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| John William Waterhouse: "The Siren" (detail) 1900. |
“It immerses all who are involved in the illusion of a fantasy world.” (CCC #2354.)
“The Catechism of the Catholic Church” is an enormously rich document that was blessedly published while I was imprisoned within the gay community and the porn industry; therefore, it was waiting to be discovered when the Lord took me from that life in 1999. I ravenously read through it, for, it answered all those numerous questions that had never been addressed during 13 years of parochial school education. In particular, the line above, concerning pornography, is worthy of a detailed exploration. My first blog on this subject, http://www.josephsciambra.com/2014/01/porn-will-take-you-to-hell-itself.html, is an introduction. Now, I would like to further study three words from section #2354: “immerses,” “illusion,” and “fantasy.”
“[Porn] immerses all who are involved…”
Since pornography is a cross, this text from St. John of the Cross I find extremely helpful: “A moth is not helped much by its eyes, blinded in its desire for the beauty of light; it will fly directly into a bonfire. Those who feed on their appetites are like a fish dazzled by a light that so darkens it that the fisherman’s snares cannot be seen. David describes this blindness well: ‘Fire, that gives off heat and dazzles by its light, came upon them’ [Ps. 58: 8-9]. The appetites cause this in the soul: They enkindle concupiscence and overwhelm the intellect so that it cannot see its light. The reason is that a new light set directly in front of the visual faculty blinds this faculty so that it fails to see the light farther away.” – “The Ascent of Mount Carmel”
In other words, porn is oftentimes so dazzlingly beautiful, which I witnessed as a young boy looking and falling in love with the seemingly perfectly formed Dorothy Stratten, that it knocks out the functionality of the senses and renders the viewer almost temporarily catatonic. I discovered this very real physical and mental state when I first found X-rated home-videos; where I would endlessly gaze at the screen for hours at a time. Later, I shut myself into little video-booths at adult arcades, masturbating while being hypnotized by the bright flashing light of the television, which served as the only illumination in the darkened rooms; only to be so semi-comatose that anonymous men would walk-in and molest me. When I finally got into porn, the first thing that surprised me was how intensely bright and hot were the production lights which shown on my body. Truly, they were all I could see. Somewhat, they were a relief, as the oftentimes gross individuals on the periphery were completely blotted out. Currently, although I missed the internet porn revolution, many write to me and state that they sometimes spend up to 8 hours in one night mesmerized by the constant glow of the computer monitor.
Scientists are just beginning to link heavy pornography viewing with the same pleasure-reward responses that occur in drug addiction. When viewing pornography, the brain releases large amounts of the neurotransmitter dopamine, the same chemical that drives reward-seeking behavior in substance addictions, this is according to “Psychology Today” contributor Gary Wilson. The lack of dopamine in the body has been linked with everything from hyperactivity to Parkinson’s disease. Therefore, the porn dopamine rush accurately pacifies the raging best. With regards to childhood exposure to pornography, Wilson wrote: “We restrict our options—without realizing how critical our choices were during our final, pubescent, neuronal growth spurt...This is one reason why polls asking teens how Internet porn use is affecting them are unlikely to reveal the extent of porn's effects. Kids who have never masturbated without porn have no idea how it is affecting them.” Furthermore, Dr. Valerie Voon, a Cambridge University neuroscientist specializing in addictions, studied 19 self-confessed compulsive pornography users. The brains of young men who are obsessed by online pornography “lit up like Christmas trees” upon being shown erotic images. Even though, John of the Cross could not have been aware of the scientific basis for addictions, over 500 years before these studies were even performed, he described much the same results – but, in the spiritual sphere: just as porn exposure literally lights-up the brain, evil stuns those involved and immerses them within the deceptive radiance of a false calm. Because porn can often feel like the all-embracing warmth of perfectly heated water: it envelopes and soothes. You become lost in its hold. I will never forget strolling into an X-rated theater, emerging back into the afternoon light, squinting my eyes, and realizing I had missed an entire day at the junior college. I had been a literal prisoner inside that place, and, even though I was outside, I was still a prisoner within my mind.