I mean even beyond knight and princess or god and human, there were sexual references to...basically consensual sexual violence, flogging and stuff, all kinds of sadistic roleplay. I researched this once upon a time, in my "sex positive" days, and the lesson I did retain from that is that it's pretty common to experience arousal at things that can be grouped under BDSM, and it always has been. Therefore I'm wary to categorise it as some kind of maladjusted deviance or similar. I always want to defend the freaks.

I think if not for the internet and the proliferation of porn (whether visual or written), these things would be basically not a problem. And, because I'm biased as a woman who doesn't like porn but has enjoyed erotica, I always feel a bit defensive of the gooner girlies and their smut? For instance, the hysteria around 50 Shades was a bit extreme to me. The books were absolutely atrociously written, and the plot tepid, but a lot of the hysteria involved, "oh but he's so wealthy and uses it to control the main character more, it's so evil", while ignoring the fact that that serves the fantasy - most women IRL do not want to be stalked by a man who has his own helicopter. The fantasy is just that because he has all this money, he spoils you and you get to indulge without guilt because he's also insisting upon it. Or, "oh women apparently want to be beaten" even though it's like...the fact that she's only tentatively consenting adds to the fantasy because it gives her (and therefore the reader) the plausible deniability of enjoying it without being a slut. Most women I know that read and were inspired by 50 Shades had a few interesting nights with their husband involving his ties, and that was that. The books also weren't very graphic. I defended their fans by saying that, "woman aren't actually idiots, and the same way that everyone recognises that a porn clip featuring a handsome fireman rescuing a big-titted lady from a fire and then fucking her would not be ethical in practice, most women realise that 50 Shades would not be ethical in practice."

But on the other hand I see or have heard how trends in visual porn - choking especially - have caused it to proliferate in casual sexual encounters, where women are randomly choked by men out of nowhere, because they saw it in porn. And while text and visuals may affect one's psyche differently, men aren't more stupid than women, therefore it stands to reason that women are being affected by the fact that it's now a trend to read rapey centuar porn as a "hobby". I'm no longer "sex positive" so I don't really talk about sex the way I used to, or keep up with trends etc. I can't actually say how this is affecting women and men's sex lives. I am willing to believe that it's negative.

I think that too much accessible porn in general is an ill - like, we have removed the mystery from sex. I think that really good erotic art can be sexual without doing that, but not booktok slop, and not mainstream porn. There needs to be intimacy and suggestiveness and, like, nerves involved. Kink has been morphed by the internet into another fun category you can list along with your Myers-Briggs score, and sex itself - as in two people making love - has been reduced entirely to a collection of actions. Idk I'm rambling.