I have never watched porn. Am I normal?
I am almost 22 years old and I have never watched porn. So, I started wondering: am I the only one? I had a look at sites like Reddit and Quora and found questions like ‘I have never watched porn, should I start?’ or ‘I am 19 years old and I have never watched porn, is there a problem with me?’ I felt relieved to find out that I was not alone. But I was quite surprised to see comments of people saying that they felt ‘weird’ for not watching porn.
Pornography is all over the internet these days and it has become increasingly normalized to watch it, especially among young adults. But what about people who have never dared to watch any porn? Is it abnormal as a young adult in 2021 to have never found yourself on PornHub’s homepage?
The official definition of pornography is: printed or visual material containing the explicit description or display of sexual organs or activity, intended to stimulate sexual excitement. If we take this definition literally, then in theory, we have all seen porn. We’ve all seen graphic scenes in films like 50 Shades of Grey.
Watching porn, in popular culture terms, relates to visiting a porn site in your free time to indulge in some self-pleasure. In that case, I can confirm that I have never watched porn.
For a long time, there was an adult content filter on my laptop and phone, which must have been automatically installed when I bought my devices. Although that filter is no longer in place on my devices and I can now freely access any porn site I want, I am still terrified to do so. I am scared of coming across something that might change my vision of sex; a rather vanilla vision of sex.
But anyway, when it comes to self-pleasure, PornHub is not an essential accessory. There are many other ways to feel stimulated. One’s own imagination or erotic literature is sometimes way more powerful than visual stimulants.
On the other hand, sites like PornHub offer endless categories of porn. What if I discovered a kink that I never knew I had? What if it dramatically improved my sex life? Is it truly wise to leave these questions unanswered?
I often wonder how many people in my generation actually watch porn. There is in reality not much data regarding the porn habits of young adults worldwide.
To get a rough idea, I did a poll on Instagram. I asked who had watched porn and who had never watched porn.
Out of 78 responses, 86% said they watched porn (regularly or irregularly) and 14% said they had never watched porn.
Of the 86% who said they watched porn, 38% were women. And of the 14% who said they had never watched porn, 81% were women.
These numbers are in fact quite close to what PornHub statistics suggest. It is suggested that in 2019, worldwide, 32% of site users were women.
Its statistics also say that in 2019, 18-24-year olds represented 25% of visitors and that the average age of PornHub users was actually 36.
It is important to note however that PornHub, despite being one of the most popular porn sites in the world, is of course not the only site.
In fact, women tend to turn to sites like Lust Cinema, Bellesa, Ifeelmyself, frolicme, elsecinema or pinklabeltv, which have a strong focus on female pleasure. These sites offer quality, ethically produced erotic films (according to my friends who watch porn).
In terms of reasons for never having watched porn, the responses were varied.
Some said things along the lines of ‘never felt the need to watch porn’. Others, with stronger religious views, explained that watching porn ‘leads to objectifying women; leads to pleasure, not happiness; is against what God wants for us.’
Some participants were kind enough to give me an insight into why they choose to watch porn.
Women tended to say that porn was a source of creative stimulation: ‘I only watch it very rarely when I need some inspiration for my own mind porn in my head’.
The majority of men explained that they watched porn because they were ‘single but would otherwise just have sex’. One said: ‘I stopped watching it when I met my boyfriend, but before then, I watched it at least once a day.’
Some participants, both men and women, explained that watching porn allowed them to explore their sexuality.
Overall, does never having watched porn make me abnormal? From a statistical point of view, people aged 18-24 who have never watched porn are a minority.
But that does not make them abnormal. Everyone explores sexuality and self-pleasure differently. And what does ‘being normal’ mean anyway?
Written by Jenny Barruol
My name is Jenny and I am 22 years old. I am French but moved to the UK in 2018 to study Spanish and Russian at the University of Bristol. Writing, photography and videography are some of my favourite things to do.
I started getting interested in journalism about one year ago. In the future, I would like to work in documentary filmmaking.
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