|
Pornified: How Pornography Is Transforming Our Lives, Our Relationships, and Our Families | 
 enlarge | Author: Pamela Paul
Publisher: Times Books
Category: Book
List Price: $25.00
Buy New: $7.28
You Save: $17.72 (71%)
New (6) Used (7) from $6.94
Avg. Customer Rating:  52 reviews
Sales Rank: 198217
Format: Bargain Price
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.3 x 1.1
Dewey Decimal Number: 306.770973
ASIN: B001068I2A
Publication Date: September 8, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Also Available In:
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
“Strips porn of its culture-war claptrap . . . Pornified may stand as a Kinsey Report for our time.”—San Francisco Chronicle
Porn in America is everywhere—not just in cybersex and Playboy but in popular video games, advice columns, and reality television shows, and on the bestseller lists. Even more striking, as porn has become affordable, accessible, and anonymous, it has become increasingly acceptable—and a big part of the personal lives of many men and women.
In this controversial and critically acclaimed book, Pamela Paul argues that as porn becomes more pervasive, it is destroying our marriages and families as well as distorting our children’s ideas of sex and sexuality. Based on more than one hundred interviews and a nationally representative poll, Pornified exposes how porn has infiltrated our lives, from the wife agonizing over the late-night hours her husband spends on porn Web sites to the parents stunned to learn their twelve-year-old son has seen a hardcore porn film.
Pornified is an insightful, shocking, and important investigation into the costs and consequences of pornography for our families and our culture.
Book Description
Porn in America is everywhere—not just in cybersex and Playboy but in popular video games, advice columns, and reality television shows, and on the bestseller lists. Even more striking, as porn has become affordable, accessible, and anonymous, it has become increasingly acceptable—and a big part of the personal lives of many men and women.
In this controversial and critically acclaimed book, Pamela Paul argues that as porn becomes more pervasive, it is destroying our marriages and families as well as distorting our children’s ideas of sex and sexuality. Based on more than one hundred interviews and a nationally representative poll, Pornified exposes how porn has infiltrated our lives, from the wife agonizing over the late-night hours her husband spends on porn Web sites to the parents stunned to learn their twelve-year-old son has seen a hardcore porn film.
Pornified is an insightful, shocking, and important investigation into the costs and consequences of pornography for our families and our culture.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 47 more reviews...
 Oh, the things you shouldn't see April 18, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
"Pornified" is Pamela Paul's riveting and disturbing collection of first-hand accounts, sprinkled with statistics, chronicling the pervasiveness of pornography in our culture, and attesting to porn's effect on the men and women and children who are exposed it. "Pornified" is also a book about self-deception -- the kind that human beings use to justify practices they know to be wrong or harmful -- but that they cannot stop themselves from using. Paul persuades, not by preaching, but by describing the way porn changes its users' perspectives and lifestyles. There is account of youngish man who spends hours a day searching for new and titillating computer images, who drops the morosely funny fact that he has not had a real life girlfriend in years. There is the sadly ironic story of young woman hoping to salvage a relationship ravaged by her partner's porn-induced neglect by trying to join him in watching, only to be shunned when her partner prefers watching it on his own. There are harrowing tales of porn users requiring stronger and stronger jolts of pornography to maintain their level of excitement -- eventually pushing them into the outer realms of human sexuality: S&M, female degradation, bestiality and child porn. Paul's narrative speaks to moral confusion about sexuality that afflicts many in our supposedly sexually-liberated culture. Her subjects seem caught between their need to appear hip and the urge to honor their own feelings of shame and disgust. It's perhaps a sign of the times, in this age that deifies emotions, that negative feelings about pornography are seen not as signals over out-of-bounds behavior, but as evidence of outdated sexual norms and prudishness. Rationalizing their partners' feelings of betrayal and abandonment, more than a few of Paul's subjects lock themselves even tighter into the cocoon of self-deception that leads to an increased use of these materials.
Paul's focus is not a moralistic one -- except in the sense that morality can emerge from societal experience. She does not appeal to Scriptures or religious maxims to make her case, but on the experiences of real human beings whose lives have been convulsed by porn or who have suffered neglect or objectification by their porn-addicted loved ones. It's one thing to feel guilty about doing something that is not culturally permissible. But ignoring one's own feelings -- as when one hides a stash of porn or lies to one's spouse about using it -- is not the sign of advancement humanity.
