His Porn, Her Pain, Confronting America's PornPanic with Honest Talk about Sex

by Marty Klein

  The argument is “heads I win, tails you lose”: if the brain activation in the high-porn (very small) group is higher, it supposedly shows addiction. If the brain activity in the high-porn use group is lower, it’s described as “reduced sensitivity” or “hypo-reactivity” in the brains of compulsive porn users.

  On the other hand, if a classical addiction model is really at work here, we would expect compulsive porn users to show less brain activation over time rather than more, due to increased tolerance of the addictive substance (porn).

  The field of brain research relevant to this matter is in its infancy. Science still has little idea about exactly what and how the brain does what it does. So virtually any neuroscientific outcome can be interpreted as supporting some ideology or other.

  Non-scientists Robinson and Wilson keep forgetting two basic scientific principles:

  Correlation doesn’t equal causation.

  The plural of “anecdote” is not “data.”

  CAN YOU PROVE THERE’S NO SUCH THING AS PORN ADDICTION?

  No. But that’s not my job (or yours). It’s the job of people who believe that porn addiction exists to prove that there is such a thing. They can’t. What they can do is show how some kinds of porn use are like addictive activities. But reasoning like that doesn’t prove anything. For now, we have perfectly adequate models to explain various kinds of repetitive, compulsive, ritualistic, or self-destructive porn use, such as:

  Psychological problems like obsessive-compulsive disorder, bipolar disorder, depression, or Asperger’s Syndrome

  Guilt or shame that keeps driving someone back to images they find troubling

  Strong sexual curiosity that has no other outlet, often combined with secrecy or isolation

  Inhibited sexual communication of either an individual or a couple

  Dissatisfaction with the sex life available to someone, whether they are single or coupled

  PTSD or other intense reasons for turning away from intimate relationships or partner sex

  And let’s remember that millions and millions of people look at a lot of porn every single week and don’t think they have a problem.

  Do some consumers have a problem with porn? Of course. But “problematic” is not the same as “addictive;” because they’re treated quite differently, we shouldn’t mistake the first for the second. And if the porn addiction movement is using “porn addiction” metaphorically, they should either put the phrase in quotes or stop using it.

  “PORN ADDICTION” IS PART OF TODAY’S PORNPANIC

  As part of transforming pornography from immoral habit to dangerous substance, activists have had to relentlessly describe porn as spectacularly unsafe. Calling it addictive was brilliant—it facilitates insidious comparisons with drugs that everyone agrees are toxic, such as heroin. And by calling it addictive, AA and other existing treatment agencies could be mobilized to help those concerned about it—and to offer alleged expertise regarding sexual phenomena about which they know nothing.

  Here’s how one advocate of the porn addiction model describes the allegedly inevitable outcomes now challenging America:

  Normal men become addicted to porn,

  Which leads to sexual dysfunction,

  Which leads to losing interest in real women.

  Through porn addiction, men craving a fix (porn) also learn to see women as nothing more than objects for their pleasure.

  They dehumanize women, thus becoming desensitized to their pain at being trafficked. “Thus, porn creates the demand for sex trafficking.”30

  This bizarre chain of illogic is a textbook expression of the porn addiction model. It fits perfectly with the myth that all porn is violent, and with the woman-hating, man-hating, and sex-hating belief that watching porn is a form of violence against women.

  As discussed elsewhere, the “addiction” model allowed for self-diagnosis and self-referral; thus, guilt, shame, and anxiety were valuable in helping people recruit themselves. Addiction recovery groups offer themselves as a place for people to lose their guilt and shame; sexual shame being as toxic as it is, confessing to an “addiction” must seem like a trivial price to pay for relief from painful emotions, regardless of whether behavior changes or not.

  The addiction model also values testimonials as evidence—which, in fact, is the only “evidence” available to the anti-porn movement. Science? Who needs science? Stories of recovering men and harmed women are presented as sufficient evidence that porn is a magic poison constituting a significant threat to people and communities. Counter-testimonials, of course, are ignored. No one who believes in porn addiction can account for the 30 or 40 million regular porn users whom no one says are addicts.

  As befits a PornPanic, the new concept of porn as toxic substance contains no model of healthy porn use. Porn addicts are encouraged to get and stay “sober” forever—hardly the “teach a man to fish” routine we hear so much about.

  There’s also tremendous confusion about whether porn addicts should be allowed to masturbate without porn. No one has yet coherently explained why a porn addict can’t masturbate to just his own fantasies—the PornPanic has rendered even something that isn’t porn (and indeed, predates it both developmentally and technologically) unclean and dangerous. If a porn addict can masturbate to just his own imagination, how is that different from masturbating to porn?

  For that matter, many porn addiction programs aren’t too keen on masturbating anyway; for example, NoFap hosts challenges “in which participants abstain from porn and masturbation to recover from porn addiction and compulsive sexuality.”31

  The porn addiction movement seems unfamiliar with the typical ecology of porn-watching and sexual relationships. Here are “symptoms” of porn addiction, followed by non-addiction explanations involving rather ordinary sexuality:

  Symptom: “Escalation” of use

  Explanation: I like it, and want more.

