(hell, yeah) Scarleteen

The real point, the thing that underpins all this, is the nature of human emotion. Feeling good about yourself is not the result of earning power or career success. It’s not a result of feeling morally superior to other women. It’s not a result of bumper pay packets or looking great or even what other people think of you. None of that makes you happy. Happiness is an inner spring. It’s more a reflection of who you are than what you are.

Am I happy, or am I just operating under “false consciousness” and think I am? When you understand that satisfaction is not a function of material circumstances, you see how pointless that question is.

So does porn make you happy? This study implies nothing about causation: maybe the people who stick around in porn were already happy to begin with. Maybe our occupations have exactly nothing to do with our feelings of satisfaction and self-worth. And maybe eventually we’ll stop projecting what we think people should do and feel onto others and start concentrating more on our own inner selves.