Does 'rape culture' accurately describe (many) societies?

[Poem]

Perhaps you could explain how all the gay, non-violent straight, non-violent lesbian, solo and fetish videos only comprise 10% of the total?
Burden of proof, you know: it's your claim so up to you to provide the evidence.

And I am saying your, 'I find this hard to believe,' is based on an erroneous assumption about the report's findings. Are you cognizant of what sexual violence is? That it can be occurring without any realization on the part of the consumer?

I asked you to verify what you considered to be non-violent porn - that it didn't contain actors coerced into doing something they didn't want to.

You want me to repeat the evidence already posted?

 

[Cosmic Yak]

And I am saying your, 'I find this hard to believe,' is based on an erroneous assumption about the report's findings. Are you cognizant of what sexual violence is? That it can be occurring without any realization on the part of the consumer?

I asked you to verify what you considered to be non-violent porn - that it didn't contain actors coerced into doing something they didn't want to.

You want me to repeat the evidence already posted?

You aapear to misunderstand me. Your claim is that 90% of online porn videos contain violence against women, of one kind or another. What I'm questioning is that all the other kinds of porn, than either do not have violence against women, or do not have women at all, only make up 10% of the total. I would have thought that male gay porn alone, for example, constituted a much greater percentage than low single digits.
So, hopefully you understand now. That's what I'm finding hard to believe.

 

[Ziggurat]

From the synopsis of the report (which you linked to), page 2, heading 1:

Des violences physiques et sexuelles dans 90 % des vidéos en ligne

Google translation: Physical and sexual violence in 90% online videos

But they never back up that claim. In fact, they seem to have simply not noticed that their 90% source was offline only.

You seem to have assumed they couldn’t screw up on something so basic, but that is not a safe assumption at all. Your entire examination of this issue is a demonstration of exactly how such errors can happen.

 

[Poem]

But they never back up that claim. In fact, they seem to have simply not noticed that their 90% source was offline only.

You seem to have assumed they couldn’t screw up on something so basic, but that is not a safe assumption at all. Your entire examination of this issue is a demonstration of exactly how such errors can happen.

Okay, you meant 'establish' but said 'say'.

They didn't notice that it was offline only and that it says nothing about sexual violence? Establish that and you will have succeeded in terminating their role as an equalities watchdog.

Anything's possible but this is fantasy-like.

That is correct. But the Bridges study is the only source for the 90% claim.

You haven't established that.

So THIS is their independent study of online porn. Note first that they don't actually describe their methodology in any detail, which is a problem, but let's set that aside for the moment.

It's the 12 page synopsis of the 214 page report.

More importantly, do you know what's missing from this description? Any percentages. That 90% figure? They never measured a 90% violence rate. They didn't measure percentages of anything.

If they haven't then they're stupid - but you haven't established that.

In fact, all it appears they did is type in key word searches and see how many results pop up. They don't compare these results to the total number of videos. And chances are they didn't screen for duplicates or even test to see whether the videos with certain key words even have the content described by the key word.

It 'appears', 'they don't' and 'chances are'?

If they never reviewed the content as they say they did, how can they say (as already posted):

The women are real, the acts of sexual violence are real, and the suffering is often perfectly visible and at the same time eroticized. The men's comments, on the other hand, are enthusiastic, reflecting the excitement of women's suffering and crying.​

This is something you might have noticed even regarding this forum. You can put tags in threads you create, but there is no automatic mechanism to ensure that tags are accurate. Nobody really bothers with fake tags here both because this forum is unimportant and because people don't primarily find threads by searching tags. But on a platform where tags are a key method for searching for content, you should expect people to try to game the system by using incorrect flags to try to pop up in more searches. So search results based on tags aren't necessarily an accurate indicator of the actual content. But again, even if it were, the HCE "study" DID NOT conclude that 90% of online porn is violent, because they did not measure any percentages.

What, so they took an afternoon to amass stats on the numbers whilst claiming 18 months work? The Guardian is way off with their:

After more than 18 months of hearings and reviewing millions of videos on the biggest international pornography sites, the report said that in millions of videos, “women, caricatured with the worst sexist and racist stereotypes, are humiliated, objectified, dehumanised, assaulted, tortured, subjected to treatment that is contrary both to human dignity and French law”.​

?

