I teach people about porn.
That’s my job, or part of it, as an assistant professor in the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies program at Temple University. In January 2023, I launched a brand-new college-level course that focuses on the study of porn with a very specific goal: to help heal the painful social divisions in our country.
It’s no secret that waking up in America today often means waking up to deep, painful, social and political divisions, which seem to be intensifying with alarming speed.
Each time I read a new headline stoking the flames of these divisions, I become more certain that thoughtful, less fraught conversations about porn and sexuality education are part of the solution to healing our wounds and bringing us back together.
My goal is to make the unspeakable, speakable. We need to make talking about sex and porn as normal as talking about the weather.
The more normal we can make these conversations, the more likely we are to recognise our shared humanity, reconnect with our human-ness, and stop hurting each other.
Thinking this is one thing. Acting on it is another. But the more I thought about it, the more I knew I needed to practice what I preach if I was going to make something I wholeheartedly believed into a reality.
So in January 2023, I walked into my boss’s office and said the words that would get most employees sent to Human Resources: “Porn – I want to teach a course about porn.”
Before I could even finish the sentence, I partly regretted it and wished I could stuff it back in my mouth.
To my surprise and delight, my program director barely batted an eye and enthusiastically agreed.
The conversation was so normal – not controversial, or sensational – just normal. My proposed course met with a similar reaction from everyone else at Temple University, including administrators and students.
I suspect everyone, not just my students, craves spaces to have these conversations without the real or manufactured outrage that often accompanies them.
A few months later, we launched Social Perspectives in Digital Pornography: The Other Sex Education to a record student enrolment.
Every Monday night for an entire 16-week semester, I met with 40 students and talked about digital porn. The course wasn’t nearly as sensational as what most people might think, mostly because we were not watching porn as part of the curriculum.
Instead, students traced the history of porn and its evolution into the modern porn industry with the introduction of photography, watched TED Talks and documentaries, and talked about what digital porn teaches or doesn’t teach about sex, consent, violence, body image, pleasure, intimacy and communication across all identities.
Throughout it all, we grappled with the influence and impact of a medium that is used by nearly three in four men and two in five women but rarely ever discussed.
In each class, I took an objective, evidence-based approach that demonstrates that porn isn’t all good or all bad, and that talking about porn in thoughtful, nuanced ways is very, very good.
In creating a safe space to have these conversations, I gave my students permission to confront their often complicated, conflicted feelings and relationships to porn. They felt less ashamed, more connected, and more likely to empathise with one another, despite their own individual, personal beliefs and feelings.
“As much as I hoped my students would learn from me throughout the semester, I ended up learning even more from them.”
No matter what students asked or the conclusions they arrived at, we always came back to the same core questions: “Am I normal?”; “Am I lovable?”; “Am I worthy?” We were exploring the basic concepts of what it means to be human and to find belonging.
Their final journal reflections showed me just how much students benefited from asking these questions.
They talked about how this class helped them to sit with the pit of shame that they associate with sex and porn and learn to become more comfortable in their own skin. Students talked about the difficulties in being vulnerable and how they were challenged to communicate through sensitive and complex topics.
My favourite reflections are the ones where students shared a sense of empowerment and a newfound confidence in themselves. Now that they’ve reconnected with their own human-ness and the human-ness of others, they feel like they are better prepared to navigate the world. That type of learning is more valuable than any grade they could achieve.
As much as I hoped my students would learn from me throughout the semester, I ended up learning even more from them.
Through feedback from our last day of class and in their final reflection papers, they reassured me that I was not, in fact, bananas — that destigmatising sex and porn not only addresses core questions about if they are normal, lovable, and worthy, but it also helps them understand what it means to be human and how to better empathise with the sheer human-ness of others.
This course is just one of many that I’m piloting at Temple University as we explore ways to make sex education more accessible to people who want and need it.
As long as there is student interest and valuable learning outcomes, I plan to offer these courses because I believe that talking about sex and porn will help us bridge the divides that separate us.
This course and the interest that grew from it over the past semester reminded me of the isolating power of the way our traditional sex education internalises stigmatising and shameful messages about sex.
It turns sexuality into a weapon and creates community based on an “us” versus “them” attitude, making us feel insecure and suspicious of each other. The more we can do to reduce shame and fear, the more likely we are to build communities rooted in compassion, understanding and a shared sense of belonging.
In a world where we increasingly feel more polarised and disconnected from our communities, perhaps it’s time we all sit with questions about what it means to be human.
Jenn Pollitt, Ph.D., is an assistant professor and assistant director of the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies program at Temple University. She received her Ph.D. in Human Sexuality from Widener University where she trained as a sexuality educator and researcher.
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