  Symptom: Loss of attraction to partner

  Explanation: A very common occurrence in long-term relationships regardless of porn use or non-use.

  Symptom: In a 2012 study, about 20 percent of participants said that they preferred the excitement of watching porn to being sexually intimate with their partner.32

  Explanation: At least 20 percent of all coupled people would rather do anything than have sex with their partner—because sex with their partner isn’t that compelling, they’re chronically upset with their partner, or they’re uncomfortable getting that close to their partner. Whether such a person would rather garden or watch porn is irrelevant.

  Symptom: Crabbiness when one attempts to quit porn (and therefore quit masturbation)

  Explanation: Most people are crabby if they relinquish a substantial part (or all) of their sex life.

  Symptom: Content of porn changes over time

  Explanation: The healthy human brain craves novelty. That’s why we buy new stuff when we don’t need it, go to new restaurants, want to listen to new music when we already love our old favorites, and yearn to travel to unfamiliar places. We want different porn just like we want different sex; for those in monogamous relationships, experiencing different porn is far easier than creating different partnered sex (whether within the couple or outside it).

  Symptom: Using porn despite negative consequences

  Explanation: Human life commonly involves people making decisions whose consequences they don’t like.

  WHY DOES IT MATTER WHAT WE CALL IT?

  Words are how we both describe and understand reality. Most people agree—now—that there’s a difference between calling a woman “frigid” and saying a woman is picky about with whom she has sex. In 100 years, people will look back on today’s concepts and words like “porn addiction” the way we now look back on previously legitimate words and ideas like “witch,” “possessed by the devil,” “a woman’s place,” “henpecked,” and “past-life regression.”

  Of course it matters what we call things. If words didn’t matter
, we wouldn’t now be using expressions like “the N word” or “F-bomb.” And we would still be saying “drunken bum” instead of “alcoholic.”

  Chapter Ten

  INCREASING PORN LITERACY AND SEXUAL INTELLIGENCE FOR THERAPISTS, DOCTORS, AND CLERGY

  Let’s be honest: Like every profession, counseling has a range of practitioners—some adequate, some excellent, some mediocre. More than almost any other profession, however, who the counselor is determines the kind of professional he or she is going to be.

  Nowhere is that more true than when the topic is sexuality. In fact, when the topic is pornography, there are some counselors whose sessions are worse than no counseling at all. There, I’ve said it. As we’re always telling our clients, acknowledging a problem is the first step toward solving it.

  Let me introduce you to four professionals who do more damage than good as they handle cases involving pornography:

  • David, a psychologist in Colorado

  After months and months of quarrelling, they finally go to a marriage counselor—which just about destroys their marriage.

  The wife leads. “We’re here to find out if his porn-watching is a form of infidelity.”

  That isn’t why I’m here, the husband thinks.

  “It’s completely disrupted our sex life.”

  No it hasn’t, he thinks. You have.

  “So,” asks the psychologist, “If your porn-watching is tearing the marriage apart, why won’t you stop?”

  • Tyrone, a pastoral counselor in Rhode Island

  “When you watch all that porn, I wonder if you love me anymore,” the girlfriend says sadly. “Why else would you leave me like that?”

  The therapist jumps right in and faces the boyfriend. “You’ll have to choose what you love more—your porn or your girlfriend.”

  This is a ridiculous choice, he thinks. Of course he loves his girlfriend more. He loves her more than he loves coffee, too, but he doesn’t think he needs to give up coffee to prove it.

  • Monika, a sex therapist in California

  Ultimately, marriage counselor and wife agree: his porn use has no legitimacy. No wonder he feels they’re ganging up on him. And no wonder the couple becomes increasingly alienated from each other. The therapist has taken a pair of marital allies with a disagreement and turned them into adversaries. Suddenly he’s fighting for the right to be himself, to be an adult—a much more serious challenge than any mere disagreement about porn.

  • Cherisse, a social worker in Michigan

  The therapist puts it simply: “You’re a porn addict. You won’t even stop watching when it’s killing the wife you say you love.”

  Killing her? What about the other 99 percent of their life together? When they’re not arguing about porn it’s pretty nice—at least it was until they started therapy.

  “This is fundamental,” the therapist challenges the wife. “If you want this infidelity to stop, demand it. Tell him you forbid this disgusting insult in your house.” And so she does.

  What he hears is: I don’t count. My needs are not as important as my wife’s. So I must keep my activity a secret.

  This erodes any desire he has left for her. And so this pathetic excuse for marriage counseling drives the couple further apart.

  Pornography use has become one of the central counseling issues of our time. Unfortunately, our culture does not support counseling professionals in doing their most effective work in this area. And as America’s PornPanic gets more emotional and more politicized every day, damaging sessions like those excerpted here are becoming increasingly common. The siren call of the well-funded and publicly accepted porn addiction movement makes our job even more difficult.

