Criminal behaviour
From Seenoevil
Concern has been expressed that exposure to pornography, particularly violent pornography may stimulate violent or criminal behavior in the people who view it.
Contents |
Effect on sex crimes
It has been long theorized that increased viewing of pornography, particularly violent pornography, leads to an increase in sex crime. Despite a plethora of studies attempting to prove a link there is no clear picture available. The variance in results between studies has led some to conclude that there is no consistent relationship between pornography and crime, while others may believe that the research methodology used is not able to produce accurate results.
However, there is evidence of a correlation between lower per capita sexual crime rate and high availability of pornography in many developed countries (e.g. Netherlands, Sweden and Japan[1]) leading some to conclude that there is an inverse relationship between the availability of pornography and sexual crime. In the United states, since the widespread adoption of the Internet as an uncensored source of adult material [2], sex crime has dropped consistently as a part of a trend of reduction of over 85% since 1972[3]. This has led some to conclude that there may be a causal relationship, at least in the United States, where the increased availability of pornography reduces sex crime[4][5][6].
In the UK, there has been an increase in sex crime since the end of the 1980s [7]. However hard core pornography was illegal in the UK until the year 2000[8] and internet access did not take off until around the same time[9] so it is unlikely to have had any effect on the trends in crime before this time. Indeed some have speculated that any positive or negative effect of pornography will only come once it has been available to the larger UK population for a longer period.
Effect on sexual aggression
It has been suggested that exposure to violent pornography causes an increase in violent behavior. Much research has been done on this issue with some results suggesting an immediate increase in tendency to wards violence and others suggesting no such increase. An overview of research concluded that for nearly 97% of American men exposure to violent pornography does not cause any increase in violent behavior. However in the remaining 3%: "if a person has relatively aggressive sexual inclinations resulting from various personal and/or cultural factors, some pornography exposure may activate and reinforce associated coercive tendencies and behaviors."[10]
Violence or sex?
The question can be asked about the effect the specific combination of sex and violence may have. Do individual studies looking at the effect of violent pornography measure the effect of viewing sex and violence, or just the effect of viewing violence? Non-sexual violence on TV [11] and in video games[12]have been separately linked to an increase in violent attitudes. Under these circumstances it seems reasonable to question if the addition of sex makes any specific difference to the influence of violence.
It has been suggested that the arousal associated with explicit sexual images can both reinforce any message perceived within violent pornography and make that message more acceptable[13]. However it has also been pointed out that the evidence does not suggest sexual explicitness itself is the critical factor effecting the potential harm of certain media stimuli.[14]
Government reports
- United States, 1970. Presedential Commission on Obscenity and Pornography concludes that pornography has no harmful effects.[link requested]
- United States, 1986. The Meese Commission comes out clearly against pornography: ” In evaluating the results for sexually violent material, it appears that exposure to such materials (1) leads to a greater acceptance of rape myths and violence against women; (2) have more pronounced effects when the victim is shown enjoying the use of force or violence; (3) is arousing for rapists and for some males in the general population; and (4) has resulted in sexual aggression against women in the laboratory.” [15]
- UK Home Office Report of the Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship (the Williams Report), 1979: Throws doubts on the ability of films to deprave and corrupt.[16]
- UK Home Office research report on Pornography - Impacts and Influences, 1990: Concludes that there was no convincing evidence for a link between pornography and sex offending. It found that trends in sex offending were not clearly linked to the availability of pornography. Also, use of pornography often appeared to post-date the emergence of criminal deviance.[link requested]
- UK, 2005: Consultation on the possession of extreme pornographic materials: "we are unable, at present, to draw any definite conclusions based on research as to the likely long term impact of this kind of material on individuals generally, or on those who may already be predisposed to violent or aberrant sexual behavior."[17]
- UK, 2007: The evidence of harm to adults relating to exposure to extreme pornographic material: a Rapid Evidence Assessment (REA), by Catherine Itzin, Ann Taket and Liz Kelly [18]. Note that Liz Kelly endorsed the Lilith Project's response to the Government's consultation (which was heavily in favour of the proposals, and even argued that all pornographic depictions of naked women be a criminal offence to possess). Some of the "extreme" material covered in the REA included "whipping, spanking or beating". The effects do not seem distinct from those of mainstream porn along the lines of "shortly after viewing porn, viewers were more likely to accept rape myths". The section asking whether viewing such material contributes to sexual or violent offending focused only on studies involving men who were sex offenders, with the exception of one study involving 11 men who were in a treatment programme for "problematic pornography use". Over forty academics signed a statement opposing the law and referred to the Rapid Evidence Assessment as "extremely poor, based on contested findings and accumulated results. It is one-sided and simply ignores the considerable research tradition into "extreme" (be they violent or sexually explicit) materials within the UK's Humanities and Social Sciences." [19]
Bestiality and necrophilia
Research on the correlation between the availability of images of bestiality and necrophilia and the practice of these activities is sparse. However it seems likely that the availability of such images has increased greatly with the availability of the internet and yet no consequent increase in these activities has been reported.[source needed]
References
- Diamond, M & Uchiyama, A (1999). "Pornography, Rape and Sex Crimes in Japan". International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 22(1): 1-22
- National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NITA) reports. Accessed 26 September 2006.
- Bureau of Justice Statistics, National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), Rape rates. Accessed 26 September 2006.
- D'Amato, Anthony, "Porn Up, Rape Down" (June 23, 2006). Northwestern Public Law Research Paper No. 913013. Accessed 26 September 2006.
- Home office crime statistics, 'Rape of a female' - Long-term national recorded crime trend. Accessed 26 September 2006.
- Melon farmers, Video Appeals Committee ruling. Accessed 26 September 2006.
- NOP Research Group report, ‘Internet Usage Up in UK’. Accessed 26 September 2006.
- Malamuth, NM, Addison T, Koss M (2000). "Pornography and sexual aggression: are there reliable effects and can we understand them?". Annual Review of Sex Research 2000 (11): 26-91.
- Johnson et al.( 2002). Television Viewing and Aggressive Behavior During Adolescence and Adulthood” Science (vol 295, p 2468).
- Anderson, C & Dill, K. "Video Games and Aggressive Thoughts, Feelings, and Behavior in the Laboratory and in Life". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 78, No. 4.
- Malamuth, N. (1993). “Pornography's impact on male adolescents”. Adolescent Medicine: State of the Art Reviews, 4, 563-576.
- Malamuth, N. (1989). “Sexually violent media, thought patterns and antisocial behavior”. In G. Comstock (Ed.), Public Communication and Behavior, Vol. 2 (pp. 159-204). New York: Academic Press.
- Attorney General's Commission on Pornography. (1986).
- UK Home Office Report of the Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship (the Williams Report), (1979).
- Home office and Scottish Executive Consultation On the possession of extreme pornographic material (2005).
Unlinked
- President's Commission on Obscenity and Pornography. Report of The Commission on Obscenity and Pornography. (1970). Washington, D. C.: U. S. Government Printing Office.
- UK Home Office research report on Pornography - Impacts and Influences. (1990).
