The Naked Truth About Pornography

 

Our Lady of Fatima is claimed to have said, "More souls go to Hell for sins of the flesh (sins against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments) than for any other reason." While it's true that no one is bound to believe in private revelations, even those approved by the Church, I do believe in Our Lady of Fatima. I will not get bogged down with arguments over the alleged "true meanings" of messages, but I wholeheartedly believe this quote is true and accurately recorded. Given the state of the world today, it was prophetic.

Two considerations: 

1. Sins of impurity damn more people than murder (including abortion and euthanasia), theft, lying, calumny, superstition, false worship, drug and alcohol abuse, unjust anger, assault etc. That's astounding. If you think about it, there is good reason. People have natural sexual inclinations, and they can be difficult to control as God intended. Most other sins develop over time. I'm sure that not very many people, who have never used drugs or alcohol, will suddenly wake up one day and think, "Today might be a good day to start taking heroin." 

2. Our Lady spoke these words in 1917! With the advent of the Internet and readily available pornography, how many more (and more serious) sins of impurity are committed 105 years later? 

The purpose of this post is to expose one of the greatest evils of our day: pornography. Its devastating effects are physical and mental, as well as spiritual. If you or someone you know is addicted to porn, let this post serve as a warning to break the habit now. My sources are many and diverse. I take credit for none of what is written below except for its compilation. WARNING! The contents of this post are of a delicate nature and may be found disturbing by some. Reader discretion is strongly advised.---Introibo 

Twenty Terrible Statistics

1. According to a recent report by the BBFC, 75% of parents believed their child had never encountered porn, but of those children, 53% reported that they had in fact seen porn.

2. According to research by the NSPCC, of the adolescents who had been exposed to porn, 28% were first exposed by accident, 19% were unexpectedly shown pornography by someone else, and only 19% searched for it intentionally.

3. Despite the fact that porn can be wildly unrealistic and often glorifies violence, sexism, or racism, one recent survey found that over half of boys (53%) and over a third of girls (39%) reported believing that pornography was a realistic depiction of sex.

4. A Swedish study of 18-year-old males found that frequent consumers of pornography were significantly more likely to have sold and bought sex than other boys of the same age.

5. A 2015 meta-analysis of 22 studies from seven countries found that internationally the consumption of pornography was significantly associated with increases in sexual aggression, both verbally and physically among males and females alike.

6. A UK survey found that 44% of males aged 11–16 who consumed pornography reported that online pornography gave them ideas about the type of sex they wanted to try.

7. Consistent with other research on the topic, one study showed that almost half (46.9%) of those surveyed said their porn tastes/preferences escalated to the point of them being interested in more extreme pornography that had previously disinterested or even disgusted them.

8. As of April 2021, according to an analysis of the most trafficked websites worldwide, 2 porn sites are in the top 10 most visited sites, with a third porn site coming in at 13th (Xvideos, Xnxx, and Pornhub at 7th, 9th, and 13th respectively).

9. According to data from the SEMrush Traffic Analytics tool, as of May 2021 porn sites received more website traffic in the U.S. than Twitter, Instagram, Netflix, Pinterest, and LinkedIn combined.

10. “Teen” is one of the most consistently popular porn themes, and research shows that this theme is (a) becoming increasingly popular, and (b) includes the portrayal of underage characters.

11. One review of 20 studies on the topic found that teen pornography consumption negatively impacts adolescents’ self-esteem and mental health.

12. In 2018, 45 million images of child sexual abuse material (sometimes referred to as “child porn”) were reported, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. In 2019, that number jumped to 69.1 million. 

13. According to a 2020 survey, approximately 45% of teens who consumed porn did so in part to learn about sex.

14. The Internet Watch Foundation recently reported that during 2020, approximately 44% of all child sexual abuse material reported to the IWF involved self-generated material. That’s a 16% increase from 2019, when only a third of reports involved self-generated imagery.

15. Of domestic minor trafficking victims who had been forced into porn production, the average age they began being filmed was 12.8 years old.

