Category Archives: Pornography

Because I Said So

December 3, 2007

Jane Jimenez

Another writer has put her best words forward, trying to prove the obvious. The title of her book tells us what we already know: Prude: How the Sex-Obsessed Culture Damages Girls (and America, Too!)

Unfortunately, though, knowing that we are a sex-obsessed culture and witnessing the damage it does to our children will not be enough to compel a cultural change. Politicians, academics and editors refuse to support education that helps teach and mentor children to remain sexually abstinent. What are they waiting for? Research, they say. Research and evidence.

Well, here in her book Prude they get what they want. Carol Platt Liebau is no dummy. Graduating from Princeton, she entered law school at Harvard and served as the first female managing editor of the Harvard Law Review. Her work as a law clerk for a U.S. Court of Appeals Judge launched an impressive succession of legal and policy positions spanning fifteen years.

Evidence? Politicians want research? Fine. Liebau gives them evidence…along with logical argument…she “puts all the facts at their fingertips,” detailing the radical sexual forces assaulting our children.

Kate O’Beirne, Washington editor of National Review can’t say enough about Prude. “All parents want their daughters to be healthy and happy. Smart parents will recruit Carol Platt Liebau to help rescue the girls they love from the destructive forces they face. Liebau sounds an alarm we dare not ignore in her brave, groundbreaking book.”

Groundbreaking? Hardly.

The books keep coming. Each year, one or more valiant writers pull together the facts and give voice to victims of the sexual revolution. Each book lays out the research and the evidence. It is never enough.

In 2000, at only twenty-three years of age, Wendy Shalit published A Return to Modesty: Discovering the Lost Virtue. For her effort, she was mocked and ridiculed. Again, in 2007, she wrote Girls Gone Mild, drawing on 100 in-depth interviews and thousands of e-mail exchanges with women from ages twelve to twenty eight. Shalit documents how young women want a culture that affirms and promotes chastity.

In 2005, Pornified: How Pornography Is Transforming Our Lives, Our Relationships, and Our Families hit bookstores. Author Pamela Paul investigated the “all pornography, all the time” mentality of many younger men and its ripple effect on the culture. Her in-depth interviews confirmed what much research shows. Pornography damages relationships, negatively impacts libido and is highly addictive.

In 2006, Dr. Miriam Grossman penned Unprotected: A Campus Psychiatrist Reveals How Political Correctness in Her Profession Endangers Every Student. Drawing on her ten years as a psychiatrist at the student health service at UCLA, she is armed with facts, evidence and research that disprove the tenets of the liberated sex mantra preached on college campuses. No wonder that Dr. Grossman feared professional retaliation and listed the official author as “Anonymous, M.D.”

Dr. Margaret Meeker, a pediatrician for more than twenty years specializing in treating adolescents, has written several titles on teens and sex. In Epidemic: How Teen Sex Is Killing our Kids, she presents research on the physical and emotional consequences of teen sex and makes these facts come alive through stories about the teens she has treated.

These books, and many others, evidence a large body of scientific research documenting the destructive consequences of “liberated sex”. They support the need to restore sexual abstinence as an expected standard for our children and to set cultural norms affirming this goal. Research is available to show that effective abstinence education programs are doing just that.

But the facts, the research and the evidence are not enough to satisfy the demands of those defending our sexualized culture. The facts are never enough…for a very simple reason.

The sexual revolution in the 60s was not founded on facts, research and evidence. It was founded to give us what we wanted. Embracing birth control and abortion on demand, human sexual behaviors of all kinds were defined as positive and empowering. Sexual self-control was defined as negative and unnecessary.

These definitions are self-justifying. One cannot fight a definition by using research. A chair is defined as a place to sit, not because research proves it true. A chair is a chair…because I said so.

If a woman says sexual promiscuity harmed her, by the modern definition of liberated sex, she is simply repressed. She is immature…”because I said so.” By definition, sex is good. Liberated sex is better.

What about a research study of a thousand women who say sexual promiscuity harmed them? Well, they are all repressed…because we said so. The study “proves” these women need to be treated so that they will enjoy liberated sex.

The more we are pushed to gather evidence, the further we drift from the truth. We can pile up research, and we can write a book. Many will laud our efforts to restore common sense and save our young women. But, our book, if not mocked as a puritanical tract, will be ignored by those who hold the power to direct a cultural change.

You may have facts. Unfortunately, though, you will never have enough facts and research. Modern definitions have been chiseled in stone: liberated sex is good sex…and sexual restraint is bad. That’s just the way it is…”because I said so.”

