Hi I'm a historian who partially specialises in the history of sexuality & I am currently working on a project on the history of erotica. Thread incoming, but first let me clarify that what I'm talking about is regarding CONSENSUALLY MADE MATERIAL.

First of all, porn is supposed to offend people. That is its nature and purpose. Porn, by default, is going to blur the lines between the erotic, the obscene, and the offensive. If it stops doing that, it automatically ceases to be porn and becomes romance or art.

If certain forms of porn are seen as unacceptable for public display, that is because a social taboo is being violated in that porn. This shows that the social taboo is, in fact, intact and healthy in public society.

However, as long as a taboo exists, porn for it is going to exist, too. Humans are by nature curious. We want to know about the forbidden. Fantasy, pornographic or not, is a safe environment in which taboos can be played with so that most normal human curiosity can be sated.

There are also always going to be those whose curiosity is not sated by fantasy. They will want to do things IRL. However, taking away safe spaces of fantasy does not stop the overly curious from exploration - rather, it just takes away a safe space & creates a culture of silence

Furthermore, what exactly is seen as the most taboo in a given society changes over time. Rape used to be far more commonly accepted (or at least overlooked), & it was far easier to find artistic depictions of rape, too. Now people are challenging rape culture

& rape is becoming more of a taboo. And this is a good thing! So why are we seeing so much rape porn nowadays? Well, because it IS becoming more taboo than it was 20, even 10 years ago. And porn by its nature is going to reflect whatever taboos are common.

Should a society have an extremely strong taboo against, say, short skirts, then it would see a rise in pornography depicting people in short skirts. Porn does not reflect any inherent problem with a given society - it simply tells you where the taboos are.