-Healing pornography conflicts: The beauty of marital/chaste love
Peter C. Kleponis, Ph.D.
Richard P. Fitzgibbons, M.D.
Comprehensive Counseling Services
West Conshohocken, PA
www.maritalhealing.com
Goals
Damage to marriage, young adults, children
The nature of the porn epidemic
Origins
Psychological harm from pornography
Enablers of the porn epidemic
The role of virtues in a recovery plan
The roles of responsible parenting and faith in recovery
Pornified culture
The omnipresence of pornography eclipses any sort of recognizable freedom.
Try this experiment: Unplug. Don’t look at the Internet, television, or even print ads for
a few days. As soon as you plug back in, you will see it again: skin everywhere. Porn is
now mainstream.
Jason Byassee, Not Your Father’s Pornography, First Things, 2008
Pornography
Pornography consists in removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the
partners, in order to display them deliberately to third parties. It offends against chastity
because it perverts the conjugal act, the intimate giving of spouses to each other. It does
grave injury to the dignity of its participants, since each one becomes an object of base
pleasure and illicit profit for others. It immerses all who are involved in the illusion of a
fantasy world. It is a grave offense. Civil authorities should prevent the production and
distribution of pornographic materials. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2354
Damage to marriage/family
A belief that fantasy is better than authentic love
Growth in selfishness - the major enemy of marital love
Failure to understand and appreciation the beauty and sacredness of marital love
Lack of refinement in self-giving to the romantic aspect of marriage, the marital
friendship and to the intimate relationship
Diminished communication with one's spouse
Damage to marriage/family
Decreases wife's ability to trust
Harms marital intimacy
Increases loneliness and anger
Creates a disordered view of beauty, goodness, the human person and sexuality
Increases vulnerability to adultery
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Leads
to marital separation & divorce
Weakens the spiritual life
Damage to spiritual life
"This plague stalks the souls of men, women and children, ravages the bonds of
marriage and victimizes the most innocent among us. It obscures and destroys people’s
ability to see one another as unique and beautiful expressions of God’s creation, instead
darkening their vision, causing them to view others as objects to be used and
manipulated.
Those who engage in such activity deprive themselves of sanctifying grace and destroy
the life of Christ in their souls.” Bishop Loverde’s Letter, 2006
Damage to spiritual life
Bishop Robert Finn wrote, paraphrasing John Paul II, that "the problem with
pornography is not that it reveals too much of the person (exposed in the image), but that
it reveals too little of the person. The person in the image is reduced to their sexual
organs and sexual faculties and is thereby de-personalized," Blessed Are The Pure In
Heart: A Pastoral Letter on the Dignity of the Human Person and the Dangers of
Pornography, February 21, 2007
Damage to men from porn & compulsive masturbation
Turns men in upon themselves thereby damaging their self-giving as spouses and fathers
Weakens men thus preventing them from fulfilling their role as physical and spiritual
fathers, protectors and leaders
Damages male confidence
Harms the ability to see and to respect the true beauty of one’s wife/of women
Loss of respect in women with increased tendency to control, dominate and overreact in
anger
Damage to men from porn & compulsive masturbation
Harms the ability to communicate
Leads to reclusiveness and to an escape from reality
Perpetuates lies and deceit
Increases guilt,shame, sadness, etc
Harms faith that strengthens men
Harms the relationship with the Lord
Damage to marriage
Damaged intimacy
In fact, porn may be behind the general dampening of libido in our culture.
An article in New York magazine in 2004 says enough by its title: Not Tonight, Honey.
I’m Logging On.