Of great interest to me was the question of what to do about porn. At the moment, the loudest voices are those claiming porn's right to exist as a First Amendment issue. Paul likens this to gun supporters claiming that arming felons with assault rifles is a Second Amendment issue. The other great hurdle is to overcome the tendency of many Americans to view religious limits on sexuality as always and necessarily repressive. Paul's greast omission in the book, if there is one, is a discussion of the religious/moral dimensions of the debate. Still, this omission might actually help her thesis -- since religious scruples have so little weight for so many. In any event, the ubiquity of porn, along with its effects on families, children and marriages, cannot be ignored, regardless of whether the impetus to limit it is religious or simply pragmatic.
"Pornified" is generally a safe read, but includes a few explicit passages and references to pornographic subject matter that the sensitive reader can easily gloss over. Some may find Paul's perspective to be biased. Perhaps it is. Or perhaps she suffers from the bias of reporting what she sees. Porn -- or perhaps the brain chemistry it unleashes -- has a way of distorting perspectives. But "Pornified" makes obvious the ever-increasing inroads that porn has made into the public sphere. When so much of our culture has been pornified -- young girls in makeup, regular use of revealing lingerie in movies and on TV, Comedy Central references and the mainstreaming of the ethic of Hugh Hefner's mansion -- the subject at least merits examination.
A great read, eye-opening and disturbing.
pulls no punches in describing the degradation of pornography February 27, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Pamela Paul deserves credit for tackling the subject of pornography. It is a difficult topic, not just for the obvious reasons of revulsion and attraction, but because porn has become politicized. On one side are those who (like many of my fellow Amazon reviewers) feel porn is "no big deal" or even that it is a "right" that they must protect against those who would encroach on individual freedoms. On the other side, are those convinced that porn does real harm and that we need to find some legitimate restraints.
Ms. Paul is well-positioned to bridge the polarization over porn. As a frequent contributor to Psychology Today, New York Times, Slate and Huffington Report, she is on good terms with the "liberal" side of our social divide. At the same time "conservatives" will appreciate the way she addresses the reality of pornography: what it has become and how it affects its viewers. Ms. Paul draws on more than a hundred interviews with porn users and their wives. In addition she commissioned an exclusive national poll which brings mountains of previous research into perspective. She makes a compelling case that porn does do serious harm - to the men who use it, to their relationships with women and to their families.
And there is something even more alarming than what pornography does to adult men. By means of cable TV and the Internet, porn enters our homes and affects children in their pre-teen and teen years. The following paragraph from *Pornified* should serve as a wake-up call for parents:
"In a nationwide study of children ages ten to seventeen, conducted in 1999-2000 by David Finkelhor, only half (48 percent) of kids told their parents they had viewed pornography online; in 44 percent of the incidents, kids didn't report unwanted pornography to anyone. A recent large-scale study by the London School of Economics found that while 57 percent of British kids between the ages of nine and nineteen had come into contact with pornography, only 16 percent of parents were aware their children had seen it. One-third of the kids said they had received unwanted sexual or nasty comments from people online, but only one in twenty parents were aware of this. Perhaps more alarming, 46 percent of kids said they had given out personal information online; again, only 5 percent of parents knew they did so. In the United States, a study by the Justice Department found that one in five children between the ages of ten and seventeen had received unwanted sexual solicitations online."
*Pornified* will help parents understand the dangers of pornography to their children. It will also help wives and husbands who are struggling with the damage that it is doing to their relationship. Ms. Paul gives hope to those who feel helpless against the flood of porn made available through cable TV and the Internet. In the final chapter, she outlines how - without imposing a government program of censorship - we can take positive steps to combat the destructive power of porn. She proposes a program similar to the campaign against tobacco use. (As someone who gave up smoking partly because of the "hassle" factor, I disagree with the reviewers that say the anti-tobacco campaign has been ineffective.)
