Now this entry may seem a little out of place from my writings the past few days, but it's something i ran across last night and it's bothered me all day.
I was readin' some in some other diaries and ran across an entry that was pretty much promoting porn. It's a sad world we live in when such destructive ideas have been twisted around and feed back to people as something that's "healthy and normal." Now don't get me wrong, even though I don't believe pornography is right, that doesn't mean i've never seen it. For many years, I was trapped in it's destructive grip and sometimes still struggle with it to this day. And looking back at all of it, I can't see any benefit that it's had on my life. Pornography is addictive, just like many of the illegal drugs in use today, and i don't really see anyone advocating the the use of those drugs, except the drug users themselves and those greedy people who could profit from others' self-destructive habits.Now some people may be thinking pornography and drugs are totally different and pornography has no addictive qualities. Many people say, "So what if i look at a picture of a naked lady or watch a good porno?" But how many people do you know that have just looked at a nudie picture or watched a porn movie? I'd say those numbers are fairly small. Instead, most people want more, and they want more naughty or explicit material. It may not be a physical addiction, but it is a psychological addiction that only grows with time. And yes, i know that we all know people that have been long time subscribers to Playboy or Penthouse (my step-grandfather included) who have never seemed to cross the line into anything harder. But how many of us who have seen anything a little more hardcore than Playboy have put up neon signs and billboards announcing the fact? Most people will still keep it a secret deep inside, never letting anyone know or what they might have seen or done. And even something as simple and "harmless" as a Playboy can have devestating effects. I recently saw a tape of Ted Bundy's final interview before he was put to death in 1989. (As a sidenote, i just found the tape at blockbuster, it's called "Fatal Addiction: Ted Bundy's Final Interview.") For those of you who might not know who Ted Bundy was, or what he did, you're pretty much in the same boat as me. Ted Bundy was a serial rapist and killer who was caught and convicted in 1979, so it was before my time really. But for anyone interested, i'm sure you could find many detailed accounts of his crimes. But in this interview, Bundy told the tale of his childhood. He lived what appeared to be a normal life. Anyone looking at him would not have picked him to be america's next major serial killer. But since an early age, Bundy had lived with a secret: pornography. As a young boy, he had come across some discarded porno magazines, which he then took home for himself. Bundy grew up with this little secret, a little secret that some years later had killed two dozen women and permanently affected the lives of countless others. And while Bundy did not blame pornography completely for his crimes, he did have this to say: "I have lived in a prison for a long time now. I've met a lot of men who were motivated to commit violence just like me. Without exception every one of them was deeply involved in pornography - without question, without exception - deeply influenced and consumed by and addiction to pornography."
So to say "So what?" to pornography is to say "So what?" to the thousands, if not millions, of victims. What victims? Well for one, the participants. Whether it be violence or money that compels them, they truly victimize themselves and others by their degrading practices, degraded minds, and their illusions of what sex should be. Women in porn become only objects, nothing more than a thing to be "loved" physically. Producers simply use other people to feed their own love of money. And then of course there are the children and others who are violently forced into pornography. Who else is victimized? The users themselves. Porn distorts many of the views of those who are exposed to it. They're made to believe that the greatest joy comes without commitment, cheating is expected, children and possible health effects are never mentioned and therefore never considered in real life, and dangerous ideas such as the "rape myth" are feed into the minds of men all over. And last but not least, the victims of men such as Ted Bundy. Even though we might not hear of something as horrible as Ted Bundy's story each day, it still happens daily. It sickens me to read of stories of children under 10 being raped by other children their same age.It sickens me to think that people are willing to continue the spread of this "disease" to feed their greed and own personal desires.

It sickens me and I'm tired of it...