Posted on 11/19/2004 3:07:51 PM PST by Lindykim
Porn Like Heroin in the Brain by Stuart Shepard, correspondent
Senate committee discusses pornography and the First Amendment.
Experts on pornography's effects on brain chemistry testified at a Senate hearing this week where a key point of discussion was whether porn is a form of speech protected by the First Amendment or addictive material that should be unlawful.
Psychiatrist Jeffrey Satinover described how pornography is analogous to cigarettes, noting that "it is a very carefully designed delivery system for evoking a tremendous flood within the brain of endogenous opioids." It's time, he added, to stop regarding it as simply a form of expression. "Modern science," Satinover said, "allows us to understand that the underlying nature of an addiction to pornography is chemically nearly identical to a heroin addiction."
Dr. Mary Anne Layden with the Center for Cognitive Therapy at the University of Pennsylvania explained how a pornographic image is burned into the brain's pathways.
"That image is in your brain forever," she explained. "If that was an addictive substance, you, at any point for the rest of your life, could in a nanosecond draw it up."
Dr. Judith Reisman, president of the Institute for Media Education, called on the Senate to take action against pornography, saying it's time to mandate that law enforcement begin to collect all data and pornographic materials found in the possession of anyone involved in criminal activity. Doing so, she added, would yield data showing whether pornography is being used as a how-to manual for sex crimes.
"The evidence the panelists presented showed an overwhelming harm from pornography," said Daniel Weiss, media and sexuality analyst with Focus on the Family. He hopes the Senate will turn the evidence into action.
TAKE ACTION/FOR MORE INFORMATION If you think Congress should be taking serious action against pornography, you can start by thanking Sen. Sam Brownback for calling the hearing, then contact your representatives in Congress and let them know what you think. For help in contacting your elected representatives, please see our CitizenLink Action Center.
Also, to learn more about one person's struggles with pornography, we suggest the resource "An Affair of the Mind: One Woman's Courageous Battle to Salvage Her Family From the Devastation of Pornography." Author Laurie Hall shares her courageous struggle to protect herself and two children from her husband's addiction to pornography.
ping
burned? Is that like seared?
Ding! BS Alert!
We've been getting inundated with this same bogus crap over teh last few days. I think some church group may have had a council meeting or something...
Regular or King Size?
The reason that the clergy aren't in this fight is because half the preachers and ministers are also looking at this stuff on the internet.
So is sex, sugar, caffine and chocolate, what's your point...
Regardless of what "addictive" means in relation to porn (people like sex, film at 11), if being addictive is sufficient cause for making something illegal, we're well over the nanny state line. Consider caffeine, for example.
Marital aids.
So what? Religion does the same thing. Do you want to outlaw that too?
Well, at least it's only half. All the Senators and Congressmen are hip deep in the stuff.
An addiction for which there is no cure; the outrageous tragedy is the introduction to young and curious minds.
Once something is SEEN, the mind can never forget, and the rest you go figure, hence the Jeff Dommers (spelling?).
They need to be more specific about what they're talking about. Child pornography, where a small, obviously young child is shown with having sex with adults should be pursued relentlessly and the perpetrators given the maximum penalty.
If, on the other hand, a woman or man is of the age of consent and can sign legally binding contracts on their own to perform in a pornographic movie or other medium, so what? As long as nobody's getting hurt, and there are no underage children involved, who cares?
Let the market determine what is and is not appropriate?
So if the market determines that the age of consent laws should go out the door, you think they should? If the market determines that child pornography is okay, I guess it is, huh? At least, according to your bogus defintion of pornography.
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