From a Christian point of view, *Pornified* provides dramatic evidence for the doctrines of original sin and of evil as a personal force. In the interviews which Ms. Paul conducts, the porn consumers begin by mouthing truisms about sex being "good" and the human body being "natural" and "beautiful." They make a sharp distinction between the women they view in porn and their wives, daughters, co-workers, etc. One world is escape and fantasy; the other is the real world. They need the fantasy world as an "outlet" to avoid doing something harmful in real life. In the real world they would never treat a woman disrespectfully or make her into an object - or so they convince themselves. Gradually, they cross thresholds - all the while feeling superior to the guys who are into the "really sick stuff." Images that once disgusted them begin to fascinate, and they find themselves involved in things they once found repulsive. Pamela Paul pulls no punches in describing the degradation that consumes like a malignant tumor. Her book is an object lesson for all of us. Evil has an enslaving power that none of us can resist - on our own.
 decent, yet far from perfect November 1, 2007
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
an entertaining read that sheds light on something many would prefer remain behind closed doors. if you can wade through the seemingly endless string of poll results, fake first names, and accompanying testimonials you might even come away from the experience a little more aware of how deeply entrenched in our society porn has become in the last 10-20 years.
i couldn't help but feel like it could have gone further, though. throughout the book i kept waiting for the author to piece together some sort of coherent argument from the disjointed stories she presented. i feel like more opinions from people who are involved in the porn industry could have been helpful, for instance... or else maybe tying things in with other aspects of the commercial sex industry...
all in all a useful critique of a societal issue not commonly addressed. i'd recommend this book simply because there hasn't been very much written about this kind of thing at all. it definitely could have done more, however, and hopefully at some point someone else can pick up the slack.
 Disturbing, but important to read July 23, 2007
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
A disturbing, yet balanced book with a message that does need to get out. Well researched, annotated and presented, this book really challenged my "liberal" beliefs through just presenting the facts. Pornography is the commercialization of women, turning men into consumers and women into products to be used and discarded. The billion dollar porn industry has many similarities to the cigarette industry, so aptly portrayed in The Insider film. The boundaries of porn continue to be pushed, taboos reduced and the prevalence in society etc. increases personal and societal acceptance. The porn industry wants it that way. You read about the porn addicts, the off shore aspects, and the politics. Issues collide in this book and some sensible suggestions made on what could be done. Of course we can delete the spam etc. but why should this be tolerated so that the young, our wives and girlfriends, continueto be always brought face to face to it? Its not harmless. Remove the market, and production is decreased.
You may want to take a shower after reading this... or punch somebody July 8, 2007
6 out of 14 found this review helpful
I gave this book a 3 because it made me totally pissed off (and since that ruins my day, it earns a 1) but the information is interesting and necessary and that would be a 5. So, it averages a 3. My husband was on the road when I got this from the library and when I told him I was reading it he said, "Uh oh. Am I going to come home to a mad woman?" Or did he mean madwoman? Hmm...
Porn, porn, porn... My mom and dad used to have screaming fights over it. My dad hid it in plain site in our house and I can still remember my sister and me finding it, and I felt really gross and sick inside. My boyfriends all looked at it. Every church-going guy I have ever known well has spent quite a bit of time with it, and I read in the paper when the Iraq War started that one of the 1st freedoms the Iraqi males enjoyed was setting up porn theaters. The lines were around the block...
Pornified may not necessarily tell you anything you did not already know, but it may flesh out the whys and wherefores of the industry and the people who are into it. The author interviews men who watch it and she talks to the females who are stuck with them about how they feel about it. Surprise! Most women think it's gross and hurtful. They feel angry and disgusted with their males and really angry and disgusted when said males do not give it up, even upon penalty of divorce.
There are some paragraphs about women and their use of porn. I am not a statistician, thank god, but I have NEVER met a woman who thinks porn is okay. I have, however, met women who put up with it because the males in their lives like it and they know they have to put up with it or do without the guys. Even the people I know who are part of the porn industry (don't ask) know they're making easy money off women who are so gross they will have sex on camera and the men who like to watch it. And now that there are so many dirty college girls who binge drink and then have sex on camera for websites, who needs the "stars" anymore? It seems like every other girl is more than ready to bare it all for free as long as she gets tequila shots and some air time.
The end of the book discusses 'what can be done.' I thought this was the weakest part of the book, because we live in a free society and one of the crappy things about free societies is that people are free to do as they please, within limits of course. Women are free to have sex with strangers and post the videos on the internet, and men are free to watch said videos and do what they do when they watch them. I think the only "answer" (if there is one) is that if porn really makes you sick and your male partner likes it too much to give it up -- no matter what -- then it may be time to cut the tether and leave the bugger alone with his internet and lotion. Then perhaps you can decompress and try to find someone nice on E-Harmony.
|
|
|
Powered by Associate-O-Matic
| |
