What is it about porn that makes you feel depressed? I've heard that opinion before, but I just can't relate, despite being one of those people raised on abundant internet porn. It has been a very clear net positive for me. I'm in a successful long-term relationship.

Are single-player games tearing society apart? Is a deck of cards wasted on solitaire? Must all bicycles be tandem?

Keep in mind that one's personal experience may not be representative of the "average" person.

> single-player games

I get obsessive about some games. A completionist, one might say. And when I've achieved what I want to in the game, I suddenly wake up and realize I haven't been outside for a week and I've ignored my friends, family, and colleagues. Worst, the guilt of that realization can be so overwhelming that I am tempted to ignore it and simply start another game that takes over my consciousness.

I've observed similar behavior in some others. It was most obvious among World of Warcraft (WoW) players when I went to university. I knew more than a handful of WoW players who dropped out of school because they found their in-game social circle more important than just about everything else in their lives. Rather than studying or going out, they needed to be present for the next raid (WoW session).

> I've observed similar behavior in some others.

You'll observe that in more than just porn and games, you'll observe it in life in general. In fact for a lot of people that's the definition of a mid-life crisis: Suddenly waking up, realizing that you've been wasting your life slaving at a job you don't like, to make money that pays for things you don't own which you only have to offset how shitty your job makes you feel.

If your doctor told you right now, "you have exactly two weeks to live", would your life be unchanged for the next two weeks, or would you suddenly wake up and think "Holy hell, what have I been doing for the past age(self) years?"

> In fact for a lot of people that's the definition of a mid-life crisis: Suddenly waking up, realizing that you've been wasting your life slaving at a job you don't like, to make money that pays for things you don't own which you only have to offset how shitty your job makes you feel

Another obligatory Fight Club reference.

> “ Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off. ”

Obligatory Fight Club reference, "what would you wish you'd done before you died?"

Man, if only instead of buying a Jet ski these poor souls would find socialism.

Or, you know, call their parents to say "I love you" before they lose the option to.

Why not both? :D

you'd be too hungry to drive the jet ski

Seems unlikely. < 1% of the US population is engaged in agricultural pursuits. Distribution is about to get self driving cars.

Maintaining a jet ski in San Francisco salt water teaches a lot of wisdom actually.

Key word, maintaining.

Equating socialism to genocide is a pretty tired take.

Seriously, socialism does not mean what you think it does. Look up a list of socialist countries.

I feel like this is just describing the human experience. We go through cycles of obsession and focus, and then a realization that our obsession and focus has kept us from other parts of our lives. We adjust, and then repeat the cycle.

It could be video games, but it could be lots of hobbies, or work, or a new relationship, etc.

What is new is the tight, software-driven loops of dopamine release and conditioning feedback that Facebook and others have developed and exploited.

Facebook is the optimiser, each second of your attention a paperclip.

Some things in modern life are a bit easier to obsess over, more like alcohol and other drugs than other kinds of hobbies.

I would say WoW, Facebook, Reddit, HN etc all use that little bit of dopamine hit to keep people “playing” as long and as often as possible.

I say that have started play WoW again after several years off and dumping Reddit this evening.

Both of the can be enjoyable places and there are some really good Reddit communities, but it can be be just as addictive.

Yeah, I consider reddit/hn to be more of a waste of time (for me) than videogames. Still, it's easier to browse Reddit than progress in a videogame.

I have similar experiences with single player games sometimes. Though after, I might go weeks without playing anything.

That is one reason why I have always avoided MMOs. I may obsess over a single player game for a few weeks, but there is always an end.

Completionist is a good term for that. I gave up online games when I realized how much of a problem that is for me. My hard rule about games in general now is that I only play them with other people in the room.

I have a similar problem. I realised while playing GameThatCannotBeMentionedBecauseOfNoDisparagementRule that reaching maximum level in Magic or Archery skills on real life versions of those skills would make me a pretty good stage magician or archer.

