Porn sites must have government health warning in Texas from September 1st::Just when we didn’t think the state of Texas could get any more wacko on tech policy, this latest bill really suggests otherwise. House Bill 1181 is an age verification measure that is similar to what we’ve seen in the state legislatures across other red U.S. states. You have an age verification proposal that is similar…
All of that is backed up by actual evidence though. It’s not really disputed that porn affects self esteem and body issues or desensitizes reward circuits of the brain.
Well, yes it is disputed. Those claims are just plain totally made up. The other bits about how watching porn makes you become a pedophile, even more so.
If they were going to totally make up claims they’d choose better ones to go with. These are actual topics based on evidence, even if inconvenient truths for those who support or oppose porn.
Not convinced. The claims being made are obviously parodies of tobacco health warnings, with reference to far-right sexual guilt propaganda.
Here’s a hint: If you’re a worker, and a politician tells you that your dissatisfaction with your lot in life is the fault of sex workers, probably of ethnic minorities … that politician is a fascist.
I would love for you to provide a source for “all of that is backed up by actual evidence”, and change my mind! I always want to learn.
I mean, you linked an entire website, I guess that’s a bit better thank just linking google, but doesn’t give me any specific info about your claims.
I’ll bite. Show us the evidence. Peer-reviewed, published studies in respectable journals.
From JAMA Psychiatry https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24871202/
The negative association of self-reported pornography consumption with the right striatum (caudate) volume, left striatum (putamen) activation during cue reactivity, and lower functional connectivity of the right caudate to the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex could reflect change in neural plasticity as a consequence of an intense stimulation of the reward system, together with a lower top-down modulation of prefrontal cortical areas. Alternatively, it could be a precondition that makes pornography consumption more rewarding.
As OP said constantly stimulating your reward pathway with instant gratification like porn does have lasting changes in your brain.
But fuck Texas also I don’t support this bill
Those claims are about porn addiction. Not the act of watching porn. On top of that, putting the burden of child trafficking and abuse onto the sites that would publicly host porn is like blaming climate change on people putting plastic in the wrong bin. Places that propagate the awful content mentioned by this warning are already against the law and flying under the radar. This is just BS that gets righteous Texan votes, not something that helps victims. It certainly doesn’t accept that consensual adults make and watch porn in healthy ways. It’s also why these folks get called out for their scandals, which wouldn’t be news worthy if they didn’t grandstand.
No, the claims are not about porn addiction, which is another issue. Legally the sites already have a burden to take down child abuse material and they do so. Complaining that the warning labels don’t account for healthy porn use sounds like the same whining that smoking warnings don’t also address people who occasionally smoke.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27114191/
Self-perceived pornography addiction (SPPA) is reported to affect users and their partners in similar ways, such as increased feelings of isolation and relationship breakdowns.
Took me longer to paste this into lemmy than it did to find evidence in pubmed
The paper itself has lengthy discussion on the flaws of the research it’s examining.
The studies reviewed examined the possible impact of SPPA on users or their partners using cross-sectional designs, with one study also using longitudinal research methods. Of course, retrospective cross-sectional designs cannot be used to draw causal conclusions 51 about any associations between SPPA and potential outcomes because they are measured simultaneously; it might be difficult to ascertain whether individuals perceived their pornography use to be problematic before or after they experi- enced negative outcomes. Moreover, the longitudinal study used a two-wave design and a much smaller subset (n ¼ 106) of the original sample (N ¼ 1,215), which substantially limits causality- related analyses, so findings are likely to be tentative at best.
Nine of the 10 studies reported evidence that SPPA had a detrimental impact on individuals or their partners. However, some important methodologic issues must be considered. First, SPPA and its impact were often assessed using a single-item measurement, which research suggests is an adequate measure- ment of complex constructs. 4,52 If an individual’s experience is multidimensional (ie, physiologic, behavioral, and cognitive), then it might be challenging for the individual to convey this using a single item, and assumptions can be made that omit potentially important information. Second, some studies used under-defined concepts and definitions; for example, Levin et al 19 used a single-item measurement to assess impaired functioning resulting from SPPA but did not provide a definition of functioning, so it is uncertain whether the researchers were measuring the same construct for all participants
Third, three studies18,20,21 suggested that individuals’ values and morals associated with their pornography use might have contributed to their perceived pornography addiction, and Prause et al20 further suggested that conflict with their held values might have led to their distress. Therefore, SPPA might actually result from a conflict in values rather than pornography use per se.
Research that examined the impact of SPPA on the partners of self-perceived pornography addicts found that they experienced several negative effects such as feelings of betrayal, shame, and isolation. These effects were attributed to the behavior of the self- perceived pornography addict. However, research investigating the effects of pornography use has shown that women who attribute their partners’ pornography use to an inadequacy about themselves experience a greater level of distress.53 None of the studies reviewed considered the characteristics of the partners of self-perceived pornography addicts, yet negative outcomes can be affected by factors such as thinking styles and attitudes (eg, how we perceive information), which can lead to these feelings of inadequacy.
There also were concerns regarding the measurements used to make conclusions about the impact of SPPA. Many relied on adapted and non-validated measurements that were not neces- sarily theoretically driven and were derived from a non-clinical sample; thus, the findings are difficult to generalize. For example, Twohig et al21 used a median cutoff (58%) from a non- clinical sample to determine an arbitrary level of problematic cognitive and behavioral outcomes of SPPA.
I could keep going, but I think that’s enough for this post - read the “Correlates and Possible Outcomes of SPPA” and “Limitations” sections of the paper you linked.