Reclaiming Love

March 27, 2006

Multiple Personality: A dissociative disorder in which two or more distinct personalities exist in the same person, each of which prevails at a particular time. Also called split personality

Jane Jimenez

In 1974, walking down the mall at Arizona State University could be a highly unpleasant experience for young women. The mall was the central thoroughfare for all college traffic. It featured an intersection at the Memorial Union and Library, where four paths led off to the colleges for business, education, science and liberal arts.

Around the library, a two-foot high block wall served as a mid-day “home” to a group of fraternity men, a perfect perch from which they could survey women walking by. These frat jocks, elevating the sport of girl-watching to a new level, had created a set of large score cards with bold black numbers 1 through 10.

Their system was meant for entertainment, not for human compassion. For the “lucky” women walking by, winks, laughs, calls and whistles would “reward” her with a row of perfect 10s. But, with the same compassion of Simon Cowell, these winks, laughs and calls from the frat men could just as easily produce score cards of seven, six, five…or zero.

Thankfully, this crass frat game died out in the summer heat, never to reappear. This was the Age of Aquarius when peace and love were painted on torn jeans. Women were busy exercising their new-found liberation, and in this new world, there was no place for a game that trivialized women.

Alas, in the short span of forty years, these same men and women of my college years are now parents to a new college generation weaned on the lyrics of such rappers as Snoop Dog, Ice-T, and Eminem. Tepid cards with numbers have been replaced by crude lyrics that describe women and sex in violent and abusive slang.

How did we get here from there? In 1974, college women were insulted by a rating system that traded respect for a few cheap laughs. In 2004, college women seek hoots and whistles by pulling off wet t-shirts in public bars. How did the sixties in America fail to produce the fruit of peace and love?

On television, Lucy and Rickie have been replaced by Sex and the City, which unlike the frat scorecards, did not fade away into summer reruns. In its sixth season, Sex and the City churned out episode 76, “Great Sexpectations” where Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte continued to tryout and discard men like last-year’s shoes. If one day they ever do find “true love,” they will probably end up cast as characters on Desperate Housewives.

Abstinence educators daily witness the impact of this cultural shift. As they work to reconnect our children with the truth of what love means, their greatest handicap is the American dissociative order which allows us to believe that the two distinct personalities of love and hate can peacefully co-exist in the same heart. America suffers from multiple cultural personalities.

In one world, we work to teach adolescents the connection between love and sex. Classroom lessons help students analyze situations between girls and guys, distinguishing between abusive and controlling behaviors and selfless, caring relationships.

In the other world, like switching the channels with the remote, we infuse our children’s hearts with entertainment based on abuse, control, violence and disrespect. In the darkest moments, we write comedies where kids laugh at crude and destructive behavior as easily as we once did over Gilligan’s Island.

We have lost the understanding that a house divided cannot stand. Integrity is now passé. We chafe at morality, rejecting the idea that good must be good all the time in order to be good. Instead, our life is a tortured contradiction where good can be bartered for whatever suits us at the moment.

If we want to restore the future happiness of our children, we must restore our culture. We must reclaim our integrity. We must pull together our cultural personality into one house, undivided, that stands for peace and love at all times and under all conditions.

To know what is right and not to do it is the worst cowardice, Confucius said.

And as an author on divine unity, he teaches a singular method for coming together into one undivided national personality. To put the world right in order, we must first put the nation in order; to put the nation in order, we must first put the family in order; to put the family in order, we must first cultivate our personal life; we must first set our hearts right.

_____________________________

October 29, 2004 – Food for the Brain

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A Failure to Love – Part 2

March 20, 2006

Jane Jimenez

For over forty years, the murder of Catherine Genovese under the windows of her Queens, New York, neighbors has stood as a defining example of the tragedy of human indifference. Her attacker had over twenty minutes to assault and stab “Kitty.” When police were finally summoned, they determined that over 38 people had heard the attack, ignoring her cries and pleas for help…and had done nothing.

Indifference, the failure to be moved by the needs of a fellow human being, in this case, had immediate and devastating consequences. We are able to see the result of indifference in the haunting photo of Kitty and point our fingers at 38 people.

But today in America, we are facing a crisis of indifference that is just as tragic. Entrusted as guardians of the welfare of our children, we have let a culture of indifference develop, turning a corporate blind eye to assaults on our children on a daily basis.

Consider this brief sampling of events over the past decade:

In 1997, the Supreme Court ruled against the Communications Decency Act, removing the legal tool needed to prosecute those knowingly sending sexually explicit materials to minors.
A Kaiser Family Foundation report states that 70% of teenagers (ages 15-17) “have accidentally come across pornography on the Web.” Adolescent males make up one of the largest consumer groups of pornography, and their access on the Internet is largely unrestricted.
In a college sex survey this year, 87% of university students polled have virtual sex mainly using Instant Messenger, webcam, and telephone.
The average age of first exposure to Internet porn is 11.
Approximately 20% of all Internet pornography involves children. According to a National Children’s Homes report, the number of Internet child pornography images has increased 1500% since 1988.

