Cheering for the Anti-Smut Backlash and Heralding a Renaissance of Intimacy

The National Center on Sexual Exploitation and Fight the New Drug are but two national anti-porn organizations that rightly contend that porn is a highly addictive substance. It is one dangerous drug. And it absolutely is; neuroscientists can clearly show how it rots the brain. No parent would ever let a cocaine dealer in their house to talk to their kids, but because of technology one can barely escape these new drug dealers even if you do not want them around.

And this new drug is one nefarious, exploitative product, and decades of peer-reviewed research are revealing its dark underbelly. Think I’m being a bit melodramatic and extreme? As was noted in the Washington Post, pornography so warps the brain that, in the findings of one Taylor & Francis Group study of American college men, a whopping 83 percent who reported viewing mainstream pornography were more likely to state that “they would commit rape or sexual assault (if they knew they wouldn’t be caught) [more] than men who hadn’t seen porn in the past 12 months.” Sure, the producers and actors in the adult film industry do not forcibly make men commit sexual assaults, but the desensitizing connective tissue that drives “rape culture” on college campuses (and the global sex trade, I might add) is not a mystery.

Having said all that, I am going and get off my soapbox now and segue here because as an evangelical Christian it is not lost on me that my tribe in particular does not have the best reputation when it comes to porn-watching and the general stewardship of sexuality. The sterile, moralistic approach many of us have adopted over the years in reaction to the sexual revolution has proven to be woefully inadequate. What should our response to this anti-porn backlash entail? How do we get it right this time?

For those of us committed to living by the historic, biblical mores of our faith despite the constant temptations coming from seemingly everywhere, the challenge of refraining from something so ubiquitous, a mere two clicks away, remains fierce. But sin management and the “Just Say No” ethic does not work. We need to resist porn, yes, but also replace it with a deep reverence for the human body and with intimacy with God.  I believe such things can inspire a cultural renaissance wherein we rediscover the glory of human sexuality complete with visual, artistic representations of it that do not degrade and exploit but accentuate its beauty and wonder. We can feast on these beautiful things with our eyes and be pure. We can and should “Just Say Yes” to this vision for sexuality including its biblical, moral dimensions. As we affirm what it truly good, let’s also get around to making more art that celebrates the human body as Renaissance art does.