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THE HARM OF PORN
Porn’s impact on the individual
Anyone who considers pornography to be a harmless, ‘victimless crime’ should consider the insidious ‘slippery slope’ of the continued viewing of pornography. Dr Victor Cline, a clinical psychologist at the University of Utah, USA, described the four- step process whereby a person becomes addicted to porn:[1]
Step 1: Addiction to the material and repeated return to it for sexual excitement. Cline says this addiction is so powerful, that his severely affected clients have to use medications such as Depo-Provera to try reduce the sex drive and eliminate sex fantasies, and may need to attend Sexaholics Anonymous for up to four nights a week to achieve sobriety and break the stranglehold of their addiction. Virtually no casual user/viewer of porn is exempt from the addictive effect of exposure to it. The accessibility and anonymity of porn on the Internet increases the danger.
Step 2: Escalation in the individual's need for more explicit, deviant and sexually shocking material to achieve the same level of sexual stimulation.
Step 3: Desensitisation towards initially gross and shocking material so that, in time, this material becomes acceptable and desirable to the viewer.
Step 4: Increased tendency to start ‘acting out’ sexual activities seen in porn.
Many people excuse their involvement in pornography by saying that they use material that is “not violent”. Dolf Zillman and his colleague Jennings Bryant who have conducted many studies on pornography say, “Our findings strongly support the view that continued exposure to non-violent heterosexual pornography arouses interest in and creates a taste for porn that portrays less commonly practised sexual activities, including those involving the infliction of pain.”[2]
Desensitisation
They exposed men and women to lesser and greater amounts of non-violent porn (“no exposure”, “intermediate exposure” and “massive exposure”) and then asked the subjects to recommend a prison sentence for a man convicted of rape. They found that people exposed to porn recommended much shorter sentences for rapists than those in the “no exposure” groups. Those in the “massive exposure” group recommended sentences only half as long as those in the “no exposure” group.[3] In the same study, Zillmann and Bryant discovered that people in the intermediate and massive exposure groups “grossly overestimated” the popularity of unusual sexual practices, such as group sex, sadomasochism and bestiality. They were also much less likely to judge pornography as offensive or to recommend restricting its availability, even to minors.[4]
Trivialisation of rape
In another similar study by Neil Malamuth, subjects exposed to common non-violent pornography less than five hours over a six-week period, halved their previous assessment of sentences they thought appropriate for rape.[5] Rape is trivialised and the ‘rape myth’ – that women want to be raped – is promoted.
Deception
Rapists use much the same logic. Lindie Wadhams, a former social worker and counsellor at Safeline says, “One of the many distortions abusers believe is that the child or woman seduced by them wanted to be abused/raped by them. Pornography often depicts women enjoying being raped, or encouraging it. The perpetrator lacks empathy for the victim due to the desensitisation effect of pornography, and therefore is not deterred from harming the person because he doesn’t perceive it as harmful.”[6]
Impact
One of the most comprehensive meta-analyses regarding pornography’s effects on individuals is a study conducted by Oddone-Paolucci, Genuis, and Violato (2000).[7] For this meta-analysis, 46 studies published in various academic journals were analysed to determine the effect of pornography on:
(a) Sexual deviancy (e.g. excessive or ritualistic masturbation);
(b) Sexual perpetration (e.g. rape);
(c) Attitudes regarding intimate relationships (e.g. viewing people as sexual objects); and
(d) Attitudes regarding the rape myth (e.g. believing women cause rape or rapists deserve lenient sentences).
In order to be selected for the meta-analysis, each study had to include a sample size of 12 or greater and include a comparison group.
The studies ranged in date from 1962 to 1995 and comprised a total sample of 12323 people. 85% of the studies (39) were conducted in the United States, 11% were conducted in Canada, and two studies were conducted in Europe.
One reason this study is particularly useful, is that nine different characteristics of the participants and the pornographic material consumed are taken into consideration: age of exposure, gender, socio-economic status, number of exposure incidents, relation of person who introduced pornography to the user, degree of sexual explicitness, subject of the pornography, medium used to consume pornography, and definition of pornography.
Oddone-Paolucci, Genuis, and Violato found that exposure to pornographic material puts one at increased risk for developing sexually deviant tendencies, committing sexual offenses, experiencing difficulties in one’s intimate relationships, and accepting rape myths.
Risk
In terms of the degree of risk, the analysis revealed a 31% increase in the risk of sexual deviancy, a 22% increase in the risk of sexual perpetration, a 20% increase in the risk of experiencing negative intimate relationships, and a 31% increase in the risk of believing rape myths.
