In this heartfelt and eye-opening talk, Edwin from the EVA Prolife Movement speaks out on the often-overlooked connection between pornography, masturbation, and sex trafficking.
He presents 5 powerful secular arguments on why masturbation can be harmful:
Edwin also shares his personal testimony — how he overcame his struggles with porn and masturbation after realizing its link to human trafficking, and how his perspective shifted when he imagined the victims as someone he loved. This video is not about judgment — it’s about awareness, transformation, and taking a stand against exploitation and addiction.
Neuroscience is telling us more and more about how pornography interacts with the brain. More recent studies show us that pornography addiction is like other process addictions, leaving to compulsive cravings.
There’s a big debate among medical professional when it comes to the terms we use to describe problematic use of pornography. Should we call it porn addiction, should we call it compulsive pornography use, or should we call it pornography dependence? The debate is actually a fairly old one, and it is bigger than just pornography, but all kinds of addiction and compulsions. In medicine, there has been a long-standing debate about these terms. Some times the definitions have considerable overlap.
Today, there are a lot more people out there speaking out against pornography on the grounds that it really isn’t a very healthy industry. The more they read the stories of the women and men in pornography, the conditions of their work, the use of drugs, the physical pain, the instances of shady behavior among porn producers, the manipulation, the sexual abuse, both on and off camera, and the spread of STDs, the more people are saying, if porn is this abusive, I don’t want to endorse it.
Christians and other religious individuals are widely known for opposing pornography for all kinds of moral reasons. I happen to be one of them, so when I tell people I’m getting ready to publish a whole book about the ills of pornography, many people assume I’m primarily speaking to fellow Christians. Now, of course, I hope my book is read by all kinds of people, but my aim in writing this is not to talk to religious people who already detest pornography, but to the culture at large that has no problem with it. This is because pornography use is not just a religiously motivated moral issue.
We’ve heard people say that all this talk about porn being bad for relationships is overrated. After all, they say, porn can give couples ideas about new ways to be fun and adventurous in the bedroom. Making us excited about sex with our partner. The fact that people watch porn because they find it exciting and pleasurable isn’t up for debate. But I want to challenge the notion that porn is conducive to intimacy and that it offers real sexual satisfaction, especially in the long run. You see porn ultimately turns our sexual focus away from another person, away from true intimacy, and onto a screen. Instead of making our beloved our focus, we turn from him or her to a screen in order to get aroused by for the most part emotionally damaged actors pretending to enjoy sex. Intimacy has been described as in-to-me-see. Watching porn with your partner is the opposite of that.
So, what does this mean? This mean porn actually impacts us medically. We begin to lose impulse control. Cravings for porn start to grow and there are no neurological breaks to put a stop to them. Porn is, in a sense, making the brain not more mature, but more childlike. Indulging in porn and other forms of commercial sex are hardly befitting of the adjective “adult.” Don’t be fooled. Actions speak louder than words—even when those words are five feet high, written neon, and contain the phrase “gentlemen’s club.”
Unfortunately we live in a world where porn has become the most common sex educator. It’s common for children, even before puberty, to see pornography, and then to continue watching it into adolescence. Let me mention just two trends in porn that are disturbing, showing why we should be concerned about anyone, especially young people, watching it.
We’ve often heard men say, “I love looking at porn. Besides it doesn’t hurt anything. It’s only fantasy. What’s the problem?” Now, you may not have a moral problem with porn, but many are starting to have a medical problem with it. The more we study the impact of porn on the male brain, the more men are starting to think twice about porn being a harmless pastime.
Dr. Sharon Mitchell co-founded the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation, also called AIM. For about 20 years she was a porn actress and director herself, and after opening her clinic, saw well over 1000 porn stars every month for STD testing, so it’s probably safe to say she knows a thing or two about porn stars. Dr. Mitchell says there are three types of women drawn to pornography: those who are desperate for money, those who are desperate for fame, and those who are addicted to sex.