Anti-Porn Petition

[Calm]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_erotic_depictions

A general reference doesn't fulfill the CFR asking for information on a claim there were no laws against porn at a certain time period.

A quick skim through the article does not present anything relevant to the specific topic.

Try again please.

Edited November 6, 2013 by calmoriah

[thesometimesaint]

A general reference doesn't fulfill the CFR asking for information on a claim there were no laws against porn at a certain time period.

A quick skim through the article does not present anything relevant to the specific topic.

Try again please.

 

From the article

 

In early times, erotic depictions were often a subset of the indigenous or religious art of cultures and as such were not set aside or treated differently than any other type. The modern concept of pornography did not exist until the Victorian era. Its current definition was added in the 1860s, replacing the older one meaning writings about prostitutes.^[4] It first appeared in an English medical dictionary in 1857 defined as "a description of prostitutes or of prostitution, as a matter of public hygiene."^[5] By 1864, the first version of the modern definition had appeared in Webster's Dictionary: "licentious painting employed to decorate the walls of rooms sacred to bacchanalian orgies, examples of which exist in Pompeii."^[6] This was the beginning of what today refers to explicit pictures in general. Though some specific sex acts were regulated or prohibited by earlier laws, merely looking at objects or images depicting them was not outlawed in any country until 1857. In some cases, the possession of certain books, engravings or image collections was outlawed, but the trend to compose laws that actually restricted viewing sexually explicit things in general was a Victorian construct.^[3]

 

IOW Our definition of pornography did not come into existence until well after the Founders were dead.

[Monster]

 In the meantime, never let

your kids have a computer connected to the internet in their rooms, and keep an eye on your spouse if you suspect they are succumbing

to the awful temptations that are available at the touch of a key.

This kind of of scary behavior just creeps me out. Treating everyone like they are an addict and spying on them. There are a lot worse things I worry about for my children.

[Calm]

This kind of of scary behavior just creeps me out. Treating everyone like they are an addict and spying on them. There are a lot worse things I worry about for my children.

Keeping a kid safe from a hot stove can involve scary behaviour, it depends on how far one takes it.

 

Simply creating a situation where one can be aware of what your child is doing as well as to as much as possible what their friends are likely to expose them to seems like good parenting to me and is not treating them like an addict; hovering over them 24/7, not allowing them to have any access to computer out of fear, reading all their emails, etc...that crosses the line in most situations (though there can be good reasons for that if there have been dangerous situations in the past).

 

As far as spouses go...he put in the condition of suspecting, not assuming...iow there is some evidence that leads one to be concerned, not simply an assumption that there is something to worry about.

[thatjimguy]

Interesting to see the different viewpoints, I'm always a little suspicious of those who want to protect/dismiss/underestimate/belittle - or even glorify, porn... I think we all know what internet sites they like to hang out on at home . 

 

 

 

I dont think ad homenim attacks would be the way to go here. I can see plenty of people that would defned the rights of others but not believe in what they do or say.

[Ahab]

No no no no no. You don't 'protect' people by shoving them off a slippery slope towards censorship, you protect them by talking about personal responsibility and context and showing the terrible working conditions and exploitation and greed and corporate nonsense and dehumanization and objectification and cruelty and unrighteous dominion that happens in porn. 

You can try to talk to people about those things if you want to but when some of those nasty pictures turn up on the computer screen of some people they're going to get an eyefull even if they already know everything you're trying to teach them.

 

Thus, the point of the petition is to keep them from popping up in front of someone's face without their consent.

[AndyDnom]

mormons have a different definition of a porn "addiction" than the rest of the world. it makes for a weird and unhelpful dynamic.

[thatjimguy]

Just eariler I looked up the Caro Kahn defense for chess and one page's content was...surprising.

[pogi]

mormons have a different definition of a porn "addiction" than the rest of the world. it makes for a weird and unhelpful dynamic.

 

Huh?

 

CFR please.

[thesometimesaint]

mormons have a different definition of a porn "addiction" than the rest of the world. it makes for a weird and unhelpful dynamic.

 

There is an addiction to porn, it is a subset of sex addiction. So it isn't just a Mormon thing.

[The Nehor]

I'm calling baloney on this.  I Googled "cat", "home" and "soup" and there was nothing in the first 10 pages of results even close to being "pornographic".

 

My favorite is someone supposedly looking for a recipe that searched for "hot and spicy", "steaming hot", and "delicious" and were surprised by what they got.

 

Naivete or protesting too much?

[The Nehor]

There is an addiction to porn, it is a subset of sex addiction. So it isn't just a Mormon thing.

 

Yes, but the clinical definition and the common usage by LDS are dissimilar.

