Pornography: straws in the wind?

Following last weeks government announcement about a default block on online pornography, quickly followed by Microsoft suddenly discovering that they could make more difficult for certain sorts of web users, comes a third straw in the wind.

Co-op supermarkets have given lads mags a deadline of 9th September to introduce 'modesty bags' or be withdrawn from sale. Apparently the Daily Sport has already agreed to this - at our local Co-op, it's displayed at the eye level of an average 10 year old.

Steve Murrells, retail chief executive for the Co-operative Group, said: "As a community-based retailer, we have listened to the concerns of our customers and members, many of whom say they object to their children being able to see overt sexual images in our stores.

"Whilst we have tried to mitigate the likelihood of young children seeing the images with a number of measures in store, the most effective way of doing this is for these magazines to be put in individual, sealed modesty bags."

Well, no, the most effective way is not to stock them at all, the way you currently don't stock other pornographic titles. The local Tesco Express, which has all the papers at floor level, doesn't sell the Sport, though the lads mags are within easy reach/sight of the Year 6 kids from the local primary school. 

With 'No More Page 3' gaining signatories and influence, there are a few signs of hope that the tide of pornification is turning. But there's a long way to go, and vast swathes of the entertainment and fashion industries still defiantly waving Beyonce's booty at any notions of modesty, sexual purity, and respect for women as people rather than sexual objects.

A Pastoral Grey Area

So, there's this bestselling book around, which over 1m people in the UK have bought, which means several hundred people in my neighbourhood, and possibly a few connected to my church as well.

As someone who likes to be vaguely aware of what's going on, I'd normally dig around a bit to find out more about the book, or even borrow a copy. After all, that's what I did with the Hunger Games trilogy a few months ago. If anyone wants my copy of Mockingjay.... (See Mark Meynell for some comment on this. That's a whole different dilemma: by buying the book, I was consuming entertainment based on young people killing each other, which itself was trying to make the point that entertainment based on young people killing each other was a bad thing. Confused yet?)

Anyway, I got as far as Wikipedia, and immediately hit a few snags. To find out anything about 50 Shades of Grey means getting into accounts of sexual activity which would make Caligula blush, and which as a husband and as a Christian, I would want to steer well clear of. There are some things I don't want in my head, and graphic descriptions of abusive sex are one of them. But not to find out anything about 50SOG would mean being unable to say very much about it.

Trouble is, the more mainstream pornography gets, the more urgent the need to work out how to respond to it as a Christian. At the overt end are books like this and the 'adult' channels dumped into your TV set by Freeview, at the covert end is sexualised fashion, pop culture, media, and 9 year old girls singing 'sexy and I know it' in the school playground.

There are a few Christian thinkers and writers addressing this, but not many. Ed Stetzer has highlighted a study on pornography, which finds:
■Pornography is addictive, and neuroscientists are beginning to map the biological substrate of this addiction.
■Users tend to become desensitized to the type of pornorgraphy they use, become bored with it, and then seek more perverse forms of pornography.
■Married men who are involved in pornography feel less satisfied with their conjugal relations and less emotionally attached to their wives. Wives notice and are upset by the difference.
■Pornography use is a pathway to infidelity and divorce, and is frequently a major factor in these family disasters.
■Among couples affected by one spouse's addiction, two-thirds experience a loss of interest in sexual intercourse.

So I'm struggling with how, as a church leader, to engage with this stuff in a way that will help my congregation, but without having to actually read/look at any of it. Any helpful thoughts?

Loaded, lads and the degrading of women

Excellent post at God and Politics, on the slow awakening of a Loaded editor to the realities of pornography. I won't be posting anything today, except to recommend that you read Gillan's excellent piece, which also references a campaign for New Look to withdraw some appalling t-shirts.

Pornography consultation: what about Freeview?

The government is consulting on whether to move the goalposts on access to online pornography. The current default setting is that, unless people opt out, you can get at pretty much anything on the web. This is like moving into a new house and accepting an open sewer running past the front door. I'm hoping the government switches to an 'opt in' version, where the default setting is that you can't see people degrading themselves and one another via your computer.

But why stop there? Following the digital switchover, open sewers have been installed in the corner of every living room in the land (if you're lucky enough to have a living room - anyone in a house built since 2000 will be lucky to to have room for a TV).

Along with Freeview comes a batch of 'adult' channels which are installed automatically, and then need to be blocked. There's probably an army of enterprising teens who have already hacked past their parents password to get round this.

If it's good enough for the web, it's good enough for TV too. Adult content shouldn't be part of the standard Freeview package, and adult channels shouldn't be automatically installed on free digital services.

That Thing We Don't Talk About

Ht Tim Chester, whose version of this pic is slightly larger and easier to read.

Chatting to someone the other day, they mentioned a computer app developed by XXXChurch, which monitors your internet use and sends a report on the sites you've visited to a group of people you've chosen (and vice versa). It's a good way to stay accountable and honest in an area that's usually very private and secretive.