Porn and its value (or lack thereof)

This analysis will be short and brief, owing to the fact that while the point has to be made, the content of the matter shouldn’t be dwelled on. This is a materialist take on measuring the value of pornography.

Beavers, when they hear the sound of running water even in a calm body of water, will begin constructing dams until they no longer hear the sound of running water. In this instance, the speakers employed by scientists to mimic the sound of running water, which in turn activates the dam-building behavior in beavers, are triggering an instinctual reaction via artificial simulations. When we look at pornography and its effects on human beings, the behavior in humans is similar when they’re triggered by artificial stimuli that appeal to instinctual impulses. As a materialist, measuring the ethics of causing both of these species to react to these artificial stimuli comes down to one primary question: how does it benefit them? Given that building dams in uneconomical locations where there is no actual running water is clearly a waste of time, resources, and energy, then surely we can look at pornography under the same lens. 

Taking humans out of the equation for a minute in order to remove personal bias, we will use the unique use of panda pornography at zoos. For those who don’t know, pandas in captivity are routinely shown pornography in order to stimulate their reproductive urges and entice them to reproduce. For the nerds who are keeping tabs on the population size and health of the pandas, noticing an increase in the panda population resulting from distributing pornography to the pandas is counted as a net gain. But let’s assume, for the second part of the metaphor, that the pandas were already initially as sexually active as the zookeepers desired them to be and that pornography exposure steadily lowered their desire to pursue mates and hindered their physical ability to mate. How would the zookeepers feel about the value of pornography in ensuring a stable population size and protecting the health of the pandas in this second scenario?

In both scenarios, the materialist perspective is forged from observations that are substantiated by numbers. The zookeepers, supplied with numerical data to base their decisions on and with nothing to lose from picking the right option, make for far better decision-makers than the pandas ever could be. In essence, A truly socialist-materialist does not take into account whether the second scenario’s pandas would be sad if their access to porn ended, but instead fixates on analyzing the net results in order to form an opinion. This isn’t because the pandas’ “rights” or “feelings” don’t matter but because if we put principles or emotions before results, we’re bound to only satisfy short-term demands at best. At the end of the day, the pandas’ wants and desires take a backseat to the numerical information that the zookeeper gathers and uses to make decisions on behalf of the panda populations under his control.

Extrapolating from the panda metaphor, when we look at the ways in which humans evaluate problems and come to decisions on topics that we either invested in or not invested in, it becomes clear that man is both a rational animal and a rationalizing animal. In the case of the invested decision-maker, man becomes a rationalizing animal that will argue in favor of his opinion regardless of what evidence is on his side. In the case of the uninvested decision-maker, man becomes a rational animal that will argue in favor of whatever opinion is substantiated by data. If asked about the value of porn on the panda species, an ordinary panda would be an invested decision-maker, while the zookeeper would be an uninvested decision-maker. While the zookeeper may need to meet a quota of increasing the panda population under his care, he does not care how it is done because he has nothing to lose in using the facts to select the most beneficial decision. 

In this article, we will use the concepts of invested decision-maker and uninvested decision-maker going forwards. Looking at the topic of whether or not porn provides value to society, discussions lose their logic very quickly as debate is crushed under the problems of things like religious dogma and porn fanaticism that invested decision-makers bring to the table. For those invested decision-makers who rationalize their position based on principles, they are best described as culturally-charged. For those invested decision-makers who rationalize their position based on usage, they are best described as consumption-charged. Looking at the difference between debates on the legality of pornography and cigarettes, it becomes clear that users of either commodity tend to rationalize their use without looking at the objective value gained or lost from indulging in either “vice,” while even culturally-charged non-users will try to rationalize their opinion on the legality of either substance based on what cultural values were imprinted on them. 

At the end of the day, decision-making efforts that refuse to take into account the natural rationalizing tendencies of invested decision-makers can become problematic. If we want good decision-making, we need to be mindful of who we allow our decisionmakers to be and using these categories to identify whose input is valuable can help greatly. When it comes to assessing the value of porn as a materialist, it comes down to purely assessing the consequences created by pornography access and exposure. The problem with not evaluating porn exposure in the same way that we evaluate tobacco use is that we ignore out of convenience the natural responsibilities that industries have in protecting the public. If we look at profit first, and then only acknowledge the negative externalities that come with business operations when we’re forced to, the pornography and similar vice industries can run rampant with their abuses until it becomes a large enough problem to require serious intervention. 

When it comes to social policies, the objective value of implementing each policy is determined by the results that come from their passing. If people benefit from something overall, then it has a reasonable justification for its continued existence. If people do not benefit from or are harmed by a policy overall, then it has no reasonable justification for its continued existence. If we looked at pornography use in the same way that we looked at smoking, we might arrive at similar conclusions or not depending on the data that was available to us. At DMSG, when we look at things in such an objective way, it becomes easy for us all to agree on different subjects on a very consistent basis. Our final verdict on smoking? Depends on the numbers. Our final verdict on cigarettes? Depends on the numbers.