In the late Seventies, America became shocked and outraged
by the rape, mutilation, and murder of over a dozen young,
beautiful girls. The man who committed these murders, Ted
Bundy, was later apprehended and executed. During his
detention in various penitentiaries, he was mentally
probed and prodded by psychologist and psychoanalysts
hoping to discover the root of his violent actions and
sexual frustrations. Many theories arose in attempts to
explain the motivational factors behind his murderous
escapades. However, the strongest and most feasible of
these theories came not from the psychologists, but from
the man himself, ÿas a teenager, my buddies and I would
all sneak around and watch porn. As I grew older, I
became more and more interested and involved in it,
[pornography] became an obsession. I got so involved in
it, I wanted to incorporate [porn] into my life, but I
couldnÿt behave like that and maintain the success I had
worked so hard for.
I generated an alter-ego to fulfill
my fantasies under-cover. Pornography was a means of
unlocking the evil I had burried inside myselfÿ (Leidholdt
47). Is it possible that pornography is acting as the key
to unlocking the evil in more unstable minds?
According to Edward Donnerstein, a leading researcher
in the pornography field, ÿthe relationship between
sexually violent images in the media and subsequent
aggression and . . . callous attitudes towards women is
much stonger statistically than the relationship between
smoking and cancery (Itzin 22). After considering the
increase in rape and molestation, sexual harassment, and
other sex crimes over the last few decades, and also the
corresponding increase of business in the pornography
industry, the link between violence and pornogrpahy needs
considerable study and examination. Once the evidence you
will encounter in this paper is evaluated and quantified,
it will...