Jason Byassee, Not Your Father’s Pornography, First Things, 2008
Damage to young men
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Involvement
in the fantasy world undermines their ability to relate to women in a
healthy manner
Interferes with the development of a healthy personality
Harms their ability to understand and want to make a loving commitment in marriage
Fosters the hook-up culture
Results in sexual obesity
Can lead to severe loneliness, depression, social anxiety and profound weaknesses in
confidence
Damage to young women/girls
According to the APA, the culture can be infused with sexualized representations of
girls and women, suggesting that such sexualization is good and normal. This leads to
girls and women feeling bad about themselves: there is evidence that sexualization
contributed to impaired cognitive performance in college-aged women, and related
research suggests that viewing material that is sexually objectifying can contribute to
body dissatisfaction, eating disorders, low self-esteem, depressive affect, and even
physical health problems in high-school-aged girls and in young women
Damage to young women/girls
In addition to leading to feelings of shame and anxiety, sexualizing treatment and selfobjectification can generate feelings of disgust toward one’s physical self. Girls may feel
they are ugly and gross.
APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls
(2007)www.apa.org/pi/women/programs/girls/report.aspx
Damage to young women/girls
Males pressure girls to send them nude photos of themselves on cell phones.
Males insist upon having pornography as an aspect of their relationship.
Girls are being invited to see themselves not as healthy, active and imaginative girls, but
as hot and sassy tweens on the prowl. Andrea Nauze and Emma Rush, Corporate
Pedophilia: Sexualization of children in Australia (2006)
Damage to young women/girls
Females are reduced to sex toys and masturbatory aids. And men are portrayed as
predatory and masterful, never as gentle and considerate lovers.
The American Psychological Association makes the vital point that sexualisation
practices may function to keep girls ‘in their place’ as objects of sexual attraction and
beauty, significantly limiting their free thinking and movement in the culture.
Damage to children
An extensive recent study of hardcore adult pornography, www.moralityinmedia.org,
shows how it contributes to the sexual exploitation of children For many perpetrators there is a progression from viewing adult porn to viewing child
porn.
It’s hard to imagine anyone becoming a child molester without porn
Perpetrators use pornography to groom their victims.
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Children
imitate behavior they view in adult pornography with other children.
Children raised in one-parent households are more likely to be sexually exploited.
Characteristics of addictive pornography use
Done in isolation
Devoid of relationship of intimacy
Harms the addict and his loved ones
Used to try to escape conflicts
Ends in despair
Male “Genius”
Greater distance from process of gestation and birth enables him to act more calmly on
behalf of life.
He acts to protect life and guarantee its future.
He is a father in a physical and spiritual sense.
He is called to be strong, firm, reliable and trustworthy.
Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, The Collaboration of Men and Women in the Church and in
the World, 2004.
Porn results in a man being weak and untrustworthy.
The Epidemic
Pornography is a silent epidemic in America
Thousands of males are addicted
Any image leads one to use another person solely for one’s own sexual pleasure.
It is devoid of relationship, love and intimacy
Pornography Time Statistics
Revenues
The pornography industry earns over $97 Billion every year
$13 Billion comes from the USA
Earns more than the top technology companies combined: Microsoft, Google, Amazon,
EBay, Yahoo, Apple, Netflix and EarthLink.
Child Pornography generates $3 Billion
Breakdown of Revenues
Adult Videos
$3.62
Internet
$2.84
Cable/PPV/Phone Sex
$2.19
Strip Clubs
$2.00
Novelties
$1.73
Magazines
$.95
Total
$13.33 billion
Internet Pornography
4.2 million pornographic websites
420 million pornographic WebPages
68 million daily pornographic search engine requests – Google
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25%
of all search engine requests
4.5 billion average daily pornographic emails
100 million child porn websites worldwide
Children and Pornography
Average age of a child’s first exposure to internet pornography: 11
80% of 15 – 17 year olds have had multiple exposures to hard-core porn
89% of all solicitations of youth in chatrooms are sexual
29% of 7 – 17 year olds would freely give out their addresses online
How Porn Enters the Home
Television
Computer/Internet
Video Games
Cell Phones
Print Media
Advertising
Popular Music
Clothing
The Addictiveness of Porn
Men are visually stimulated
Viewing an erotic image releases Dopamine in the brain which is similar to a drug high
Creates a slight feeling of euphoria
Euphoria + Sexual Arousal + Orgasm = The Desire for More!
