The sensation of pleasure humans feel when looking at… Ruins? This is called ruin porn. Why is it called this, and why isn’t it even a phrase might be someone’s first thought after hearing such a phrase, it surely was mine. So why is it a phrase used in academic language, simply because it is a way to describe the social aspect of people trying to understand an emotional feeling people get from observing ruins, and the fear of the chaos that they come from. Which is weird because ruins basically represent the death and destruction of a distant society which should be disturbing and unnerving to observe. Thinking of a time that was once there and the people and social structures, so people are receiving pleasure from looking at destruction. This makes sense to me in the world we live in today, we have tons of action movies, war movies, and superhero movies that all emphasis the destruction that occurs within those realities and they dominate the box office because people enjoy watching those things come to play on the big screen, and seeing how in the end a majority of a time from those destructions come rebirth, and a better society from the one destroyed. So in the end people who enjoy looking at ruins and partaking in seeing ruin porn, observe and learn from those fallen societies what worked and things that didn’t work, to use in their own or a new society.

       Another thing I feel like may influence the way people perceive the word ruin porn negatively is simply because of the connotation of the word porn. The negative connotation with porn goes far back in our history, and something I think can even be pulled from the bible, “But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart”(Matthew 5:28), porn is basically looking at predominantly naked women or women in an inappropriate manner, which is what is being said and looked down upon by God. We see this sense of women and nakedness being taboo in the book of Genesis with Adam and Eve. Because like Adam and Eve who were at first innocent not even recognizing their nakedness tricked into eating the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they all of a sudden feel shameful and even like it’s a taboo. And this notion of shame and taboos I feel like is introduced and prevalent in the world from which “they created”. The thought of porn has the very close association of taboo and it goes to show with Adam and Eve that once we become knowledgeable about norms and cultures taboos are quickly picked up and recognized as so. So why is ruin porn not seen as Taboo in the academic sphere of knowledge?

       From my understanding and analysis of the words and their meanings, ruin porn is a term used in a manner not to showcase taboos of the pleasure people get from staring at ruins but how society as a whole is captivated by this phrase that represents something so negative and destructive as a way to be helpful and improve our societies. Even the recognition of how the word porn and its original connotation being negative, from something as old as the bible and now it is being used in academic language shows the progress and change in norms in our society from then to know.

CNN article “What ‘ruin porn’ tells us about ruins”