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Santorum gone too far

Cleon said:
;)

The idea of Mick Jagger writing political analysis was a bit too much for me.
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For what it is worth, Wikipedia says that he studied at the London School of Economics before becoming a professional singer.
 
Ladewig said:
I may have missed it. If so I apologize for the repetition, but here is Mr. Santorum's claims on his own website


Originally Posted by www.RickSantorum.Com/issues
America is suffering a pandemic of harm from pornography. A wealth of research is now available demonstrating that pornography causes profound brain changes in both children and adults, resulting in widespread negative consequences. Addiction to pornography is now common for adults and even for some children. The average age of first exposure to hard-core, Internet pornography is now 11. Pornography is toxic to marriages and relationships. It contributes to misogyny and violence against women. It is a contributing factor to prostitution and sex trafficking.
A wealth of evidence showing pornography causes profound, negative, brain changes in children and adults? Really?!
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In some technical sense, he is right. Everything causes "profound" brain changes, depending on what you mean by "profound". I'm not sure whether they would be negative, but they might be. I don't even know what a porn addiction could be, but the term is widely used by people who talk about pornography. It's true that it would be "a factor" in all kinds of bad things, although I'm quite sure broken families, drug abuse and early sexual experiences will have a stronger relationship.

But in a more meaningful sense, none of this has anything to do with pornography. It's a mis-reading of technical research. It sounds like someone who took a few undergrad psych classes writing talking points for Rick. Unfortunately, it fits in very well with the direction of a lot of the technical research that's been and is being done on sexually explicit material.
 
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Real world eperiment:

In the mid 1990s the world was introduced to the Internet. Since that time pornography has become cheap an easy to get. The consumption of pornography has sky rocketed.

Questions: What have the past decade and a half demonstrated? Have crime rates risen as a result? Sexual assaults?

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/everyday_economics/2006/10/how_the_web_prevents_rape.html
How the Web Prevents Rape

The bottom line on these experiments is, "More Net access, less rape." A 10 percent increase in Net access yields about a 7.3 percent decrease in reported rapes. States that adopted the Internet quickly saw the biggest declines. And, according to Clemson professor Todd Kendall, the effects remain even after you control for all of the obvious confounding variables, such as alcohol consumption, police presence, poverty and unemployment rates, population density, and so forth.
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Of course it fair to point out correlation vs causation and the author deals with that. But let's assume there is no causation for reduced rape. Can we agree the negative correlation demonstrate there is no cause for increasing rape?

Are there potential social harms? Sure. I'm not sure it calls for legislation and I'm not sure what else we could or ought to do about it.
 
I would love to know the internet browsing habits of Dick Sanatarium and his ilk. And not just the stuff that shows up in his history.

Out of my cold, dead, slightly sticky and strangely odoured hands.
 
Scott Sommers said:
In some technical sense, he is right. Everything causes "profound" brain changes, depending on what you mean by "profound". I'm not sure whether they would be negative, but they might be. I don't even know what a porn addiction could be, but the term is widely used by people who talk about pornography. It's true that it would be "a factor" in all kinds of bad things, although I'm quite sure broken families, drug abuse and early sexual experiences will have a stronger relationship.

But in a more meaningful sense, none of this has anything to do with pornography. It's a mis-reading of technical research. It sounds like someone who took a few undergrad psych classes writing talking points for Rick. Unfortunately, it fits in very well with the direction of a lot of the technical research that's been and is being done on sexually explicit material.
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I am willing to concede porn addiction. Sex Addicts Anonymous has some members that describe themselves that way. If you are looking at porn at work and get fired for that, and you manage to get another job that involves computers and you look at porn at that job too, then addiction might broadly fit your behavior.

But Mr. Santorum said such an addiction is common among adults. That is pure bull ****.
He is talking out of his ass. Again.
 
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Ladewig said:
I am willing to concede porn addiction. Sex Addicts Anonymous has some members that describe themselves that way. If you are looking at porn at work and get fired for that, and you manage to get another job that involves computers and you look at porn at that job too, then addiction might broadly fit your behavior.

But Mr. Santorum said such an addiction is common among adults. That is pure bull ****. He is talking out of his ass. Again.
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Some how I don't think porn is the only computer addiction.
 
RandFan said:
In the mid 1990s the world was introduced to the Internet. Since that time pornography has become cheap an easy to get. The consumption of pornography has sky rocketed.

