Also, does anyone want to take a guess how long street lights have been around? Only 200 years - first gas, then electric. So, go ahead and try to picture in your mind just how dark cities were prior to that time - notwithstanding maybe a few torches here & there. Now, incorporate the cultural elements listed above. OK, all set? James Boswell - the author of the Life of Johnson - described being propositioned by a young 15 yo girl from an outer village in downtown London (1780) as he was walking home from a party. He thought about it for a moment, and then right there for the equivalent of maybe $5, not 10 yards off a main drag in front of a park, he & the girl did their thing.
This is the way sexual dynamics were from pre-history up until the Victorian age. It's not coincidental that the era of mores and prohibitions began once technology allowed police forces to control/illuminate public areas. As the author noted, it's deeply ingrained evolutionary behavior. The only thing different is the last 200 years which has taken mankind that long to get back to the free availability that existed beforehand.
Before welfare, girls in poverty had two choices: (a) convince a man with income to take her in, in exchange for her keeping him happy, or (b) starve.
Middle class women will NEVER go for cutting back on welfare, because they do not want competition for available desirable men.
I just read this article so am posting on this old thread. Sure, we all know everybody f*cked back in the day. As the fellow said on the TV show “Entourage”: Otherwise, how did we all get here?
But that was real life, and throughout that time, as you well know, Society discouraged random sexual liasons. And how could they have done otherwise, because you know, you get children with that sort of carrying on. (The Birth Control pill is really at the heart of all the sexual revolution.)
So no, online porn is NOT the same as getting randy with the milkmaid, or boffing the milkman.