  If you want to be helpful with these cases, you have to find out why, exactly, clients have come to see you. “Too much porn” (like “too much spending” or “always criticizing”) is too vague to be a true clinical project. “I feel guilty about what I watch” or “I feel too angry about his porn to have sex with him” are clinical dilemmas worth addressing. And although porn may be the center of where you start a case, it should rarely be where you end up with it.

  American culture is ambivalent about pornography: almost all men interested in sex consume it, yet most hide this, deny it, and feel shame about it. Women who think about their mate using porn often feel powerless, confused, or resentful. Other women ignore the whole cultural phenomenon and assume their mate doesn’t watch porn. Many parents of teen boys or girls make the same mistaken assumption: “Porn? Be serious—not my kid.”

  This cultural ambivalence creates a special complication for clinicians: What end-states are we aiming toward? How much of the problem is people’s behavior, and how much is their feelings about their behavior (or each other’s behavior)? To make things more complex, when it comes to the Internet, what counts as “behavior” anyway?

  We now live in a digital world, which didn’t exist in its present form when you were being trained. Of course people are using digital media for sexual purposes. The niche possibilities of Internet pornography (as opposed to mass-produced magazine porn) have revealed a stunning breadth of fetishes and fantasies that most people had no clue existed. Neither clinical nor pastoral training prepare young professionals for the foot fetishes, crushies, furries, chubby chasers, waist trainers, leather daddies, frotteurists, transsexuals, or bears and cubs that are now routine on porn websites.

  Naturally, ordinary people are bringing their incomplete personal and couples’ skills to this new digital playground, creating the same old human problems, albeit with more colorful details.

  Those problems are our area of expertise. So you don’t need to be an expert in every exotic kind of porn in order to do good work around this topic. Just treat these clients as you treat all others: with dignity, a non-judgmental attitude, an openness to learning, and a desire to know what meaning and value clients give to their experiences and feelings.

  What are people talking about when they’re talking about pornography? Here are some topics you can expect to discuss in these cases:

  Wanting to increase one’s sexual desire

  Wanting to increase one’s partner’s desire

  Mourning one’s partner’s lack of interest

  Wanting to enjoy the state of arousal

  Wanting to enjoy a more intense state of arousal

  Wanting to validate one’s ability to get aroused

  Arousal as an antidote to boredom, low self-esteem, hopelessness, or anger

  Porn-watching as habitual

  Porn-watching as a high-integrity way of staying in a sexless marriage

  Porn-watching as an alternative to going to a sex worker

  Porn-watching as a battleground for internal conflict

  Porn-watching as a solution to spiritual restlessness

  Porn-watching as medication for depression, anxiety, or isolation

  When pornography is part of individual or couples counseling it can be so distracting that we forget some basic principles of counseling. Here they are, applied to cases involving porn.

  • Don’t take sides.

  The cardinal rule of couples counseling is to not take sides. Some counselors have trouble following this high standard when the subject is sex, all the more so when a case involves pornography. Remember that the pain of the porn consumer’s partner is no more important than the dignity and needs of the porn consumer. As you know, when one partner is more upset or vocal than the other, we must be vigilant not to side with him/her, regardless of the topic.

  • Remember to do a differential diagnosis.

  Some people who use pornography in a self-defeating way have serious emotional issues. These can include bipolar disorder, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety, PTSD, borderline personality, autism/Asperger’s, antisocial personality, or intermittent explosivity.

  Other problems may involve alcohol or substance abuse, chronic physical pain, low self-esteem, or undiagnosed effects of prescr
iption medication. And some may be crushed by the feeling that God hates or has abandoned them.

  Make sure you assess for emotional, environmental, medical, and historical issues before you treat a problem presented as involving pornography.

  • Don’t depend on common cultural myths about porn.

  For a list of common myths, and facts on which you can rely, see Chapter 3.

  • Do know your values around masturbation, infidelity, and lust.

  Everyone is entitled to their own values. If yours don’t leave you the option of being patient, empathic, and non-judgmental about issues relating to a client’s porn use, both you and the client will be better served by you referring the case on to a colleague.

  • Don’t get involved with what’s “normal.”

  For years, every one of our clients has been hearing what’s sexually normal—from Oprah, from their parents, from Cosmo or Men’s Health, from their faith tradition, from their friends or brother-in-law, and yes, indirectly from porn. They don’t need one more voice in this chorus.

  Besides, the goal of all counseling is to empower clients to know their values and to act on them with integrity. That’s “their values,” not what’s “normal.” That’s “integrity,” not what’s “normal.”

  When it comes to sexuality, there is no normal; when it comes to sexual fantasy, to be outside what others consider normal might be part of the fantasy. Whether your goal is to support or to influence clients, getting rid of the concept of sexually “normal” is crucial.

  • Don’t be in love with porn addiction (or sex addiction).

  There is no evidence that “porn addiction” exists; indeed, both it and sex addiction were rejected from both the DSM-5 and ICD-10 (the international medical classification published by WHO, the World Health Organization). A key problem with the porn addiction model is its assumption that porn consumers have lost control of their decision-making, which is rarely true; when it is true, it’s almost always part of a syndrome that’s far larger than porn, such as bipolar disorder or major depression.