Pornography – What’s the big deal?

A Veritas lecture at Fresno State University about the presence and effects of pornography today.

Russell Willingham, the first presenter, explores the issue of pornography and sexual brokenness. He examines the spiritual, psychological, social and cultural aspects of these issues from a biblical standpoint. He demonstrates how a biblical worldview on this subject is effective in transforming lives for the better. Russell Willingham is Director of New Creation Ministry in Fresno, California.

Dr. Tamyra Pierce, the second presenter at the 46th minute, shares her research and expertise on the content, some of it pornographic, found on teens’ ‘MySpace’ websites. Dr. Tamyra Pierce is assistant professor and director of the Dept. of Mass Communications and Journalism at Fresno State University. She holds a doctorate in Media Effects from University of Missouri, Columbia.

There is a Question and Answer session with the students at the end.

Seven problems with pornography:

1. Pornography objectifies sex. It divorces sexuality from any kind of relationship.
2. Pornography trains the person who engages in it to live in his head, in a narcissistic world of gratification.
3. Pornography keeps the person stuck in an adolescent selfishness, rendering them incapable of true adult relating or sexual functioning.
4. People who engage in pornography tend to become isolated.
5. When it comes to pornography, more and more research has indicated that pornography has a lot in common with substance abuses and other addictive behaviors. There is an actual neurochemical kick involved with pornography.
6. It often leads the person to act out the pornographic scenarios that they’ve seen.
7. Physiologically, more and more research is indicating that porn actually stimulates the brain (in males and females) in ways that create an addictive experience, adrenal releases and neurotransmitter releases that actually change, not only brain functioning, but, brain tissue.

Pornography: What’s the Big Deal? from Veritas [2] on Vimeo.

The Social Institution Damages Pornography Causes:

(1) SOCIAL DAMAGE: In the social institution of Marriage- it chips away at it in a number of ways: 

• If the couple engages in pornography together, they lose their intimacy, which takes years to develop. In time, the man tends to become more attached to the pornography and less attached to the wife.
• Pornography provides images and scenarios that a spouse (man or woman) can never live up to and it breeds this chronic disappointment.
• Pornography tends to isolate the user from the spouse, which can lead to solo sex, adultery and even prostitution.
• It blinds their thought pattern. They stop engaging with spouse and children, or even their job, because they can’t think of anything else.

(2) PSYCHOLOGICAL DAMAGE: In the relationship and with the training of children

• Pornography has such an addictive quality that the person who engages in this (and this applies to all addictions) the addict has the addiction as his/her primary relationship in life. Every other relationship is secondary. In fact, the people in the addicts life are judged in whether they get in the way of their addictions or they encourage it. So, obviously, that’s gonna cause problems for  a father or a mother, who needs to be emotionally available to their children, when they are actually occupied with other pursuits in their mind.
• Another issue is that addiction tends to rob us of our soul. We become automatons. It definitely impacts how we parent our children. They become truly unable to engage children’s real needs. Children need more than food, clothing, and shelter, a drive to the soccer practice, a movie or hot dog from time to time. They need adults who will engage them soul to soul, and addicts cannot do that effectively, because their soul is engaged elsewhere. Even if they’re not acting up as of this moment, it robs us of our ability to be human.
• The emotional detachment that the children experience on the part of the parent who’s addicted to porn, feels to them like rejection. And this sets the children up, often times, for lifetime issues of abandonment, that will likely spur addictions in their own lives, down the road, to fill the hole. And the beat goes on.
• Lastly, the person who engages in pornography, if they do any sex education at all, they will either give their children a warped view of sexuality or because of their own shame and guilt, they won’t talk to their children at all. (22:00)
• If a person engages in certain types of pornography and allows certain walls to crumble in their own moral system,  they could even abuse their own children sexually. Pornography shapes and warps a person’s perspective not only for sexuality, but, for what people are for and what people are about and how to connect and it can create problems. Pornography has a way of breaking down laws of our own conscience, to the point where we don’t even see a problem anymore and anyone who points out that problem anymore is simply a ‘prude’.

(3) CULTURAL DAMAGE: How pornography affects culture

• This is not just a private matter. We like to think we are islands, and what we do in private doesn’t affect anybody else. That’s a falsehood. 
•  (1) First point about that is: There is an entire industry in pornography, that requires the violation of women and children. If you have engaged in online pornography (or videos or printed) you have helped support that industry. You’ve given your donation to them. You’re helping to enslave people. Much of the slave trade, human trafficking is related to pornography or prostitution.
• (2) Pornography contributes to the cheapening of sex in our culture and the lowering of protection of marriage and children. Pornography contributes to many crimes: Rape, child abduction and molestation. At the national level, Americans spend between 8 and 10 billion dollars annually on pornography.
• It contributes to the early sexualization of children and teens.
• There’s been a link to teen sexuality and depression.

(4) SPIRITUAL DAMAGE: There is a damage that we inflict on ourselves when we engage in pornography.

• 1 Corinthians 6:18 „Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body.” When Paul talks about ‘body’, he has a much more hollistic view than we do. He sees it as being – body, soul and spirit, the whole package. And, he is teaching that when we engage in sexually destructive acts, it does a number on our psyche, in a way that nothing else can touch. My sexuality is with me all the time. And, if my behaviors and my choices distort that, I carry that around with me the rest of my life. Thankfully, a person can experience healing from that. But, it is incredibly hard work. That’s one of the reasons the Bible pleads with people not to go down this road. Because whatever impacts the spirit and the soul, will eventually impact the body as well.
• Sex, like every other desire, can burn out of control and it can cause damage. And, throughout history, every  culture that practiced a biblical sexual ethic, and what I mean by that is monogamy,  saw less violence against women and children, and even greater economic prosperity. If you’re interested in doing research on that, I would recommend a book called „The Gift of the Jews”. And, it’s argued in that book that the Jewish nation gave the world something it never had before: monotheism and monogamy. And every culture that’s been impacted by that has been blessed.
• In my work, I have worked with some very broken men and women. By the way, the whole pornography issue is becoming a bigger and bigger issue for women now. That’s a first. That’s a whole new phenomena that’s never existed before. I’ve seen very broken people, marriages that had no hope. People who had been engaged in this behavior for 20 or 30 years start to heal. Start to experience not only behavior modification, but intra psychic change. And of course, as a Bible believing Christian, I believe that the Creator has the power to bring that about. It’s not a quick fix. It’s really the hard work of recovery just like AA has said for 100 years, encouraging everybody in their groups to reach up to a higher power. I just tend to be more specific about that power.
• There is an interesting story in the New testament book of John. It tells the story of Jesus speaking to a female sex addict. And the way He interacts with her us fascinating. He’s talking with her about spiritual things and then He says, „Go and call your husband, I’d like to talk with him”. She says, „Well, I don’t have a hsband”. He says, „You’re right when you say that, you’ve had 5 husbands and the man you’re with now is not your husband. He’s a live in, but, you’re not married”. And she was stunned. She felt like He saw her whole life. But, not once does He bring the book down her head, not once does he tell her she needs to repent, she needs to get her act together. In fact, what He says to her is, „You’re here at this well looking for water, I have living water to give you, if you want it”.  My paraphrase? You’ve been looking for satisfaction and satiation for your soul in the arms of one man after another. You haven’t found it daughter. Only your Creator can give that to you. God is far from being shameful and angry at people who have sexual struggles. He wants to restore them. So, pornography is in fact a problem, but, there is a solution. (46:00)