Same reason there’s more clothing advertisments targeting women than men.
The data shows that men consume more porn than women.
Because AO3 isn’t counted as “social media”.
Because testosterone is a hell of a drug and men, in general, are way hornier than women.
I was going to say men have more testosterone, testosterone makes you horny, horny people want porn. Badabing Badaboom
From Fight the New Drug (it’s an anti-porn site but I’ll use their statistics and leave out the moralizing):
"While pornography consumption for young adults has been repeatedly reported to be approximately 75% for men and 30% for women, these rates are considerably lower than those found in this study. In this study, consumption rates of men were generally consistent (91–99%) across time frames, though women’s consumption varied more widely (60–92%). Interestingly, this range in reported rates for women is consistent with the variability found in previous literature, which may be indicative of a profound impact of assessment methods (Hald et al., 2014).
Notably, 11% of women in our sample primarily consumed written pornography compared to other pornography modalities (with written pornography being 90–100% of the total pornography they consumed […] Alternatively stated, if written pornography had not been included in this study, our consumption rate for women using pornography in the past month would drop to approximately 49% from 60% reporting consumption. A similar pattern of decreased endorsement would have occurred across all time frames.
So video and photographic pornography is targeted more towards men as the primary consumers.
This answers my question, however I wished if all genders were equally pervert.
I don’t think watching porn and doing kinky sex stuff in person is necessarily related.
I am a woman and use my imagination almost exclusively, so wouldn’t be counted here but it doesn’t mean I’m not kinky
women? having SEXUAL URGES? AUGH!! (clutches pearls so hard they turn to diamonds) /s
yeah for some reason, women liking sexual stuff is frowned upon in society while men are encouraged to like it
Don’t porn production companies just make whatever sells?
Yes, but they do so through the male gaze.
Most porn made for men is really unappealing to women. It’s degrading, the men tend to be unappealing, it’s not intimate, and it’s not realistic. In short, it’s not experiences we would want to have, so it’s not arousing.
Porn made for women by women is actually a decent seller with women, much like erotic fiction (and importantly, men like it also), but it’s still a pretty niche market because the assumption is women don’t want it.
It’s sort of a self-perpetuating issue.
If there was a market for it, it would be made and sold. There isn’t. Same reason there aren’t more prostitutes serving women, more male strippers, or gay bath houses focused on women.
It is made and sold though?
https://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/news/a43169/the-best-porn-sites-for-women/
There are a number of women-led porn studios and sites, and the number is growing, not shrinking. The first studio was started less than 20 years ago, if memory serves, so it’s not like it’s had a wildly long time to overtake the booming market.
The difference between those other things you mentioned and woman-directed porn is that men also consume the porn quite readily, because it’s still porn they would want to watch.
The market for erotic fiction is huge (think romance novels) and is primarily aimed at and consumed by women. I’ve always thought (and I think there are some studies to back it up) that women and men process sexual desire differently - visually for men vs cerebrally for women. Although I do think that as pornography has become more socially acceptable those differences may be less pronounced.
Harlequin is big business and a casual overview of their covers and synopsises tell you quite a bit what they are selling and to who they market
I’m sure a lot of the hypotheses here are correct, but history plays a role, too. Heterosexual men have been encouraged to pursue sex and women have been encouraged to eschew it. For centuries if not millennia. So there’s just a significant amount of inertia.
Couple that with some likely real differences in what gets women off that the porn industry is still working out, and there will be differences in the volume of porn targeting each.
You reminded me of when I noticed the sheer volume of professional straight porn that was written with the performers as step-siblings.
I found it annoying but my guess is that it’s a quick/cheap attempt to broaden the appeal to as many as possible beyond the core “man and woman having sex” enjoyer demographic.
And also that targeting men is effective like YouTube 😱 Thumbnails aimed at kids and the algorithm, and the success of titties helping garner a following. (albeit one that may be there for the “wrong” reasons)
You reminded me of when I noticed the sheer volume of professional straight porn that was written with the performers as step-siblings.
Not just siblings. Also dads and moms, uncles … and let’s be real, the “step” is there mostly for legal reasons. Basically people really seem to like incest. Not sure what that tells us about society.
I don’t think the step- relations are to hide incest. I think it’s a lazy way to create situations where two people are alone together. Otherwise you’d have to go to tired tropes like pizza delivery, or visiting plumber, etc.