16. Porn is a global, estimated $97 billion industry, with about $12 billion of that coming from the U.S.

17. In 2019 alone, the equivalent of nearly 6,650 centuries of porn was consumed on one of the world’s largest porn sites.

18. 1 out of every 8 porn titles shown to first-time users on porn home pages describe acts of sexual violence.

19. According to Pornhub’s analytics, “Lesbian” was the most-searched-for porn term on the site in 2018. In 2019 and 2021, it was “Japanese.”

20. Survey results show that one in four 18 to 24-year-olds (24.5%) listed pornography as the most helpful source to learn how to have sex.

(See fightthenewdrug.org/10-porn-stats-that-will-blow-your-mind). 

The Teaching of the Church

According to theologians McHugh and Callan:

"Impurity is a mortal sin because it is a disorder that affects a good of the highest importance (viz., the propagation of the race), and brings in its train public and private, moral and physical, evils of the most serious kind. Man has no more right to degrade his body by lust than he has to kill it by suicide, for God is the absolute Lord over the body and He severely forbids impurity of every kind. Those who do the works of the flesh, whether according to nature (e.g., fornicators and adulterers) or against nature (e.g., sodomites) or by unconsummated sin (e.g., the unclean, the impure), shall not obtain the Kingdom of God (Galatians 5:19; 1 Corinthians 6:9 sqq.), nor have any inheritance with Christ (Ephesians 5:5)."

(See Moral Theology, [1930], 2:509; Emphasis mine). 

Pornography is at an all-time high in consumption. The reason, which is fairly obvious, has been the advent of the Internet. No longer relegated to filthy magazines, which no decent person wants to get caught buying or reading, the Internet brings porn right to you with ease. I've read some estimates that say as much as 34% of all websites are pornographic. Many people try to turn this into a strictly religious issue, with some even claiming that porn has societal benefits (e.g., men will be less likely to commit rape, there will be less adultery, etc.). However, the Church, in Her wisdom has said (as per Her theologians) that impurity (of which porn is the most prominent example) "brings...moral and physical, evils of the most serious kind." It shall be shown below how porn:

1. Rewires the human brain for the worse.

2. Has a high correlation to violence against women (including rape)

3.  Has a high correlation involving child molestation 

The Brain on Porn

In recent years, one of the most interesting findings about the effects of pornography focuses on how pornographic images rewire the brain. Gaining an understanding of exactly how the brain can be rewired is important in order to have a full understanding of how viewing pornography can impact the behavior of those you love.

In an article about pornography and the male brain, Dr. William Struthers, author of Wired for Intimacy: How Pornography Hijacks the Male Brian, wrote:

“The on-demand availability of robust sexual stimuli presents a unique problem for developing and maintaining a healthy sexuality. The ease of access, variety of images, and the vigorous sensory constitution of this media go beyond the strength of mental imagery and fantasy. People can see whatever they want, whenever they want, however they want. In doing so they can generate, serve, and satisfy their sensual nature. Pornography creates a world today where the consumer (usually men) has the ability to bring up at their whim graphic (and sometimes interactive) depictions of nudity and sexual encounters. Women are perpetually available for their pleasure with minimal immediate consequences. People become disposable.”

(See Struthers, W.M. (2011). Pornography and the male brain. Christian Research Journal, 34 [5]).

Some of the most powerful studies of the brain and pornography come from investigating brain scans. In one experiment, the brains of men were scanned while they viewed porn. When neurologists looked at their brain imaging scans, men’s brains reacted to women as if they were objects, not people. This is important because it is the process of dehumanizing a person that makes violence against them much more acceptable. (See Haslam, N., & Loughnan, S. (2014). Dehumanization and infrahumanization. Annual Review of Psychology, 65, 399-423). 

Research comparing the brains of people who are addicted to pornography versus those who are not has found that addicts like pornography just as much as others, but they desire it much more. So, when brain scans of men who are addicted to pornography are compared to non-addicts, they both respond the same way in their “liking centers” but respond differently in the “desire centers” of their brains. When addicted men were shown pornography while their brains were being scanned, their dorsal anterior cingulate, ventral striatum and amygdala were activated – showing a strong desire for the material, more so than other, non-addicted men. In short, all men tested liked pornography, addicted men felt like they had to have it. In an interesting twist, the men who were addicted to pornography had first seen porn much earlier in their lives than did the healthy men. (See Wilson, G. (2014). Your brain on porn: Internet pornography and the emerging science of addiction cited in Wired for Intimacy). 

