The Most Dangerous Drug

According to a new report put out by “The Witherspoon Institue”, roughly 40 million people in the world have spent an estimated $96 billion on this drug worldwide since 1996.

This insidious drug is pornography.

The report, titled “The Social Costs of Pornography”, was signed by more than 50 scholars representing a wide array of scientists, psychologists, and other professions. The report details the immense social costs that pornography exacts upon men, women, and children.

I’m convinced that pornography is one of the most secretly diabolical forces of our day; it is daily destroying marriage and authentic understanding of relationships and gender, while tearing apart the central core of our world–the family. Having just graduated from college, I can say that this is the most deep-seated–yet generally accepted–problem among people my generation, especially among men. As many have shown in the past, pornography leads to inauthentic relationships (guys who have been absorbed in porn during their teenage and young-adult years find it difficult to be faithful and loving husbands) and de-sensitization towards acts of abuse and sexual violence towards others.

To top it off, we have an obvious relationship crisis in our country (roughly 50% of marriages end in divorce), and I think pornography–while not the only contributing factor–is a huge force that is propagating the situation. If pornography continues to be a drug-of-choice for teenagers and young-adults, the future will be bleak as well.

Thankfully, studies like this one are popping up all over the place, each pointing out the scientifically-proven detriments that pornography brings to one’s life. People look at pornography because they think it will make them happier–because it gives them sensory pleasure. But as these studies continue to show, ultimately it only destroys. As in the use of any drug, the user sacrifices long-term wholeness for short term gratification.

Pornography, however, cannot bring true happiness.

Love brings happiness. Holiness and purity bring happiness. Fullness of relationship brings happiness. That is what Jesus said then, and it is what He says now. That is what the Church said 2,000 years ago, and that is what it continues to say now (check out Pope John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body” for a brilliant understanding of these things.)

Drugs–especially the dangerous drug of pornography–bring death.
Authentic love–the core of who God is–brings life.

“Death to lust, life to love” must be the rallying cry of the world.

(You can read a short summary of the report–along with some personal reflections–here, or learn about the full report here.)