I never did end up learning magic tricks or real archery, but I did go onto Duolingo and learn German. Kaj Esperanto. Και Ελληνικα…

I've done this with League of Legends. I find that it corresponds very closely with times in my life when I am depressed[1] about some other aspect of my life. When I feel out of control, and the game provides a stable environment with known rules, where I have a great deal of agency to impact the outcome. It's a trap, if course; in real life, ignoring problems is (usually) not a good strategy for resolving them.

On the flip side, though, when I'm not playing as part of one of these sessions, I like my relationship with the game. Especially, it's a great way of keeping in touch with a friend long-distance, which is normally something I struggle with[2].

[1]: In the colloquial, not medical, use of the word.

[2]: Somewhat, I also put less effort into long- distance friendships by choice; putting in lots of effort to keep in contact with someone who I wouldn't otherwise interact with becomes a chore and I don't get as much out of it. Since I would still be gaming otherwise, this doesn't become a chore, and regularly using voice chat makes it even better, compared to a game like scrabble where it's just text. (This part not being unique to League, of course; any other real time team game would do the same).

WoW isn't single-player, is it? I think GP was commenting on the fact that spending some time alone (with video games or otherwise) won't necessarily tear society apart, as long as it's done in moderation.

Single-player in the sense that one typically plays physically alone even if virtually together.

If it wasn't video games it would be something else.

A simple Google search I did just now on the effect of pornography gave me this :

http://psych.utoronto.ca/users/tafarodi/psy427/articles/Owen...

Conclusion for the lazy :

Increased access to the Internet by adolescents has created unprecedented opportunities for sexual education, learning, and growth. Conversely,the risk of harm that is evident in the literature has led researchers to investigate adolescent exposure to online pornography in an effort to elucidate these relationships. Collectively, these studies suggest that youth who consume pornography may develop unrealistic sexual values and beliefs. Among the findings, higher levels of permissive sexual attitudes, sexual preoccupation, and earlier sexual experimentation have been correlated with more frequent consumption of pornography. Researchers have had difficulty replicating these results, however, and as a result the aggregate literature has failed to indicate conclusive results. Nevertheless, consistent findings have emerged linking adolescent use of pornography that depicts violence with increased degrees of sexually aggressive behavior. The literature does indicate some correlation between adolescents’ use of pornography and self-concept. Girls report feeling physically inferior to the women they view in pornographic material, while boys fear they may not be as virile or able to perform as the men in these media. Adolescents also report that their use of pornography decreased as their self-confidence and social development increase. Additionally, research suggests that adolescents who use pornography, especially that found on the Internet, have lower degrees of social integration, increases in conduct problems, higher levels of delinquent behavior, higher incidence of depressive symptoms, and decreased emotional bonding with caregivers.

Many of my friends have expressed that they don’t want to watch porn. They do it anyways and hate themselves for it after you know... they are done.

I personally think it’s completely natural to have such urges and to cave to them. In fact, for men specifically there are some benefits in keeping the system well lubricated (pun not intended). It’s just something one has to moderate.

Additionally, i have noted that people’s expectations of their desired partner is usually skewed from what they see in porn.

>>Additionally, i have noted that people’s expectations of their desired partner is usually skewed from what they see in porn.

Porn is hardly the only - or even the main - driver of this, though. Look around you: you'll see billboards, magazines, TV commercials, banner ads, etc. etc. basically a plethora of images showing gorgeous women. Compared to that, porn's effect on men's partner expectations is probably negligible (unless it's for specifically sexual attributes like whether they shave their genitalia).

Note that post-coital depression/tristesse/dysphoria (terminology has varied over time) is a very real thing that people feel, regardless of whether porn is involved. Human contact can counteract this, however, which is an advantage of in-person sex.

This seems to be indicative of a problem with them not with porn. They probably come from heavily religious backrounds that makes them feel guilty.

I have seen no evidence in myself or my friends that porn affected our expectations for our partners.

For me it’s because there’s always the associated thought/worry that the woman(-en) in it aren’t in it voluntarily.

The numbers I’ve seen about sex-trafficking ruins all porn for me.

