Prof Mark Regnerus of the University of Texas is back in the news: Regnurus, you’ll recall, published a study this summer that claimed children born to gay couples had more problems with than kids from straight homes.
Now Regnerus is claiming increased support for same-sex marriage across America comes from people looking at so much darn porn.
In an article on the website for the Witherspoon Institute, the right-wing think tank that paid for his discredited parenting study, Regnerus explains that porn “redirects sex—by graphic depiction of it—away from any sense of it as a baby-making activity.”
And once guys start thinking of relationships as something other than a baby-making arrangement, all hell breaks loose:
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Porn also undermines the concept that in the act of sexual intercourse, we share our “body and whole self … permanently and exclusively.” On the contrary, it reinforces the idea that people can share their bodies but not their inmost selves, and that they can do so temporarily and (definitely) not exclusively without harm.
Moreover, the Web’s most popular pornographic sites do little to discriminate one sex act—or category of such—from another. Gazers are treated to a veritable fire-hose dousing of sex-act diversity. (These are not your grandfather’s Playboy.) So, add to the sharing of bodies temporarily and non-exclusively a significant dose of alternative forms of sexual activity—positions, roles, genders, and numbers—and that’s basically where porn presses its consumers today: away from sex as having anything approaching a “marital meaning” or structure…”
Of course, Regnerus isn’t talking about women—the ladies don’t look at pornography: “Women typically aren’t as into porn as men are,” he explains, “and yet women in general tend to support same-sex marriage more readily than do men.” Rather than acknowledge a clear flaw in his theory, Regnerus just plows through.
Data from the New Family Structures Study reveal that when young adult Americans (ages 23-39) are asked about their level of agreement with the statement “It should be legal for gays and lesbians to marry in America,” the gender difference emerges, just as expected: 42 percent of men agreed or strongly agreed, compared with 47 percent of women of the same age. More men than women disagreed or strongly disagreed (37 versus 30 percent), while comparable levels (21-23 percent) said they were “unsure.”
But of the men who view pornographic material “every day or almost every day,” 54 percent “strongly agreed” that gay and lesbian marriage should be legal, compared with around 13 percent of those whose porn-use patterns were either monthly or less often than that.
Statistical tests confirmed that porn use is a (very) significant predictor of men’s support for same-sex marriage, even after controlling for other obvious factors that might influence one’s perspective, such as political affiliation, religiosity, marital status, age, education and sexual orientation.
Y’know why, Dr. Regnerus? Because men who acknowledge they look at porn are honest. And they’re less judgmental. They accept than humans are sexual beings with natural urges they can’t just wish away. Which would make them more the kind of guys to support marriage equality—and not.say, expect gay men to magically turn straight.
Those other guys, the non-porn-viewers? Well, they’re just liars.
2eo
He went full derp. You should never go full derp.
People look at pornography, I AM LITERALLY SHOCKED, SHOCKED. MY MORAL OUTRAGE IS A SPEED-O-METER AND IT IS SET TO SHOCKED.
Also people who are honest and not twats support marriage equality, again SHOCKED.
dkmagby
And to think someone paid this a-hole to watch porn all day for his “research” which has little to nothing to do with why many people who don’t watch porn are in favor of gay marriage.
Jeffrey
This is the best thing that could happen to that lame study on same-sex parenting. As its author uses more schlock surveys and evaluation methods to come to ridiculous conclusions, the other study will be looked at more critically and found to be wanting.
If his data were to be accurate, then states with the highest porn consumption (of which Utah is #1!) would lean more towards marriage equality. We know that’s not true about Utah.
The fact is that the world has been moving away from sex as just procreation since the late 1950s and the development of birth control. That’s why the Catholic Church is so against it. They still have the old “every sperm is sacred” mentality.
2eo
@Jeffrey: This doesn’t stop people. People won’t listen to scientists and proper analysts.
Look at the tens of thousands of people in the Anti-Vaxxer movement headed by Jenny McCarthy, to this date responsible directly for the deaths of hundreds of children and neglect and abuse of children by all members. People will listen to these worthless imbeciles because they are given time on the air.
Also the right wing leaning media hate scientists, education and progress.
Brian
Mark Regnerus has a point but I think porn’s greatest influence is that it has caused men to de-value their penises. Who needs a penis when you can watch other men use theirs on a screen? Whether you’re watching a man have sex with a woman or a man have sex with a man, the act of watching takes over from the act of you wanting to participate in a real-life sex act.
When you prefer to watch others on a screen over actually going out and experiencing it yourself, it kind of de-values your penis and your masculinity.
