Did you know that abstinence gives you superpowers? Well, that’s what a growing contingent of young men online would have you believe. Reddit threads, Instagram influencers and ‘manosphere’ blogs are all jumping on the hottest new way to explain the mass disenfranchisement of young, heterosexual men: watching too much porn. In fact, if you were to listen to these influencers for a few hours, you’d be forgiven for thinking that pornography is the only reason you don’t have a great job, a sports car and an incredible sex life. It all sounds great in theory, but it’s a classic case of too good to be true. As is the case for so many online echo chambers aimed at young men, men’s anti-porn forums and spokespeople only scratch the surface of the issues within the porn industry, and never without a side of some pretty heinous sexism for good measure.
It’s no secret that today’s young men have come of age in an era where pornography has played an unprecedented role in their sexual development. A 2015 study published in the New Zealand Journal of Public Health found that 100% of men aged 15-29 had viewed pornography, with the median age of first viewing being only 13 years old — several years before the median age for men’s first ‘irl’ sexual experience. Of this group, 39% of men made porn a part of their daily routine, and a further 46% viewed pornography at least once a week. What this data tells us is that porn plays an important role in shaping young men’s sexuality and expectations, and begs the question of how exactly men are being impacted by their pornography consumption.
The content of popular porn videos, and their potential effects on the young people who regularly view them, are disturbing. A 2016 systematic review into the content of popular pornography analysed over 8000 pornographic scenes and found that, in the majority of studies, over 50% of videos included female performers being gagged, insulted, spanked, or slapped. Affectionate sexual behaviours, such as kissing, were represented in a far lower proportion of videos, and negative racial stereotypes about women from all backgrounds pervade. But, in addition to shaping attitudes towards women, porn consumption also plays a role in shaping men’s attitudes towards themselves. Although to a lesser degree than women, men’s porn use has been shown to increase men’s body dissatisfactions and can create intense anxieties about their own sexual performance. Gary Brooks coined a term for this phenomenon in the 90’s called ‘centrefold syndrome’: a compulsion to observe and objectify idealised images of women combined with a fear of personal inadequacy that prevents them from actually engaging in sexual relationships.
It is this syndrome around which the contemporary men’s movement is built. The community is made up of Instagram and Tiktok influencers, Reddit forums such as NoFap and Pornfree, and gets some play on the incel-adjacent blogosphere. Through these channels, millions of (mostly heterosexual) men share their experiences quitting porn and encourage others to do so. Although the language in these forums is a confusing jumble of acronyms, the message is simple: watching porn is emasculating, and is preventing you from becoming the best version of yourself.
| Learn the Lingo! PIED – Porn induced erectile dysfunction Death grip – A phenomenon where men become conditioned to only respond sexually to their own handsPornsick – A young man whose social behaviour is profoundly impacted by pornography use, usually used to describe men who oversexualise the behaviour of their peers. Post-nut clarity – Mixed emotions of shame and wisdom following ejaculation |
Over the decades, the feminist movement has also levelled its fair share of criticisms at the porn industry, and at the men who make up porn’s primary consumer base. However, these anti-porn sentiments come, unsurprisingly, from a feminist viewpoint, and tend to focus on how the giants of the porn industry contribute to wider systems of patriarchy: examining the ways in which large porn companies exploit both professional sex workers, victims of sex trafficking, and victims of revenge porn.
This is not the case for the Men’s movement, which takes a stand against porn consumption on the primary basis that porn and masturbation decreases an individual’s ability to form satisfying sexual relationships. Men within the movement share memes with each other that depict their abstinence as saving them from ‘beta-male tendencies’, and Instagram influencers spread misinformation about how abstinence is ‘more effective than steroids’ and can increase testosterone levels beyond the scope of scientific possibility. One of the most popular posts in the reddit community details how a user’s motivation to quit was a woman in a video calling him a ‘little loser’. In fact, these men frequently describe themselves as losers — feeling cuckolded by the men they watch having sex with the women they’re attracted to — and there’s a clear association for these men between narratives of their own abstinence and their sense of self worth and masculinity. Not only does these narratives sound demoralising, but they centre the conversation completely around individual stories of self discipline. This individualism is at the centre of the problem: eschewing porn is essentially seen as a way to one-up other ‘pornsick’ men, increase focus and productivity, and reassert sexual self-esteem by rejecting the sex workers they want but can’t have.
The movement is therefore completely centred around men’s experience of their bodies and sexuality, and de-emphasises the experiences of the women who are commodified for the purpose of their pleasure. Never is this logic clearer than in one of the movement’s central commandments: the only acceptable ejaculation has to involve a woman you didn’t pay to be there. This may not seem all that bad, but when it becomes a ‘rule’ for millions of men who haven’t actually investigated their attitudes towards women, it can lead to some deeply troubling rhetoric. Users talk about being increasingly preoccupied with women in their classes or their workplace, and pursuing women more aggressively for sex—something often cited as a benefit of the movement.
A further danger of the movement is that it doesn’t encourage men to have real empathy for sex workers, or argue for any material change to the porn industry. In fact, men who subscribe to pages on OnlyFans, one of the few sites where sex workers remain almost entirely in control of their product, are frequently mocked more harshly because they are seen as ‘simps’ of the creators they follow. In general, their critique of the industry is tied up in backwards attitudes towards women and incel-adjacent beliefs about how a man’s sex life reflects his value as a person, which keeps the movement from contributing meaningfully to porn industry reform.
The men’s anti-porn movement raises a range of valid critiques of the porn industry, particularly surrounding its impact on heterosexual men’s sexual development and self esteem. At the same time, it’s hard not to feel like these men are missing the point, just a little, by failing to critique the underlying sexism of their movement.