Dysfunctional
The researchers acknowledged that while pornography is likely not a solitary influence in people’s lives, exposure to pornography is one important factor that contributes directly to the development of sexually dysfunctional attitudes and behaviours.
Role models
A particular concern is the impact on boys whose fathers use porn. These young men are placed in a position where they either have to admit that their father’s involvement in porn is perverse or that there is nothing wrong with porn. Because of the natural desire of a young man to identify with his father, he usually chooses the latter. In a study conducted by Cornett and Shuntich in 1991, they found that college men who reported a greater propensity of some kind for sexual coercion/aggression, mentioned that their fathers read magazines such as Playboy and Penthouse frequently or watched X-rated movies frequently.[8]
The effects of porn on the brain
In The Drug of the New Millennium, Mark Kastleman[9] describes why porn addiction is so dangerous for the addict. In any sexual arousal experience, the brain goes into a ‘funnel’ effect, blocking out all distractions. However, in contrast to a married couple entering the ‘funnel’, porn is ‘heartless’ of design. With his heart and spirit disconnected from the funnel process, the porn-viewer’s brain is in control and is totally focussed on ‘me, mine and more’. With no heart and spirit to create balance, the brain is not restricted to narrow but to super-narrow. The release of natural chemicals by the body speeds the process on its way. Once into the narrowed focus of the porn funnel, the addict no longer has the ability to think. The overpowering flood of chemicals overrides his thought and reason abilities. The frontal lobes (logic centre of brain) are virtually shut down and the limbic system, which controls the pleasure/emotional centres take over.
Mind-altering
Pornographic images cause secretion of the body’s ‘flight or fight’ sex hormones. This triggers excitatory transmitters and produce non-rational, involuntary reactions, intense arousal states that overlap sexual lust – now with fear, shame, and/or hostility and violence. Addiction to pornography is essentially addiction to ‘erototoxins’ – mind-altering drugs produced by the viewer’s own brain.[10] Porn is as addictive as LSD or heroin.[11]
Like cocaine and methamphetamine addiction, porn addiction causes shrinking of the frontal lobes of the brain.
Women and porn addiction
Women are less interested in pornography than men. Women are more interested in relational connectedness and place a higher priority on the sensory package as a whole. For porn to be addictive to women, there must be tenderness, love and romance. This is why romance novels (including some that are explicit) are popular among many women. When it comes to sex on the Internet, they are therefore more easily drawn into Internet chat rooms. Chat rooms consist of informal groups of people who ‘meet’ on an Internet chat room page, then ‘talk’ with one another privately by typing messages sent via the page’s instant messaging function. All this is behind a ‘shield’ of anonymity that may lend itself to full disclosure, beyond that of even some marriages. Over time her conversations may become more bold and explicit. Before the woman realises it, she has achieved an artificial intimacy that she perceives to be superior to that of her marriage. This will destroy a woman’s marriage.
South Africans are prone to porn’s messages
Many factors contribute toward some people being more prone to pornography’s message. As described previously, the use by their parents, or other authority figures, of the material is a primary influence. The age of the user, the amount of time he or she is exposed to it, past abuse, his education or lack thereof of its dangers, are other factors. A factor of particular concern is one described by Cape Town sexologist Dr Angelo Grazioli in his booklet Pornography in South Africa (1995). He writes, “As a sex therapist practising in South Africa I find that the exceptionally violent climate of the society, and the high incidence of broken family units, has left many individuals with a pre-established vulnerability to the most misleading and destructive effects of SEM… I observe large sectors of the society in transition from rural to urban settings, in transition from lower to higher socio-economic status, and in transition from disempowered to empowered class… Such transitory status renders individuals, hungry for success, to be particularly vulnerable to symbols of freedom, independence and maturity.” Grazioli said that he “frequently encounter(s) individuals whose acceptance and use of SEM has more to do with a quest for such upward mobility than with a carefully thought out logic.” South Africans, he said, therefore are relatively more vulnerable to the negative effects of SEM than ‘first-world’ societies.
Variables that determine porn's affect on individuals
Why do some people get addicted to porn quicker than others? Why does addiction to porn lead some to commit rape or abuse and not others? Dr Angelo Grazioli, a sexologist, has identified five variables that determine the effect SEM will have on any individual[12]. In the same way that an advert on TV is more likely to influence one person more than another, the following factors determine to what extent a person is affected by the consumption of pornography.
