Porn Nation

An assistant professor of business administration at the Harvard Business School talked one of the top-ten vendors of online "adult entertainment" (a.k.a., porn) into sharing certain anonymous information about where the bucks for paid nakedness were being spent. The porn company shared the zip codes "associated with all credit card subscriptions" for online porn with the researcher. You can guess what's coming here, right?

Subscriptions are slightly more prevalent in states that have enacted conservative legislation on sexuality .... In the 27 states where "defense of marriage" amendments have been adopted (making same-sex marriage, and/or civil unions unconstitutional), subscriptions to this adult entertainment are weakly more prevalent than in other states....

Those who were prone to referring to their own "red-state" areas as "the real America" back during last year's campaign will want to stake a good deal of their current reputations on the researcher's use of that adverb weakly in that last sentence. Otherwise, there's not a lot to be proud of here, O ye of the Bible Belt.

...subscriptions are also more prevalent in states where surveys indicate conservative positions on religion, gender roles, and sexuality. In states where more people agree that "Even today miracles are performed by the power of God" and "I never doubt the existence of God," there are more subscriptions to this service. Subscriptions are also more prevalent in states where more people agree that "I have old-fashioned values about family and marriage" and "AIDS might be God's punishment for immoral sexual behavior."

This adds evidence to our longstanding assumption that the person railing the loudest about other people's sins is very likely more guilty of that sin than the people he's pointing the finger at. And the bigots screaming about gays are themselves signaling some powerfully frightening private urges.

We're particularly amused that Utah, possibly the reddest state in the Union, has the highest precentage of porn subscriptions per thousand people in the whole country. Apparently, Utah's "redness" is more than just a political inclination.

FOOTNOTE: HT: C.D. The full report, "Red Light States: Who Buys Online Adult Entertainment?" can be read here (pdf file).