This past weekend I spoke at a conference in El Paso alongside my friend Matt Fradd. I was delighted when he gave me a copy of his new book, The Porn Myth. The next day, between time in the United lounge, time at an altitude of 39,000 feet in the sky, and time back home, I finished reading his book—in under 6 hours. And I can’t say it enough: Please buy this book. Do not delay. You can order it here. Then, please share it. If there is only one book you will read that makes the secular case against pornography, make it this one. Why? I think the best way to answer that is to share with you my list of the “Top 12 Best Quotes from Matt’s Book”:
1. “This book rests on one fundamental presupposition: if you want something to flourish, you need to use it in accordance with its nature. Don’t plant tomatoes in a dark closet and water them with soda and expect to have vibrant tomato plants. To do so would be to act contrary to the nature of tomatoes. Similarly, don’t rip sex out of its obvious relational context, turn it into a commodity, and then expect individuals, families, and society to flourish.”
2. “Which activity sounds more ‘mature’ and grown-up: making love for a lifetime to one real flesh-and-blood woman whom you are eagerly serving and cherishing, despite all her faults and blemishes (and despite your own), or sneaking away at night to troll the Internet, flipping from image to image, from one thirty-second teaser to another, for hours on end, pleasuring yourself as you bond to pixels on a screen?”
3. “In a letter to a friend, Oxford scholar C.S. Lewis offered some insights about masturbation. He said that a man’s sexual appetite is meant to lead him out of himself, to lead him into being a self-gift that both completes and corrects his personality—first by sharing whole-life oneness with a lover and second by procreating children. With masturbation, however, the appetite is turned in on itself and ‘sends the man back into the prison of himself, there to keep a harem of imaginary brides’.”
4. “Whatever we might say about the exact relationship of porn to sexual violence, it should be clear that in order for men to violate a woman’s body, some part of them must first believe she is an object to be used rather than a person to be respected—and porn is quite possibly the most powerful means of delivering that belief.”
5. “Sex and porn addictions are realities, and just as with alcoholism or drug addiction, the label ‘addict’ does not excuse a person for his actions. Addiction is slavery, to be sure, but it is a chosen slavery. Addicts find freedom not by denying the power that porn has over them, not by denying that their addiction is real, but by admitting it to others and asking for help.”
6. “With the increasing availability of pornography has come an increase in the number of cases of sexual performance issues, such as erectile dysfunction (ED), among young men…A 2012 Swiss study found that 30 percent of males ages eighteen to twenty-four have some form of ED, and a Canadian study published a couple of years later reported that 27 percent of sixteen- to twenty-one-year-olds have this problem.”
7. “Married life no more cures a porn addiction than winning the lottery cures a gambling addiction. A person so trained on the pornographic experience isn’t merely after a good orgasm. He is hooked on the anticipation of what comes next, the rush of moving from one object of desire to the next, one body to the next, always looking to trade the one in front of his eyes for what he hopes will be the ultimate sexual experience.…In gambling, the addiction is not to the money but to the high that results from chasing the money. Giving a gambling addict money only fuels the habit, because he is addicted to the feeling that gambling gives him…Porn addicts are hooked on the high they get from chasing after sexual fantasies. The unrealistic expectations that are fed by porn are what carry over into and destroy relationships, because no person can live up to the on-demand, anything-goes sex depicted in movies. When faced with the inevitable difficulties of establishing and maintaining a human relationship, it is much easier for a porn addict to opt for the instant relief of virtual sex. Marriage will not fix a pornography habit, but a pornography habit will likely destroy a marriage.”
8. “Izabella St. James, one of [Hugh Hefner’s] former girlfriends, lived with him in the [Playboy] mansion for two years and shares in explicit detail the day-in, day-out happenings of Hef’s lifestyle in her book, Bunny Tales: Behind Closed Doors of the Playboy Mansion. Her description of Hef’s orgies is telling. The icon of sexual liberation needed Viagra, multiple women, and finally pornography in order to experience a sexual climax. If a harem of real-life porn stars isn’t enough to satisfy a porn-imbued libido, what makes us think an average woman can compete?”
9. “But what if the mechanics of arousal and pleasure are not the essence of better sex? What if the Big O of sex is not orgasm, but oneness? What if the best sex is about bonding and connecting to another person?”
10. “To help our children to grow up in a pornified world, we must take the double-pronged strategy of both protecting their minds and preparing their character…A child who never suffers the consequences of his bad choices will soon learn that he can get away with anything. A child who never learns to respect authority will soon come to believe that all rules and guidelines are nothing but arbitrary standards that can be discarded for any momentary pleasure. Such a child is ripe for porn when he stumbles upon it. This is why children should grow up in homes where there are clear rules and expectations.”
11. “One of the reasons many people find it difficult to break free from porn and remain free is that they confuse sexual desire with a craving for pornography. Whatever protocols you put in place to distance yourself from pornography, remember: the goal is not the long-term squelching of sexual desire. The goal is the healing of your sexual cravings so that you can pursue them in a manner that pushes you toward a healthy and satisfying marital relationship.”
12. “French novelist Virginie Despentes has reportedly said that consuming pornography does not lead to more sex; it leads to more porn…Porn promises freedom, but it enslaves us. It promises excitement, but it ends up boring us. It promises us ‘adult’ entertainment, yet it makes us increasingly juvenile. It promises intimacy, but leads to isolation. The good news is that freedom is possible and something so much better awaits us on the other side.”
Once again, you can order the book here.