I never used to feel that way until internet-awareness woke me to it.

You could try giving normal, mainstream porn a shot.

I don't think adopting either far end of the spectrum view of womens' sexuality is healthy. On one hand you have people who think less of women (putting it lightly) who are sexually active, and on the other people who treat them like they're children and believe there's no way they could be enjoying themselves as performers and that someone must be forcing them into it.

Women aren't any different from men wrt sex - some like to have a lot, some a little, some with different people, some outdoors, some with members of the same sex, and some with members of both sexes. Like green eggs and ham, kinda.

The history of humanity clearly shows that men want more sex than women.

It clearly shows nothing of the kind. Point me to the large swaths of recorded history where the men and women are treated equally in their society and the women express less desire for sex.

There's a difference between wanting and signalling that want in an overt way. Throughout history women have been conditioned to satisfy their sexual desires in much less overt ways than men, but that doesn't mean the desires themselves are any less in frequency or magnitude.

there is no evidence that human sexuality is the result of conditioning, but let’s pretend it is. who conditioned nearly all the other mammals to have the same pattern we do? and why did we bother to condition ourselves to behave in a way that nature clearly provides?

First, I have talked to an actual expert in the field of human sexuality, and yes we do condition on anything that occurs simultaneously with any orgasm. You can try this for yourself by picking something you don’t mind accidentally fetishising.

Secondly, what pattern? Dogs (and TIL dolphins) hump random things; hyenas are (in human terms) femdom sadomasochists; the male antechinus gets horny once in their life, then has as much sex as possible before dying of exhaustion; female ferrets literally die if they don’t have sex; bonobos have sex pretty much as a way of saying “hello”, “sorry”, or as a social favour; and pandas famously don’t mate enough for their own survival.

It shows that men have, more often than women but not uniquely, had the physical and political power to disregard consent. Not the same thing as wanting more.

>at some point realized myself how empty and depressed I felt after watching it.

Herin lies the problem with moral crusading. I feel awesome after watching internet porn. Keep your opinions from bleeding into others' rights.

Herin lies the problem with your bait-and-switch pseudo-tolerant stunt. Telling him to keep his opinions to himself is bleeding into his rights to express them.

> I feel awesome after watching internet porn

Well then... wait til you try cocaine!

I feel awesome after smoking a cigarette.

Me too.

Still bad for you though.

Terry Crews has been very vocal about this: https://www.facebook.com/realterrycrews/videos/1083942814959...

I feel like society is using science to rediscover the basic findings of the moral theologians. Compare the daughters (secondary effects) of lust listed by Thomas Aquinas to all the newly "scientifically verified" side effects of pornography use.

Haven't you learned by now? Science that goes against the will of the people is invalid.

Well, at least people might end up engaging in fewer self-destructive behaviors as a result either way.

Can you explain what you mean?

There's a big difference between having concerns about something like porn and wanting to ban it for the society.

Unfortunately many people do not recognize this difference: "I don't personally like X" is exactly equal to "X should be banned by law for everyone."

Unfortunately, some people do not recognize the difference between "I personally don't like X" and "X is immoral and destructive" and "because X is immoral and destructive, it ought to be banned". Morality isn't just about killing or stealing.

Yes, I agree and should've said that I'm not for banning internet porn, but I do believe it's harmful in the same way that nicotine or addictive drugs are. I wouldn't support a system where the gov't forces ISPs to filter porn, but I would be in favor of web browsers or ISPs building more tools for parents or addicts to self-filter porn on their own.

It is a matter of prudence in governance. For example, we may permit prostitution (without sanctioning it) if we find that banning it will lead to worse state of social affairs (e.g., society "convulsing with lust", as Aquinas wrote when writing about this very topic). It can be argued that the tolerating of prostitution is actually as such preferable to the toleration of pornography.

Point being, because it is a matter of prudence on the part of civil authorities, I am not claiming that people have the right to these things as hedonists are wont to claim.

I realize I’m just a sample of 1 but I feel pretty good after watching porn. Maybe you’re watching the wrong kind?