The more dopamine that is released in your body, the more you are drawn to a particular experience. The highest amount of dopamine is released when someone is sexually stimulated and experiences sexual release. We learn from neuroscience that dopamine works alongside opioids. Dopamine influences the desire for an experience; the opioid makes you like it. Internet porn provides unlimited sexual stimuli, stimulating dopamine to continuously release to a chemical level that is nearly impossible to match through natural human bodily experiences. Thus the brain becomes trained for a level of stimulation (to quickly and constantly available computer images) that can’t possibly be duplicated in real life.

In the process of using more and more pornography, the brain gets used to self-stimulation to porn and feeling a pleasurable release. What people don’t usually realize is that gradually, their brain starts to fight them. Professor Wilson (Your brain on porn: Internet pornography and the emerging science of addiction) found that when the brain keeps experiencing abnormally high levels of stimulation (such as with sexual release while watching porn), it moves into a protective mode of lowering the dopamine release, so that people will want less of the overly stimulating experience. So with less dopamine, the viewer becomes less satisfied with self-stimulating to the same old porn. The individual is then compelled to desperately seek stimulation that might elicit the same levels of a dopamine experienced previously. The brain changes, physically, and becomes desensitized to the images it saw before and needs more and more to reach the same levels of arousal. A porn addict is thus born. 

This addiction can break apart marriages, lead men not to be aroused by real life partners so as to preclude having children, and can lead to financial ruin. Moreover, since porn addiction goes hand in glove with Internet addiction, such people have less gray matter in several important areas of the brain, such as the frontal lobes, the striatum, and the insula. These areas help people with self-control, prioritizing, and feeling empathy; when gray matter lessens, so do these important functions.

There is even more bad news...

Violence Against Women

The leading researcher about the content of today’s pornography is Dr. Ana Bridges, a professor of psychology at the University of Arkansas. Dr. Bridges is an author of one of the most prominent studies of pornography ever undertaken. She and her research team purchased the most popular pornography videos in the mid 2000’s. They methodically watched each one, coding the behavior that occurred in every scene of every movie. They found critically important implications for our understanding of pornography. Each pornography movie had several scenes – perhaps a dozen or more. In 88% of the scenes – not just the movies, but the scenes in these movies – there was verbal or physical aggression, usually toward a woman. What is even more interesting is the result of this violence, as scripted by the pornography industry. When there is aggressive talk or behavior toward someone in porn, 95% of the time, the target expresses pleasure or has no response at all. This teaches viewers that people enjoy being hit. It also teaches viewers that if they are hit during a sexual encounter, they should like it, or at least not object. Think about how an 11-year-old boy, or girl, would interpret what they see. If a woman is hit, she likes it. Pornography teaches boys to hit girls, and shows girls that they should like it. That is why pornography is a recipe for sexual violence. (See Ana J. Bridges, Raymond M. Bergner, and Matthew Hesson-McInnis, “Romantic Partners’ Use of Pornography: Its Significance for Women,” Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy 29 (2003): 1-14). 

The data suggest “a modest connection between exposure to pornography and subsequent behavioral aggression,” though when men consume violent pornography (i.e. depicting rape or torture), they are more likely to commit acts of sexual aggression. Dangerously, pornography strongly affects psychotic men, who are more likely to act out their impulses.

Consumption of nonviolent pornography also increases men’s self-acknowledged willingness to force compliance with their particular sexual desires on reluctant partners. And though there are conflicting data on the relative effects of violent versus non-violent pornography, there is little doubt that the consumption of pornography leads to a significant increase in “rape myth acceptance,” which involves a reduction of sympathy with rape victims and a trivialization of rape as a criminal offense, a diminished concern about child sexual abuse, short of the rape of children, and an increased preparedness to resort to rape.

