I have a huge problem with this term - used by the media in supposedly describing films with a large gore component, such as Hostel and the Saw series.
This is mainly because the term assumes, by use of the word 'porn', that the violence is 'excessive and without artistic merit'.
Assuming that this is a bad thing, where does one find a media critique of 'food porn'? 'Drug porn'? 'Tabloid porn'?
Can one honestly say that a tabloid publication such as In Touch is not 'excessive and without artistic merit'?
Oh, but violence is BAD, you say. Gossip harms no one.
Imagine reading fabricated headlines about yourself every day. Hearing people refer to you as 'trash'. Trying to maintain a stable relationship with someone while every shallow person in the world is attempting to analyze it.
Exposing yourself to staged violence somehow makes you a pervert. Buying countless copies of magazines promoting staged drama, however, is simply normal.
On another point, 'porn' generally refers to recorded sex.
Repeat after me: Sex is not evil.
Having sex and recording it? Fine. Consensual.
Actually torturing someone to death and recording it? Here, we have a problem.
No actual torture is occurring in these movies. Funny how 'legitimate' films with excessive sex scenes are never referred to as 'porn'. Why? Because these are actors, and their credentials pardon all scenes requiring nudity.
'Porn' should not be a bad word.
Is there some agenda behind the term 'torture porn' to associate all horror films with the taboo of 'pornography'?
There is something much more sick, to me, about the inherent voyeurism involved in reading tabloids than there is in watching a few anonymous fictions get their heads cut off.