The Truth About Porn- A Non-Bashing Woman's View

I don't know exactly when I contracted it, but I have suffered from Harlequin Romance disease for many years....it's main symptom? Burning loins.......

Montana - if you're reading any romance novels, you're reading Harlequin. They control the industry - have bought out all the competitors. Romance = porn. Some of is minimally different from what you find in Penthouse Forum.

There's also quite a bit of visual porn being developed with women in mind. Apparently, men and women aren't that different in terms of what arouses them (several of us have posted the research on this in other threads) - but women don't like to admit it. Interesting studies of blood flow, brain activity and the like. We're aroused, but most of us aren't talking about it.

Montana wrote:

Someone here did compare romance novels to porn and I do have to say that this statement blows me away. I don't know what kind of romance novels you're talking about, but the ones I read don't even come close to comparing to porn.

I did in the other thread a long while ago, and I think shewolf quoted me on it here (?).

Like Slappy says, the point isn't that romance novels are like porn in style or whatever. My point was that many women turn to romance novels for much of the same kind of reasons many men turn to porn. They find it arousing. It might serve as fodder for masturbation fantasies. Men and women both masturbate - just while some men do it after they looked at some pictures, some women do it after they dreamed away with some romance novel thing. (Not saying that every time you read a romance novel ... etc ... but come on, it's one of the things they're used for).

Also, in both cases, and this was really why I made the comparison in the first place back then, the guy and the girl are both temporarily fleeting from day-to-day reality and fantasising about some fictitious persons who dont exist in their real marriage, and, well, get off on that one way or another. This was relevant because as you'll have seen, there's a lot of the "if he thinks about someone else while he's masturbating he's in fact cheating on me" kind of logic in those porn threads. This I truly found hard to wrap my mind around. I mean, when you masturbate (not necessarily you, Montana, but just, you, women), do you always just fantasise about your own man every single time? Kidding, right? Sometimes you might fantasize about some movie star or rock singer - or the guy just described in that romance novel you just read. So whats the difference? Man closes himself off from the whole daily household-marriage-responsibilities thing for a sec, looks at some pictures, fantasises about what he sees, gets off. Woman closes herself off from the whole daily household-marriage-responsibilities thing for a sec, reads some trashy novel or watches some sappy movie, fantasises about what she sees, gets off. Why would one be cheating when the other isn't? They're doing the same kind of thing, they just get off on different things.

That was kinda the context I put the comparison in, when I made it ... does that make sense?

Good on ya' Montana. Takes me back to a time when I was mis-quoted and vilified. :wink:

I can't believe you guys can actually compare romance novels to porn! That almost makes me laugh because the only reason I can think that you'd compare the two is to try and justify using porn.

Oh, and when I'm with someone, I don't need to masterbate and if I did then yes I do think of him

Montana wrote:

I can't believe you guys can actually compare romance novels to porn! That almost makes me laugh because the only reason I can think that you'd compare the two is to try and justify using porn.

<shrugs> I have no need to "justify using porn" because I dont partake much of it myself. Last time I saw a sex movie (OK - of over two minutes ;-)) was when I still had a TV and got bored in the night, which is like two years ago. It's the double standards that get to me and keep me posting about such stuff - that and the "controlling" element in these porn-chasers' posts.

Montana wrote:

Oh, and when I'm with someone, I don't need to masterbate and if I did then yes I do think of him

You never masturbate when you have a boyfriend - and if you do, you only ever think of him while doing it? (No need to answer, its a rhetorical question, as in - damn - wow - man - really?)

Well, OK, thats fine. But you know I'm sure that other women do, anyway - just read up here - so just because the Harlequin/porn comparison doesn't work for you, doesnt make it ridiculous or stupid or unbelievable.

To each his own inner life, I guess. You have yours, thats fine, noone is saying you should change it - just that it's no reason to be hatin' others'.

Montana makes sense though. Not everyone is the same. When I say "women are turned on by this," and "men are turned on by that," it's a generalization. Again, the whole point is just how men and women are wired a little differently.

For example, not everyone gets turned on by having sex with the elderly, while your girlfriend videotapes the event while wearing a Richard Nixon mask and screaming degrading comments at you...like I do.