One study at a rape crisis center interviewed 100 sexually abused women to determine if pornography played a role in any past incidences of sexual abuse. While 58 percent could not say, 28 percent stated that their abuser had in fact used pornography. Of this 28 percent (women who were aware that their abuser used pornography), 40 percent (or 11 percent of the total group) reported that pornography actually played a role in the abusive incident they experienced. In some cases the abuser had watched pornography before abusing the woman, in one case he used pornography while committing the abuse, and in yet some other cases he forced his victim to participate in the making of a pornographic film.

Sex Crimes Against Children

A study of sex offenders and non-offenders revealed significant differences in adolescent pornography use as well as current use. Significant proportions of different types of rapists and molesters had used hard-core pornography (depictions of non-consensual acts) during their adolescence: 33 percent of heterosexual child molesters, 39 percent of homosexual child molesters, and 33 percent of rapists. The current use of hard core pornography was even greater for these groups: 67 percent of heterosexual child molesters, 67 percent of homosexual child molesters, and 83 percent of rapists, contrasted with 29 percent of non-offending pornography viewers. About a third of the sex offenders reported using pornography as a deliberate stimulus to commit their sexual offenses.

Another study examined the beliefs of three groups: real life, “contact-only” child sex offenders, Internet-only child sex offenders, and mixed offenders (contact and Internet). While all groups were more likely to minimize the gravity of their offense, the Internet-only group was more likely than the contact-only group to think that children could make their own decisions on sexual involvement and to believe that some children wanted, even eagerly wanted, sexual activity with an adult.

[See W.L. Marshall, The Use of Sexually Explicit Stimuli by Rapists, Child Molesters, and Nonoffenders, The Journal of Sex Research 25 (1988): 267-288 (279); and Dennis Howitt and Kerry Sheldon, The Role of Cognitive Distortions in Paedophilic Offending: Internet and Contact Offenders Compared, Psychology, Crime & Law 13 (2007): 469-86 (478)]. 

Other Findings

The studies that support these facts may be found in Appendix 1 of The Porn Myth, by Matt Fradd, [2017], pgs. 191-212.

There is a correlation between the frequency of porn viewing and:

•  depression, anxiety, stress and various social problems
•  the motivation to pursue goals
•  changed sexual preferences
• poor overall health
• hurting oneself
• problems with intimacy

Porn and deviancy:

• Porn use increases the risk of developing sexually deviant tendencies such as beastiality by 31%
• The risk of committing a sexual offense increases 22% in those who use porn frequently
• States that had higher sales of porn magazines had higher rates of rape
• In one study, in 193 cases of rape, 24% of the rapists mentioned the use of pornography without any solicitation for such information

Porn and Marriage:

• Porn heightens belief that marriage is "sexually confining," that promiscuity is normal, and that raising a family is unappealing
• Women who discover a husband's porn use may experience depression, fatigue, and suicidal tendencies
• Porn use correlates to higher incidence of adultery
• Porn correlates with sadistic marital rape

How to Beat Porn

1. If you're not addicted, don't start. Just say NO (apologies to Nancy Reagan).

2. If you're addicted, seek counseling from a Traditionalist priest. See a doctor as there are sometimes medications that can help a person to overcome certain types of addictions. 

3.  It needs to be clear to children that their parents do not approve of immodesty or impurity in any form, that they oppose the pornographic exploitation of others, and that they are willing to correct deficiencies in this area. These attitudes need to be reflected in speech, dress and behavior at every level.

4. Pray frequently and stay close to the Sacraments. God will give you the necessary grace if you are sincere and persevere in your prayer life and in reception of the Sacraments.

Conclusion

There is no doubt that God's Laws are in place for our good both here (wellness) and hereafter (to get to Heaven). Don't be fooled into thinking that pornography is "harmless," "normal," or "prevents greater evils." Secular studies prove this is not the case. More importantly, porn is a mortal sin, making one worthy of Hell.

Say no to porn, and parents, please check what sites your children and teens visit. As Our Lord said, "And if thy eye scandalize thee[causes you to sin], pluck it out, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire." (St. Matthew 18: 9).