“Soft“Soft Porn”Porn” PlaysPlays HardballHardball Its Tragic Effects on Women, Children & the Family Judith A. Reisman, Ph.D. Our communities and our families are being systematically corrupted by pornography says Dr. Reisman. It's time the public is made aware of the nature of this assault. The precipitous increase in divorce, venereal disease, abortion, as well as new and deadly forms of sex crimes against women and children can, to a large extent, be laid at pornography's door. In this book, Dr. Reisman documents how four decades of "soft porn" have influenced TV, film, art, music, novels, and sex education in public schools. If we are to survive as a democracy, our nation's family values must be defended. "This study must be read by all those concerned with the ways pornography and violence in the media affect the incidence of child sexual exploitation and abuse." John B. Rabun, Jr., Deputy Director, National Center for Missing and Exploited Children "[Y]our report was extremely helpful throughout the prosecution [of child molester Dwaine Tinsley]. Mr. Hardy used the report as a reference source for putting together his closing arguments, and for his cross examination. Mr. Hardy considers your report to be a great piece of work and has recommended [it] to the National Association of District Attorneys." Detective Sergeant Anthony Harper III, City of Simi Valley, CA. "Soft Porn" Plays Hardball Its Tragic Effects on Women, Children and the Family Judith A. Reisman, Ph.D. Huntington House Publishers Copyright © 1991 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review; nor may any part of this book be repro­ duced, stored in a retrieval system or copied by mechanical, photocopying, recording or other means, without permission from the publisher. Huntington House Publishers P.O. Box 53788 Lafayette, Louisiana 70505 Library of Congress Card Catalog Number 90-84932 ISBN 0-910311-92-7 Trade paper ISBN 0-910311-65-X Hard back Printed in the United States of America Table of Contents Dedication! knowledgments v Epigraph vi Part I: Soft Porn's Agenda Chapter One-" ...A Clear and Present Danger" 7 Chapter Two-A Neuro-Chemical Addiction 16 Chapter Three-A Magazine Lays Siege to a Nation 24 Chapter Four-Finding the Fantasy Playboy 32 Chapter Five-Playboy Emasculates the American Male 47 Chapter Six-A Campaign to Eliminate the Nice Girl 58 Chapter Seven-TheFamily: Playboy's Greatest Fear 68 ChapterEight-Drugs Substituted for Lost Arousal 82 Part II: Images of Children in Soft Porn Chapter Nine-Cartoons and Photos in Playboy, Penthouse, and Hustler(PPH) 98 Chapter Ten-SoftPorn's Child Magnets 114 Chapter Eleven-Kinsey's Infant Data Brought Alive 126 Part III: Where Are We Headed? Chapter Twelve-Whatever Happened to Childhood? 138 Chapter Thirteen-Women's Testimony about Pornography 160 Chapter Fourteen-Regaining a Lost Civilization 170 Appendix One 186 Appendix Two 199 Appendix Three 203 Notes 206 Index 215 iii Dedication In the larger sense, this book should serve as a flashlight for many endangered American families, cleansing the dark and secret places of husbands, wives, and children. In a more personal vein, it is dedicated to my mother and father, Ada and Matt, who taught me (by example) that our unparalleled inheritance of freedom and opportunity was paid for by the lives of millions of Americans. These gifts dictate a lifetime commitment to truth. Acknowledgments There are so many people who have distinguished them­ selves by their personal and professional assistance in sharing their own knowledge and in helping to bring this book to the public. I would be remiss, however, should I lose this oppor­ tunity to mention a few of these folks by name: Dr. Tom Landess, Dr. Linnea Smith, Dr. W.R. Coulson, Dr. John Court, Dr. George Comstock, Dr. Gordon Muir, Dr. Emanuel Landau, Dr. Franklin Osanka, Pat Buchanan, Laura Lederer, . Dr. Richard Zakia, Edward Eichel, Gladys Dickelman, Susan Orr, Richard Dryer, Jim Wootton, George Mercer, Larry Crain, John Whitehead, Randy Shaheen, Kristin Kazyak, Douglas Alexander, John Rabun, Robert Heck, Virginia Armat, and Don Turner. My thanks to my brave publisher for his generous spirit and commitment to the truth, to Barbara Banks for her willingness to be pleasant day after day, and to Laura Carroll, my editor, who without murmur, made sense and sensibility out of a manuscript with more added scribbles on it than original typed text. Deepest gratitude to you chosen few who must remain nameless who labored in the cold and damp, who kept the bill collectors at bay, who made the flowers grow, and who held my hand and opened my days to the sun. Thank you all. That which is useful in this book reflects the collective wisdom and labor of many good people. I alone am responsible for the body of ideas put forward here as