Title: Has The Internet Made Porn Socially Acceptable? Word Count: 924 Summary: In a world dominated by computers and technology we take a look at what effect the Internet has had on people’s attitude towards sex and pornography. Pornography and prostitution is nothing new to the world, it has been around for years and years and will carry on to do so, of recent times it appears to be everywhere, sex shops in high streets, top shelf magazines in newsagents, recognised red light zones, legal brothels, mobile phone videos and even porn star name t-shirt... Keywords: internet, pornography, socially acceptable, society, moral Article Body: In a world dominated by computers and technology we take a look at what effect the Internet has had on people’s attitude towards sex and pornography. Pornography and prostitution is nothing new to the world, it has been around for years and years and will carry on to do so, of recent times it appears to be everywhere, sex shops in high streets, top shelf magazines in newsagents, recognised red light zones, legal brothels, mobile phone videos and even porn star name t-shirts are used to promote pornography. Pornography has had many effects on society, it has recently been suggested that violent porn should have a blanket ban due to rapists being influenced by such films. A rapist also admitted that a girl wearing a FCUK t-shirt inspired him to rape her and these are just some of the bad effects of having a wide range of highly accessible porn. Whether it is legal or illegal there will always be prostitution in society due to there being a high demand of men willing to pay for sex and women prepared to accept that money. Brothels have a mixture of good and bad press as they are seen to confine the issue to a particular area, cut curb crawling and sexual activity in public places. If you go back to the early 1900’s sex before marriage was looked upon as the devil’s work, the many unwanted pregnancies due to the lack of protection were dealt with down back alleys in an inhumane fashion. These abortions were a very painful experience and managed to keep many women away from pre-marital sex. Instead of sexual intercourse many lovers decided to perform what was referred to at the time as safe sex, this was a form of foreplay involving the man simulating sex with the females arm pit. Even though this did manage to cut down the unwanted pregnancies the view of pre-marital sex and pornography amongst the world was looked upon in bad light. In these days porn was in literature with racy stories and even these were viewed upon as revolting and unnatural by most, there were few pictures and drawings that existed but nevertheless they did exist, even dating back to the Egyptians with hieroglyphics. The 60’s was a start for sex becoming more acceptable due to the free love period and hippy influence, cannabis was a factor as roadies and hippy’s turned to cannabis to relax and lose their inhibitions. Pornography snowballed from there sparking a huge industry that started out in theatres where nudity was allowed on stage if there was no movement, it then proceeded to still images strung together to simulate movement. Then along came pornography magazines which became popular amongst many ages of men with titles such as playboy and mayfair dominating the market, the amount of money in this industry is clear to see if Hugh Hefner’s playboy mansion is anything to go by. Pornography by this time had a following as single men used it to release any sexual tension built up, although many men were too embarrassed to buy pornography magazines and still the market was socially viewed as inappropriate and looked down upon by many. The internet became main stream in the mid nineties which opened a gateway for people to access pornography anonymously and in the privacy of their own home in the years to come. This proved successful with money in the industry reaching a record high, and pornography reaching the homes of millions of people, the current figure in the UK is that a quarter of Britons view porn across the internet. Men across the world viewed pornography across the internet and felt more confident about viewing such images and movies as they could see the global demand for this market and people started realising that it is perfectly natural. Men had started to openly chat about porn, some found it funny, some informative, some repulsive and for some it became their life. With just soft-core porn available, UK residents visited European countries like Holland and Germany where they were years ahead of the UK in the social acceptance of porn. Hardcore porn was banned in the UK until September 2000; the popularity of internet porn had played its part in the decision to legalise hardcore porn. The breakthrough of playing and transferring media through mobile phones enforced the fact that porn HAS become acceptable in many walks of life as 60% of men own pornography on their mobile phones. This figure without the internet would be considerably lower without the internet as the internet is over 90% of the population’s source of porn. Amongst some, pornography and prostitution are viewed upon similarly although there is a definitive difference, in the majority of countries pornography is legal whilst prostitution is not and then there is the fact that most pornography is viewed/created in privacy whereas prostitution can be a very public affair, although both are welcomed by people across the world. There can be no arguments that pornography has become socially acceptable, the internet has had a major impact on this due to being able to access adult content of any nature anonymously in the privacy of your own home. This has paved the way for other areas in the porn industry to grow alongside internet porn and help turn this market into the multi billion pound industry that it is today. Like it or not porn is now socially acceptable amongst the majority of people under the age of 30.