image transcript:

Anonymous asked:
is it true that porn of any kind (erotica, audio, pics, etc) rots the brain? like, is there any truth to the idea that I’m damaging my brain permanently? I mainly like to read erotica on tumblr or ao3. I’ve also seen people refer to anyone who likes any type of porn as degenerates and sex pests.

batmanisagatewaydrug answered:
is this what we’re doing now. we’re calling people degenerates just for reading horny fanfic.
besties we are never ever never ever never ever never escaping conservative christianity.

sure whatever. porn rots holes in your brain. anything that makes you feel good is bad actually. if you derive joy from movies or food or seeing your friends that’s also deeply suspect and you should probably go to confession about it. if I’m being totally honest we should not stop with porn, having sex with other people is pretty fucked up. kind of predatory to desire another person carnally. probably we should all just go live in caves and think about god until we die a celibate death.

in my undergrad classes we talked about how periods of (relative) social progress are often followed by sharp conservative backlash, and I didn’t really get it until I lived through it with the 2016 election. and like a fucking goober I thought “well, at least this is as bad as it will ever get iny lifetime,” because I could never in ten million years could have predicted the protestant comeback tour convincing people that they’re psychologically diseased sex criminals if they so much as think about nutting

end of transcript

  • Uriel238 [all pronouns]@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    721·
    3 months ago

    I was frustrated when Psych2Go (a YouTube channel) decided that porn rots your brain. Remember that our moral guardians also claimed that Rock & Roll and Dungeons & Dragons rot your brain, or hand your soul over to Satan. No moral panic should ever be trusted or acknowledged.

    So when it comes to consuming porn, there are three negative effects I can imagine:

    1. If you are using porn as a substitute for sex education, then it may leave you with some misconceptions about how adult humans relate. Not all women are looking to get pounded by Priapus for an hour. Cindy Gallop raised a concern in 2012 that too many young men were obsessed with jizzing in women’s faces, and noted this wasn’t fun for her, and not fun for any of the other women she asked, hence her Make Love Not Porn crusade to elevate the standards of porn to reflect closer to what is typical human behavior.

    For the rest of us, the starting treatment is better sex ed. Planned Parenthood take comprehensive sex ed seriously, and they make materials that (I believe) they offer for free.

    2. If you are used to non-amateur porn (and even then) you may be exposed to more than a little bit of super-normal stimulus. In nature super-normal stimulus are elements that go hard in triggering fixed action patterns. Doritos Nacho Cheese powder is an example of a super-normal stimulus as is Jessica Rabbit’s (impossible) hip-to-waist ratio.

    So if you’re used to playboy centerfolds, to mainstream Hollywood porn stars, to anime (which plays on cute SNS), to cultivated AI porn, to porn art, etc. Your brain might decide that actual real women are wanting in their qualities. This is managed with awareness that hotties in porn are not representative of what human beings are like IRL, and those that actually have careers being a commercial sexpot have to devote their entire lives to staying fit.

    3. As per any other pleasurable thing, porn can become addictive. This is a larger-picture issue in that our society demands we live lives so stressed that we must self-medicate, whether through porn, booze, gambling, career advancement, video games, or whatever. Dealing with addiction is a bigger issue, and I’ve taken the path of replacing harmful addictions with slightly less harmful addictions.

    One final disclaimer, porn doesn’t actually rot your brain. (say the way that Alzheimer’s does), but these are ways that it can have negative effects on your life, or your kids’. Here in the States, our society hates sex, and does not have half a clue how to deal with their teens suddenly interested in sexual activity, and as such we more act to contain them rather than let them explore what is supposed to be a normal facet of adulthood. So if you have teen kids or teen friends or are a teen, it’s going to be up to you to figure it all out. Again, Planned Parenthood might be able to help.

    Also, most doctors think from late adolescence / early adulthood onward, we should be sexually active, and that may even be healthier than abstinence or celibacy. Just make sure everyone is opt-in consenting.

  • TotallynotJessica@lemmy.world
    42·
    3 months ago

    It’s not the smut that rots your brain; being terminally online rots your brain. Some of the most brainrotted individuals are conservative and anti porn. It’s not an issue with the content as much as the medium. Capitalism often drives the worst of it.

  • Jimbo@yiffit.net
    29·
    3 months ago

    Meanwhile I’m sitting here doing basically the opposite of conservative thought in ethical hedonism

  • JackbyDev@programming.devEnglish
    28·
    3 months ago

    It’s honestly a bit of a self report when I see religious people act as if all masterbation and erotic media consumption equates to a gooning addiction.

  • zea@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    27·
    3 months ago

    All this talk of porn is bad for you or rots your brain, but I never hear any evidence, or even fully fleshed out reasoning.

    If it’s inherently harmful, I expect to see the inherent harm. Closest I get is seeing a few particular scenarios of an unhealthy relationship with it or people telling me there’s some invisible harm I can’t see and they can’t show me (bit unfalsifiable, don’t you think?).

