The Pornification of America: How Raunch Culture Is Ruining Our Society

About the Book

An up-close look at how porn permeates our culture
Pictures of half-naked girls and women can seem to litter almost every screen, billboard, and advertisement in America. Pole-dancing studios keep women fit. Men airdrop their dick pics to female passengers on planes and trains. To top it off, the last American President has bragged about grabbing women "by the pussy."
This pornification of our society is what Bernadette Barton calls "raunch culture." Barton explores what raunch culture is, why it matters, and how it is ruining America. She exposes how internet porn drives trends in programming, advertising, and social media, and makes its way onto our phones, into our fashion choices, and into our sex lives. From twerking and breast implants, to fake nails and push-up bras, she explores just how much we encounter raunch culture on a daily basis—porn is the new normal.
Drawing on interviews, television shows, movies, and social media, Barton argues that raunch culture matters not because it is sexy, but because it is sexist. She shows how young women are encouraged to be sexy like porn stars, and to be grateful for getting cat-called or receiving unsolicited dick pics. As politicians vote to restrict women's access to birth control and abortion, The Pornification of America exposes the double standard we attach to women's sexuality.

About the Author :
Bernadette Barton is Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies at Morehead State University. She is the author of The Pornification of America: How Raunch Culture is Ruining Our Society, Stripped: More Stories from Exotic Dancers, and Pray the Gay Away: The Extraordinary Lives of Bible Belt Gays.

Review :
"Zippy and well illustrated, this book persuasively argues that 'equating hypersexualization with sex positivity is a form of Orwellian doublespeak.'" (New York Times Book Review) "Barton, a professor of sociology and gender studies at Morehead State University, assembles her case against porn and pornification through a blend of pop-culture analysis and interviews (mostly with young women in their 20s)...The Pornification of America is a solid update of the traditional feminist case against porn." (The Washington Post) "Once dismissed as a teenage phase, raunch culture is now a path to the presidency. Barton inspires us to take America back. Deftly teasing apart notions of sex positivity, sexual liberation, and radical feminism, she exposes raunch culture's pernicious lie: that pornification is empowerment. And not a moment too soon." - Lisa Wade, author of American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus "Feel anger, rage, or hope. It is impossible to read The Pornification of America without feeling something about the thorny issues of mediated sexual desire in the 21st century. Bernadette Barton writes about the relentless capitalist commodification of female sexiness and the people who participate in it. From incels to pastors to politicians, nobody is exempt from the objectified and self-objectified raunch culture that Barton portrays. This book aims to deprogram readers' subconscious conditioning and create the mental space to imagine a sex-positive revolution, not merely sexist shadows of that goal." - Shira Tarrant, author of The Pornography Industry: What Everyone Needs to Know "In The Pornification of America, Bernadette Barton offers a multi-faceted examination of what she calls 'raunch culture' in American society. She has a sophisticated awareness of feminist debates that are attuned to both protecting women's right to bodily self-determination—and our right to do what we please with our bodies—while simultaneously remaining critical of sexist and racialized cultural commodifications that can have insidious effects on women's sense of feminist freedoms." - Lynn Chancer, author of After the Rise and Stall of American Feminism: Taking Back a Revolution "In her timely book, Bernadette Barton shows us how raunch culture has invaded every aspect of our lives—personally, professionally and politically. This book should be used on college campuses across the country to stimulate debate on how we got here, why it matters and what we can do to change it." - Kathleen A. Bogle, author of Hooking Up: Sex, Dating and Relationships on Campus "The Pornification of America is an excellent book for considering how sexism shapes popular culture and consequently public vernacular and social relationships. This is a great read for students or for any reader curious about the politics of raunch culture." - Kristen Barber, author of Styling Masculinity: Gender, Class, and Inequality in the Men's Grooming Industry "Barton argues that something counterintuitive and grave is happening: as our culture becomes increasingly sexualized, it is actually becoming less sex-positive ... Barton is insightful too about the shortcomings of a culture that upholds consent as the best (and too often only) way for girls and everyone else to articulate their feelings about sex, sexual desire, and sexual attention." (Boston Review) "A valuable contribution to works about sex, the pornication of culture, feminism and the objectication of women. Undoubtedly, the book has a place in every Gender and Women's Studies class taught in college, but discussions brought up in the book should start earlier than that, with High School students and between parents/caregivers and children." (Metapsychology) "Pornification does demonstrate Bernadette Barton's skill as a teacher and her many insights into one of the most important and under-scrutinized features of our contemporary culture.... We do need ways of understanding these phenomena, talking about them, and teaching ourselves and each other how to resist, interact with, produce, or consume them responsibly." (Journal of American Culture)