 

[Ziggurat]

They didn't notice that it was offline only and that it says nothing about sexual violence?

Well, yes. Because there's no other mention of any 90% except that offline study of aggression.

Anything's possible but this is fantasy-like.

Not really. Incompetence is quite ordinary and common.

It's the 12 page synopsis of the 214 page report.

So where's the full report? Where in that full report do they back up this claim? Again, this is your claim, back it up.

 

[Poem]

Well, yes. Because there's no other mention of any 90% except that offline study of aggression.

90% isn't mentioned in the Bridges study.

Not really. Incompetence is quite ordinary and common.

But this would be outright lying.

So where's the full report? Where in that full report do they back up this claim? Again, this is your claim, back it up.

Your assertion is that the Bridges study is the only source which you have not established.

The full report is only available in French (on their website) and it's not possible to copy and translate. I am trying to get an English copy.

I asked you about how they could claim the following if they did not actually properly review content?

The women are real, the acts of sexual violence are real, and the suffering is often perfectly visible and at the same time eroticized. The men's comments, on the other hand, are enthusiastic, reflecting the excitement of women's suffering and crying.​

Did they take an afternoon to amass stats on the numbers whilst claiming 18 months work? The Guardian is way off with their:

After more than 18 months of hearings and reviewing millions of videos on the biggest international pornography sites, the report said that in millions of videos, “women, caricatured with the worst sexist and racist stereotypes, are humiliated, objectified, dehumanised, assaulted, tortured, subjected to treatment that is contrary both to human dignity and French law”.​

?

Have you succeeded in establishing that they didn't notice that the Bridges study does not analyse any online content or for sexual violence?

Clearly not.

 

[Ziggurat]

90% isn't mentioned in the Bridges study.

The HCE cite the Bridges study as 90%. You are correct that Bridges itself doesn't say 90%, they say 88.2%. So either they did some rounding, or their citation is wrong. If you're trying to prop up the reliability of the HCE, a wrong citation isn't exactly a step forward, is it?

The full report is only available in French (on their website)

Why haven't you linked it?

and it's not possible to copy and translate.

Link it. If nothing else, maybe someone can transcribe it by hand.

I asked you about how they could claim the following if they did not actually properly review content?

Because it's got nothing to do with my argument, which was about claimed and unsupported percentages. I'm not disputing qualitative descriptions of some content.

Did they take an afternoon to amass stats on the numbers whilst claiming 18 months work?

I have no idea what they did, and neither do you. Because they don't say in that summary what they did, and you haven't provided any source that shows what they did. I know what's missing from the summary, though.

 

[Poem]

The HCE cite the Bridges study as 90%.

It does not.

You are correct that Bridges itself doesn't say 90%, they say 88.2%. So either they did some rounding, or their citation is wrong. If you're trying to prop up the reliability of the HCE, a wrong citation isn't exactly a step forward, is it?

Or the Bridges study is cited because it also points to violence as being high.

Why haven't you linked it?

https://www.haut-conseil-egalite.gouv.fr/IMG/pdf/hce-vio-rapport_pornocriminalite-v11-bdef.pdf

Because it's got nothing to do with my argument, which was about claimed and unsupported percentages. I'm not disputing qualitative descriptions of some content.

Your argument: or even test to see whether the videos with certain key words even have the content described by the key word.

I have no idea what they did, and neither do you. Because they don't say in that summary what they did, and you haven't provided any source that shows what they did. I know what's missing from the summary, though.

Yes they do - the study involved millions of videos and they comment on the violence that is clearly visible. 18 months would be about right to build a case. The report was to be an in-depth examination and extension of the French Senate Report (2022) . It also reviewed existing literature.

Why did this happen?

Bérangère Couillard, the French minister for equality and the fight against discrimination, wrote in an opinion piece for the Journal du Dimanche that millions of videos online showed acts of torture and barbaric cruelty​

 

[Ziggurat]

It does not.

Yes it does.

