he early 1980s by theWilliams Committee in England, reported that as the availability and abundance of sexually explicit material increased, the number of violent sex crimes suchas rape did not increase, but in fact decreased in many areas (Christensen1990:128-129). So what is it about pornography that women and anti-pornographyorganizations do not like? Violence! One of the greatest myths about pornography isthat it contains an excess of violence against women inevitably resulting inreal-life violence against women. Anti-pornography groups release propagandathat the media approves of violence against women through pornography. Inactuality, however, the total amount of violence in sex-related movies was found tobe approximately 6% in a study by T. Palys in the early 1980s in Vancouver,Canada. Even this material was almost entirely composed of verbal threats andspanking (Christensen 1990:59). In addition to the above, studies in Ohio alsofound that the amount of violence in “G”-Rated movies was a staggering two times morethan in “X”-Rated movies. In fact, major films such as Die Hard: With AVengeance and Terminator 2, contain extreme violence 85-90% of which is directedsolely at men. There are, however, exceptions; the slasher genre of movies contain muchmore violence towards women, possibly due to the desensitization to violencein other genres of films. Because women are involved, violence against themcould create a true sense of horror. However, this does not suggest that menshould go into society and rape a woman any more than it suggests that men shouldgo out and kill other men. Horror movie fans choose to watch these moviesbecause they enjoy portrayed violence. Needless to say, no sane individual wouldwish for this violence to become a real-life conception. Similarly, sex also excitespeople and because these two elements offer the most thrills in movies, they areoften combined. It should be pointed...
