The Dangerous Fragility of a Pornified Culture
I originally wrote this in November 2017. Unfortunately, it’s still applicable.
Yesterday, I came across a very disturbing tweet.
An adult male posted a picture of an obvious adult woman. He then posed a question to his followers: “You at a party and you been talking to this girl all night. Y’all get ready to leave but before you do anything, she tells you that she’s 15. What would you do?”
I responded directly to him, informing him that I thought the tweet was disturbing on so many levels. He retweeted my response, but did not directly reply. I found that interesting. Sadly, what I found most depressing were many of the other responses. They go something like this:
“If she 15, I’m 15.”
“If she moans, she legal.”
“B**** shouldn’t be at no grown party.”
What’s even more disturbing is this is not a new phenomenon. I see things like this daily throughout social media, and while the lives that many people lead on the Internet are a farce, I am not willing to dismiss the lawlessness by which these sorry excuses for males live. But instead of letting my thought process end there, I went a little deeper in my psyche.
I thought about all of the times I have been alone in a room with a woman I have some sort of relationship with, whether it be romantic or platonic. I sat in the chair at my desk. Tears started flowing from my eyes. I imagine that if I ever wanted to force myself sexually on any of those women, the majority of them wouldn’t physically fight back. It’s entirely plausible that they would endure the trauma of sexual assault in a silent pain, one totally encompassing their entire being: physical, emotional, spiritual and physical.
I am not a righteous man, but I am incredibly thankful that there’s no fiber in my body that has the need to exercise such sadistic power over someone; take something so incredibly precious that’s not freely and willfully given to me. That’s one of the unique things about rape, namely, we love to think about it only in a brutal, scar-leaving context. Contemporary media wants us to believe that rape is only when a person is physically beaten up and assaulted, tied up with a rope, and left bleeding profusely. But the most common form of sexual assault happens in the scenario that I outlined above. When a person joins another friend or romantic partner alone in a dormitory or apartment building, and doesn’t want to have sex, but there seems like there’s no plausible way out of the circumstance.
That’s why the very limited time I spent on social media yesterday ate at me through today. It’s eating at me right now. Not only do such responses explicitly show that there are adult males out here feeding a subconscious attraction and desire for pedophilia and rape, but it shows the depravity by which they approach life on a daily basis. Perhaps that’s why “teen porn” is the most sought after form of pornography.
An endless number of times, I have heard people say “Why rape someone when so many girls will just give you sex?” That question, to put it loosely, illustrates a failure to see the true societal issue. Rape is rarely ever about the sex, though to dismiss the sexual aspect of it is problematic as well. Instead, it’s a twisted, satanic expression of dominance and of power, and of misplaced fortitude and violent sexuality. It says I will have what I want when I want it. It stems from a misguided theology and/or ethos of sex and sensuality. A decent man delights in the sexual pleasure and gratification of his wife, therefore, his greatest desire is to know that she is pleased, comfortable, and aroused. It means he understands when she says she is tired, even if he is frustrated after a long waiting period. It means that if something makes her uncomfortable, he ceases said action, and/or patiently and lovingly guides her through it with her explicit consent. More importantly, it means that he learns how to control his urges, fully knowing and understanding that he has does not have dominion over any person’s body, including his own.
A pornified culture makes learning these lessons to young boys incredibly difficult, because as soon as they turn eleven, they know how to use an iPad better than I know how to wash a plate. From the moment they are able to reproduce, they know how to find the visual image of exactly what they want whenever they want it. It sounds far fetched, but it’s true, but it’s also not an excuse. Going further, perhaps we should just change the way we view sex all together, because even “consensual sex” can be violent, emotionally abusive, coercive and one-sided.
Am I saying that every person indulging in pornography is bound to evolve into a rapist or pedophile? No. But a society that uses distorted views of sex to sell nearly everything, coupled with the absence of adequate guidance, education, and mentorship for our adolescents, makes me increasingly fearful about the world my nieces will live in when they go to high school.
That’s the most frightening thing of all, knowing that the innocence of many is literally stolen, and our world is full of people who think that’s worth a retweet or more followers. I don’t have the answers, and perhaps none of us individually do, but maybe we can start a conversation that leads to the restoration of such a strange, beautiful and pleasurable gift? I truly hope that we can.