1EqualityUSA
Of the entire article, this sentence was the most interesting to me, “On the contrary, it reinforces the idea that people can share their bodies but not their inmost selves” because it delves into non-physical aspects of relationships, which should not be undermined by anybody.
FStratford
@Brian:
lame. watching makes you not want to do it? lame
watching basketball makes you not want to play?
watching people excercise makes you not want to go to the gym?
idiot!
in which case, we should make people watch violent movies all the time, expecially children so that they wont have to want to do anything violent when they grow up? So no to censorship or age qualification of movies and video games then?
Hmmm youre an idiot
FStratford
Regnerus is obviouly wrong. The Bible Belt have the highest consumers of porn.
Enough said.
RSun
@FStratford: I have seen Brian’s comments on other threads. Agreed…he’s an idiot.
the other Greg
Actually Queerty agrees with Regnerus here – his conclusions, that is – while pretending not to. If this were a gay or pro-gay researcher making exactly the same conclusions (minus Regnerus’ pejorative lingo), Queerty would love it.
The more porn someone watches, the less concerned he is with what real people out there in the real world are doing. So it makes sense that even the straight, originally-homophobic porn addicts, after awhile, just don’t care what gays and/or marrying types out there are doing. They probably feel a little embarrassed about their own, sad masturbatory celibate “sex lives.”
“Not that there’s anything wrong with that” as in the Seinfeld-ism: except this takes a sinister turn in GAY porn for the unfortunate barebacking performers who are doomed to reinfection and eventual death by the drooling desires of porn addicts. “Of course, the [gay] bareback companies usually do not require testing because it is assumed most or all of the models already are infected with HIV.” (Quote on Queerty from a former porn performer, 12/22/12).
At the very least, an organized boycott of gay bareback videos would be appropriate. We boycott offensive products all the time. Damn, a few months ago in Queerty we were all supposed to be upset about some movie trailer where Vince Vaughan said “Electric cars are gay!” – no sh*t, I kid you not. GLAAD and Queerty are always pretending to get offended about the most minor, trivial things.
Got any proof of this curious notion that *all* men watch porn and those who say they don’t are liars? My bf and I and our sex pals (former and current) and most of our gay male friends would love see the “proof”!
the other Greg
Also, Dan Avery, got any explanation for why you violated your own Queerty Comments Policy the other day, when a former porn actor petulantly demanded that Queerty remove some of his OWN comments?:
“Comments will not be deleted or amended by request. Before posting a comment, be sure you actually want to have your words published on the Internet forever. Do not ask us to remove them.” http://www.queerty.com/queertys-comment-policy/#ixzz2FzEE6z4T
2eo
@the other Greg: For a site which often posts racially passive aggressive topics, it’s good to know r@cist is a completely blocked word, I put the @ in because it looks like a fancy letter a.
You won’t get an answer, Dan and the others don’t actually do any moderating, they only check when a friend of theirs posts. The rules are only the rules if you call them on their bullsh1t.
Little-Kiwi
what the heck is he talking about?
newsflash – heterosexual oral sex has been around for a LOOOONG time before pornography….
that said, the pious and hypocritical link between anti-gay rhetoric and same-sex pornography is rather telling…
http://littlekiwilovesbauhaus.blogspot.ca/2011/11/youre-not-really-anti-gay.html
the other Greg
@2eo: Ha, well that’s another problem. For some reason any word that ends in “-ist” is prohibited in comments (even if it’s in the article itself). Try it for instance with “fasc***” or “social***,” it won’t work.
From an HIV-prevention perspective, I’ve always found it troubling that “fucking” is allowed in comments, but “c*ck” and “c*cksucking” are censored! Maybe this a clue to Queerty staff’s sexual proclivities, but as a c*cksucker I’m kind of offended, and from the HIV perspective it should really be the other way around.
Little-Kiwi
@FStratford: amen. what nonsense.
“Brian” is basically saying “watching porn makes you masturbate”
uh…duh.
the other Greg
@Brian: I can think of lots of reasons why many men don’t watch porn:
– Some have satisfying, fun sex lives so they see no need for artificial, contrived stimulation designed by others for others.
– Some find the porn depictions to be unrealistic and/or they can’t identify with the contrived situations. (I often see Queerty comments to this effect.)
– Some are former porn addicts who woke up one day, realized that their lives were mindlessly, pointlessly devoted to whacking off to porn 16 hours a day, and quit cold turkey.
– Some have watched porn in the past (a little or a lot), back when they were single and bored, but now they have a spouse or sex partner who’s exciting and satisfying.
– Some have watched porn in the past (a little or a lot), back when they were single and bored, but now they have a spouse or sex partner who would virulently (or violently!) object to it.
