A FACT SHEET ON PORNOGRAPHY

• * 2/3 of the films approved by the Ontario Film Review Board in the fall of 1992 were adult sex films.
• * 86% of rapists use pornography regularly (Dr. William Marshall)
• * 87% of female children and 77% male children who have been sexually assaulted, pornography has been involved.
• * Every 17 minutes in Canada, a sexual assault is committed. 90% of the victims are female (House of Commons report of family violence).

  As pornography is on the increase in our society, so is abuse of women and children. Porn research points to the fact that THERE IS A CORRELATION BETWEEN PORNOGRAPHY AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE.

• * 27,000 sexual assaults reported to police across Canada in 1990, nearly double the number of 1984, according to Statistics Canada (Toronto Sun May 29, 1991).
• * Dr. James Check - study of 117 college students and 319 non-student subjects indicated that consistent with expectations, exposure to both sexually violent and non-violent dehumanizing pornography fosters the perception in the minds of the user that they might rape and force women into unwanted sex acts.
• * N. Malamuthe, E. Donnerstein - study indicates that aggressive pornography that is rampant today GREATLY INCREASES the inclination in normal males to commit crimes of violence against women by (1) portraying physical and sexual abuse of women as being erotic
  (2) perpetuating the myth that women ultimately enjoy rape or physical and sexual abuse.
• * Legislative Assembly of Ontario minutes November 21, 1991 - A study of video pornography (restricted to adult and triple X videos) found 13% of all scenes involved sexual violence, 53% included rape, 35% involved sexual harassment, 17.5% sadomasochism, and 6% sexual mutilations.
• * Canadians Use of Pornography National Survey - primary consumers are people between the ages of 12 - 17 years. 35% of these users express interest in sexually violent scenes, rape torture, bondage, etc.
• * Research suggests that even non-violent pornography leads to a callousness toward women, a trivialization of rape, and an appetite for more deviant porn. It devalues marriage as an institution and encourages the belief that unfaithfulness is normal.

4 STAGES Many Users Of Porn
Progress Through:

1. ADDICTION - equals the power of drugs and alcohol
2. ESCALATION - need for rougher, more explicit matter to receive the same effect.
3. DESENSITIZATION - with exposure, the shocking becomes acceptable, then craved.
4. ACTING OUT - tendency to act out behaviour viewed.