I am unable to understand on what grounds/arguments they were able to legalize it.
One reason maybe to monitor/legislate the industry. Underworlds are harder to govern than something legal.
I’m not particularly surprised.
People may associate the Western world with the production and consumption of pornography, but interest in it is actually highest in more sexually repressed areas of the world. According to google, countries like Pakistan, India, Egypt, and Morocco lead the world in browsing for sex-related websites (source). The US, despite having tens of millions more internet users than all of those countries combined, doesn’t even figure into the top 10.
Dear OldBoy
I think the reason you can't see the line between what's "legal" or "illegal", or what's"acceptable" and "unacceptable" is precisely because in the west, we are free to make up our own minds about that, and opinions are so divided that you have not just black and white but every shade of grey in between. It's not clear cut. What is offensive to one person (e.g. what we call "page 3" of the Sun newspaper where a photo of a topless girl is featured every day), is either enjoyed or ignored by another.
Nowadays, the British "upper / middle class" call that kind of thing "lower class", because they believe that pornography is for idiots and your biggest sex muscle is your brain (!).
Still, without the prescriptions of religion telling us what the boundaries are, we have to rely on our own moral judgement to create them. The older generation (say 50s upwards) was brought up with a strong Christian ethic which is why pornography was kept underground, and the boundaries were very clear. Pornography was illegal (up to a point). In the 1960s, there was a big rejection of moral and religious dogma. A lot of people stopped believing that you had to be religious to be good, and that there could be common, universal agreement on what was "right" and what was "wrong" that was often found in most religions anyway. You could "do your own thing", and so long as it didn't have a bad effect on anyone else, it was OK. Golden Rule, do as you would be done by etc.* That meant that pornography could "come out of the closet" and you would often be called unfashionable or a prude if you said you didn't like some of the things that started becoming common in film, on video etc.
So - I'm not an expert, this is only my own view - I think people just stopped looking and caring. We closed our eyes to it and if we couldn't see it, we could pretend it wasn't going on - now I'm talking about the really bad stuff. Stuff that IS illegal. So the less people care, the more people get away with. The more people get away with, the more the boundaries get pushed. What was unacceptable yesterday become acceptable. "It happens, get used to it" kind of attitude.
Back to prevous post, exploitation, greed etc etc.
*Another subject really, but nowadays we are being much more critical - it's not enough to say that so long as your intentions are honourable, you are forgiven for causing something bad to happen. What you should do is stop and take full responsibility for your actions (or inaction), and understand what the conseuqences of your choices are, so you can't use "good intentions" as an excuse any more.
This is exactly what I want to understand. If its taboo, then how come so much porn is made, the likes of Hugh Hefner and Larry Flynt have thousands of employees/artists. I want to know that from which class of society majority of them belong to? Do all of them come from impoverished background or do any of them come from an average middle class family with the blessings of their family?
**You have to understand that those thousands of employees are a VERY small percentage of the population in the west. Many of them come from "trashy" backgrounds. Such as: abusive parents/ families. Also a larger number of them step into this industry only after failing to find acting careers.
As far as blessings, do you really think any parent would be giving blessings to pose nude for a magazine or movie? Most probably NO, but of course there are always exceptions.
However, once they enter the industry there is a much higher chance of a glamorous life for a porn star in the west then there is in the east. Why you ask? Because the western economies can afford it. There are more then enough companies willing to invest.
This industry in PK cannot even come close to the profits made in the west, hence why so much porn is made here.
**
Again, I would say that it is now much more acceptable, even desirable in some circles (mainly working class) to say that your son or daughter is working in the "glamour" industry (see, if you use nice words, it sounds quite OK, doesn't it!). I would say that in parts of the UK, you'd be proud to say that your daughter was a "Page 3" girl but you wouldn't openly admit to her being a porn star and probably wouldn't like it but wouldn't interfere if it was her own choice and made her rich / happy.
In the US, I think the line is VERY blurred - I mean look at the Little Miss beauty pageant industry (money again): I'm not allowed to post links but images are easy to find. To me, THAT verges on the pornographic. It's clear that lots of perverts (another topic??) get their kicks from watching these. And so it grows and spreads and gradually becomes more and more acceptable. I do think the trend is reversing in the west though, as people are starting to be more aware and enlightened...
The resons porn is still somewhat a taboo in West has nothing to do with nudity or sex. People here feel that porn is dehumanizing and degrading towards sex and sexuality.
So how do you explain the hundreds of cases of unreported sexual abuse towards young girls in Pakistan? To them, they aren't little girls. To them they are just tiny women.
"Unreported?" How do you know about hundreds of cases even if they are not reported?
Do you know how many kids are raped in USA?
Again, I would say that it is now much more acceptable, even desirable in some circles (mainly working class) to say that your son or daughter is working in the "glamour" industry (see, if you use nice words, it sounds quite OK, doesn't it!). I would say that in parts of the UK, you'd be proud to say that your daughter was a "Page 3" girl but you wouldn't openly admit to her being a porn star and probably wouldn't like it but wouldn't interfere if it was her own choice and made her rich / happy.
In the US, I think the line is VERY blurred - I mean look at the Little Miss beauty pageant industry (money again): I'm not allowed to post links but images are easy to find. To me, THAT verges on the pornographic. It's clear that lots of perverts (another topic??) get their kicks from watching these. And so it grows and spreads and gradually becomes more and more acceptable. I do think the trend is reversing in the west though, as people are starting to be more aware and enlightened...