- Motivation to process material. This can range from general curiosity, to entertainment, to desiring sexual stimulation for arousal. A teenager seeking peer group acceptance is not motivated to critically assess SEM shown at a party. Such a teenager will be primarily concerned with reacting in a manner which promotes peer acceptance and respect. A mother who finds SEM in her son’s room will lead her to a careful criticism of the SEM concerned. A male viewing porn in order to arouse himself will process it in a different manner.
- Ability to process material. Individuals vary greatly in their ability to process porn. One’s moral upbringing, education or level of intelligence can all affect a person’s ability to critically evaluate the messages sent through SEM. Arguments around “free speech” are grounded in the presupposition that all individuals have the ability to process effectively the SEM they choose to view, without consequent harm or danger to themselves or others. This is not a predictable factor and therefore one fraught with hazard. The young man raised permissively by godless, or distant parents, who never modelled true love in action, will lack the basic insight necessary to effectively differentiate between love and sex and/or genital versus non-genital expression of sexuality.
- Degree of sensitisation/desensitisation. Repeated exposure to SEM desensitises a person to SEM’s lies, that, for example, women enjoy pain being inflicted on them during sexual intercourse.
- Pre-established degree of vulnerability. If a man has been sexually abused as a child, they may have a distorted view of sexuality. Someone raised with an extreme lack of parental love may try to combat his loneliness, or low self-esteem, through phone sex or interactive porn websites. Victims of child abuse are known to be more likely to abuse others when not adequately helped, or able to successfully process this trauma. Similarly, borderline, antisocial, or psychopathic, personalities are extremely vulnerable to the desensitising of all SEM. More commonly, well-adjusted, but extremely impulsive, individuals are more likely to engage in harmful activities.
- Degree of exposure to co-existing persuasion forces. Another powerful influence promoting the uncritical consumption of SEM is provided by popular figures who belittle SEM’s destructive potential, or actually promote its distribution. If a pornographic film, for example featured a celebrity (as did Basic Instinct with Sharon Stone) and was well made, this may give someone a greater interest to process the material and absorb its message.
The impact of porn on the family
Dr James Dobson commented in the Final Report of the Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography 1986, “What is at stake here is the future of the family itself. We are sexual creatures, and the physical attraction between males and females provides the basis for every dimension of marriage and parenthood. Thus anything that interjects itself into that relationship must be embraced with great caution.” Doreen Meissner, from the South African anti-porn organisation STOP, explains how porn can lead to the breakdown of the family: “Pornography attacks family life – exposure to it erodes and finally destroys family relationships. The mother is frequently portrayed as an object to be humiliated, ridiculed and abused. When respect for the mother goes out of the window, she can no longer fulfil her role as the cornerstone of the family. The wife and mother may also suffer so much physical and psychological damage from the deviant, frequently violent, sexual behaviour inflicted by a husband hooked on pornography, that she is degraded to the extent that she loses all motivation to function as a normal mother who cares for her children… Where a husband is addicted to viewing the glamorous models in their explicit poses in glossy pornographic magazines his own ‘forty-something’ wife no longer matches up to his expectations. Group sex, swapping of partners, even violent sex – all this becomes acceptable and the scene is set for divorce. The tragedy of divorce for children needs no elaboration… sadly the way is often open to neglect and even abuse – sexual abuse by step-fathers being particularly common.” [13] The spread of AIDS and other sexual transmitted diseases is also exacerbated by promiscuity, which is so often spurred on by porn.
Dr Grazioli said he often deals with men whose view of human sexuality was predominantly gained from the narrow picture given by porn and thus they “experience difficulties when faced with the reality of a spouse’s much broader needs and desires.” He also encounters individuals (mostly women) battling for years to regain self-esteem and security following the discovery of their partner’s use of sexually explicit material.[14] “Therapists report many individuals conditioned by repeated exposure to SEM who consequently are left unaroused, or even repulsed, by their spouse’s no longer youthful body…. SEM often portrays sexual activity involving three or more people as normal and enjoyable. Therapists report relationships damaged by a partner’s suggestion, or insistence, that they engage in partner swops, or sex with a third party.”[15]
Marcel Londt, a clinical social worker who has worked with sex offenders in Pollsmoor Prison, says that “Violence against women and children is intertwined with the production and availability of pornography. I have heard several personal accounts of and by perpetrators who have admitted to using pornography…” They use porn in order to “undermine their victims and the anticipated resistance to the abuse… Many of them excused their violence by referring to the ‘blue movies’ where women seem to want to please their partners.”[16]
The impact of porn on communities
The impact on the individual and the family has been considered, but what about the greater community? Many pro-porn puppets say, “If you don’t like it, don’t look, and it won’t harm you.” But just because you do not look at it, does not mean that it no longer exists. Even if you do not look at it, do not have it in your home, or choose not to have anything to do with porn, its insidious harm will affect your community and possibly you and your family directly. Will putting your head in the sand, as the pro-pornographers would have you do, mean it won’t harm the society you live in? To say that all this can carry on and not poison the environment you live in, is ridiculous.
