I went to Beaumont Texas Thursday-Saturday to a Bill Glass Champions for Life prison ministry event. We had great success with 2222 (Yep that is right – lots of twos) decisions for Christ and 856 of those being for the first time.
I was talking to a couple of men while I was out there who were very educated and thoroughly trained in top professions. They both started watching pornography and soon it got out of hand and both ended up in prison. One served seven years and the other about the same.
I don’t recall ever writing about pornography in Words for the Day, because it has never been a problem for me or anyone I’ve known personally. I decided to check it out and found some startling statistics. This will amaze you:
- 47% percent of families said pornography is a problem in their home
- 9 out of 10 children aged between the ages of 8 and 16 have viewed pornography on the Internet, in most cases unintentionally
- 1 in 7 children who use the internet have been sexually solicited
- 1 in 4 kids participate in Real Time Chat
- 1 in 5 children (10 to 17 years old) receive unwanted sexual solicitations online
- 2 in 5 abductions of children ages 15-17 are due to Internet contact
- 6% of victims in Net-initiated sexual exploitation cases were 13-15, 75% were girls. “Most cases progressed to sexual encounters” – 93% of the face-to-face meetings involved illegal sex
- As of 2003, there were 1.3 million pornographic websites; 260 million pages
- The total porn industry revenue for 2006: $13.3 billion in the United States; $97 billion worldwide
- More than 70% of men from 18 to 34 visit a pornographic site in a typical month
- More than 20,000 images of child pornography are posted online every week
- Approximately 20% of all Internet pornography involves children
- 100,000 websites offer illegal child pornography
- As of December 2005, child pornography was a $3 billion annual industry – U.S. adult DVD/video rentals in 2005: almost 1 billion
- Hotel viewership for adult films: 55%
- U.S. Adults admitting to Internet sexual addiction: 10% – 28% of those are women
- A 1996 Promise Keepers survey at one of their stadium events revealed that over 50% of the men in attendance were involved with pornography within one week of attending the event.
- 51% of pastors say cyber-porn is a possible temptation. 37% say it is a current struggle
- Over half of evangelical pastors admit viewing pornography last year
What’s porn addiction like? This was published in the San Francisco Chronicle.
- A 50-year-old married physician views Internet pornography for hours at home, masturbating five to seven times a day, then begins surfing porn sites at the office and risks destroying his career.
- A woman spends four to six hours a day in Internet chat rooms and having cybersex, and eventually starts arranging to meet online strangers for casual sex in the real world.
- A man spends many hours a day downloading porn, filling multiple hard drives, and devotes a separate computer just to pornography.
- A married couple view pornographic movies together as part of their loving relationship, but the husband starts spending more time watching and less time with his wife, who feels left behind and rejected
- In 2008, Nielsen Online reported that one-fourth of employees use the Internet to visit porn sites during their workday
- Online porn sites report that highest usage is between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.
These guys I talked to said they started viewing porn and seemingly couldn’t get enough and behaved very similar to what is described above. Soon they couldn’t get satisfaction just from watching it and had to act it out. The next thing they knew they were in prison.
They have special units in prison to protect them because the other inmates will kill them if they end up in the general population. When they get out they are reviled by others and are required to register in the public domain as sex offenders. No one wants to live next door to a registered sex offender. Both are very sorry for what they did, but it doesn’t change the consequences. They cannot get a job regardless of their sterling accomplishments in their professional lives, or education.
Satan has some powerful tools and it appears that this particular one is wreaking havoc on the world. If you are addicted to pornography, seek help before it’s too late. These men I know are not sleaze balls from the gutter, one is an electrical engineer from a fine family, and the other was a war hero that got a scholarship to and graduated from one of our country’s finest military academies. He was happily married and gainfully employed until he began his downward spiral into porn addiction. He ended up looking at razor wire and eating bologna sandwiches and watching his back for many years in prison because of it.
Just like drug addiction, alcoholism, food addiction, cigarettes, et al – pornography can be just as addicting and just as devastating. I’ve been successful in fighting off many addictions in this life. I do think it is important to find good friends that aren’t addicted to hang out with. It would be pretty hard to be an alcoholic and work as a bartender or go out with friends who are getting smashed constantly, or keep hanging out with potheads if you’re addicted to pot. In the case of porn addiction, it appears to be a solitary thing and so choosing non-porn watching friends might be a little difficult.
I’m convinced that the secret to success for resisting any addiction comes from our minds.
What do you think about?
Paul suggested that we think about the things listed below. Think about these things instead of whatever you are addicted to and your addictions will be under control. If you have kids use parental controls and know what they are doing. Don’t let them chat with strangers. It could cost them their lives…
Phil. 4:8
Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.