– Some have access to a computer only at work, or not even there.
– Some are asexual. (Asexuality is a real phenomenon; doubters can look it up.)
– (Straight guys): Some have qualms about supporting even indirectly an industry that dehumanizes its female performers.
– (Gay guys): Some have qualms about supporting even indirectly an industry that treats its barebacking performers so brutally (i.e. casually condemns them to death).
Seriously, Queerty – many of your readers don’t watch porn. Do you really need to insult much of your readership on a regular basis by calling them liars?
Little-Kiwi
if they don’t watch porn and yet are also not complete ninnies then they wouldn’t be “insulted” by posts that have to do with the adult industry.
what’s your point? that posts about porn upset the ninnies? 😉
Joincny
I wouldn’t trust any gay related research done by a conservative christian. These studies can be twisted in anyway to fit there belief system.
@ Brian, You’re arguments are absurd. Most guys watch porn because they aren’t getting any sex, not the other way around.
the other Greg
@Little-Kiwi: Quote from the article: “Those other guys, the non-porn-viewers? Well, they’re just liars.”
Kiwi, I’m disappointed! I realize that plenty of guys are porn addicts because they can’t get laid, but I wouldn’t have guessed you were in that category. 🙂
There are good reasons for socially-responsible, politically-leftist gay men to refuse to support the gay porn industry, which promotes the early death of its barebacking performers and is mostly owned by straights anyway.
Little-Kiwi
define “the porn industry” – there are indeed safe-sex enforced adult videos, there are even lines of non-penetrative adult material to show people all the fun that can be had without anal penetration
add to that the reality of the Amateur market- real couples, in-love couples, couples or groups who actually enjoying sex with each other who film it and share it for those who like to see non-actors engaging in legit enjoyable sexual conduct.
and some couples enjoy adult material together.
the whole “oh, porn is for guys who can’t get laid thing” is very odd. unintelligent, and odd.
but hey, if that’s what some of you need to tell yourselves to feel better about your own lives, and the lives of your fictitious online-personae, then keep it up! 🙂
i have no reasons to be some anti-pornography poseur. i’m part of the sexually liberated and enlightened demographic.
the other Greg
Well I should have guessed – for Kiwi, if it doesn’t happen on video, it doesn’t happen!
But everything he described sounds harmless. I’m guessing it’s all a pretty minor facet of the “industry,” as indicated in this quote (12/22) from the aforementioned former porn performer: “Did you know that [gay] bareback sex videos sell more than double what a video with condoms will.”
Little-Kiwi
aw, you’re so sad 😀
happy Christmas!
the other Greg
@Joincny: “Most guys watch porn because they aren’t getting any sex, not the other way around.”
Yes. And from an HIV-prevention perspective, this is actually a GOOD thing – for the audience at least (not the barebacking performers, unfortunately). In the gay world, porn is mostly for losers who can’t get laid. That’s sad for them, but at least in HIV terms, no one is a threat to them and they aren’t a threat to anyone.
On the other hand (pun intended), we end up with about 15-20% of the gay male population stranded at home whacking off to porn all the time, increasingly incapable of relationships and uninvolved in gay life and the real world. Which seems less than ideal for gay progress overall.
Aaron
@Little-Kiwi: hmm, I’ve been seeing a lot of your posts on here today. I think I am in love! 😉
@the other Greg: Greg, not so much!
Little-Kiwi
Aaron, i adore you 😀
i think it’s hilarious that some idiots will believe that “an entirely made-up percentage of gay men cannot relate to other men because of pornography”
more likely they can’t relate to other gay men because they refuse to check their own internalized homophobia….
Joincny
@the other Greg: You’re so uptight. There’s nothing wrong with porn at all.
Little-Kiwi
what i think we’re seeing is an evasive projection: prudes hate porn because it reminds other gay men of all the sex acts they’re too timid to try. and no, i’m not talking about barebacking.
face it – some guys (and girls) are as boring, sexually, as a rerun of Little House on the Prairie. What is porn? A reminder that there are lots of things that guys (and girls) enjoy sexually that they can’t, or won’t, get into.
Little-Kiwi
that said, can you imagine if “outlawing gay marriage” meant the removal of all girl-on-girl scenes from heterosexual pornography?
we’d have legalized gay marriage in every state, overnight. 😉
Brian
I just think that porn reduces human connection. If you get your rocks off watching a screen made of pixels having sex, it reduces the chances of you becoming a well-adjusted human being.
Pixels having sex is not real sex. Real sex is when you go out and do it.
the other Greg
@Joincny: “There’s nothing wrong with porn at all.”