"90 % des contenus pornographiques contiennent de la violence physique ou verbale³"​

Or translated,

"90% of pornographic content contains physical or verbal violence³".​

What's that 3 citation? Why, it's the Bridges paper.

https://www.haut-conseil-egalite.gouv.fr/IMG/pdf/hce-vio-rapport_pornocriminalite-v11-bdef.pdf

OK, so let's look at this full report, and see what it says. Near the start of the full report (page 20), they have a section titled "90% des videos contiennent des actes de violence physique ou verbale." And what does that section start out with? A citation and description of the Bridges paper. They mention the 88.2% "physical aggression" number then go on to say, "Les chercheureuses concluent que 90% des scenes comportent un acte de violence physique ou verbale", or translated, "The researchers conclude that 90% of the scenes involve an act of physical or verbal violence". Who are the researchers being referenced? Bridges et al. And the 90% DOES come directly from the conclusion of the Bridges paper (though misrepresented):

Compared with prior content analytic studies suggesting that aggression rates of pornographic films vary but rarely rise above 30% (Barron & Kimmel, 200; Duncan, 1991), the results of the current study showed much higher rates, approaching 90%.

So the full HCE report is very explicitly citing Bridges as the source of their 90% statistic. That statistic doesn't come from anywhere else. It comes from the Bridges study, and the Bridges study alone.

OK, so what about the internet porn research on video titles? They start talking about that on page 21. But what do they say about it?

"Une etude menee par le Haut Conseil a l'Egalite en mars 2023 a permis de referencer le nombre de videos par categories et mots cles sur les principaux sites pornographiques."

"A study conducted by the High Council for Equality in March 2023 made it possible to reference the number of videos by category and keywords on the main pornographic sites."​

They looked for categories and key words, and listed the number of search returns. They do not list how big the total set of videos being search was, so that it's impossible to derive any percentages from any of these numbers. The full report does not indicate that this study consisted of anything more than typing in key word or category searches and seeing how many results were listed.

Yes they do - the study involved millions of videos and they comment on the violence that is clearly visible.

I'm sure it is in at least some of them. All of them? They don't make that claim.

18 months would be about right to build a case.

Except they didn't do that. They did it during one month (March 2023), not 18 months, and there's no indication that it took the whole month. They present no data from that work other than the number of hits that different key words returned. So the idea that this was some painstaking 18-month exhaustive study of all this content is entirely invented by you, it's not in the report itself.

It also reviewed existing literature.

I'm sure it did. And yet, the 90% figure still only comes from the Bridges paper, not anywhere else. The full report makes that clear, it's not just the result of them cutting stuff out for the summary.

I spent more time than I should have diving into this report, and I shouldn't have needed to, because it was your claim not mine. But you wouldn't back it up, you wouldn't examine your own sources, so you didn't discover on your own that they didn't say what you thought they said. I'm not going to do that again. If you want to reference something in the future to support your claims, you need to actually quote from it and give direct citations including page numbers, or I'm going to assume that, like this one, you aren't accurately describing what those sources actually say.

 

[Poem]

////////////////////

How did you manage to copy the text from the report?

 

[Ziggurat]

How did you manage to copy the text from the report?

By manually typing it out. Like I said, I spent far too much time on this, and I'm not going to do that again.

 

[Poem]

By manually typing it out. Like I said, I spent far too much time on this, and I'm not going to do that again.

Qudos for that but the only way is for a full translation. As I said, I am trying to get one.

 

[theprestige]

Qudos for that but the only way is for a full translation. As I said, I am trying to get one.

Then you should wait until you have one before basing your argument on what it says.

If you can't read French, and you don't want to type it into a translator line by line, how do you know the report says what you think it says? If there's no complete translation, how did the media know what the report actually says? How do you know if they got it right?

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about, when I say that you have a tendency to foist claims uncritically, without properly examining their sources or understanding what's actually been done to support those claims. If it seems at first glance to support your thesis, you present it as true and reverse the burden of proof on anyone who questions your research.

Remember, we're not here to convince you. You're here to convince us. Ziggurat has been very clear and detailed about why he finds one of your claims unconvincing. He's put more effort into explaining the basis for his disagreement, than you have put in effort to establishing a sound basis for your claim. And now all you can think of to do is say that you're not really sure what basis for your claim actually says, so you don't know what to make of his disagreement.