Porn and rape
Porn is connected to all forms of sexual crimes. Lindie Wadhams, a former social worker at Safeline says, “About 80% of the perpetrators I worked with admitted to being involved with pornography, ranging from soft-core pornography to hard-core pornography…”[17]
Researcher John Court conducted a study showing the relationship between the availability of porn and the reported rape rate in five regions, one of them, South Africa. The study was done in 1979 when South Africa was clamping down on porn. Court believed that in South Africa “the desire for pornography appears to be much more pronounced among white people” and therefore limited his analysis of rape rates in SA to those committed by white people. He compared the rape rates from 1960–1977 in three regions with permissive legislation on porn (the US, Denmark and South Australia) with those of Singapore and South Africa, both of which restricted porn. Complete data for 1960–1977 was available for these regions. From his study he concluded, “Countries adopting a liberal approach to pornography have, contrary to expectations, experienced major increases in rape reports in the years following the inception of that approach. By contrast, those jurisdictions taking a conservative stance have experienced only minimal increases. It is not argued that the availability of pornography is the only relevant factor.” He described another important factor: “Where the probability of being sent for trial, and receiving sentence if found guilty, is low, a higher rate of offences could be expected.” He said, “Any proposals to liberalise the laws relating to pornography should be considered in the light of the adverse consequences which have now been experienced consistently where liberalisations has been tried.” [18] Incidentally, South Africa had the lowest rate for the increase in rape at that time.
Other research found that:
- Rapists are 15 times more likely than non-offenders to have had exposure to hard-core porn during childhood, between ages six and ten.[19]
- 86% of rapists studied admitted regular use of porn. [20]
- 57% of serial rapists admitted imitating pornographic scenes in the commission of sex crimes.[21]
- Baron and Straus determined that there are “significant positive correlations between a state’s rape rate and per capita sales” of pornographic magazines such as Playboy and Hustler.[22]
- Research on 36 serial sex murderers revealed that 81% reported pornography as one of their highest sexual interests.[23]
Porn and child abuse
Another link is the connection between porn and child molestation. 87% of molesters of girls and 77% of molesters of boys studied in Ontario, Canada, admitted to regular use of hard-core porn.[24]
Former Safeline social worker, Lindie Wadhams, said that survivors of abuse often reported to her how the perpetrator used porn to lure them. “They would feel immense guilt and the pornography was used to assure them that if adults are doing this they shouldn’t be reluctant to.”[25]
Londt says of her work with rapists and child molesters in Pollsmoor Prison, “Child molesters in our programs have referred to various films and publications which they have used to force
their child victims into compliance.” Rapists and sexual abusers used pornography to make them feel ‘okay’ about what they are
doing. Wadhams reports how, “a 42-year-old South African father of three children said that it was only after viewing pornography at an Amsterdam airport that he gained the courage to act on his impulse to sexually abuse his niece. The pornography made it okay for him and legitimised his deviant urges.”
Pornography, especially child pornography, is used by paedophiles for three reasons:
- to stimulate themselves;
- to destroy the consciences and lower the inhibitions and resistance to sexual activity in their intended child victims; and
- to teach the child what to model in their sexual encounter with the adult.[26]
There are strong moves to deal with child porn as the harm it does is recognised internationally. This is laudable, but if authorities are serious about protecting children, adult porn must be banned too.
When children are exposed to porn
Dr James Dobson in the Final Report of the Commission on Pornography, 1986 said, “It appears extremely naïve to assume that the river of obscenity which has inundated the American landscape has not invaded the world of children… Obviously, obscenity cannot be permitted to flow freely through the veins of society without reaching the eyes and ears of our children.” Marcel Londt of Safeline says that during interviews with school staff and principals, they often pulled out of drawers and cupboards porn confiscated from their pupils.