Quotes from a gay porn performer in Queerty comments: “Did you know that [gay] bareback sex videos sell more than double what a video with condoms will.”
“Of course [!!!], the bareback companies usually do not require testing because it is assumed most or all of the models already are infected with HIV.”
[wow… nice touch, that blithe “of course.”]
“two HIV+ people should not engage in unprotected sex either because of varying strains, strengths, reinfections, or super infections.”
http://www.queerty.com/gay-porn-star-josh-weston-dead-at-39-20121219/#ixzz2FtyOgtit
Reinfection, super-strains of HIV, eventual death. For the general public = bad. For performers in the gay bareback porn industry = que sera sera, let’s not be “judgmental,” there’s nothing wrong with porn at all!
the other Greg
@Little-Kiwi: “prudes hate porn because it reminds other gay men of all the sex acts they’re too timid to try. and no, i’m not talking about barebacking.”
Um… specifics? If you’re not talking about barebacking, what ARE you talking about?
Since I read Dan Savage occasionally I’ve heard of… Watersports? Foot-worship? Sex involving plush cartoon toys? Auto-erotic asphixiation? S/M? If someone is too timid to try any of those things, does that make them prudes?
If a gay guy has a pretty wild sex life over many years, but one consisting entirely of fucking (with condoms) and c*cksucking, does that makes him a prude?
Apparently an “entirely made-up percentage of gay men” are prudes?
bmwblonde
Monseigner Regnerus is SO OBVIOUSLY either (a) Roman Catholic; (b) a NOT-recovered ex-Roman Catholic, or (c) an out-and-out mouthpiece that life-hating “Church” (or he is a Mormon, which is merely a different strain of the same mental disorder). He hates sex: small wonder — since his physical appearance shows that his self-hatred has gradually morphed his physiognomy to reflect the ugliness of his “beliefs.” (Weird how that happens!) But he doesn’t just hate sex for HIMSELF, he hates it by proxy for all the rest of us. Must be a real “cross to bear” to have to be the Prophet of Self-Hatred for everyone. Amazing the pinched, miserable little lives some people perversely decide to undertake. Why QUEERTY is giving him airtime is another puzzle.
Brian
Barebacking is fine so long as both partners are healthy. Men often bareback women without using condoms. Therefore, I don’t see why men who bareback men should take extra care. The sex act is the same.
The only condition I would put on barebacking is that, if you are picking up a total stranger whose sex history you know nothing about, it is always best to use protection. You’re engaging in an intimate act with someone you know nothing about. Use common sense and take care.
As for porn? If you prefer to watch than do, porn is right up your alley. However, most of us actually prefer to engage a fellow human being and not a radiation-emitting screen.
PRINCE OF SNARKNESS aka DIVKID
brian = jason
fact.
Aaron
Why does everyone assume that people PREFER porn to human contact? That’s hardly what’s being discussed here. The content of this article in no way suggests we’re talking about people who would rather watch porn than have sex, it makes blanket statements about people who watch porn at all. It’s then throughout the comments about how you are better than this or that person because you’d rather have actual sex than watch porn. There are many, many reasons why porn can be part of a healthy sexuality, and no one is suggesting we forgo all human contact in order to watch porn 24/7.
Look up straw man sometime.
D9W
brian = jason That explains so much…
Still self hating after all these years after Real World hu?
D9W
Quote from Robin Williams: Weapons of Self Destruction >>.
And by the time you get to be 58,
it gets a little more difficult.
“okay, here’s what you gotta do:
You put a sparkler in your ass
I’ll set my pubic hair on fire.
You put on a German army helmet.
You jump off the couch yelling, ‘fire in the hole!’
That might work. I don’t know.”
And then…
If that doesn’t work, there’s always pornography.
And the definition of pornography is quite simple:
Erotic is using a feather; pornography is using the entire chicken,
which is weird.
-Thanks Robin for that up and cumming attaction.
JayHobeSound
Prison-orange looks good on Regnerus. Unfortunate color choice LoL.
the other Greg
@D9W: Oh well, maybe that explains it, Robin was 58 when he said that, I’m 54 & my hot bf is 52. So maybe in 4 years, according to Robin Williams, I’ll finally understand the appeal of porn!