Why are you foisting this study in support of your thesis, if you're not really sure what it actually says?

---

ETA: And why is a full translation "the only way"? The only way for what? You can pull up the French language report, find the passages Ziggurat has cited, and type them into a translator. You can see for yourself if Ziggurat is lying about what those passage say. Do you mean that a full translation is the only way for you to find other passages that put Ziggurat's cites in a different context, one that rebuts his claims and supports yours? If that's the case, then you have no business citing this study in the first place, since you don't actually know what it says.

 

[Poem]

Yes it does.

"90 % des contenus pornographiques contiennent de la violence physique ou verbale³"​

Or translated,

"90% of pornographic content contains physical or verbal violence³".​

What's that 3 citation? Why, it's the Bridges paper.

I still draw a distinction between the HCE citing of Laure Beccuau's citing of the Bridges study in relation to physical and verbal aggression and the HCE's assertion of 90% regarding physical and sexual violence. Clearly, the physical violence does not need to be 90% for HCE's headline to be valid. The experience of porn actress Nikita Bellucci, who is mention in the French Senate report and linked to in the HCE report, is relevant - she has spoken about the issue of consent.

It might be that the HCE has used the Bridges study as a foundation for the 90% figure - and it isn't a stretch to assume that violence has actually gone up in the years since that study (ie 2004/5). You acknowledged this in #928.

It might be the case that the HCE has failed to properly distinguish between the Bridges study on aggression and their own findings on violence and sexual violence. If they haven't then that would be remiss.

OK, so let's look at this full report, and see what it says. Near the start of the full report (page 20), they have a section titled "90% des videos contiennent des actes de violence physique ou verbale." And what does that section start out with? A citation and description of the Bridges paper. They mention the 88.2% "physical aggression" number then go on to say, "Les chercheureuses concluent que 90% des scenes comportent un acte de violence physique ou verbale", or translated, "The researchers conclude that 90% of the scenes involve an act of physical or verbal violence". Who are the researchers being referenced? Bridges et al. And the 90% DOES come directly from the conclusion of the Bridges paper (though misrepresented):

So the full HCE report is very explicitly citing Bridges as the source of their 90% statistic. That statistic doesn't come from anywhere else. It comes from the Bridges study, and the Bridges study alone.

Again, I would draw attention to the HCE's inclusion of sexual violence in their headline. There will be a good number of videos that contain no physical violence that will nevertheless be sexually violent.

OK, so what about the internet porn research on video titles? They start talking about that on page 21. But what do they say about it?

"Une etude menee par le Haut Conseil a l'Egalite en mars 2023 a permis de referencer le nombre de videos par categories et mots cles sur les principaux sites pornographiques."

"A study conducted by the High Council for Equality in March 2023 made it possible to reference the number of videos by category and keywords on the main pornographic sites."​

They looked for categories and key words, and listed the number of search returns. They do not list how big the total set of videos being search was, so that it's impossible to derive any percentages from any of these numbers. The full report does not indicate that this study consisted of anything more than typing in key word or category searches and seeing how many results were listed.

One would expect significant push back in the media etc if this were the case. I haven't seen any - the opposite in fact. If you are right then, yes, it's remiss.

I'm sure it is in at least some of them. All of them? They don't make that claim.

In the text you translated.

Except they didn't do that. They did it during one month (March 2023), not 18 months, and there's no indication that it took the whole month. They present no data from that work other than the number of hits that different key words returned. So the idea that this was some painstaking 18-month exhaustive study of all this content is entirely invented by you, it's not in the report itself.

Ok, it looks like they spent less time than I suggested on that part of their study. I said their report took 18 months.

I'm sure it did. And yet, the 90% figure still only comes from the Bridges paper, not anywhere else. The full report makes that clear, it's not just the result of them cutting stuff out for the summary.

The full report?

 

[Poem]

Then you should wait until you have one before basing your argument on what it says.

If you can't read French, and you don't want to type it into a translator line by line, how do you know the report says what you think it says? If there's no complete translation, how did the media know what the report actually says? How do you know if they got it right?