The Internet and cell phones have made the exposure of children to pornography “10 times worse”, estimates Clive Human, Chairman of STOP. Teachers he has spoken to at primary schools, have been shocked at the pornography children have accessed on their, or their friends’, cell phones, or via the Internet. One mother even mentioned that her child had accessed bestiality images on their home computer. The child had been told about these images from friends at school and then had inquisitively gone and searched them out.
Exposing children to porn is a form of child sexual abuse and its effects are serious. A study by Drs. Davis and Braucht, funded by the U.S. 1970 Presidential Commission on Obscenity and Pornography, found that exposure to pornography at a young age was the strongest predictor of sexual deviance. The study found that “the amount of exposure was significantly correlated with a willingness to engage in group sexual relations (and other serious sexual deviance); and there were trends for the number of both high school heterosexual partners and total homosexual partners to be positively related to (pornographic) exposure.”[27] Young children are not neurologically ready to process sexually stimulating information.
According to the CEO of Doctors for Life, Dr Albu van Eeden, the primitive brain (limbic system) matures in a child long before the thinking brain (neocortex and prefrontal cortex).
“That means the child can ‘feel’, and ‘experience’ sexual images and sexual touches from an adult before the child can even express him or herself. These memories are stored sometimes subconsciously and can lead to deviant behaviour later in life,” he says.
“Pornographic images cause a combination of feelings of lust, fear, disgust, anger, etc. All these feelings form part of the addictive nature of pornography. However, in children fear is often the primary response due to the fact that they do not have the emotional, or cognitive, skills to handle the impulses,” says Van Eeden. “The results are clear, life-long memories and mental scars.”
Furthermore, Van Eeden notes that since children’s ability to differentiate between fantasy and reality is very weak, they easily adopt attitudes and behaviour seen in pornographic material as
acceptable and normal, thus making them even more vulnerable to abuse.
Researchers Gill and Johnson have concluded that the exposure of children to pornography can traumatize them to such an extent that they cannot fully comprehend or assimilate the material:
A frightened four-year old who is forced to observe, or be part of, sexual intercourse between two adults cannot fully understand what is happening… (his) memory of the event may not be intact, yet he may suddenly repeat phrases he heard during the experience, have intrusive flashbacks… may suddenly become terrified in the presence of a male adult, or may refuse to go to bed, remembering on some level what occurred in bed… These are ways in which children re-experience fragmented aspects of trauma through behaviour, sleep disturbances, or post-traumatic stress symptoms, such as intrusive flashbacks. This is a very typical reaction of children who have been exposed to pornography.[28]
Yet, despite this harm, porn is deliberately marketed to children by porn peddlers such as Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler. Judith Reisman in her book Soft Porn Plays Hard Ball documented how these magazines target children: “Examining the 683 magazines, the research team not only identified 6004 images that included children, but thousands of additional images which qualified as ‘child magnets.’ Child magnets are images with an identifiably special appeal to the average boy or girl: three dimensional pop-ups and cut outs, fairy tales, space ships, cowboys and Indians, dolls, brides, Mickey Mouse figures and other likely ‘toys.’ One of the staff noted a pull-out called: The Playboy Colouring Book, a fourteen page colouring book. The instructions read: ‘These are extra playmates. Every playboy should have several to spare. That is because variety is the spice of life. Make one of the girls a redhead… a blonde… a brunette. It does not matter which is which. The girls’ hair colours are interchangeable. So are the girls.’”[29]
When children abuse other children
Marcel Londt, of Safeline says, “Pornography is available to young people and it does inform how they view, not only women and others, but also their younger siblings. The increase in sibling incest is not a coincidence.”[30] Frighteningly, one study found that 97% of young sex offenders had been exposed to X-rated magazines or videos; while the average age at exposure was about 7.5 years. They also found that exposure to pornography at a young age was common.[31]
Doreen Meissner of STOP says, “An alarming trend reported by the South African CPU is the ever decreasing age of offenders and the increases in child-on-child sexual crimes. Could the circulation of pornographic magazines in primary schools (which even warranted the calling in of the CPU by a South Peninsula school principal) be responsible for this? Very likely. The 18 age restriction on pornographic publications is totally ineffective – it is available to children everywhere, mainly when it is left lying about by careless adults in their homes, but also from car boot sales, to school recycling depots, to second-hand book shops, etc.”[32] Add to this the easy accessibility of porn via the Internet and smartphones and you have a recipe for disaster.
Lindie Wadhams, a former social worker at Safeline, reported that, “As part of my work I often dealt with young boys between the ages of 12–17 years who had been accused of molesting a younger child.”
