Sobre la pornografía y la educación sexual: ¿puede «el sexo» legitimar la humillación y la violencia?

Abstract

The aim of this article is to argue for the need and urgency to open an interdisciplinary debate on the goals of critical sexual education. From a philosophical and gender approach, the consequences of generalized online access to pornography, a profitable business, are analyzed as a school of sexuality for youth. The article deals with the violence and misogyny of many of the most visited contents and poses two hypothesis to debate. Firstly, pornography is subject to a process of erotizing violence, which may become a new space of legitimization of inequality between female and male teenagers. Secondly, a mismatch exists between the expectations of female and male teenagers regarding what a good sexual life is. Movements such as Me too and Cuéntalo as well as social polarization over trials like that of “the herd” would confirm such a mismatch. The conclusions reflect on the contradictions in societies, committed to equality, which increasingly tolerate less sexual abuse and aggression and at the same time are becoming more tolerant towards pornographic contents freely accessed by young people as a school of misogyny and violence. Some of the most serious consequences of those contradictions are dealt with by way of three current examples.