I sort of skimmed through some responses so I'm sorry if I'm repeating something here, and I have nothing to back up my opinion except 2 cents and a cup of coffee:
I really think the only reason porn has as much of an influence as it does is in the societies that complain about it is due to inherent prudishness in those societies.
For instance: American women suffer from a lot of body image and negative sexual education. Many receive piss poor information about their own reproductive and sexual health. American society on a whole receives incredibly shitty messages about how to conduct relationships. Blame this on religion if you like, but atheists fuck up a lot of stuff too.
As a result, many people feel guilty about their consumption or participation in porn because of external shaming. The idea of getting caught with it or doing it is pretty scary, and we've had several stories lately involving some awful slut-shaming of girls who either made porn for enjoyment or money (or both). Many women don't even know what their own vagina looks like, and if they do look at it in a mirror they might get freaked out because it doesn't look like the vag they saw in a porno once or thrice upon a time. Newsflash: most womens' vagoos don't look like that. But since we don't really see each other naked anymore, we're out of touch with how incredibly varied everyone is in size, shape, color, etc. This goes for men too - I know and knew lots of guys with perfectly adequate to large or HOLY SHIT sized penises who thought they weren't big enough 'because of porn' who likewise hadn't exactly seen a bunch of other dudes naked (I guess guys hide themselves as much as women do in lockers rooms?) to know the differences.
There's nothing wrong with sex, but Americans treat sex like there IS something terribly wrong with it, by and large, so their information access isn't always robust and well-sourced. Porn isn't an accurate representation of sex just like movies aren't a great representation of real life, but how are misinformed people supposed to know that? Especially given how poor people are at separating movies from real life...
If you educate your society from the ground up, porn becomes an awesome tool. You can enjoy it when you're single and looking for release, you can use it to find new ideas to try with yourself or your partners, etc. If you don't bother educating your culture, you end up with a bunch of neurotic idiots constantly second-guessing themselves as to whether or not their up to par or if their predilections are 'weird.'
As for the OP's question about influence: dude, porn isn't doing anything today that hasn't been done for millennia. Ask any piece of ancient Greek pottery. Ginormous dildos were a thing, and there's no new position advertised in Cosmo that wasn't already invented.
NSFW:
Do you know what they were taking pictures of when the camera was invented? Cats dressed up in outfits (no joke) and pornographic scenes. There's an incredibly rich history surrounding BDSM back into Victorian times and earlier. People don't make porn to try and get others to try things - they make porn because the market already exists. Rape fantasies, balloon popping, pony-play, etc - that shit was already there and someone just filmed it for their enjoyment.
I really think the only reason porn has as much of an influence as it does is in the societies that complain about it is due to inherent prudishness in those societies.
For instance: American women suffer from a lot of body image and negative sexual education. Many receive piss poor information about their own reproductive and sexual health. American society on a whole receives incredibly shitty messages about how to conduct relationships. Blame this on religion if you like, but atheists fuck up a lot of stuff too.
As a result, many people feel guilty about their consumption or participation in porn because of external shaming. The idea of getting caught with it or doing it is pretty scary, and we've had several stories lately involving some awful slut-shaming of girls who either made porn for enjoyment or money (or both). Many women don't even know what their own vagina looks like, and if they do look at it in a mirror they might get freaked out because it doesn't look like the vag they saw in a porno once or thrice upon a time. Newsflash: most womens' vagoos don't look like that. But since we don't really see each other naked anymore, we're out of touch with how incredibly varied everyone is in size, shape, color, etc. This goes for men too - I know and knew lots of guys with perfectly adequate to large or HOLY SHIT sized penises who thought they weren't big enough 'because of porn' who likewise hadn't exactly seen a bunch of other dudes naked (I guess guys hide themselves as much as women do in lockers rooms?) to know the differences.
There's nothing wrong with sex, but Americans treat sex like there IS something terribly wrong with it, by and large, so their information access isn't always robust and well-sourced. Porn isn't an accurate representation of sex just like movies aren't a great representation of real life, but how are misinformed people supposed to know that? Especially given how poor people are at separating movies from real life...
If you educate your society from the ground up, porn becomes an awesome tool. You can enjoy it when you're single and looking for release, you can use it to find new ideas to try with yourself or your partners, etc. If you don't bother educating your culture, you end up with a bunch of neurotic idiots constantly second-guessing themselves as to whether or not their up to par or if their predilections are 'weird.'
As for the OP's question about influence: dude, porn isn't doing anything today that hasn't been done for millennia. Ask any piece of ancient Greek pottery. Ginormous dildos were a thing, and there's no new position advertised in Cosmo that wasn't already invented.
NSFW:
![[Image: 800px-Erotic_scenes_Louvre_G13_n4.jpg]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=upload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fthumb%2Fd%2Fdb%2FErotic_scenes_Louvre_G13_n4.jpg%2F800px-Erotic_scenes_Louvre_G13_n4.jpg)
Do you know what they were taking pictures of when the camera was invented? Cats dressed up in outfits (no joke) and pornographic scenes. There's an incredibly rich history surrounding BDSM back into Victorian times and earlier. People don't make porn to try and get others to try things - they make porn because the market already exists. Rape fantasies, balloon popping, pony-play, etc - that shit was already there and someone just filmed it for their enjoyment.
![[Image: Untitled2_zpswaosccbr.png]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=i1140.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fn569%2Fthesummerqueen%2FUntitled2_zpswaosccbr.png)
