Clean Media United Grow Clean

Written By: Mark Kastleman

I want to share with you a body of scientific facts that supports Dr. Ron Miller's diagnosis of Laurie Hall's husband, when he said, "You've destroyed your mind by fantasizing. You've dug a deep channel going in one direction. The rest of your mind is atrophied!"
Dr. Gary Lynch, a neuro-scientist at the University of California at Irvine, in discussing how the human brain processes information received from the outside world, said:

"What we are saying here is that an event which lasts half a second, within five to ten minutes has produced a structural change that is in some ways as profound as the structural changes one sees in [brain] damage."

Further commenting on how a word or image can immediately alter the brain structure, Dr. Lynch says, " . . . in a matter of seconds, taking an incredibly modest signal, a word . . . which is in your head as an electrical signal for no more than a few seconds, can . . . leave a trace that will last for years."

In the book The Brain and Nervous System, it states:

. . . Our thoughts, feelings and memories exist as particular patterns of nerve messages, passing repeatedly along certain pathways in the brain. Each message would burn a specific pathway among the billions of axons and dendrites.

In my research of numerous scientific papers, experiments and studies, one thing stands out: Stored away in the cells of your brain and body are all the things you have ever seen, heard, felt, tasted or smelled. That's why Dr. Miller was able to tell Jack after 20 years of porn, "You've destroyed your mind by fantasizing. You've dug a deep channel going in one direction." Jack had literally developed a one-track mind.

After reading about Jack, there are some who will say, "That's a rather extreme example. I'm sure that there are men who look at pornography and don't end up like Jack."

True enough, but I think most people would be shocked at just how many Jacks are out there whose brains and lives have been devastated by long-term porn addiction. And I can guarantee you, with the porn floodgates wide open on the Internet, the number of "Jacks" in the world is soaring.

I discussed how pornography's scourge scorches the soul of the innocent-the children and teens. Theirs is the most tragic situation of all because they suffer needlessly as a result of the lust, greed and selfishness of others.

But what about the men who get sucked into porn's cauldron of lust? I certainly would never suggest that their suffering is anything like that of innocent women and children who lay in the wake of pornography addiction.

Nor am I suggesting that their actions should be excused or justified. But I do submit that the suffering and misery experienced by men who get pulled into the pornography trap are real and excruciating.

• Nearly all men who view pornography use it as the stimulus for masturbation. As a result they frequently suffer feelings of guilt, shame, regret and humiliation.
• Many men become addicted to pornography and lose their freedom. They feel trapped, out of control, and in despair. They literally become slaves to their own lust.
• Pornography places men on an emotional roller coaster. One minute they're happy, the next they're sad; calm, then angry; kind, then cold. These moods change without warning, causing stress and pain for wives, children, friends and associates. Feelings of estrangement ensue, further isolating and alienating them from their loved ones, which often drive men even deeper into the self-medicating escape of pornography.
• Men isolated on the slippery slope of pornography typically fail in their families and marriages, and in their relations with people in general. They are less effective, less reliable, less creative, and more prone to meanness and fits of anger. In essence, pornography turns men into zombie-like characters who are but a shadow of their true selves and potential. They waste their time, talents and resources, caught up in their own dark little world of pornography viewing.
• In the advanced stages, pornography addiction can lead a man to commit rape, incest, violence, exhibitionism, other sex-related crimes and even suicide. Millions of men have lost their families, their careers, their reputations, their good names, and their freedom just to satisfy their addiction.
• Pornography can take an immensely good, talented, enthusiastic man and turn him into one of the walking dead.
  Porn is a purely selfish hobby-it gives nothing to anyone but the viewer and the porn producer. In that way it is not at all like other hobbies, such as painting, writing, playing a musical instrument, woodworking or gardening, which give something of value to others and make the hobbyist a more well-rounded person.
  With rare exception, porn for the male viewer has a singular purpose: It is a process that leads to climax. In marriage, the process leading to climax at least has the potential to be a binding, loving, giving experience for both the man and the woman.

No such benefits exist with porn. And, in fact, when a husband is locked into the porn process leading to his private orgasms, this selfish attitude will nearly always spill over to his marriage.

Over time, he will be less of a soul mate and more of an isolationist. Plus, sooner or later he will begin seeing his wife as an object similar to the porn images he views in order to achieve climax.

Thus, pornography often turns intimacy in marriage into a totally selfish and narrow experience.