Questions: What have the past decade and a half demonstrated? Have crime rates risen as a result? Sexual assaults?

Of course it fair to point out correlation vs causation and the author deals with that. But let's assume there is no causation for reduced rape. Can we agree the negative correlation demonstrate there is no cause for increasing rape?
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Imagine how much lower rape would be if there had been no increase in pornography though...


;)
 
Ladewig said:
I am willing to concede porn addiction. Sex Addicts Anonymous has some members that describe themselves that way. If you are looking at porn at work and get fired for that, and you manage to get another job that involves computers and you look at porn at that job too, then addiction might broadly fit your behavior.

But Mr. Santorum said such an addiction is common among adults. That is pure bull ****.
He is talking out of his ass. Again.
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I suppose.

I know what you mean. It is the common usage of the term these days. The problem is that this makes it hard to distinguish between obesession and addiction. It provides a definition of the term that can not be linked with what is meant by a herion addiction, for example.

But yes, I do know what Rick is trying to get at, that some people find the use of porn for sexual excitement to be obsessive and that this ruins marriages and lives. I too doubt this is very common. I personally don't know anyone with this experience.

And to return to my earlier points, I think a proper understanding of pornography would show how stupid this kind of rhetoric really is. But instead, professional scholars continue the tradition of focusing on the hard/prevelance/effects of exposure - as it is frequently termed.
 
Scott Sommers said:
I suppose.

I know what you mean. It is the common usage of the term these days. The problem is that this makes it hard to distinguish between obesession and addiction. It provides a definition of the term that can not be linked with what is meant by a herion addiction, for example.

But yes, I do know what Rick is trying to get at, that some people find the use of porn for sexual excitement to be obsessive and that this ruins marriages and lives. I too doubt this is very common. I personally don't know anyone with this experience.

And to return to my earlier points, I think a proper understanding of pornography would show how stupid this kind of rhetoric really is. But instead, professional scholars continue the tradition of focusing on the hard/prevelance/effects of exposure - as it is frequently termed.
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And, again, we must have evidence. Who has done the studies in question? Under what conditions? What were the findings, (and not just what garnered the headlines)?

I'm reminded of Dr. James Dobson's "interview" with Ted Bundy, and Bundy's assertion that porn drove him to kill. Yet, had that been a valid defense, even in the days of Reagan, his sentence might have been commuted. (I'm also reminded that Bundy tried to weasel his way out of the Chair by offering to tell where other victims were buried, provided he were spared.)

I'm not buying it, Scott. Not without something more than a few vague allusions.
 
Roadtoad said:
And, again, we must have evidence. Who has done the studies in question? Under what conditions? What were the findings, (and not just what garnered the headlines)?

I'm reminded of Dr. James Dobson's "interview" with Ted Bundy, and Bundy's assertion that porn drove him to kill. Yet, had that been a valid defense, even in the days of Reagan, his sentence might have been commuted. (I'm also reminded that Bundy tried to weasel his way out of the Chair by offering to tell where other victims were buried, provided he were spared.)

I'm not buying it, Scott. Not without something more than a few vague allusions.
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What the Hell are you talking about? What is thing I said that you are not "buying"? That Rick Santorum is an idiot? Oh...you missed that part? Get a grip you guys. I know this is the JREF and that means memory is really short.

What part of the post is it that you "don't buy"?
 
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Scott Sommers said:
What the Hell are you talking about? What is thing I said that you are not "buying"? That Rick Santorum is an idiot? Oh...you missed that part? Get a grip you guys. I know this is the JREF and that means memory is really short.

What part of the post is it that you "don't buy"?
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You're gonna look real good on ignore. :mad:
 
Scott Sommers said:
I suppose.

I know what you mean. It is the common usage of the term these days. The problem is that this makes it hard to distinguish between obesession and addiction. It provides a definition of the term that can not be linked with what is meant by a herion addiction, for example.

But yes, I do know what Rick is trying to get at, that some people find the use of porn for sexual excitement to be obsessive and that this ruins marriages and lives. I too doubt this is very common. I personally don't know anyone with this experience.
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Fair enough. I can agree with your assessment.
I am not going to fall on my sword to defend a particular definition or diagnosis.

And to return to my earlier points, I think a proper understanding of pornography would show how stupid this kind of rhetoric
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Here is where I got lost. What is the antecedent of "this kind of rhetoric"?
 
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