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about, when I say that you have a tendency to foist claims uncritically, without properly examining their sources or understanding what's actually been done to support those claims. If it seems at first glance to support your thesis, you present it as true and reverse the burden of proof on anyone who questions your research.

Remember, we're not here to convince you. You're here to convince us. Ziggurat has been very clear and detailed about why he finds one of your claims unconvincing. He's put more effort into explaining the basis for his disagreement, than you have put in effort to establishing a sound basis for your claim. And now all you can think of to do is say that you're not really sure what basis for your claim actually says, so you don't know what to make of his disagreement.

Why are you foisting this study in support of your thesis, if you're not really sure what it actually says?

---

ETA: And why is a full translation "the only way"? The only way for what? You can pull up the French language report, find the passages Ziggurat has cited, and type them into a translator. You can see for yourself if Ziggurat is lying about what those passage say. Do you mean that a full translation is the only way for you to find other passages that put Ziggurat's cites in a different context, one that rebuts his claims and supports yours? If that's the case, then you have no business citing this study in the first place, since you don't actually know what it says.

I did ask that you respond to some previous posts of mine. Why would I expect you to reply if I respond to this post?

 

[Poem]

You aapear to misunderstand me. Your claim is that 90% of online porn videos contain violence against women, of one kind or another. What I'm questioning is that all the other kinds of porn, than either do not have violence against women, or do not have women at all, only make up 10% of the total. I would have thought that male gay porn alone, for example, constituted a much greater percentage than low single digits.
So, hopefully you understand now. That's what I'm finding hard to believe.

The 90% figure is indeed high - surprisingly high. It's HCE's claim and it's notable that article's such as the Guardian's (a left leaning paper) on the HCE claim has no push back.

 

[Darat]

I still draw a distinction between the HCE citing of Laure Beccuau's citing of the Bridges study in relation to physical and verbal aggression and the HCE's assertion of 90% regarding physical and sexual violence. Clearly, the physical violence does not need to be 90% for HCE's headline to be valid. The experience of porn actress Nikita Bellucci, who is mention in the French Senate report and linked to in the HCE report, is relevant - she has spoken about the issue of consent.

It might be that the HCE has used the Bridges study as a foundation for the 90% figure - and it isn't a stretch to assume that violence has actually gone up in the years since that study (ie 2004/5). You acknowledged this in #928.

It might be the case that the HCE has failed to properly distinguish between the Bridges study on aggression and their own findings on violence and sexual violence. If they haven't then that would be remiss.



Again, I would draw attention to the HCE's inclusion of sexual violence in their headline. There will be a good number of videos that contain no physical violence that will nevertheless be sexually violent.



One would expect significant push back in the media etc if this were the case. I haven't seen any - the opposite in fact. If you are right then, yes, it's remiss.



In the text you translated.



Ok, it looks like they spent less time than I suggested on that part of their study. I said their report took 18 months.



The full report?

How is sexual violence not a subset of physical violence?

 

[dirtywick]

The 90% figure is indeed high - surprisingly high. It's HCE's claim and it's notable that article's such as the Guardian's (a left leaning paper) on the HCE claim has no push back.

some might even call it extraordinary

 

[Poem]

some might even call it extraordinary

In the list of acts under the HCE's headline claim about the 90% are:

Double anal, triple anal, choking, bukkake, gangbang, gagging, torture, electrocution, surprise (penetration by surprise), urine spraying.

Prolapse is mentioned as a sought-after category.

It also says:

Signing a contract doesn't change a thing. On the contrary, contracts are binding: signing them in advance is one of the pornocrats' means of coercion, giving an appearance of legality to the most sadistic acts. But you can't consent to your own torture and humiliation. You can't contractualize an act of physical or sexual violence. Pornographic industry contracts are legally null and void.​

I suspect that many porn consumers will be fully normalized to such acts -which would explain why the 90% figure does not appear credible.

 

[Poem]

How is sexual violence not a subset of physical violence?

Sexual violence means that someone forces or manipulates someone else into unwanted sexual activity without their consent.

See previous post.