In most societies today, sex is legislated: we have outlawed rape, prostitution, and pedophilia. What about sex plus money? We call forced sex plus money commercial sex trafficking, and it’s illegal. Consensual sex plus money, on the other hand, is called prostitution, and it’s also illegal or at least unacceptable by societal norms and religious values. So, basically, if money is exchanged for sex, a crime is committed. But unfortunately, when someone films the sex and distributes it on the world wide web (internet), we call it pornography, and not only is it legal and protected as an expression of free speech and sexuality, but it is also celebrated and encouraged as a rite of passage and recreational escape. The perpetrators are described as “stars” (read porn stars) worthy of emulation by the young and impressionable, rather than as criminals.

The word pornography, derived from the Greek words porni (“prostitute”) and graphein (“to write/document”). It was originally defined as any work of art or literature depicting the life of prostitutes. So, pornography is actually filmed prostitution or recorded fornication. Therefore, by watching porn, you create a demand for filmed prostitution, as it were. People are getting paid to have sex and to get others to pay to watch them have sex. This is the commodification of human beings for the pleasure of paying consumers.

Just like tobacco undeniably causes cancer, the pornography industry both drives and supplies the growing demand for sex slaves. The logic is simple: where there is no demand, there is no supply, and increased demand leads to increased supply.

To many nowadays, porn is the number one teacher on sex education, and if that’s the case, it’s only fair that we ask ourselves: “what curriculum does this teacher use?”

A 2012 content analysis of over 100 of the roughly 250 most popular and bestselling porn movies revealed aggressive, abusive, and corrosive acts in every porn movie, and in most cases, the victims were the women while the men were the dominators. The analysis also shows how porn, ever since the 70s, have become increasingly more aggressive and humiliating.

When someone views pornography, they end up creating an intimate bond with an artificial, fake world and eventually lose the ability to bond with real people. They increasingly become desensitised to the extent of not getting aroused by their spouses anymore. Porn is a fierce competitor; even real sex cannot compete with it. This is the reason why so many men now suffer from weak erections (ED – erectile dysfunction) and relationship problems. Like cocaine addiction, while pornography use may result in a short term high, it eventually results in feelings of emptiness, low self-esteem and deep loneliness. Eventually, porn ruins your life.

Dopamine and Porn Addiction

When you eat something delicious, your brain releases dopamine, a chemical that makes you feel good. This is the same neurochemical released when you watch porn, only in much larger quantities. As porn users become too used to the overloads of dopamine, they often find that they cannot feel normal without a dopamine high. Over time, the brain requires higher levels of dopamine releases to get the same level of high. That’s when the porn addicts seek novel and more aggressive porn genres to get same level of satisfaction, and that brings us to what is known as the Coolidge Effect.

The Coolidge Effect

Spreading genes is Nature’s number 1 priority. However, settling down with the first person we fall in love with and staying bonded would not help spread our genes. So almost all mammals, including us humans, have a built-in, ancient mechanism that scientists call The Coolidge Effect, which operates to make us seek out ‘novel’ mating partners when our fertilization job appears to be done. It works by building tolerance to, or boredom with, the same person or stimulus. Over time, their presence becomes less ‘rewarding’ to the primitive brain and causes less and less desire for the same sexual partner.

President Calvin Coolidge

Here’s where the term “Coolidge Effect” is thought to originate: The President and Mrs. Calvin Coolidge were being shown [separately] around an experimental government farm. When Mrs. Coolidge came to the chicken yard, she noticed that a rooster was mating very frequently. She asked the attendant how often that happened and was told, “Dozens of times each day.” Mrs. Coolidge said, “Tell that to the President when he comes by.” Upon being told, the President asked, “Same hen every time?” The reply was, “Oh, no, Mr. President, a different hen every time.” President: “Tell that to Mrs. Coolidge.”

Farmers know this too, as bulls will only mate with a cow once per season. They will seek out new cows in the field in order to fertilize the whole herd. This ancient program to spread as many genes around as possible, does not fit with our more civilized lives today. We want to bond and stay committed for as long as possible.

The Coolidge Effect and Porn

The Coolidge effect has allowed the internet pornography industry to mushroom into a multi-billion-dollar business. The brain sees each pornographic image as a new sexual partner. As soon as a person has ‘fertilised to satiety’ an apparently willing sexual partner, they will stop. This happens even if it is just an image of one. Then the brain produces less “go after it “dopamine and hunts around for new fertilisation opportunities. With around 10 million porn videos consumed in the UK alone every day, there is no shortage of apparently willing sexual partners. All this goes on at an unconscious level but affects everyday behaviour, none the less.

The good news is that we don’t have to be trapped by The Coolidge Effect. We humans are smart when we put our minds to it. By learning to reduce the effects of too much dopamine in the brain and redressing the balance with more oxytocin thus reducing stress levels too, we encourage more loving bonds and connection. These are sustainable and help us flourish both individually and together.

Disturbing Statistics on Pornography on the Web

There are 4.2 million pornographic websites. This represents 12 percent of all websites in the world. Every day, there are 68 million search engine requests for pornographic material. That is 25percent of all search engine requests. There are 100,000 websites that offer illegal child pornography. Annually, there are 72 million worldwide visitors to pornographic websites. As of July 2003, there were 260 million pages of porn online, an increase of 1800% since 1998.Porn amounts to about 7% of the 3.3 billion pages indexed by Google. The average age of first internet exposure to pornography is 11 years. 70% of teens have accidentally stumbled across pornography online. Pornographers disguise their sites (i.e. “stealth” sites) with common brand names, including Disney, Barbie, ESPN, etc., to entrap children. More than 20,000 images of child pornography are posted on the Internet every week. Pornography is a $12 to $13 billion-a-year industry – more than the combined annual revenues of Coca-Cola and McDonnell Douglas corporations. Pornographic entertainment on the Internet constituted the third largest sector of sales in cyberspace, with estimated annual revenues of $100 million. Such marketing success has fueled an increase in the size of the pornography industry – $10 billion annually, according to conservative estimates. Americans rent upwards of 800 million porn videos and DVD’s a year compared with 3.6billion non-porn videos. Nearly one in five rentals is a porn flick. Hollywood produces 400 feature films a year. The porn industry churns out 11,000. One in four American adults surveyed in 2002 admitted to seeing an x-rated movie in the last year. 40% of sex/porn addicts lose their spouses, 58% suffer considerable financial loses, and about a third lose their jobs.

Say No to Pornography

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. For every child that is trafficked for sex, you contribute to the demand by watching porn. For every click of a pornographic link and for every second you spend watching porn online, you directly finance the porn industry worldwide. We are either a part of the solution or a part of the problem. There is no neutral when it comes to valuing each individual as a person who craves to be known and loved. Every pornographic download exploits somebody’s child, mother sister, brother, friend – fellow human beings inherently worthy of our respect. When we reduce people to the sum of their body parts and eliminate their humanity, we uphold the same cultural mindset that drives sex slavery. By accepting the status quo, and denying the causal relationship, we also contribute to the slavery of 27 million people. Do you think your orgasm is worth the price being paid for it?

May Allah save us from us!

Abu Bilaal Abdulrazaq bn Bello bn Oare