"Rick Santorum wants to ban hard-core pornography"

As I observed the other day, forced reform of Wikipedia is a lot more likely to come from America's social conservatives than its liberals.

Great. The one time he comes up with something that actually might help against Wikipedia, he has to blurt it out before the election and lose even more votes for himself!

Nevertheless, I wonder if a position like that could work with mainstream voters if he made it clear he only wanted to limit porn distribution from channels (like WP) that aren't primarily know for porn distribution? (Though the time seems to be coming when WP actually will be known primarily for that.)

I realize he doesn't want to limit it to just those channels, he wants to get rid of it entirely, but still... would it work?

Um...I thought there were studies that showed that pornography actually decreased incidences of crimes like rape?

He seems to be saying the exact opposite. (With nothing to support his statements, obviously)

I can't imagine how one would successfully isolate the factors needed to draw a conclusion one way or another.

I'm confused. Santorum says that pornography contributes to misogyny, but the rest of it seems to imply he's against pornography.

-Mooby

Will Santorum ban Wikipedia?
No

Will Santorum ban the distribution of hardcore pornography?
No

Will Santorum bolster his appeal to conservative voters by taking this stance?
Yes

Is this like "More Guns Less Crime"?

What number of hours of porn should the average person in society be watching for the maximum reduction in rape rates?

Given that some quite young kids (12 or so) have been found guilty of rape, what age in your opinion should we start showing kids porn? Should they be familiarized with it by age 10 or younger, or older? What type of porn should they be watching straight, gay, or other? Should they be educated into the bondage scene too?

Show and tell could become very problematic.

Where did you hallucinate that? All studies prove that porn makes you de-sensitized to sex so you need more and more, or more risky kinds. The claim that not having something makes you want it more has never been proven, and is always shown to be 100% opposite of what is true.

[citation needed]

He read it on wikipedia. Oh its gotta be TRUE!

There are just so many different variables in highly-qualitative studies like the ones people do on pornography - hardcore vs. softcore, viewer demographics, what acts are depicted, professional vs. amateur, the whole nine yards.

Ottava is actually right about porn studies that examine the issue in terms of how it affects children, including pre-adolescents. And many, if not most, academic studies have concluded that heavy exposure to porn makes people roughly 20 percent more likely to become sexually aggressive, with a similar percentage increase in the commission of sexual offenses (including rape).

However, there have also been studies suggesting (maybe even "proving," though who can say really) that "casual" (i.e., not-so-heavy) exposure is not only not harmful, but beneficial to some people - particularly those who don't already have aggressive behavioral tendencies.

So, unsurprisingly, porn ends up being like a lot of vices, such as alcohol, tobacco, or certain narcotics - OK in small doses, very nasty and dangerous in high doses.

IMO the problem with Rick Santorum's approach is, like Mr. RMHED suggests, he's really only bringing up the issue for votes and he'd do nothing about it if he were actually elected. It may be that he couldn't do anything about it, given the degree to which the courts currently control the issue (for better or worse). It's likely that nothing short of a constitutional amendment would give him the power he'd need, or want, to crack down to the extent he's talking about.

ALL STUDIES PROVE...

Your ignorance is astounding.

Furthermore, what the hell do *you* know about sex in any form?

I'll give you the de-sensitized to sex part, but you'll need to prove the risky kinds. From what i've been seeing in a quick search is that desensitization did occur, but it did not result in increased interest in new sexual practices outside the norm.

And I think that this is the study I was remembering.

For those who don't want to read through all of that, there's quite a few news articles reporting on the study.

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/everyda...vents_rape.html


Oh, hey! There's a news article from yesterday that says Santorum is wrong because of that study.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-03...ntorum-internet

At a glance, it looks like Kendell – an economist – has used internet access as a proxy for pornography consumption.

If you read the Slate article, it says,

"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.

OK, so we can at least tentatively conclude that Net access reduces rape. But that's a far cry from proving that porn access reduces rape. Maybe rape is down because the rapists are all indoors reading Slate or vandalizing Wikipedia. But professor Kendall points out that there is no similar effect of Internet access on homicide. It's hard to see how Wikipedia can deter rape without deterring other violent crimes at the same time. On the other hand, it's easy to imagine how porn might serve as a substitute for rape."

He'd have a hard enough time not letting federal agencies spend money on porn production, wherever they happen to be doing that.

Removing porno from wikipedia should be relatively easy IMO: IRS should tell WMF: either porno or tax exempt status, and I believe the very next day the porno will be gone at least until image filter is ready for use.

Agree, except for last bit. Santorum doesn't know about Wikipedia, and I don't think he really cares about it. I mean, really. Let's not get ahead of ourselves.