Meanwhile I still suspect that for younger guys………… yeah, nowadays, porn is for losers who can’t get laid. I didn’t realize that Dan Avery was in that company and frankly, I’m disappointed. I’d always imagined the Queerty staff as fun-loving guys who drank a little too much. I haven’t been to SF since the early 80’s but I’d imagine the Queerty staffers in NY at the Tunnel or Spike – oh no, those closed in the ’90s – well, at the Boiler Room or Splash or Candle Bar or Crowbar or the C*ck or whatever. Or maybe even at that sleazy Kings Highway Cinema in Brooklyn (gasp). But apparently not – alas, they prefer to stay at home jerking off to porn, they can’t even be bothered to take the N train for an hour to watch porn and get a bj (hopefully). And I still think it’s weird that we can’t say c*ck in these comments when it’s actually in the goddam fucking Bible! (Mark 14:72) but I wouldn’t want to accuse Queerty of being, you know… prudes.
Aaron
@the other Greg: You must have missed my comment about straw man arguments, since you continue to make the same one. People who refuse to learn will repeat the same mistakes.
the other Greg
@Aaron: Sorry, I figured it out. It’s because I came out in the early ’80s – a grim, depressing time to do it, when AIDS was first freaking everyone out.
Porn is tied up in this for me since this was exactly the time VCRs were starting to become common (but not yet ubiquitous), and the old ’70s porn places were disappearing (due more to the VCRs, I suspect, than to the health authorities).
Anyone who tried to watch gay porn in this era was confronted with the grim reality that the performers on screen were probably already dead (often we knew this for a fact, they definitely WERE dead). I wasn’t the only one who found this an extreme, depressing turn-off, a boner-killer to end all boner-killers! And the remaining ’70s-type porn theaters – yeah I saw a few – were creepy, filthy and gross. The gay historian Daniel Harris has written eloquently about how porn used to be a weirdly “communal” experience, in that one had to go a theater (with a bunch of creepy characters) just to see it.
It was scary even to make friends in the early ’80s in NY since they might start dying the next week. Guys in this era were skittish about the boyfriend stuff – i.e. getting too attached to someone who might die soon. But we tended to huddle together in these regular-steady-sex-buddy duos or groups. In a way I found this disappointing – this wasn’t the gay life I’d been hoping for! (a few years earlier in the military). But in a way, I kind of liked it. The emotional pressure was off and I could have some fun in a grim time.
“Timid”? Hardly. Anyone back then who was really timid was celibate! But even that was no guarantee of safety since there was no test yet, so no one knew for sure that they didn’t have it.
Porn didn’t fit into our scene because it was an uncomfortable reminder of the diseased outside world.
I’m pretty grateful to those guys because we almost all survived, maybe they saved my life, who knows. There was a lot of confusion about what exactly was causing AIDS, but suspicion in my circle, fortunately, focused right away on barebacking, or what we now call barebacking (a term not in use back then).
I can’t understand why any really young guy is into porn, unless he’s using it to avoid sex entirely. Back then I had a vague fear that porn would have been massive overkill over-stimulation! As a horny 25 year old, I was plenty stimulated already and didn’t need extra stimulation.
But if I didn’t have this extremely negative “Pavlovian response” to porn, would I be more open to it? I guess, maybe.
the other Greg
@Aaron: Anyway, re: straw man arguments, how the fuck can we counter something like “All gay men watch porn and those who say don’t are liars.” It’s an unprovable assertion with absolutely no evidence. Has Nate Silver aggregated some polls on this subject? 🙂
Reminds me of when I was dating and a friend lectured me that I was being way too picky in rejecting smokers: “ALL gay men smoke! You’re the only one who doesn’t!” Heh heh, although sometimes this assertion seemed pitifully close to being true, fortunately it ain’t true. Only about 40% of gay men smoke and eventually I found one of the 60%.
Aaron
@the other Greg: I appreciate you sharing your personal experience and can understand why porn would have negative connotations for you. My point about straw men was more that there is NO connection between
assertion #1: porn makes people accept gay marriage
and
assertion #2: people who watch porn prefer it to real sex
These two positions were being stated throughout comments like they were somehow the same. I’m sure you can see my point.
Definitely there are people in this world who do not like porn and who do not watch it. But considering that it’s so very ubiquitous and the most searched and downloaded internet content, you must agree that the vast majority watch porn some of the time, whether between relationships, when their partner is “not in the mood”, or because they don’t have the time or energy to devote to hooking up. The number of those people who actually prefer porn to real physical contact is most likely a sliver of a fraction.
Samuel
Even if prof. Regenerus’s research data is true.. that men who watch pornography are more likely to accept same sex marraige, it doesn’t take away from the valadity or lack of it of same sex marraige, which is a moral question to be decided NOT by the mobs.
a plausible explanation for his data findings could be that men being inherently self interst driven are most likely to approve of things which they demand for themselves, in this case sexual freedom. Also seeing a gay couple in action or for that matter even an interacial couple in love, can make the hardened opponent of either of those two beautiful relationships, rethink their opposition to it…