Porn Isn't The Bad Guy

There is a little voice in my head that is shouting:

"Why did you join NoFap forum, post under porn addiction if you believe the product isn't evil, leads many to being addicts and destroys relationships?"

Such a stance sounds a bit hypocritical to me, but many probably did different research to you that made us have a totally opposite opinion. That, plus the fact that so many have had amazing improvements in their lives once they escape the clutches of porn.

For most addicts, thinking along the lines of "porn isn't evil or won't cause any harm" is what got us into the disastrous messes in the first place. As for me, I constantly despise porn totally and completely and stay aware of the massive harm it causes to avoid falling into the trap again. That is one of the main reasons I keep educating myself about the evils of porn and reading NoFap posts every day.

 

There's a very good reason many PMO addicts view themselves as victims, because we are. Many of us started PMO as young teens, some started even younger. Is it because we're all weak minded like you suggest? Or are our addictions perhaps linked to being 12 years old and having unlimited access to an infinite amount of porn?

 

I don't understand why it can't be both evil and your responsibility to stay away from it. Some things are useless like crack cocaine. It's evil and 100% my responsibility to avoid it.

 

When you're going through puberty you don't yet have the wisdom to stay away from porn. I had zero clue I was causing myself any harm, until years later of course.

 

This kind of shit fucking infuriates me.

Telling addicts they have "weak minds", that "they're the problem," that they're "not strong enough to say no" ... fuck that. I can't imagine 'advice' being more counterproductive.

The SAA green book has a single line that seared into my memory when I first read it ... like I'd instantaneously memorized it without a second look:

"As long as we retain a belief in our self-control as a remedy for our addiction, we will continue to fail."
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That's real. There is no amount of self-will that will conquer this addiction. Addiction hijacks the brain. Addicts can't "make better decisions" any more than a man without legs can "run faster." As much as I loved Nancy Reagan, "Just Say No" doesn't work.

If the answer was within yourself, none of us would be on this forum. We'd all be living our lives PMO free with 2500 days under our belts. We may have chosen porn, but none of us chose to be addicts.

Get out of here with that crap. If you think shaming yourself is the key to long-term recovery, knock yourself out and let us know how that works for you. The rest of us will take a day at a time, recognize porn for what it is, and move forward in life.

 

As with anything, there is a thread of truth running through your post.

And it would be thoroughly true if indeed human nature was how libertarians like to paint it - that we are free and rational beings to make our own choices.

Now, ideally, this may be the case for the adult well-bought up in a decent society. But consider the poor pre-adolescent young men exposed to the vice of porn at the click of a gadget. He has hardly the chance to develop a strength of character with which to resist the whim of his impulses.

The reality of the social context undermines the ideal of individual responsibility. I'm not saying we should become socialists here and turn society upsidedown. Rather, it should just be a case of recognizing the role our social setting has.

 

Evil is a very strong word to use. I'd say porn is inherently vicious.

 

I believe we have an individual responsibility to avoid porn, in the case of us addicts we have a responsibility to TRY and avoid it. However I do believe society as a whole needs to confront this issue. I'm not saying ban porn but it needs to be dealt with in some way. Force internet companies to use .xxx domains, educate parents so they can help their children avoid porn, I don't know but something large scale needs to be done.

 

Not to diminish my guilt and stupidity, but I feel that comparing porn to heroin is NOT accurate. Maybe the addiction is the same, but when I was young, we were constantly warned about drugs and alcohol abuse, and the symptoms of those addictions are visibly clear. But porn... it is a silent, secret and hidden addiction. It is actively put out there, made to seem harmless and fun, and in most cultures, masturbation is made out to be "acceptable".

The comments that ALL boys/men do it, all men watch porn etc. makes porn more acceptable. It is only in the last few years that studies have shown the dangers and addictiveness of porn and people are coming out and admitting they are addicts. If more of us had known of the dangers porn holds years ago, I guarantee you, there would be far less of us here trying to break free from it and PMO.

I say: "Make it public knowledge, put it out there. Expose porn for what it really is, and teach the youth of its dangers. Then the youth stand a better chance of not falling down the hole we have.

 

Sure, and society at all the levels. It may be next to impossible to get something done at the political level today, given the orthodoxy of anarchic libertarianism, but still a lot can be done at the immediate level of the family. Parents just need to get a lot more proactive if they are at all concerned with their children's upbringing.

 

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Our parents generation knew it was wrong, and there was accordingly a deep seated sense of shame about the whole affair. And shame is probably the single strongest social form of defense against this vice. BUT the technology came out of left field to completely sidestep the power of shame. Teenagers could now in the privacy and secrecy of their bedrooms degrade themselves. And because it was done in secret it was OK.. it wasn't affecting anyone else right [the classic error of liberalism... no thought given to self-development/ virtue].

