Pornography in Southeast Asia: Issues, Challenges, and Possibilities

This chapter surveys the state of pornography and sexually explicit audio-visual media in southeast Asian countries by considering the political, religious, economic, technological, and moral discourses surrounding it. Instead of doing an in-depth analysis of these discourses, the chapter attempts to describe them comparatively in the hopes of sparking scholarly debates informed by comparative approaches and initiating in-depth academic research on the local and national contexts in southeast Asia. The chapter considers pornography as a text that facilitates socialization and is crucial to the (re)production of gendered and sexualized knowledge. In terms of politics, law, religion, culture, and morality, pornography in southeast Asia is considered taboo, even illegal, because it disrupts established moral, religious, and political regimes. Economically, however, pornography sees more opportunities for production, distribution, and consumption, especially for queer individuals, as digital media enables individuals to build communities, socialize, and construct their identities using pornographic media. Lastly, the chapter charts the approaches of different southeast Asian countries in addressing child pornography, which is a pervasive issue in the region.