Porn and racism
Porn’s insidious impact occurs in other ways. Racism, of serious concern in South Africa, is another problem with porn. Hustler, a popular men’s pornographic magazine, has, for example, “portrayed black women with enormous lips and buttocks and with grotesque vaginal areas infested with crab lice and infected with venereal disease.”[33] In South Africa, porn magazines have published the face of at least one black female politician in a urinal and invited readers to urinate in her face. Stereotypical representations abound in porn: the black male stud, the animalistic black woman, the sensuous Latina and the demure Asian geisha. Pornography vendors even have a special category, ‘interracial’, which allows consumers to pursue the various combinations of racist stereotypes.
The racism of the porn industry is so pervasive that it goes largely unnoticed. Researchers Gail Dines and Robert Jensen interviewed the producer of a DVD called Black Bros and Asian Ho’s. He was asked if he was ever criticised for the racism of such films. “No, they are very popular,” he replied.[34]
Pornographers’ promotion of drugs
Entire books have been written on this issue. Dr Judith Reisman did a study of Playboy’s promotion of illegal drug use. Not only
has Playboy pushed for its legalisation in countless articles and editorials, but the magazine even financed and underwrote the creation of an organisation to push for its legalisation.[35] According to the American Family Association, “Playboy has done more to promote the legalisation of drugs than any other single entity in America.”
While pornography purports to show women voluntarily and happily performing in pornographic movies, this is far from the truth. Many women are drugged and forced into doing it. Some are even held as slaves, or are forced to pay back ‘debts’ as prostitutes to their pimps. Others are forced into it by poverty or desperation, are sold into the sex trade by their parents, such as in Thailand, or runaways who are promised all sorts of rewards if they become ‘movie stars’ or ‘models’. At the very least, the women who enter it are broken emotionally. Many have been sexually abused, or are victims of tragedies resulting from parental divorce, or single parent homes.
Pornography, prostitution and sex trafficking
In 2010, Former Senior Advisor on Trafficking for the Office for Democracy and Global Affairs US State Department, Laura J. Lederer, summarised the link between porn, prostitution and trafficking in the following four points:
1. Some types of pornography actually use trafficked victims, some of which were recruited via fake job advertisements.
2. Some traffickers film the acts that their victims are forced to perform.
3. Pornography is used in sex trafficking and the sex industry to train women and children what to do.
4. Pornography creates, and provides rationalizations for, exploiters as to how and why their sexually exploitive behaviors are acceptable.[36]
The depiction of women as sexualised objects and as sexually available nymphomaniacs, in pornography and increasingly in mainstream media, contributes to the demand for prostitution. When there is a demand, somebody will see this as a profitable opportunity and supply the ‘goods’.
Pornography and prostitution are two sides of the same coin. Pornography is prostitution with the camera running.
There’s nothing ‘free’ about this type of ‘expression’
There is nothing free about pornography – not for the performers, the victims of users and not even for the users themselves.
Pornography destroys minds, morals and marriages but real freedom, joy, satisfaction and restoration can be found in Jesus Christ! Listen to this testimony from a Christian man:
Although I was a professing Christian, I began to develop a secret life in which I became captive to the thrill of viewing pornography and gratifying my flesh. I hid my secret life from my wife, from my friends, and from my Bible study group.
This secret life took me into my own little world where I would begin to escape reality, where I could find love and instant ‘sex’, where I would never be bored or lonely, and where I would never be rejected. Oh, how exciting it was.
But this secret life of darkness also began to consume me, to crush me, and to overpower me. By that, I mean that over time I began to lose the ability to say ‘No’ to viewing porn, and would often be overwhelmed with the desire to give in and gratify my flesh. A year or so after I became involved in viewing pornography on a regular basis, I began sex-chatting on the Internet, which led to committing adultery and also into other areas of sin.
The deeper I became involved in sin, the more I became isolated from normal society and healthy friendships. I began putting on weight and became approximately 50 pounds overweight. I also began drinking during this time in my life. My relationship with my wife was soon to follow; she filed for divorce and moved to the other side of the country, taking our two children with her.
Several years after my divorce, I remarried. However, my bondage to sin did not change one bit. I continued viewing pornography, sex-chatting on the Internet, developing other sinful relationships, and also continued in my bondage to alcohol and food. After just one year of marriage, my wife, Jody, had enough of the deception and hiding, the lies and critical spirit, and the secret life that had by now completely taken over. She began to look for help, and we found ourselves in the office of a pastor, who began to counsel me from the Bible.
