarava!
Thanks for the post. It seems that porn satisfies a particular drive. How about non-pornographic cinema? For instance, what do you think of people's addiction to series of 5, 7 seasons, highly addictive? I know watching a good series like The Wire is not harmful (I guess). What I mean is the way it works. You have lots of movies and series online, a infinite supply, and people get addicted to this sort of entertainment. Or let's say football.
Von Klausewitz said that "war is diplomacy through other means" (or something similar). I think that porn is football through other means. Do you think that's too much? How would you analyse porn in the context of a society addicted to entertainment involving watching other human beings doing something we would like to do, being something we would like to be, etc? Or that's precisely the nature of entertainment, and a society living in abundance is destined to search for infinite and multiform entertainment because there is "spare time"?
Regards,
A.
Sunday, June 02, 2013
Aleix
The TV series are an interesting case and a live one in my community. Clearly they are a bit more complex. Stimulation is still central to the appeal, and distraction from present experience. I think also the loneliness of modern life plays a role - our fascinations with online personas are called para-social relationships. Ersatz replacements for meaningful relationships. I'm quite scathing of the idea of "virtual communities".
I would think that vicarious experience is definitely a part of the picture. But this provides a kind of artificial stimulation.
Underlying it all is a view about what it means to live well. Fundamentally most civilised people associate living well with pleasure - I believe this goes across cultures. Hence the Buddha's admonishments about addiction to sensual pleasure are still relevant across the world.
To me it seems that civilisations itself - beginning with living in large communities supplied by agriculture - has warped our relationship to our own bodies and appetites by over supplying the things we need; and warped our relationships to each other forcing us to live amongst unrelated strangers. It's an evolutionary argument based on the idea that out genes have evolved much slower than our culture for at least 10,000 years.
I've blogged on these ideas quite a lot and at some point hope to extract them out and make them into a book. Evolutionary Buddhism :-)
Sunday, June 02, 2013
Jayarava,
thanks for the post and your comments. I especially appreciate your scepticism about what is "natural". It is not the case that everything which may happen in some form in nature is "natural" when it happens in a much exaggerated form, with little or no similarity with its natural one. Nor is it the case that "nature" justifies per se.
(As you might imagine, I am thinking of discussions about "vegetarianism is unhealthy because eating meat is natural", although we now eat meat thrice a day, whereas our forerunners could only dream of our portions of meat.)
Just in case no other woman commented, I agree also with your other point: porn might be a pity, since it is quite hard to enjoy normal women if you are used to porn stars and because it is quite hard to do X in a spontaneous way,if X is so heavily connected with the porn approach to it (can one hear the words "anal sex" without thinking of porn images and of female subjugation?). The only possible comparison I can think of is the abuse of "charmant prince" fairy tales by girls (because no real man will ever be that charming). But, at least, fairy tales idealise men, whereas in the case of pornography part of the fun seems to be the fact of using someone without actually caring for her needs and desires.
Sunday, June 02, 2013
Hi Elisa
Thanks for your comments. I hadn't really thought of what I wrote as scepticism about nature, but yes I suppose you are right. I do think that Buddhists have to make distinctions between desires that arise as appetites (e.g. the need to eat for example) and desires which are artificially stimulated (e.g. food laden with sugar, fat, salt and chilli). Because as Buddhists we seek to be free of the compulsion to satisfy our desires.
I'm not sure if you are familiar with the writing of Emma Jung, but she made an interesting point about the Prince Charming story, especially in it's Beauty and the Beast variety. This story is also the plot of *all* romance novels. It represents, according to EJ, the female individuation - a girl coming to terms with her inner masculine in order to integrate that part of herself and become an individual woman. In other words an adult woman strives to have the kind of relationship with her inner masculine (animus) as the Princess has with Prince Charming.
On the other hand men's individuation myths support a very different story. Men who fall in love with their inner feminine (anima) are slaves to their emotions both positive and negative. A man must learn to control his emotions since if he acts them out he can be dangerous - either through anger and violence, or through sentimentality and indecisiveness. Most porn scenarios tend to conform to this more dominant type of relationship as romance novels conform to the Beauty and the Beast story. We could see men consuming porn as acting out inner dramas in a desperate attempt to understand and come to terms with our inner feminine. And mostly failing in the attempt.
Of course not everyone accepts Herr and Frau Jung's opinions about what goes on in the human psyche. But it is one way of understanding both phenomena. At base they represent a craving to mature and become individuals. Until this happens people cannot really take their place amongst the adults of the tribe.
Of course trouble ensues if we project these inner dramas into our real relationships. It's in no one's interests that men and women relate to each other the way they might relate to their animus/anima.
Another part of the problem is that we no longer live as members of a tribe and now lack the rituals and ceremonies to bring this change about in young people. I have a lot of sympathy with this kind of view. It is one of the reasons I sought ordination - a ritual to mark my entry into adult society (though it has not entirely lived up to expectation). I think the PhD process has similar resonances.
Monday, June 03, 2013
Thanks Jayarava. I did not know that Emma Jung had also written about psychoanalysis. If compared to The Beauty and the Beast, pornography seems to me quite "unexpressed" (avyakta). I mean, The Beauty and the Beast (except in its W. Disney's version, I am afraid) tells the story of a redemption, of the possibility of a journey from beastness to humanity (or godness, according to some interpretations). By contrast, pornography probably depict a situation, but possibly does not depict its solution. It is a Beauty and the Beast with the Beast who is never redeemed. At least, I do not know of dynamic pornography.
As for initiatory rites, you are right. Perhaps groups of young boys watching pornography, masturbating, looking at prostitutes are trying to "become adults" but can't stop doing it because of the lack of a real transformative experience on top of these repetitive experiences?
Tuesday, June 04, 2013
I guess I would see porn use in this context as a projection of unresolved shadow/anima issues. A desire to possess and control that denied inner feminine; which being denied is acted out unconsciously.
I wouldn't want to go too far down this route however as it starts to sound like a justification. I think my conclusion that we'd be better off without it is the main point.
This essay has about 3000 readers now. Which is 10x my daily average. Lots of people interested in pornography!
Tuesday, June 04, 2013