    Showing brain rot requires showing that it has an effect on the brain/mind (which it probably does, as almost any activity will) AND that effect is net bad. Again, I’ve never seen much evidence that the effect is inherently bad.

    As long as you’re managing it right - noticing any affects and deciding if that’s worth stopping over - I trust you to regulate yourself. Everybody’s different, so who am I to say something is bad for everyone or that nobody can have a healthy relationship with something?

  • beefbot@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    26·
    3 months ago

    Religious traditions control sexuality in order to breed armies who will fight for them. They get into people’s minds and hearts early to enslave us. It’s hideous.

    And they pay zero fucking taxes, the shitpiles

    • ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world
      3·
      3 months ago

      Things like that is why I advocate for “super-secularism”, or the dissolution of any church or religious org that tries to dismantle secularism, is involved with any other similar anti-democratic movement, or are against human rights.

  • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
    21·
    3 months ago

    It’s been so refreshing to discover queer neurodivergent spaces online, suddenly no one gives a shit so long as you’re not clearly harming others, and will merrily half-joke about chronic bussy deficiency

  • ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world
    9·
    3 months ago

    There were times, I thought I was a “sex addict”, but after trying to quit cold turkey multiple times I had to realize I’m just hornier than most others.

      • HollowNaught@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        3 months ago

        But fr tho, it’s important to not nut more than once every two days. Neural receptors get desensitised to the stimulus, and studies like “prevalence of masturbation and associated factors among older adults in four european countries” showed there were interesting correlations between it and depression.

          • HollowNaught@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            3 months ago

            Why yes, the study did focus on older adults, as the title implied. It’s quite hard to find papers on younger individuals, given the nature of the topic

        • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
          2·
          3 months ago

          do you want to spread some more misinformation?

          the official swedish website for youth health information explicitly says that masturbation is not harmful, and that if anything it tends to make you feel better which is good.

          • HollowNaught@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            3 months ago

            Masturbation, like most things, is not inherently harmful. In fact, it’s quite healthy, just like we both said

            It’s the process of masturbating too frequently that has problems associated with it

  • nebula42@lemmy.zip
    72·
    3 months ago

    I’ll just drop this here.

    Watching porn isn’t something to be ashamed of. Does it cause damage to the brain? yeah. Is it permanent? No. I won’t judge anyone who uses porn but I sure as hell won’t pretend that it’s healthy.

    • AVincentInSpace@pawb.socialEnglish
      28·
      3 months ago

      Ask a user, “If you could go back to the time before you became hooked, with the knowledge you have now, would you have started using porn?”

      “NO WAY!” would be the reply.

      Ask the confirmed user, someone who defends internet porn and doesn’t believe it causes injury to the brain or downregulation of dopamine receptors: “Do you encourage your children to use porn?”

      “NO WAY!” is again the reply.

      I answered yes to both of these questions, what do

        • AVincentInSpace@pawb.socialEnglish
          25·
          3 months ago

          Why would I be lying to myself? I haven’t seen any evidence that porn is in any way detrimental if used in moderation, and keeping things taboo is exclusively harmful for everyone involved. If, someday, I have a child, and that child comes to me telling they feel guilty for watching porn (because they don’t have a real romantic partner and feel guilty about that, because they read that porn rots their brain, because of puritanical bullshit like this post, etc. etc.), I would of course assuage their fears and tell them there’s nothing to be ashamed of. Once you get to a certain age, jerking off is as natural and as necessary as going to the bathroom, and if porn helps you do that then I fail to see the problem.

          • Brickardo@feddit.nl
            12·
            3 months ago

            After reading your post history, it’s obvious to me why you fail to see the point. I can only hope you eventually do.

    • AVincentInSpace@pawb.socialEnglish
      15·
      3 months ago

      That book seems to say pretty explicitly that everyone who uses porn is an addict and that being a porn addict is something to be ashamed of.

      • nebula42@lemmy.zip
        2·
        3 months ago

        I never interpreted it that way (the book does change), but if you see it like that then know I don’t agree with that philosophy. there are external factors that can contribute to any addiction and shaming someone for being addicted to anything is just straight up asshole behavior.

    • Brickardo@feddit.nl
      3·
      3 months ago

      The previous time I saw this book mentioned, it was downvoted to oblivion (in Lemmy of all places, where you’d expect people to be better than that).

      If anyone is double thinking of reading it in case your comment gets downvoted as well, please do read it. Pay no mind to the coomer hive mind, because your life is about to improve massively from the very first page.

  • TimewornTraveler
    2·
    3 months ago

    I’ll say again, sexuality is an important part of one’s overall health. And so like nutrition, sleep, and exercise, it must have some level of moderation. People have thrown their lives completely off balance by obsessing over porn or compulsively fornicating with anyone they have access to. YES, excessive porn use can impact your dopaminergic systems.

    I dont like the moral rubber-banding we seem to be engaging in, whereby beyond affirming sexual needs we seem to be encouraging all levels of excess. That’s going to lead to more problems, and eventually the rubber bands will snap back.