War Porn

WHEN DOES WAR BECOME PORNOGRAPHY?

In 2004, the French social theorist Jean Baudrillard published an essay called "War Porn" in which he focused on how the explicit images of the war in Iraq borrowed from the aesthetics and production values of modern pornography. Since then, the term "war porn" has been used widely to describe the huge amounts of garish video material and photographs that emanate from wars fought in the digital age.

When does an image of war become pornographic? British journalist James Harkin wrote, "War porn is designed not to titillate, but to humiliate its victims and horrify its audience. Like pornography, its producers heighten their sense of reality by videoing themselves in the act, while its audience does the same by ogling the videos." Most people who commented on his article were offended by his definition. One poster wrote, "We have to see [to] understand." What do you think?

Resources

• Pred porn: a YouTube video of a Predator drone attack in Iraq.
• Video clips of gun camera footage are set to thrash-metal songs with titles like "Blow Me Away."
• Some observers claim that taking "trophy photos" of your enemy in an armed conflict contravenes the Geneva Convention. (Warning: graphic imagery)
• Close-up video footage of U.S. Marines in Iraq is being widely distributed on the Internet.
• "Smart bombs and war porn hit YouTube"
• Does the media show enough images of the horrors of war?
• ""War Porn," the essay that defined the trend
• Read Harkin's op-ed piece in the Guardian