How Common Is Violence Against Women in Porn?

It’s a mantra oft-repeated among porn critics: 88 percent of pornographic videos contain violence against women. If that’s correct, then the vast majority of porn meets the accepted social-science definition of violence: “any behavior directed toward harming or injuring another who wants to avoid it.”

Do 88 percent of porn videos really depict violence against women? No. Many studies show that porn is actually less violent than many action movies, TV shows, video games, and romance novels. In a recent report, Australian researchers analyzed almost two dozen porn-violence studies and concluded that anti-women violence in porn is “rare.” Scenes that appear violent to naive viewers actually involve consensual bondage, discipline, and sado-masochism (BDSM), which is play, not violence.

The Australian investigators scrutinized 23 studies of pornography published from 1986 to 2017. They included three video formats: VHS (from the 1980s), DVDs (from the 1990s), and Internet videos (produced from 1997-2017).

The 23 studies depicted these activities:

• Fellatio: in 71 percent of analyzed scenes.
• Vaginal intercourse: 70 percent.
• Men ejaculating: 67 percent.
• Cunnilingus: 45 percent.
• BDSM with men dominating women: 39 percent.
• Kissing: 34 percent.
• Women spanked: 27 percent.
• Anal intercourse: 22 percent.
• Women gagged: 19 percent.
• Women having orgasms: 17 percent.
• Group sex: 15 percent.
• BDSM with women dominating men: 13 percent.
• Analingus: 10 percent.
• Name calling: 7 percent.
• Women raped: 4 percent.
• Bondage: 3 percent.
• Hair pulling: 3 percent.
• Men gagged: 3 percent.
• Men spanked: 1 percent.
• Women choked: 1 percent.
• Punching or kicking: 0 percent.
• Torture or murder: 0.5 percent.

Porn is not completely nonviolent, but after conducting the most comprehensive content analysis to date, the Australian investigators concluded that violence in porn is “rare.”

What Exactly Is “Violence”?

How could these researchers call porn violence rare when they found many activities that look violent, including...:

• Men dominating women (in 39 percent of analyzed videos).
• Women spanked (27 percent).
• Women gagged (19 percent).
• Women raped (4 percent).
• Women’s hair pulled (3 percent)
• Women choked (1 percent).

Violence must always be considered in context. Consider this: One big, tough man runs up to another and strikes him hard on the back. Most people would call that violence—assault. But if the two men are football teammates and one has just scored a touchdown, the blow is actually recognition of a job well done—not violence, but congratulations. Violence must be judged not by the actions alone, but by the actions in the context of the participants’ intentions.

The overwhelming majority of activities in porn that appear violent are actually standard elements of consensual BDSM. A San Francisco State University researcher surveyed 1,580 women involved in BDSM who ranged in age from 19 to 72, with an average age of 36. Their favorite activities included:

• Spanking: 96 percent enjoyed this
• Hair pulling: 93 percent.
• Biting: 92 percent
• Scratching, leaving marks: 90 percent.
• Use of bondage gear (rope, cuffs, chains, gags, etc.): 88 percent
• Moderate bondage (can move but can’t escape on one's own): 86 percent.
• Light bondage (can escape on one's own): 85 percent.
• Paddling: 84 percent.

In BDSM, there is no intent to harm, and no efforts to avoid it or escape.

BDSM Fantasies Are Quite Prevalent

Credible estimates of the proportion of American adults who regularly engage in BDSM range from 1 to 2 percent—or 2.5 to 5 million people. Another 1 to 2 percent of U.S. adults don’t play that way regularly, but occasionally sample BDSM at clubs, parties, or at home. So somewhere between 5 and 10 million Americans are, at least to some extent, into BDSM. That’s enough to support BDSM clubs in every major metropolitan area and many rural locales—which is what we have. (If you doubt this, search “BDSM” and any locale.) Many studies show that people who enjoy BDSM are totally normal people next door, except for their interest in kink. (See my previous post.)

Meanwhile, a great many Americans who don’t actively engage in BDSM have fantasies that include it—in some studies, more than half of those surveyed. BDSM fantasies are especially popular among women. Consider romance fiction. Few men read it, but millions of women love it. Romances vary tremendously, but they usually follow a formula: A naïve woman attracts a powerful aggressive man who falls so hard for her that he must have her by any means necessary. As the plot unfolds, he threatens her with violence and/or rape—and in some romances, commits rape. But in the end, the savvy heroine transforms the brute into the man of her dreams—a caring, committed lover, husband, and father of their children. According to Publishers Weekly, romance fiction accounts for almost one-quarter of fiction sales (23 percent), the second-largest fiction category after general fiction, but far ahead of the number-three category, mystery/suspense/thrillers.

Now consider the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy, which follows classic romance-fiction conventions—with one key difference. The powerful man is also an enthusiastic BDSM dominant who persuades his naïve young paramour to play the submissive, complete with whips and restraints. Fifty Shades was published in 2011, and in just four short years, sold 100 million copies—almost exclusively to women. It’s the bestselling novel of all time. Clearly, a tale porn critics would surely call “violence against women” fueled the erotic fantasies of a huge female audience.

Pornography Essential Reads

Treatments for Problematic Pornography Use

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With BDSM fantasies so popular, it should come as no surprise that a great deal of porn features it.

Romance Fiction Is More Violent Than Porn

Critics rail against X-rated media, but they are oddly silent about the way male characters dominate, threaten, and brutalize women in romance fiction. Consider the TV series, Outlander, a time-travel romance in which both the heroine and her daughter are frequently threatened with violence—and are both brutally, graphically raped. Why don’t women porn critics condemn romance fiction? Because they understand it’s fantasy. Apparently, they fail to recognize that porn is, too.

If you loathe porn, you have every right to your opinion. But BDSM—in real life and in porn—is not violent. It’s consensual play. Once we eliminate BDSM activities from consideration, porn depicts less violence against women than many action movies, TV shows, video games, and most romance fiction.

The recent Australian study is just one of several showing that in porn, violence against women is rare. For more, see my previous post.