This pastor shared the Gospel with me over a period of several months. He stated that God had made provision for even a deep sinner like me to find forgiveness through the Blood of Jesus Christ.
I did not think there was any hope for me. And yet, I now saw from Scripture that:
“In Him we have redemption through His Blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace” Ephesians 1:7
I saw that the Cross offered forgiveness for the guilty, and I found hope that even I might be forgiven and, not only forgiven, but given a new life in Jesus Christ. I saw that my slate could be wiped clean, that my guilt could be removed, that my sins could be covered, and I could be made new – if only I would repent. God graciously granted repentance to me; I turned away from my sins in great sorrow, and have not been back since (I’ve been free for 10 years). I continue to enjoy freedom in Christ, and I have the hope that God will keep me from falling, at least in these areas, for the rest of my life.[37]
What did God intend for sex?
Often the Christian view of sex has been thought to be some kind of prudery, a denial of the enjoyment and warmth of sexual pleasure. The world often sets up a caricature of Victorian pomposity and attacks that image, accusing Christians of trying to limit sex to a biological necessity, reluctantly permitted only for procreation, with as little enjoyment involved as possible. Michael Pearl (No Greater Joy Ministries) writes in his book, Holy Sex:
The devil didn’t create sex. God did. Sex is not the original sin; it is the original blessing. The first gift God gave to man was a beautiful, naked woman. The first commandment he gave them was “Be fruitful and multiply,” which means “copulate and make babies.” After placing the naked, married couple together in the garden, their Creator looked upon them and said “Behold, it is very good”… God gave us a whole book in the Bible that celebrates the beauty and passion of sex. It is frank, bold, lively and absolutely blushless in its freedom and freshness. Divine inspiration gave it the title – Song of Songs.[38]
John Piper writes in Sex and the Supremacy of Christ, “God created us with sexual passion so that there would be language to describe what it means to cleave to Him in love and what it means to turn away from Him to idols”.[39]
Joshua Harris writes in his book, Not Even a Hint – Guarding Your Heart Against Lust, “When we lust, we take this good thing – sexual desire – and remove from it honour toward fellow humans and reverence for God. Lust is idolatrous and an ultimately insatiable desire that rejects God’s rule and seeks satisfaction apart from Him. God says, you shall not covet. (Exodus 20:17).”[40]
Jerry Kirk, founder of the US National Coalition Against Pornography and author of The Mind Polluters, summarises how Christian parents can model a Biblical Worldview of sexuality to their children:
Children who grow up in a loving, affectionate home where the mother and father obviously respect and enjoy one another will learn to seek that kind of relationship in their own marriages. In a home where there is modesty as well as honesty and respect for one another’s bodies, children will learn that there is a holy mystery to sex. Children will see and absorb their parent’s concern for each other, their pleasure at being home again after separate workdays, or their excitement when coming together after a business trip. They see their parents sharing problems and sorrows together, and they learn the trust, security, and joy of the Christian home.[41]
One can hardly believe how something God intended for our good, has been twisted for such perverted and exploitative ends.
[1] Dr Victor B. Cline, “Pornography’s Effects on Adults and Children”, 2002, article is an abridged version of booklet published by Morality in Media, www.pornharms.com.
[2] D Zillman and J Bryant, “Pornography, Sexual Callousness and the Trivialisation of Rape,” Journal of Communication, 32(4), 1982.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Prior to the advent of Internet porn, Zillman and Bryant were two of the most frequently cited researchers on pornography’s effects. Their findings sparked considerable debate and criticism for a number of reasons. The main criticisms pertained to the fact that their research was:
- Limited to experimental situations,
- Lacked real punishment or social controls,
- Used college students as the normative group, and
- Was unable to ethically produce real violence
With that said, many consider their results to be reliable and valid, and their work has continued to be referenced for nearly two decades.
[5] N Malamuth and E Donnerstein, “Aggression against Women: Cultural and Individual Causes” in Pornography and Sexual Aggression, 1984.
[6] Lindie Wadhams, article in The Pornography Debate, Meissner and Swain (eds), 1998.
[7] E Oddone-Paolucci., M Genuis., & C Violato. A meta-analysis of the published research on the effects of pornography. The Changing Family and Child Development, January 2000, p. 48–59.
[8] Cornett & Shuntich, Sexual Aggression; Perceptions of its Likelihood of Occurring and Some Correlates of Self-admitted Perpetration, 1991.
[9] Mark B. Kastleman, The Drug of the New Millennium: The Science of How Internet Pornography Radically Alters the Human Brain and Body, December 2001.