I think it’s a lazy way to create situations where two people are alone together.
But that would work just as well if they were actually related.
I think there is a HUGE leap between imaging that you had an attractive step sibling vs it being you’re actual sibling.
I think most people could fantasize about that hot girl from your science class suddenly living in the next bedroom over. I think most people have near 0 interest in hooking up with their actual family.
and let’s be real, the “step” is there mostly for legal reasons.
Is this true? I’m surprised.
When I was 12 I got a step sister that was 17-18 and I definitely had a thing for her. I always assumed this stuff was aimed at that but maybe I’m just living in my own head over here.
The step stuff I really dumb though and I have no interest in it either way. However, if they dropped the step I would be 100% out.
Is this true? I’m surprised.
I don’t know if it’s true in general. I don’t have the data on that. But I do remember some videos in which “But I’m just your step-sister” was said quite sarcastically.
When I was 12 I got a step sister that was 17-18 and I definitely had a thing for her.
I also have no good data on how many people have step siblings. But it has to be quite a lot if it’s a market for one of the biggest porn genres.
if they dropped the step I would be 100% out.
It really does make it a lot weirder. That’s why they don’t do it. I probably still would be in though. I can ignore the title and dialoge if needed.
You’re right. It’s not just legal reasons. There are some neat studies showing that if two people under the age of 5 are raised in the same household together, feelings of sexual attraction generally don’t develop later when you’re sexually maturing. So the porn somewhat follows reality in the scenario of step-siblings being more likely to develop sexual attraction.
I can take a guess at what it tells us.
We’re lonely. We get no physical contact. No touch. No warmth. And it’s not really socially acceptable for us to seek those things, because men are scolded for emotions and vulnerability. We are scolded for anything that would enable intimacy.
And it’s to such an extent that most men are so repressed they don’t even realize they crave intimacy. They don’t even have the vocabulary to describe their need for intimacy.
Now introduce, to such a man, a “sister.”
Heavy emphasis on the quotes.
The “story” of the porn, using their family ties as a shortcut, quickly establishes that she lives with him. She bonds with him. It’s socially acceptable for him to hug her, to wrestle with her, maybe even to cuddle her. And she will always be there, because her connection to him runs deeper than most “romantic” relationships can (we’re still assuming this man can’t articulate his own need for intimacy), so he doesn’t need to worry about her abandoning him.
Naturally, this emotionally repressed man is going to look at this fictional family member, this figment of his suspension of disbelief, and say, “well I want to 🦆 her!” (I always find my keyboard’s lack of profanity amusing. I refuse to teach such an innocent piece of software how to cuss.)
What he really means is that he appreciates that intimacy. And cannot really get turned on in its absence. But he can’t say that. He can’t admit that or even know that. Because this man is not only starved of all of the above: he can’t even articulate this starvation.
Daughters? Sisters? Mothers? They all serve the same purpose as a shortcut – “here’s a person who is intimate and trusting with you by default.” The familial bond is a fast, easy way to establish prebuilt trust and affection without spending 20-30 minutes on storytelling or 20-30 hours of therapy trying to convince a repressed audience that it’s okay to have a deep, intimate, trusting connection with this consenting woman.
In other words, what it tells us about society isn’t good.
Financial, not legal. A bunch of credit card companies and ad companies don’t want to be associated with incest porn, but are fine with step-incest porn, for whatever reason. So long as the actors aren’t actually related it’s totally legal, and even related actors would be legal in some US states.
From what I heard about it, the issue was one of production quality.
Tons of vanilla porn in low quality, but -fetish- porn was high quality.
The family ties stuff is easy enough to ignore if you just don’t listen to the limited dialogue, so people would seek that out because it was better quality than vanilla, which led producers to think the fetish was the important part.
More men look for that stuff.
Well, as a sweeping generalization, women like written stories more than video porn, and men like videos better than stories. I don’t think it’s accurate to say guys are more into sex, necessarily, but more into pictures and videos yes.
When I was young, lived in a household with a bunch of other people and we had this absolute freak of a friend who always brought us boxes of porn magazines. He would sweep in brandishing the box then say, “And Forums, for the LADIES!”. Because he knew girls liked words and guys liked pictures.
