American Conservatives Love Porno

Just last week and in October, the KT had an article about Korean kids as young as 11 and 12 viewing and subscribing to online pornography. This week, an excellent report came out about American online porn consumption (pdf).

"...this paper focuses on the consumption side of adult online entertainment, and in particular on subscriber demographics and consumption patterns of those who subscribe to such websites."

I am more concerned with political/religious affiliation here than anything else.

"Social critics...often argue that the rise of Internet pornography is contributing to a coarsening of American culture. Do consumption patterns of online adult entertainment reveal two separate Americas? Or is the consumption of online adult entertainment widespread, regardless of legal barriers, potential for embarrassment, and even religious conviction?"

We hear from the right wing nuts that America is becoming more and more of a cesspool of sexual deviancy and perversion, but coming from the party who mastered extremism, manipulation and hypocrisy, I know not to take it seriously. These are the same goons that want gay marriage banned to cover for their penchant for gay sex.

It appears that while most of the industry is centered around California, most of the viewing is going on in traditionally red states.



And here's the kicker.

Subscriptions are slightly more prevalent in states that have enacted conservative legislation on sexuality (regression results on file with the author). In the 27 states where “defense of marriage” amendments have been adopted (making same-sex marriage, and/or civil unions unconstitutional), subscriptions to this adult entertainment service are weakly more prevalent than in other states (p 0.096). In such states, there were 0.2 more subscribers to this adult web site per thousand broadband households, 11 percent more than in other states.

As shown in Table 4, subscriptions are also more prevalent in states where surveys indicate conservative positions on religion, gender roles, and sexuality. In states where more people agree that “Even today miracles are performed by the power of God” and “I never doubt the existence of God,” there are more subscriptions to this service. Subscriptions are also more prevalent in states where more people agree that “I have old-fashioned values about family and marriage" and "AIDS might be God’s punishment for immoral sexual behavior.”

And one final thought.

" Visitors from the “red”states that voted for Bush in 2004 are more likely to visit wife-swapping sites, adult webcams, and sites about voyeurism."

But when I look at this list, I'm not surprised.