Out of Pandora's box, parents sadly now have to be open about this stuff that in a more decent society wouldn't have even seen the light of day. Vice once had to be hard sought after... down dark blind alleys and dingy nightclubs.

 

I get what you're saying, however, knowing the dangers of porn doesn't necessarily mean you would have avoided it. I went through the DARE drug program at my school and I still did drugs. In fact the DARE program backfired in that it made me even more curious about drugs.

Regardless I didn't know anything about the dangers of porn on my brain when I started watching it, but I did inside have an instinct that told me that porn wasn't normal or healthy. It only took one viewing of porn to realize this on a very basic level. Obviously one experience with porn, like drugs, isn't enough to make someone an addict. Me ignoring that inside voice, my conscience, is what led me to addiction.

 

A 12 year old generally doesn't have instant access to drugs but they do to porn. Parents have failed en masse to protect children from the dangers of porn, partly because they themselves didn't understand the true danger either. For countless PMO addicts they were already fully addicted before they started high school. What I'm really saying is many people were already consumed before they were even old enough to truly grasp or comprehend the potential dangers even if they were told.

 

The OP may be right, check this out (they even mention porn):

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Sounds a lot like drugs... Moderation is key yeah right.. Just avoid it.

Thats why i love fight the new drus campaign they go to schools and educate children. They should do the same in other schools.

you can't ban alcohol or tabac but you can still educate children of the danger of it and the adictive sentence.... Thats would solve the porn problem a lot education.

 

Alcohol IS Poison, that warm feeling in your belly? That's the booze burning you on the inside, that great happy dopamine filled wonderland, that's the alcohol physically damaging your brain. And casinos prey on those sad and miserable suds who are their most "loyal" customers. Casinos are very very much an evil business, exploitative, manipulative, downright shady, and completely dishonourable (they even rig digital slot machines now).
Funny thing is most pornstars don't watch a lot of P, they just have a lot of sex, yet just being involved in that industry, that completely defiles what should be one of the strongest and most intimate experiences of any person's lives, often completely and irreversibly destroys their lives.
There is no "moderation" in vices, it's just a matter of where you draw your own line on self-harm. Alcohol being chemical self-harm, gambling being monetary self harm, and PMO being both psychological and sexual self-harm.
Playing the "victim"? No one here plays the victim, we ARE victims of our own ignorances, and bad choices. We only vent, or let out our emotions because we know that we are one group, one will, a will to set ourselves free and to keep supporting one another in this path. If you (OP) have really such an issue with people creating enmities with something that destroyed huge parts of their lives. Then honestly, you really should reconsider why you've joined nofap. This is a support group, where we are focused on one simple thing, ridding our lives completely of P.

 

Sup yall you can call me VP and I'm here to drop facts. Don't mind if I do.



Now if you live in the US, hardcore porn is illegal to distribute so what you see on the internet, well, it shouldn't be there to access legally. Now if that doesn't say something about where I'm about to bring this thread call me a donkey.





NICE TO MEET YALL.

 

Alright we got a full lineup today and my friend might drop by later.

 

You guys like sharing your own opinions? That's cool. I don't. Just the opinions of experts from my end.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/free-porn-ruins-men-sex-lives-not-women-608647

According to this survey (admittedly small sample size) 20 % of American men view porn 3-5 times a week. If this survey accurately represents American men - that means at least 1 in 5 is addicted to porn. I consider myself an addict while looking less often than that for years.

I know men who look at porn far more often than I did and who would laugh at the notion they were addicts. I couldn't seem to completely quit, even though I was trying, for 15 years before I seriously came to the conclusion that I was an addict.

Sure, education and self control are good for prevention and overcoming. Average age of porn exposure is 12 for boys - 9 out of 10 are exposed by 18. Keep in mind that those boys are going to sites like pornhub - where just about anything is a click away. Just look at the threads on here of boys hooked on transvestite porn or this sissy hypno stuff. Apparently 32 % of teenage boys have viewed bestiality.

above stats taken from http://www.covenanteyes.com/pornstats/

Perhaps not every instance of pornography is evil - but the vast majority of it and the whole easily accessed online porn thing is completely evil. How can those of us who are here who read the threads on this forum even be having this conversation? It's only a completely morally bankrupt society that can argue over the merits of internet porn.

Internet porn is brand new when you step back and look at human culture. It's probably not going anywhere either. I shudder to imagine where it's going in the near and far future. This crap is radically changing the way people perceive and treat each other. Large numbers of our children are having their minds and sexuality warped. Tell me one instance of porn doing anybody any good, besides a brief spurt in the reward center of someone's brain.

Let's face it - unregulated high speed internet porn is a pernicious evil. Treat it as such.