[10] Dr Judith Reisman, “The Psychopharmacology of Pictorial Pornography. Restructuring Brain, Mind and Memory”. The Institute for Media Education, 2001.
[11] Reed M Douglas, “The Role of Pornography in Compulsive or Addictive Sexual Behaviour”, Paper presented to the National Family Foundation Convention, 10 November 1990 in Pittsburgh, PA, p. 15.
[12] Dr Angelo Grazioli, “Pornography in South Africa”, 1995.
[13] Doreen Meissner, “Pornography as it impacts on Children – a Challenge”, address given at the Western Cape Child Abuse and Neglect Forum, 1997.
[14] Dr Angelo Grazioli, “Pornography in South Africa”, 1995.
[15] Ibid.
[16] Marcel Londt, “Presentation to Standing Committee on Home Affairs on Film and Publications Bill” in The Pornography Debate, September 1996.
[17] Lindie Wadhams, social worker with Safeline, article in The Pornography Debate, Meissner and Swain(eds), 1998.
[18] J Court , “Pornography and rape in white South Africa”, De Jure, 12, 2, 1979, cited in D Russel, “Pornography – Towards a Non Sexist Society”, Agenda, No 36, 1998.
[19] Internet report by the National Coalition for the Protection of Children and Families www.nationalcoalition.org/ncpcf/facts, Goldstein, Kant and Harman, 1973.
[20] Internet report by the National Coalition for the Protection of Children and Families www.nationalcoalition.org/ncpcf/facts, Marshall 1985.
[21] Ibid.
[22] Catherina Hurlburt, Concerned Women for America, “Pornography and its Impact on Civil Society”, March 1998.
[23] Internet report by the National Coalition for the Protection of Children and Families www.nationalcoalition.org/ncpcf/facts, Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1987.
[24] Internet report by the National Coalition for the Protection of Children and Families www.nationalcoalition.org/ncpcf/facts, Dr William Marshall, 1983.
[25] Lindie Wadhams, article in The Pornography Debate, 1998.
[26] Internet report by the National Coalition for the Protection of Children and Families www.nationalcoalition.org/ncpcf/facts, Det. Bill Dworin, Sexually Exploited Child Unit, LAPD.
[27] Dr Victor B. Cline, “Pornography’s Effects on Adults and Children”, 1998, found on Morality in Media website.
[28] “Sexualised Children”, Launch Press, 1993, cited in “Report on Internet Usage and the Exposure of Children to Pornography to Learners in South Africa”, Film and Publications Board, 2006.
[29] Judith Reisman, Soft Porn Plays Hard Ball, 1992, p. 114-115,
[30] Marcel Londt, “Presentation to Standing Committee on Home Affairs on Film and Publications Bill”, September 1996, published in The Pornography Debate, 1998.
[31] E Wieckowski. et al, “Deviant Sexual Behavior in Children and Young Adolescents: Frequency and Patterns”, Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment 10(4), 1998.
[32] Comments made by D Meissner at National Consultative Conference Against the Sexual Exploitation of Children, edited and compiled by Dr Rose Barnes-September, Anne Mayne, Ingrid Brown-Adam, 16-18 March 1999.
[33] Rob Herbert, “Naked Truth”, The New York Times, 3 March 1997.
[34] Gail Dines and Robert Jensen, “Pornography is a Left Issue”, 2005, http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/freelance/pornographyisaleftissue.htm.
[35] “Pornography: A Report”, American Family Association, 1989, p 31.
[36] Laura J. Lederer, “Sex Trafficking and Illegal Pornography: Is There A Link?”, Remarks made to the Pornography Harms briefing : What Congress Can Do To Enforce Existing Laws, United States Capitol Visitors Center, 15 June 2010.
[37] Testimony published on: www.settingcaptivesfree.com.
[38] Michael Pearl, Holy Sex, p. 1, 2002.
[39] Ben Patterson, “The Goodness of Sex and the Glory of God”, p. 48-49. Chapter in Sex and the Supremacy of Christ. Edited by John Piper and Justin Taylor, 2005.
[40] Joshua Harris, Not Even a Hint - Guarding Your Heart Against Lust, p.38-39, 2003.
[41] Jerry Kirk, The Mind Polluters, p. 201, 1985.
Africa Christian Action
P O Box 23632
Claremont 7735
Cape Town, South Africa
Tel: 021-689-4480
info@christianaction.org.za
www.christianaction.org.za
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