14 Mind-Blowing Facts About Porn in America

Porn is everywhere. Hardcore, softcore, all sorts of fetishes; there's almost no escaping it. Reports vary, but according to one study, 77% of Americans view pornography at least once a month. This infographic claims 40 million Americans (about 12% of the population) are regular visitors to porn sites and that 12% of websites (or roughly 26,644,172 sites) are pornographic. Take a look:

Some of these numbers are astounding. But what arguably makes them more interesting is the fact that while porn viewing continues to increase to these dizzying numbers, over the past 30 years, Americans' moral sense of porn viewing has barely changed. According to a new CNN poll, while support for "smoking marijuana" and "engaging in homosexual behavior" has grown tremendously since 1987, support for "looking at a pornographic magazine" has barely budged. 

Image Credit: CNN

Since 1987, the population who thought smoking pot was morally wrong was cut in half to 35%, and those surveyed who thought homosexual acts were morally wrong dropped from 82% to 50%. In 1987, 58% of the polled believed viewing porn was morally wrong (the poll actually asked about "looking a pornographic magazine," but come on, who really uses magazines any more?), in 2014 that number dropped, but only 12 points to 46%. Why are our thoughts on porn so different from weed and homosexuality? 

Because porn viewing statistics tend to vary, it can be hard to get firm numbers, but if we take this report that claims 77% of Americans view pornography at least once a month compare it to 46% of people who think viewing porn is morally wrong, something isn't adding up. Are the other 33% just looking "for science"?

But putting that aside, the better question might be "why?" Why have Americans relaxed on some of these very polarizing social issues, but remained relatively unchanged on pornography, which, like it or not, is basically everywhere? If you look at advertising campaigns (I'm looking at you, American Apparel), movies, and TV shows, we've clearly become a lot more relaxed about nudity and sexual suggestive imagery, and while this stuff isn't "hardcore," it wouldn't be far off to say that porn is "everywhere you look."

When our porn viewing number are what they are, and we're regularly seeing stuff like this, why are so many Americans still so morally opposed to porn?