The liberals generally do not admit that there is anything wrong with pornography, but if they do, they claim that pornography is a “victimless crime.” Anyone who thinks that should read the testimonies of the victims who gave their first-hand stories at the hearings of the Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography. Here are a few.
Sharon met her husband at college where she received her B.S. in education and he his M.D. in dental surgery. After their marriage, he developed a fixation with pornography in the so-called men’s entertainment magazines. He left the magazines around the house and their relationship deteriorated. Everything he said or did became sexually related, and he suggested that she have sex outside of marriage. He abused his daughter and molested ten of his patients. Finally, she fled from and divorced him, but the court has refused to stop the father’s visitations with his daughter.
Sara was a runaway forced into prostitution. She described how the pimps used pornography to train and hold the girls, and how she tried to escape. “Pornography and prostitution,” she said, “are two sides of the same coin.” Kandy described the pornographic aspect of rock music. The basic philosophy of sex in today’s rock, she said, is summed up perfectly in Tina Turner’s smash hit “What’s Love Got to Do With It? … It’s only physical … you must try to ignore that it means more than that … if it feels good, go for it.”
Ingrid asserted that, “You cannot have child pornography without child sexual abuse. They are inseparable.” She told about how her father abused her and how she wanted to die because the emotional pain was so great.
Evelyn told how pornography destroyed her happy marriage. Her husband became obsessed with Playboy, cheap paperbacks, obscene playing cards, and R-rated movies. This robbed their children of time and a loving relationship with their father. Her husband wanted her to perform what he saw in pornography, and even progressed to where he wanted to exchange sex partners and participate in orgies.
Brenda told how she became a Playboy Bunny because her father had Playboy magazine around the house, and she thought it was acceptable. She told how she and other Playboy bunnies were depressed and suicidal, and she described the relationship of pornography to suicide, drugs, sex, and VD.
Dr. Frank was the psychiatrist who thoroughly examined a man who committed a brutal rape-murder following 19 to 24 other sexual assaults of women. Dr. Frank described how pornography was an essential part of the criminal’s development. He needed pornography to commit sexual assault, and he progressed through every bizarre sex act until the final tragedy.
James described how he became a victim of pornography starting with crude movies at age 12. He said that pornography does not stand still, but it feeds on itself and “the decadence becomes more decadent.” Now, at age 48 with four children, he said, “I still struggle daily with the images, the thoughts, the yearnings, the lusts, cultivated during those years of self-indulgence in pornography.” He said that the images are “permanently embedded” in his mind because of the “sticking power” of pornography.
Diana did extensive research on convicted rapists. “Pornography must be understood,” she said, “as an important factor contributing to an environment that trivializes, neutralizes, and ultimately facilitates rape.”
Dan was introduced to pornography at age 9 by a man in his 20s who showed him cartoons with explicit sex acts. He admitted that he has been a “porno addict” for more than 40 years, even though he is now a successful professional man, a management-level employee in a large corporation, married and with a family. He recognizes his problem, has had counseling, but the urge never leaves him because he is “held in bondage to pornography.”
Diane told how her son Troy died from imitating the autoerotic asphyxiation graphically depicted in an article in Hustler magazine called “Orgasm of Death.” She found the magazine at her son’s feet; it directly caused his death.
Garrett told how, at age 10, a trusted friend of her family and highly respected lawyer sexually abused her, starting with showing her Playboy and Penthouse. He robbed her of her childhood, and she attempted suicide. Too scared to tell her parents, she confided in the family doctor, and he used the opportunity to assault and abuse her for two more years.
Another woman told how a local cable television company came into town with its package of programming, and her husband became addicted to porn movies within three months. This completely changed their relationship and destroyed their 30-year marriage. He wanted her to perform the acts he saw in the pornography and, when she wouldn’t, he found a woman who would.
There is much, much more in the 3,000 pages of Commission hearings — depressing but important for those who care about helping the victims of the social evil called pornography.