The difference usually lies within addiction and the knowledge of one’s addiction to it. If you knew you were addicted to cigarettes and dissatisfied with that addiction, for example, you’d likely feel a wave of depression after lighting up.

Some people can “handle” porn in that they don’t experience any negative effect from it. Some, unfortunately, cannot.

I share your concerns. The consequences of porn consumption are real. Google "your brain on porn".

I now see frequent posts on /r/relationships about porn problems on various level.

Alcoholics. Gambling addicts. Drug addicts. People who leave their children to starve while playing MMOs.

It turns out that a small subset of humanity is incapable of controlling themselves regardless of the medium and all that really matters is how destructive the activity is when abused.

The next question is... after the detachment, social awkwardness and unreal expectations... what happens when you add the constant drum beat of "He asked me out now I'm charging him with assault"?

I'll be amazed if people are dating in 5 years at this rate.

What "constant drum beat"?

Many books on raising kids already warn about the consequences of internet porn.

citing what long-term studies exactly?

Here is a good review from the NIH: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5039517/

Abstract:

Traditional factors that once explained men’s sexual difficulties appear insufficient to account for the sharp rise in erectile dysfunction, delayed ejaculation, decreased sexual satisfaction, and diminished libido during partnered sex in men under 40. This review (1) considers data from multiple domains, e.g., clinical, biological (addiction/urology), psychological (sexual conditioning), sociological; and (2) presents a series of clinical reports, all with the aim of proposing a possible direction for future research of this phenomenon. Alterations to the brain's motivational system are explored as a possible etiology underlying pornography-related sexual dysfunctions. This review also considers evidence that Internet pornography’s unique properties (limitless novelty, potential for easy escalation to more extreme material, video format, etc.) may be potent enough to condition sexual arousal to aspects of Internet pornography use that do not readily transition to real-life partners, such that sex with desired partners may not register as meeting expectations and arousal declines. Clinical reports suggest that terminating Internet pornography use is sometimes sufficient to reverse negative effects, underscoring the need for extensive investigation using methodologies that have subjects remove the variable of Internet pornography use. In the interim, a simple diagnostic protocol for assessing patients with porn-induced sexual dysfunction is put forth.

Essentially, yes, Porn on the internet seems to be a 'serious' problem in that it affects relationships and personal health in a measurably negative way.

Delayed ejaculation is a sexual dysfunctional now? After decades (more?) Of jokes about chronic premature ejaculation?

Anecdotally, this does make sex with my boyfriend less enjoyable, since it becomes a chore to get him to cum.

Have a friend who can't have kids the natural way because of this

I think the warnings are of precautionary nature.

But if you want some studies:

https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/brain-scan-studies-porn-user...

The Bible, citing the eternal God. Can't get longer term than that ;-)

Sure, but how many millions of young people watch or are addicted to porn and how many of their parents know or know how to stop them from doing it?

The problem is banning something also affects those who do not have a problem which in this case most likely is the overwhelming majority.

I'm raised with internet porn and I don't believe I have a problem. Why should I be banned from watching something I enjoy?

I don't buy the crap about porn changing people. Sure you can say that for yourself if you got addicted but you can't just throw that out as a general truth. Porn has been around for a long time now and I don't really see people behaving different today.

Do you similarly worry about romance books written mostly for women, or is it only male sexual fantasy that needs to be regulated?

>and its role (if any) it plays in how men emotionally and physically connect with women or other men.

I see this said a lot but it's never described in what ways porn changes this, other than men suffering from sexual disfunction.

It’s treating partners as objects for gratification rather than as humans. So it’s dehumanizing relationships.

Partners have been objects of gratification for millennia

True. Porn didn't invent lust...it just perfected it, heh.

There’s a fairly recent movie that explores this topic..

Don Jon, for those wondering. (At least I think that's the one sjg007 is talking about.)

The real curiosity is why you think there may be "societal consequences" based on your own personal experience? Isn't this quite similar to how "kooky evangelicals" behave?