These events signal a change in our culture that cries out for our attention. In the name of love for our children, we cannot be indifferent.

Replicated studies on pornography are virtually unanimous in their conclusions: When male subjects were exposed to as little as six weeks’ worth of standard hard-core pornography, they:

developed an increased sexual callousness toward women;
began to trivialize rape as a criminal offense or no longer considered it a crime at all;
developed distorted perceptions about sexuality;
developed an appetite for more deviant, bizarre, or violent types of pornography (normal sex no longer seemed to do the job);
devalued the importance of monogamy and lacked confidence in marriage as either a viable or lasting institution; and
viewed nonmonogamous relationships as normal and natural behavior.

Thankfully, the FCC has begin to tackle the problem of nudity and sex on television. Weeding through roughly 300,000 complaints, it recently proposed almost $4 million worth of fines for television programming deemed indecent by the commission. Of this total, $3.6 million in proposed fines were for the Dec. 31, 2004, episode of CBS’s “Without a Trace” which depicted teen girls and boys participating in an orgy.

Parents must do their part, too. A Kaiser Family Foundation report released in March, 2005, reported that “about half (53%) of all 8- to 18-year-olds say their families have no rules about TV watching. Forty-six percent (46%) say their families do have some rules, including 20% who say the rules are enforced most of the time, while the rest say the rules are enforced either some of the time, a little of the time, or never.”

Indifference is killing our children. The graphic sexual imagery assaulting our children at every turn is not harmless. It is poisoning their view of normal human relationships, teaching them that sex is a commodity even in the most casual of encounters.

Love for our children demands more than words and hugs. If we want our children to grow and mature with healthy attitudes about love, sex and marriage, we must fight the tendency to ignore what is right in front of our eyes. We must get involved.

If we love our children, we cannot be indifferent.

_____________

For more information visit: www.protectkids.com

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An Impure Thought

Jane Jimenez

November 14, 2005

It used to arrive in a plain brown paper wrapper. Schoolboys lucky enough to find a hidden copy would sneak off to share it at school… a perfect way to win points with their friends.

In the span of one lifetime, the plain brown paper wrapper has been recycled to make in-your-face glossy catalogues and wall-sized murals of nearly naked teens suggestively posed by Abercrombie and Fitch. MTV puts the photos to music. And video games draw you into the fun.

Fully fusing porn with American family life, last May, hometown burger king, Carl’s Jr. gave Dads something to watch with their young boys. Paris Hilton, barely clad in a thong bikini, “with hoses shooting up everywhere,” writhed in suds atop a Bentley…seductively licking her lips over a hamburger.

As Pamela Paul writes in Pornified, “Today, pornography is not only planted in people’s psyches; it’s everywhere in our culture….We’ve become ‘pornified’—that is, the culture, values, standards, and language of pornography have infiltrated our daily lives, shaping how we view sex and how our sexual and romantic relationships play out.”

And just like the consequences related to sexual promiscuity, the consequences of our porn addiction are beginning to take a toll on marriages, families and our children. Psychiatrist Jennifer Schneider studied ninety-one women and three men, “all of whom had spouses or partners seriously involved in cyber sex.” She found they all shared feelings of hurt, betrayal, rejection, abandonment, humiliation, jealousy, and anger.

But Schneider’s study points to something not so widely known about addiction to porn. As Paul reports it, more than one in five of those surveyed by Schneider, “had separated or divorced as a result of their spouse’s cybersex addition. Half reported their spouses were no longer sexually interested in them, and one-third said they were no longer interested in sex with their partner.”

Men interviewed by Paul tell it best. “Kenneth, a married man and father of three, began to have trouble relating to women in the real world. ‘I objectified them,’ he explains… ‘If you meet someone and you’re preoccupied with women’s anatomy because you spend time looking at porn, then in the real world, you spend a lot of time looking at women’s anatomy.’”

Another father addicted to porn, Liam tells Paul, “It takes a three-dimensional human being with feelings – someone who could be your daughter, sister, or mother – and basically says, this is a creature that is only intended to satisfy your sexual desires. It becomes your natural way of thinking.”

Even as married fathers like Kenneth and Liam struggle to overcome their addiction to porn, teachers in our classrooms are witnessing its impact on our youth. Dana spends five days each week in the classroom talking about sex with teens. She and the kids cover the physical, emotional and relational reasons for abstaining from sex until marriage.

On the last day of class, Dana brings up the subject of porn. “I can see it in their eyes,” she says. “Half of the kids in the class look down at their desks. They’re involved with porn, and they’re embarrassed.”

