Pornography and the Military

posted on 10:32 AM | permalink

by Justin Hart, VP Communications, Lighted Candle Society

There's a debate going on in Congress and on The Corner about pornography and the military. Arguments from people in the military, in the libertarian square, gov/legal perspective, and the common sense conservative outlook are valuable discussions points but there's another perspective: science.

One of the goals of the Lighted Candle Society is to finance and promote scientific studies into the effects of pornography on the brain and on society. A growing mountain of evidence points to the risks associated with pornography addiction. Later this year we will be conducting our own study using ground breaking fMRI technology to examine the effects on the human noggin'!

We've been collecting some prominent studies here, but here's a quick rundown:

• Individuals who have had an extramarital affair are 3.18 times more likely to have used pornography than individuals who did not have affairs.
• Young men who are high consumers of pornography are more likely to engage in anal sex, as well as have sexual relations with a friend (i.e. someone with whom they are not in a loving romantic relationship).
• People who reported being happily married were 61 percent less likely to report using pornography.
• People who have engaged in paid sex (i.e. used prostitution) or had extramarital affairs were three times as likely to have used porn than those who did not.
• Pornography consumption is significantly associated with perceptions of emotional infidelity. People also perceive online acts of infidelity as being authentic and real as offline acts.
• Married women are more likely to experience distress over a partner's pornography use than are women in dating relationships.
• A relationship exists between frequent pornography consumption and sexually aggressive behavior. This relationship is especially strong for those with the highest "predisposing" risk level for sexual behavior.
• Results also revealed associations between pornography acceptance and use and emerging adults' risky sexual attitudes and behaviors, substance use patterns, and nonmarital cohabitation values.
  

To use a common neocon analogy: not all Muslims are terrorists but most terrorists are Muslim. Not all porn addicts are rapist and pedophiles but most (if not all) rapists and pedophiles are porn addicts (see here for a two week example).