You should be aware of this which I posted to before:

http://www.crab.rutgers.edu/~goertzel/mythsofmurder.htm

It applies to all such 'studies' and those from an economic background are particularly prone to falling foul of it: which is why it is called 'econometrics'.


The executive summary is that these models don't work for economics where they were designed and there is no evidence to assume that they work for social issues for which they weren't designed. They are either so simplistic that anyone can see the flaw in the model immediately, or so complex that any slight change in the data will give you the opposite result from that reported. For example if you choice your start or end point to be a month earlier or later, or if you picked a slightly different population group

IOW they are the type of junk science that is so beloved by the media.

Presumably they have some non-random correlation with the underlying truth most of the time, but that's a long way from knowing what's actually going on and why. People like Silver Seren grasp at them because they appear to confirm what they want to believe; this is probably also the motive of many authors. If there were a real science of society, people wouldn't be stuck screaming at and pressuring one another to come around to their essentially religious points of view.

This was well worth reading; thanks for linking, Lilburne:

Seconded. Thanks. Larry Sanger made a slightly different point here a week ago. He is a parent (as I am). He doesn't want his children exposed to this kind of stuff at an early age. Neither do many parents. End of story. Wikipedians can try and reform society as much as they like, the fact remains that parents like us don't want to be 'reformed', thank you. The problem is that (unlike parents, who have to balance earning money and paying for their family with actually looking after them) Wikipedians have much more time on their hands to push this kind of nonsense. That is where the whole thing is fundamentally unbalanced.

There are just as many studies that porn can help marriages, reduce incidences of rape as there are that say it increases misogyny and 'desensitisation'.

When it comes to porn all studies show whatever the grant payer wants them to show.

A simple internet search on de-sensitization with porn will show you that. It is the same with any chemical addiction, and porn is connected to chemical addictions you know (hint, sex releases endorphins).

Dr. Kort, visiting scientist at MIT, said that solving difficult puzzles is even better than sex, as it releases more endorphines. If that's the case, people should really try to solve the difficult puzzle of Wikipedia and the rest of Web 2.0. An endorphine overload will surely happen once the problems connected to those things are solved.

Santorum is running a faith-based campaign.

Don't let any of that secular scientific method stuff get in the way of a good bible story...


t

As opposed to who?

Times like these I wonder if I didn't mistakenly log into Daily Kos or Democratic Underground.

Mitt Romney. Or, at least, his campaign is not overtly Mormon.

Either way, but it at least is starting to show that that supposed separation between church and state is rapidly getting smaller.

Give it a few more decades and there'll be little difference between the US and Iran the only difference will be the direction government officials pray to.

Iran -> Mecca
USA -> Wall St.

What you fail to realize is that there is no "separation of church and state" but a prohibition on Congress limiting religion. It would violate the First Amendment to keep politicians from being open about their religion. In the Federalist Papers, one of the statements about voting for elected officials is that we should vote for their moral and ethical systems as opposed to what we want them to pass in terms of specific laws, so knowing their views on religion is necessary.

(Mod note: Try to stay on topic if possible, this can't really be split effectively to the politics section due to how the issues of politics and religion around this are intertwined, but try to keep it as on topic if possible rather than turning into a total US politics discussion! And remember when the debate gets heated, attack the arguments not the contributors, a couple of one-liner back and forths removed )

Here's a new article http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/santoru...-163813068.html

Right, that's Iraq and Afghanistan sorted, not to mention the extradition treaty with the UK and how much money is spent by the MPAA on lobbeying.

Nooooo, Santorum will also put an end to WR. No WP, no WR...

A highly religious person persecuting things he considers obscene.

Well, Canada looks nice this time of year.

AKA follow the law. You do know that obscenity laws are still there, and mostly used now to target things like bestiality, child porn, etc. that rightfully should be blocked, right?

Define "obscene".

I bet you can't do it any better than a religiously motivated politician can.

My definitions of obscene rarely include sexual matters.

In the spirit of more useful communication,

http://www.salon.com/2012/03/20/santorums_...ence/singleton/

I'd like your response to the dearth of scientific papers that might back your assertion and links to those that you think do back your proposition.

sex is bad ... mkay?

Add to the list:
Exercise
Soothing music
Spicy food
Sunlight
Laughter
Tears
Sweets
Life (hint, endorphins arn't the boogie man)

"Bring it on." indeed. Ottava, where is this wealth of scientific literature that you've been reading while waiting to complete your PhD.


Better yet, come to Australia where it is nice all year round

You know who coined that phrase, yea? (or at least is credited for it)

Things that generate either or these responses: or

Don't you already have enough problems with imported foreign pests?