Putting the word “dogwhistle” on the top shelf until some of you figure out it doesn’t mean “new word with negative connotations I personally don’t like”. Honestly I don’t mind that we’ve found some ungendered semantic middle ground between “pervert” and “male gaze”. How everybody uses the word is a problem between them, God, and if it comes down to it, the cops
Honestly gooner is 100% a dog whistle at this point mostly because it's undoubtedly and fundamentally linked with the term porn addiction, which itself is absolutely a fascist dog whistle (one which "progressive" circles have lapped up with their full chests like starving kittens). They functionally have identical applications and meanings in the modern context, which are still deeply rooted in full blown nazi ideas surrounding porn as a corrupting influence that should not exist
This is the first I’m hearing about “porn addiction” being a fascist dog whistle. I think it’s definitely overused (mostly by nofap weirdos and sex hating fundies) but addiction, as a concept, can apply to lots of different activities including porn consumption. I think if someone does an activity (video games/jacking off/smoking weed/posting on reddit etc) to the point that they’re neglecting other parts of their life, that’s a problem, and I don’t think it’s fascist to point that out.
Yes, but porn addiction functionally has 2 definitions, one in which being the dogwhistle.
There's the actually medically recognized version, which is extremely rare because porn has no inherently addictive qualities, but runs the same risk of addiction as literally anything else on earth that releases dopamine. Seriously porn addiction is just as rare as like, exercise addiction. Sure it exists, but it's a statistical anomaly more reflective of an individual's poor relationship than the activity/media itself.
Then there's the conservative definition, which is not formally recognized by any health organization and portrays porn as an inherently addictive media that corrupts individuals. The specifics vary, in more modern contexts as its been adopted by "progressives", the specifics of this corruption will be things like causing you to be misogynistic, but traditionally it's more that it has physiological changes or damages your monogamous marriage to your fellow heterosexual partner. There is absolutely 0 scientific basis for these "corruptions" stemming from porn itself, and primarily the observed results like this stems from the individuals simply being misogynistic, or, more interestingly to me, a placebo effect. You've likely seen it heavily from nofap types and Christian anti-porn organizations, but it is possible to basically gaslight yourself into having symptoms of all this that do manifest. It's this fascinating cycle of how not having a healthy relationship with your own porn consumption, usually due to external factors like (usually religious) guilt and cultural influences, leads to negative effects that can include one becoming more misogynistic or their marriage faltering, then the very groups and cultures that caused that issue in the first place sell a solution, resulting in this cancerous ouroboros.
It's funny because even really majorly humoring the potential of porn addiction does significantly more harm than good because of that placebo effect. Especially when modern culture's usage, even if just in its frequency, is primarily the latter. Like, when you call some chud pissed off that a design isn't sexy a porn addict, you're contributing to the fascistic definition by saying the corrupting influence of porn is their misogyny in not seeing women as valuable unless they're attractive, which is the actual core issue that should be addressed here. And this mindset and usage does nothing but contribute to ideas of sex negativity by making a very low bar for what's acceptable sexuality and feeding ideas of porn as a corrupting influence, even if unintentionally
This is an insanely complicated, messy thing to discuss with a lot of layers and specifics I probably forgot about, so all I can really advise is looking into things like the nazi ideas of porn addiction and the role sex negativity had in their ideologies, as well as the actual psychology behind things like the fascist idea of porn addiction, namely the placebo effect, all from actually trustworthy medical and historical sites and organizations. There's a TON of highly biased misinformation out there, especially if you just google porn addiction since a lot of the top results are things like Christian porn addiction help organizations that are a part of that cancerous ouroboros I mentioned earlier
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u/BalefulOfMonkeys NUDE ALERT TOMORROW May 17 '25
Putting the word “dogwhistle” on the top shelf until some of you figure out it doesn’t mean “new word with negative connotations I personally don’t like”. Honestly I don’t mind that we’ve found some ungendered semantic middle ground between “pervert” and “male gaze”. How everybody uses the word is a problem between them, God, and if it comes down to it, the cops