well as any errata which may have inevitably crept in during the rush of publication. Should you, kind reader, somehow come upon some such slippage, do be generous and drop a line to me for correction in a future edition. Warmly, Judith Reisman, Ph.D. v Epigraph Hefner's airbrushed centerfold "was their mental mistress . they often saw her picture while making love to their wives. She ...was always available at bedside, was totally controllable, knew the perfect touch in personal places, and never said or did anything to disturb the mood before the moment of ecstasy. Each month she was a new person ... cateringto various whims and obsessions, askingnothing inreturn. She behaved in ways that real women did not. ...It was a convenient way to carry on a relationship. For the price of the magazine .. [Hugh Hefner] provided old men with young women, ugly men with desirable women, black men with white women, shy men with nymphomaniacs. He [triggered] imagined extramarital affairs of monogamous men, supplied the stimu­ lus for dormant [or impotent] men, and was thus connected with the central nervous system of Playboy readers nation­ wide." Gay Talese, ThyNeigh bor's Wif e vi Part I: Soft Porn's Agenda Chapter 1 " • • . A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER" Former U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. C. Everett Koop, declared pornographya "crushing public health problem ... a clear and present danger ... blatantly anti-human .... We must oppose it as we oppose all violence and prejudice."l Serial rapist-murderer Ted Bundy illustrated this danger in January 1989 when he talked to psychologist Dr. James Dobson on the eve of his execution. Bundy maintained that "drug store pornography"helped change a vulnerable boy into the brutal mass murderer of over thirty women and girls: This is the message I want to get across, thatas a young boy,and I mean a boy of twelveand thirteen certainly,that Iencountered ...in thelocal grocery store, in a localdrug store, thesoft-core pornography that people call "soft-core" .... [W]hatI am talking abouthappened twenty, thirty years ago in my forma­ tive stages.2 Moments before he was electrocuted, Bundy warned America about the sadosexual material children consume today: What scares and appalls me, Dr. Dobson,is when I seewhafs on cable TV,some ofthe moviesand some of the violence in the moviesthat comes into homes today,with stuffthat they wouldn't show in X-rated adult theatersthirty years ago . as it gets into the home to children who may beunattended or unaware that theymay bea Ted Bundy.) 8 "Soft Porn" Plays Hardball What did Bundy have to gain by this confession? He was about to die. On the threshold of death, he predicted a future that most academicians, sociologists, psychologists, and sexologists still ignore: There are lotsof other kidsplaying in streetsaround this country today who are going to be dead tomorrow,and the next day andthe next day and next month,because other young people are readingthe kindsof thingsand seeingthe kinds of thingsthat are available in the media today.4 Scholarly studies confmnBundy's observations. Toxic sadosexual media floods America today. Adults are not its only audience. Infact, a recent Canadian study found adoles­ cents using pornography more than adults.S Younger and younger children are exposed to sadosexual stimuli on tele­ vision, in comics, music videos, film, and books. Children by the millions are being trained by documentably more violent media than anything Ted Bundy saw as a boy. What happens to masses of children raised on blood­ chillingly violent sexual images-toxic images? Sex was not graphically displayed until the early 1970s. In 1959 Bundy was thirteen years old and Playboy (1953) was the only "soft-core"sex magazine a boy would have been likely to fmd in a local drug or grocery store. Penthousedid not appear on newsstands or in stores until September 1969. By then Bundy was in his early twenties. He had already raped, and apparently murdered, numerous young girls and women. WHAT WILL TOMORROW'S SEX CRIMINALS LOOK LIKE? Dr. Koop had warned that pornography "can prompt violence in people already leaning toward deviancy."6 Bundy and his generation used Playboy to stimulate their undevel­ oped sexual emotions. Typical of its impact on most serial rapist-murderers, Playboy took Bundy beyond his own im­ mature, inexperienced imagination. It comes as a surprise to most people that in the 1950s and 1960s, Playboy typically mixed shiny layouts of smiling, naked women, colorful sadosexual cartoons, and photo stories of sex, rape, and pain. Articles, letters, and graphics glamorized sexual deceit, rape, and even sex with children. National rape and child abuse statistics reveal that Bundy was not unique inhis response to these stimuli.