Factors That Contribute to the Problem of Pornography - Essay Example

?Introduction Every day, in millions of newspaper around the world, millions of people read news about sexual violence, sexual deviance, and child trafficking. So much news about so much crime leads one to wonder where all these things come from. Why have we, human beings, the best creation of God turned into such animals? Why have our instincts enslaved us so? What is the cause of such crimes? This report believes the reason to be heightened pornography in today's world. Statistics made with regard to a few respected organizations, show that every minute almost $3,075.64 is being spent or rather wasted on pornography. Every minute, 28,258 people see porn. Meanwhile minute 372 people search for terms related to porn on the internet (Internet Pornography Staistics, 2011). Pornography is a truly huge business, sweeping even large companies like Google, EBay and Microsoft under the rug when it comes to revenues earned annually. So much economics leads one to think what pornography is? According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, it means: "Sexual excitement caused due to erotic behavior shown in pictures” Sociological perspective of pornography Pornography is so much on the rise these days, and constitutes a major part of our society, so researchers set out to link sets of different perspectives to define the behavior of pornography and its effects on societies. Here the report defines the different perspectives that have been used in to describe pornography along with their weaknesses and strengths (Three major perspectives in Sociology, 2000-2011): 1. Structural functionalism: This perspective represents different dependant parts of the society which separately contribute to the worki8nbg to the society as a whole. For example, the children study in schools paid by governments, but they grow up and get jobs on the basis of this education to serve the same government in return. Functionalists believe that any individual society is secured within its bounds by cohesion, and social consensus. Different members of the society agree on these and work together for the best of the society. This perspective gained popularity the 1940s and 1950s. It is most popular amongst the American sociologists. We see that the American functionalists are more intent on figuring out the human behavior while European functionalists focus on finding the internal working of social order. In functionalism, the approach taken by the sociologists concentrates on the rapport between the functions of the entire society and the functions of the individual smaller parts. Functionalism is more often criticized as it neglects the negative aspects of any event and puts forward the positive or the less harmful ones. It is also criticized that this functionalism justifies the complacency and the status quo of the society. Functionalism does not require that the society change itself for the betterment of the social environment even if they see that changing will do them good. 2. Conflict theory: This perspective justifies itself by highlighting the negative aspects of a society or the negative effects of an event on the society unlike the other two perspectives. This perspective talks about the ever-changing and conflicting nature of the society. The functionalists avoid changing the social setup, and stand-by the status quo, the conflict theorists encourage changing of the social setup and go against the status quo very strongly. Most of the American sociologists ignore the functionalism in favor of conflict perspective. These days, most of the sociologists, put conflict theory to test where ever they see potential for racial political, gender, or religious inequality. They say that unequal parties have conflicting values causing them to fight. This fighting gives rise to changes in the social setup of any society which is essential for the growth of the society. This perspective is criticized by saying that the negative points of any society are taken out and diagnosed. 3. Symbolic interactionism: This perspective allows sociologists to believe that the symbols and details exist in everyday life and gives them access to these symbols and the way people interact with each other. Its believers assign meaning to every symbol and then act according to their interpretation of the symbol, whatever that may be. Verbal conversations are the most important symbol in this perspective. Symbolic interactionist gives a lot of consideration to how people act and think. After that analysis, they proceed to determine the hidden meanings. Its critics say that symbolic interactionism often times concentrates on the smaller aspects of human behavior ignoring the bigger social interpretations or the big picture. In short, symbolic interactionists miss the main points of the society and focus only on the small issues. The symbolic interactionists are also criticized for neglecting the effect that institutions and social forces have on individual interactions. This report addresses the problem of pornography with reference to sexual violence, and sexual deviance by answering the following questions. How the problem is typically defined? What are seen as typical causes? What are usually seen as conditions associated with the social problem? What are the typical consequences? What are the preferred solutions? The report talks about pornography in terms of structural functionalism by looking at the good points of having porn watched by the society on the whole. The functionalism usually looks at any aspect of sexuality of a society in order to describe its basic need in the society. If more porn is watched in a society than more people get the freedom of expression about their sexuality. Porn creates a lot of controversy. People are not bored out of their minds as they have a perfect way of entertaining themselves by watching porn. Porn soothes ones’ ego. The basic psychological issue in today’s society is that a lot of people are lonely or feel insufficient and depressed. Pornography allows those people to let go of their innermost desires so that they may feel whole and better about themselves. This way crime lessens, and work productivity increases. If people are satisfied due to watching porn, then the family unit remains clear as lesser women and children are now assaulted. Structural functionalism also tells us that even though prostitution gives a bad name to women, it meets the serves to meet and sate a lot of the sexual desires of people and help them being successful. Unlike structural functionalism and symbolic interactionism, the conflict theory looks at the bad outcome of a societal aspect which in this case is pornography. Through sexuality a lot of the inequality of a society emerges hence leading to an unbalanced setup. We see that although paid sex or prostitution is a monetary give away in exchange for hourly porn or sexual pleasure, but more often than not the prostitute is arrested for it. Pornography also leads people and the society in general think of women as sexual objects. This theory points out homosexuality as being queer and plain wrong. Homosexuality is a result of too much straight sex carried out by a person that they become bored with the opposite gender and look for pleasure in the same gender. Pornography leads to long-term addiction and greatly increased destructive practices. Watching even a little porn can completely destroy the viewer's marriage sex life. People who watch porn find that they can never have an intimacy with their spouse when they may be imaging about somebody else. Here again like structural functionalism, symbolic interactionism looks again at the good that watching porn brings to a society and tells us that sexuality has different realities which are highly variant according to the time and context. This report sees that through pornography the economy of any nation goes up. If porn were to stop for even a day, a lot of people would be unemployed and would cause a huge burden on the nation’s finances and economy. Every time, an individual watches porn, they are actually helping improve the GDP of the nation. Pornography lessens rape, stalking, and underage sex. Through it people can easily pleasure themselves. If porn is taken out of the equation then those people would have to find other ways to pleasure themselves. This can cause an upward graph in the number of harassments and rapes cases. Conclusion While structural functionalism endeavors to make people understand that sexuality focuses on continuity rather than change, symbolic-interactionist thinking allows people to see how social setup of any place changes the definition of a society even in the terms of pornography. Structural-functionalism ignore change, symbolic-interaction rather over-emphasizes changes and differences. Whereas conflict analysis forgets that sexuality is not a big issue for the society and undermines the reduction in inequality that occurs due to it. Bibliography Merriam- Webster dictionary (2011): http://mw1.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pornography Internet Pornography Staistics; Jerry Ropelato (2011): http://internet-filter-review.toptenreviews.com/internet-pornography-statistics.html What's so bad about pornography; Paul (July 3): http://www.porn-free.org/porn_is_bad.htm 5 reasons why pornography is bad for society; Azreal Sky (May 21, 2007): http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/248654/5_reasons_why_pornography_is_good_for_pg2.html?cat=7 Three major perspectives in Sociology; Cliff notes( 2000-2011): http://www.cliffsnotes.com/study_guide/Three-Major-Perspectives-in-Sociology.topicArticleId-26957,articleId-26837.html Read More