This is where an addiction can develop
The Addictiveness of Porn
Soon a tolerance develops
More of the substance is needed to achieve the same effect – “soft porn” is not enough
The addict moves onto “hard-core porn,” which can include violence, children, fetishes,
etc.
Dependence develops after this. The person craves porn physically and emotionally.
The Addictiveness of Porn
Eventually viewing sexual acts in pornography is not enough
The addict will want to engage in the sexual acts he has seen in pornography
He may seek out prostitutes or anonymous sex partners
This can result in contracting sexually transmitted diseases and even death
Adult Internet Porn Statistics
Men admitting to accessing pornography at work: 20%
US adults who regularly visit Internet pornography websites: 40 million
Promise Keeper men who
viewed pornography in last
week: 53%
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Adult Internet Porn Statistics
Christians who said pornography is a major problem in the home: 47%
Adults admitting to Internet sexual addiction: 10%
Breakdown of male/female
visitors to pornography sites:
72% male - 28% female
Women and Pornography
Women keeping their cyber activities secret: 70%
Women struggling with pornography addiction: 17%
Ratio of women to men favoring chat rooms: 2X
Women and Pornography
Percentage of visitors to adult websites who are women: 1 in 3 visitors
Women accessing adult websites each month: 9.4 million
Women admitting to accessing pornography at work: 13%
How Wives Feel About Their Husbands Viewing Porn
It is as serious as an extramarital affair
They feel deeply hurt and betrayed
Makes them feel unattractive and sexually undesirable
They cannot compete with the young women in pornography
How Wives Feel About Their Husbands Viewing Porn
View their husbands as untrustworthy and as weak role models for children
Leads to severe marital problems and even divorce
Causes of the porn plague
Selfishness
Loneliness
Male insecurity
Poor body image
Marital conflicts
Excessive pressures
Weak spiritual life
Causes of the porn plague
Sexual utilitarian philosophy
Accessibility
Mistrust of women/men
Lack of a sense of fulfillment
Lack of sexual confidence
These conflicts lead to five core cognitive distortions.
Cognitive distortions that fuel pornography addiction
• My identity is determined by my body and I am unattractive and unworthy of being
loved.
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• My happiness come from using others.
• I cannot trust in anyone’s love or in God’s love to meet my needs. Therefore, I will be
in control and comfort myself. (If people really knew me, they would reject me.)
• Pornography/sex is my most important source of comfort.
Enabling the porn plague
• Failure to appreciate the beauty and sacredness of marital love
Failure to communicate the fullness of the Church’s teaching on sexual morality
Permissive parenting style with an abandonment of emotional and spiritual leadership
Selfishness in parents
Contraceptive mentality
Enabling the plague
Lack of awareness of the harm caused by porn and masturbation
Media
Educators
Cultural animus against morality
Risk factors for pornography
1.Loss of appreciation of the beauty and goodness of one’s wife
2.Believe that fantasy is better than reality
3.Neglecting the romantic aspect of the marriage
4.Neglecting the marital friendship
5.Loss of interest in the intimate relationship
Risk factors for men
6. Difficulty maintaining custody of the eyes with women
7. Seeking sexually arousing articles of photo spreads in newspapers or magazines?
8. Attempt to isolate from spouse with the computer
9. Increased struggle with insecurity and anxiety
10. Strong impulses to masturbate
Spousal Response
to the conflict
Spousal correction
Attempt to do so without excessive anger which is challenging
Describe to offending spouse the betrayal pain that is identical to that of infidelity
Challenge the husband to be loyal to his marital vows and to his vocation as the
protector of the marriage and children
Insist that he know himself, work to overcome the conflict and meet with a third party as
a couple
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