I know of a girl who's a porn star and her mum is proud lol, but then again I think it's more to do with all the material benefits, the huge amount of money she's making. Like a lot of girls in porn and the 'glamour' industry (tho Page 3 girls earn about 20x less than the girls who do porn) she also works as an escort on the side, not sure if mum is aware of that tho. Mum brags on facebook that her daughter gets to fly first-class and is treated like a 'star.' Their family history is very tragic tho, parents divorced acrimoniously and her brother was killed, they also had severe financial problems..
Re: attitude of West towards Pornography
Pornography is just another entertainment sect created and given birth by the Wests themselves. No denial on how and to what level they have taken it to and what form it is as being presented now a days.
There were times where one can have a little bit of space for the children, but now even in Muslim countries you go to the beach and see ladies 99 percent naked
Re: attitude of West towards Pornography
I don't think you can blame the west entirely for this one! Many people consider the Kama Sutra to be pornography, and - er - where did that come from? There have been "pronographic" images displayed in private and public places for millennia (cave walls, temples...).
Did you see the documentary The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan, where men train young boys to dance for them and have sex with them? It's been going on for centuries. Videos of that are very popular out there. Is that pornography? What makes what "they" do in the west worse than what "they" do out there?
What constitutes pornography is different for everyone.
Re: attitude of West towards Pornography
^ Exactly. Some ppl just blame the West for everything, not realising that similar stuff has been going on in their own communities for hundreds of years, a lot of it just gets dressed up as part of 'culture.'
child pornography = horrible, evil, lands you in jail and gets you raped by your fellow inmates.
landing in jail for any other reason will have the same treatment too.
I know of a girl who's a porn star and her mum is proud lol, but then again I think it's more to do with all the material benefits, the huge amount of money she's making. Like a lot of girls in porn and the 'glamour' industry (tho Page 3 girls earn about 20x less than the girls who do porn) she also works as an escort on the side, not sure if mum is aware of that tho. Mum brags on facebook that her daughter gets to fly first-class and is treated like a 'star.' Their family history is very tragic tho, parents divorced acrimoniously and her brother was killed, they also had severe financial problems..
their family history usually is like that. either the parents are on drugs or the girl is on drugs or stuff like that.
Go Deeba, go Deeba…go Seetee, go Seetee…
sorry couldn’t help myself. I was going to mention bellydancers and potentially harems (which granted are meant to be used for women and kids) and how they sexualised women way before the Western porn industry took hold. But then I was worried about a fatwa being released on my head being from the West and all…
Considering what Janab-e-Ali mentioned, I’m wondering if the fascination with porn is due to the nature of ‘forbidden fruits’? When you’ve grown up in a culture where alcohol, clubbing, porn, dating etc etc etc are within easy reach IF you want to get hold of them they don’t really play on your mind. They are there, you know they are but you ain’t really bothered. Does that make sense? I know it will make sense to at least Deeba! I’m sure she’s the only one who really understands me.
their family history usually is like that. either the parents are on drugs or the girl is on drugs or stuff like that.
I'm afraid I don't completely agree with that...."Jazmin" (Jazmine Chaudary) who was born in Chittagong (sorry if that's mispelt!!) was born into a fairly 'normal' desi family. Where were the drugs in her situation? It's not always down to a history of 'bad' stuff....as I've said before Hugh Hefner is making millions out of the industry...he was allured into it but wasn't from a broken family. Jenna Jameson came from a family where he father worked within the police force although she lost members of her family fairly young...drugs are always to blame. Addictions are not always to blame. We ain't talking about hookers on the streets, we're talking about girls who may potentially make millions out of a legal industry in the West.
Re: attitude of West towards Pornography
Dear Princess
I think you're spot on about 'forbidden fruits'. What you can't have, you want. One example I have been given is Muslim women in a part of Bangladesh who strip to the waist when they work in the fields because it's so hot. They say that they never get harrassed by men or get their boobs ogled, because they're on view all the time. I think that's a much healthier attitude, personally.
Or, like dieting - when you can't have food, you think about it all the time to the point of obssession.
Re: attitude of West towards Pornography
^hmmm.............so if all women strio no one will ogle at them.
Do you want me to parade the girls in front of you and have them tell you their harrowing stories? Is that the only way you will take that blindfold off your eyes and see the truth yourself? Yes murders, thefts, roberries (sp?) take place everywhere. But that's not the topic on hand is it? We are talking about the attitude of pornography in west vs. east. And I am telling you the truth. That there is a huge difference in the attitude. And I can accuse a country because it's not 1 person in the entire country that has that attitude, it's the entire country who shares the same thought. How many people do you know that have been arrested for child pornography in Pakistan, and have been sent to jail? In contrast in the west, you **will **hear about cases where people have been arrested for just having pictures on their computers, let alone producing it, and they've been sent to maximum security prisons, where even the heinous of the criminals consider child pornographers the worst of the worst and they give them their due justice.
Actually OP was only asking about west's take on pornography ..... not east's
child pornography = horrible, evil, lands you in jail and gets you raped by your fellow inmates.
Atleast this attitude of the west is much better than the attitude back in Pakistan, where it's like "well, she's going to have sex one day anyways, so who cares"
**
thts way too stereotyped ..... I don't know with whom you interacted in Pakistan .... but like other guppies who are "residents" of Pakistan ... I too don't know any person who think like that**
^hmmm.............so if all women strio no one will ogle at them.
I wouldn't go so far as to say that but I do think in countries where women showing skin is the norm men become so accustomed/densensitised to it that they hardly notice. A woman walking down the street in a skirt that would be better suited as a belt probably wouldn't even get a second look over her in the UK. However, in countries where showing skin is less common the men will stare, even at the sight of a bare ankle.
It's the forbidden fruit concept again...
Re: attitude of West towards Pornography
AAHHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA, there is no child sexual abuse in Pakistan, HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAAH, that's a good one, I needed a laugh today, HAHAHAHAHA.