Dana has a hard job in a culture that mixes porn with simple television commercials for hamburgers. She must help students understand the damage of an impure thought. She must lead them through the natural consequences of linking a beautiful expression of intimate sexual love to the heartless eroticism of porn.

We train our bodies with our minds. And the irony of training our minds with porn is that we destroy our ability to enjoy the natural physical sexual pleasures that sustain a marriage between husband and wife. Our libido is no longer satisfied by natural sexual activity. And our intimate emotional connection with our sexual partner is destroyed.

“It’s really a shame that today, people are actually afraid to admit they are opposed to pornography,” Paul says. “It’s time we realized that this line of thinking – fed to us by the pornography industry – doesn’t have to be our way of thinking. The reality is that using and accepting pornography has negative effects on our lives.”

The brown paper wrapper existed for a reason. Its existence acknowledged the harm that can come from an impure thought. And for the teens who meet Dana each week, this is a message that can’t come too soon.

Read More About the Impact of Porn

Pamela Paul, PORNIFIED: How Pornography Is Transforming our Lives, our Relationships, and our Families, TIMES BOOKS, Henry Holt and Company, September, 2005.

October 29, 2004 – Food for the Brain

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Sex Without Value

Jane Jimenez

February 21, 2005

The large card still stands on my dresser, a sweet remembrance from the man who has shared over thirty years of life with me. As February winds down, my mind is filled with the many pictures of love

renewed on this past Valentine’s Day.

At one luncheon, going around the table for introductions, we shared special thoughts about the husbands and wives who completed our lives. From newlyweds to those married over forty years, it was refreshing to see the tenderness used to describe the object of each person’s affection.

Last Sunday, Andrew thanked those who organized this month’s Sweetheart Dinner. As he talked, sounds of babies surrounded us, until one coo and babble turned more insistent. Mom bundled up her hungry babe, and headed to the private room in the back.

Sex is at the center of so much loveliness. It is the intensity of passion, the bond of reconciliation, the playful encounter and…the creator of life…building and sustaining relationships of love, promise and honor.

And then…we turn on the television and see sex purchased with a hundred dollar bill on prime time television during what used to be family hour. Wives are traded, singles prowl the city in search of sex, and nearly naked ladies sell everything from potato chips to beer.

Computer filters must fight the ever-mutating attacks on family life by XXX fare. Even public librarians defend the right to provide porn, resisting filters to protect the minds and hearts of children.

Cheap sex is not new. Modern culture simply puts a new shine on the “world’s oldest profession” and magnifies the ways to profit from sex. Yet, one sad result of our ability to reproduce sex on stage, television, music and film is the complete disconnect of sex from its greatest purpose and its best expression.

Promiscuity is a concept undone by American marketers and impotent judges. Still defined by a dusty dictionary… aimless, designless, desultory, haphazard, hit-or-miss, indiscriminate, irregular, purposeless, unplanned…the word promiscuity carries no meaning today because all sex is permissible.

The director of a major metropolitan agency worked to explain the finer points of their sex education program to me. They taught it all, she said. They empowered kids to embrace their sexuality. They reinforced that sex was just a normal part of life, complete with deprovera, cherry-flavored condoms, and “confidentiality,” the promise they will help kids evade the loving supervision of parents who know that sex is not meant for teens.

What about abstinence? I asked.

Sure, she said.

Sure, what? I asked.

For some kids, abstinence is a choice…until they are ready for sex. Responsible sex.

Responsible sex? What would you tell a thirteen-year-old girl in your sex ed class who came to you for your advice about having “responsible sex” with her sixteen-year-old boyfriend? Could you tell her, since she asked, that you advised her not to have sex of any kind with him…that sex at her age was unhealthy and out-of-order…and even just a teensy weensy irresponsible?

Without a pause big enough to blink, she fired back at me. No.

No?

No. We are values-neutral. We don’t teach values.

Sex without values?

What kind of educator is reluctant to teach our children the immovable healthy boundaries of sex? This means more than mentioning boundaries…saying that abstinence is a choice…something that some kids will choose…until they don’t choose abstinence.

Sex education is a matter of connecting sex with a nobler, finer purpose than recreating in the backseat of a car with a kid you just met. And it is a matter of believing in that purpose with enough conviction to commit to it and promote it and counsel for it.

Everyone teaches the value of sex. It’s just a matter of focus. Either you link sex to the values that sustain healthy relationships and support the care of our next generation with mothers and fathers who love each other…or you don’t.

Our children learn what we teach. If they are having sex that is aimless, designless, desultory, haphazard, hit-or-miss, indiscriminate, irregular, purposeless, unplanned…need we wonder why? Aren’t they doing exactly what we are teaching them?

Sex without value IS a value.

May 14, 2004 Order in the Courtroom!

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