 

In common LDS parlance any desire for porn that is fulfilled is an addiction. Clinically addiction is compulsive and repeated use that causes serious negative effects in someone's life (physical, mental, social, financial, etc.)

 

A 17 year old LDS teen who views porn once a month and doesn't think about it much outside of the time they are actually viewing it may be labelled an addict by people in the LDS church. Clinically he or she is not an addict. The guy who goes home every night and views porn for three or four hours and skips work regularly for porn sessions and spends his rent money on pay to view porn to the point where these is little or no pleasure left in it as they seek a sexual high that they have long since deadened themselves to is, clinically, an addict.

 

Yes, porn is a sin and the 17 year old needs repentance and, if the problem is difficult to overcome, may need help from Priesthood leaders. It will probably have negative effects on the teen's life. Calling it an addiction though is an abuse of the word.

 

LDS do this in many areas. Recreational drug use is another one. It is also a sin for LDS but not all sinners are addicts.

[thesometimesaint]

Yes, but the clinical definition and the common usage by LDS are dissimilar.

 

In common LDS parlance any desire for porn that is fulfilled is an addiction. Clinically addiction is compulsive and repeated use that causes serious negative effects in someone's life (physical, mental, social, financial, etc.)

 

A 17 year old LDS teen who views porn once a month and doesn't think about it much outside of the time they are actually viewing it may be labelled an addict by people in the LDS church. Clinically he or she is not an addict. The guy who goes home every night and views porn for three or four hours and skips work regularly for porn sessions and spends his rent money on pay to view porn to the point where these is little or no pleasure left in it as they seek a sexual high that they have long since deadened themselves to is, clinically, an addict.

 

Yes, porn is a sin and the 17 year old needs repentance and, if the problem is difficult to overcome, may need help from Priesthood leaders. It will probably have negative effects on the teen's life. Calling it an addiction though is an abuse of the word.

 

LDS do this in many areas. Recreational drug use is another one. It is also a sin for LDS but not all sinners are addicts.

Viewing porn should be a participatory sport just between two consenting adults behind closed doors.

 

It's like the difference between ordinary mental depression and clinical depression. Neither one is good. We all get the "blues" every once in a while, that is just part of being human, far fewer take the sad road to clinical depression needing specialized medical help.

 

I really strive hard to teach the difference the two.

[Kevin Christensen]

While writing "Paradigms Crossed" many years ago I found occasion to point out the following:

The scriptures do recognize four valid motives for managing access to information: (1) pedagogy—when the information cannot be understood without significant preparation or experience (3 Nephi 17:2-3; Hebrews 5:11-14), (2) confidentiality on personal matters (D&C 42:88, 92), (3) sacredness (3 Nephi 17:17; D&C 63:64), and (4) social danger —this restriction never applies to ideas, but only to spelling out methods. For example, the Gadianton oaths are suppressed, but not their existence, function, or goals. See Helaman 6:25-26 and the discussion of Mesoamerican secret societies in Sorenson, An Ancient American Setting, 300-309. In contrast to the hesitancy to discuss the Gadianton oaths, notice the boldness in presenting Korihor's atheistic arguments at length in Alma 30. In such cases, without open discussion there can be no refutation and no preparation. In the case of a recipe for kitchen explosives, you do well to talk about why such things are a bad idea, but you do not need to pass along the recipe.

And of course all four of these conditions demonstrate a presumption that that love, rather than freedom, is the first and great commandment. Value systems are defined by what gets compromised when there is a conflict. If order was first and great, then love and freedom get compromised. If freedom is first and great, then order and love are compromised. (Think Patrick Henry, as a slave holder, saying "Give me liberty or give me death!") If love is first and great, as Jesus says it should be, it makes room for the others, and calls for a willingness to compromise other values for love, but does not compromise itself in doing so.

These four points seem to me relevant to a discussion of the proper social response to addiction. Pornography raises flags at all four of these points. At the moment, the industry grosses more per year in the US than ABC, CBS, and NBC combined. And given that 80% of users rely on free material, we have a large problem. And it is not a victimless crime.

I recently read Emily Pearson's memoir, Dancing with Crazy (her response her husband's play and an LDS exit narrative). Emily is Carol Lynn Pearson's daughter. Reading this alongside and after Confessions of a Mormon Boy (by Steven Fales, her ex-husband), and Goodbye, I Love You, by her mother, about her father's death from AIDS brings a Rashomon-like transformation to the earlier accounts. And my own knowledge of addiction, something that none of the three authors discuss, transforms it even more. It's clear that Gerald exposed young Emily to hard core porn, and it did not do her any good. Indeed, had Gerald been more honest and responsible, and given Carol Lynn a more truthful account of his doings, her book might have been very different. He lied to her, even after he left, and even after he came back to die. Emily became co-dependent to his narcissism. Undiagnosed addiction permeates all three stories.

