From an article I recently read claiming that pornography might be good for us:
According to the conservative media watchdog group Family Safe Media, the porn industry makes more money than the top technology companies combined, including Microsoft, Google, Apple, and Amazon.
Without debating the relative merits of porn, if there are any besides temporary satiation of carnal desires, I find it fascinating that moving and still pictures of naked people copulating generate more revenue than the top technology companies combined. I suppose it makes perfect sense. After all, every human being on the planet is pretty much hard wired to enjoy looking at naked people of one or both sexes. All the counter programming that human societies attempt to instantiate (mostly via religion) cannot overpower basic biological programming.
Whether we admit it or not, our genitals and our brains work together to influence our thoughts and actions.
The illegality of prostitution in most U.S. jurisdictions continues to bother me on about the same level as the federal government’s continuing need to pretend that the War on Drugs is somehow making the United States a better place to live. As a society, we are doing a woefully poor job of channeling natural behaviors into more constructive venues. If violent video games are outlawed too, we’ll have an unholy triumvirate of repression and suppression of natural human urges. While I don’t think that will happen, it really makes me wonder how long we’ll continue the juvenile societal attitudes and puritan set of mores we have towards human sexuality in America.
Tech is definitely changing sexual mores in this country. I get the distinct impression from generations younger than mine that ideas like polyamory, open relationships and casual sex with many partners are getting a new look. And when it comes to acceptance of homosexuality, I know attitudes are changing drastically. My feeling is that porn must have played a role in the changing attitudes. Even more important, technology was the delivery vehicle for most of the porn.
Technology and porn aren’t just changing sexual mores in the U.S. Sites like 4chan have worldwide reach, and they affect the way their audiences think. They change the memeset. In two generations, human sexual mores of the technorati will be completely alien to a typical 20th century American.
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