It's important to recognize that the current science of addiction notes that all addictions, whether chemical or the so-called behavioral addictions use the same neural pathways. Indeed, the brain chemistry involves chemicals that are of the same family as morphine and heroin. The science of addiction uses the disease model, that is Organ + Damage = Symptoms. Heal the damage, the symptoms go away. Ignore the symptoms, or pelt the symptoms with either disapproval or enabling, and the only change is that things get worse. Addiction is a progressive disease. Someone who is only slightly addicted is also only slightly brain-damaged. No cause for alarm, right? Why bother to take action unless the symptoms get really obvious? Part of the damage is to the cerebral cortex, the part that should be weighing risks and benefits. How good is an addict at doing that, given the damage to judgement and the craving?

In addiction, the dopamine receptors in the mid brain adjust to increased amounts of dopamine, first by adjusting the level of response, requiring more to get the same hit, and then by enlarging to attempt to squeeze the most pleasure out of every molecule. The portions of the cerebral cortex that should be weighing benefits and costs actually shrink in rsponse. What happens is that the brain becomes tricked into treating the the addictive behavior as equivalent to survival, rather than as optional. That misconnection is the key to the destructive compulsive behaviors of addicts. The damage to the brain corresponds to a combination of craving combined with impaired judgement. (It's hard to think about David Carradine, as Caine, the wandering Kung Fu sage, dispensing Eastern wisdom, and dying the way he did. Where did the wisdom go?) The symptoms emerge as a consequence of that.

Carnes also discusses how the brain chemistry is designed to go through a process designed to lead to bonding and intimacy. Porn interrupts the process and prevents intimacy.

It's a point of interest that the founder of A.A., Bill W. died of emphysema, thanks to his smoking addiction. He also apparently had a long term affair, that is, an addictive relationship. You can't get the benefit of a working solution, the Twelve Steps of Addiction Recovery, if you don't apply it to the problem, even if you invented it. Those who decide that what they do is not as bad as what whomever does ought to remember that addiction is, by nature, a progressive disease. Without treatment, it gets worse. Cravings and judgement both get worse over time. The worse it gets, the harder it is for the addict to comprehend that they have a problem, until suddenly the party is over.

None of the stuff that hooked my interest as a young, naturally curious boy back in the mid-sixties would raise much concern today. Indeed, I thought I was normal. But if "everyone is doing it," normal is the wrong word to use. The word "normal" becomes corrupted into enabling. What should be of greater interest is what are the consequences of use? If everyone is doing something, the consequences of the choice are masked by the absence of control groups. I'm involved in addiction recovery because I've been through both the disease and the cure. That gives some perspective on the consequences, and what is really normal.

I'd recommend reading something like Patrick Carnes, Out of the Shadows of the Net, to get a better idea of the nature of the problem, including the brain chemistry involved, and the physiological damage involved, and the kind of social and personal costs that subsequently occur. Carnes points out that a person can become physically addicted via the net within 15 minutes. He reports that people who have been addicted to crack have consistently told him that it is harder to break porn addiction. Six years or so years ago, I met a guy who reports that as a child, he was walking down a road with two other boys when a gust of wind blew a magazine out the window of a passing car. You could tell how much he wondered how much different, how much better his life would have been had that not happened, if some tasteless idiot had just kept his window rolled up.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen
Pittsburgh, PA

Edited December 7, 2013 by Kevin Christensen

[AddamS]

I'm calling baloney on this.  I Googled "cat", "home" and "soup" and there was nothing in the first 10 pages of results even close to being "pornographic".

 

So how does the "average person, even children", type in one of those words and "instantly be inundated with offensive and disturbing pornographic images"?

 

I did find this though on page 7.

 

http://bridesthrowingcats.com/

 

I was curious how far you'd have to dig into Google pages to find what is described here, as well.

It is today's "How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?"

[Doug the Hutt]

Morning Folks,

1. Looks like the petition failed. I saw the numbers at the beginning and they had more than a 90,000 signature deficit and didn't see much hope in it passing. Anyone know the final count?

2. Maybe the petition belongs not with the goverment but with the ISPs. British Telecom just a few days ago announced this exact opt-in feature:

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/bt-porn-block,25421.html

[Stone holm]

We are not talking about censorship of great book or book burnings. There needs restraint when to comes to Porn.

Really. And you of course will draw the line for everyone? And do what when a censor decides that too many stories in the OT are sufficiently racy to constitute porn. Much of the modern restrictions on personal liberty have been obtained by playing the protect the children card. If you have kids or grandkids and you don't want them to see nudity, then you can institute steps to avoid it, don't force everyone to be treated as if they were kids or have kids. This play the kid card has gotten so out of hand that people are starting to want neighborhoods where children are banned.