Addicted to Porn: Chasing the Cardboard Butterfly Page #9

the word "addiction" is...

The new manual for mental health disorders,

I'm sorry.

The word "addiction"

is used once.

And it's used

with a line that says...

"Addiction is not

a precise enough term anymore."

Because we don't really

know what it means.

Sex looks just like those drugs,

and the more

we learn about that,

the more we understand

it's a contextual thing, really.

That's why the American Society

of Addiction Medicine,

which is comprised of

medical doctors like myself,

who are more biologically based,

redefined addiction in 2011

as a disease of the brain.

They used the "disease" word.

Affecting three systems,

reward, motivation, and memory.

And the second part

of their definition was that

sex, food, and gambling

are addictions

just as much as alcohol,

cocaine, or heroin.

And yet, one the DSM is

gonna say is an addiction,

and the other is not?

It's ludicrous. It really is.

And the DSM-5 is deeply

flawed for that reason.

And so, anyone that

would... would say that

if it's not in the DSM-5,

it's not an addiction

simply doesn't understand

the neurobiology of the brain.

There's so many subjective perspectives

on that based on family of origin,

culture, heritage,

faith, and so forth,

that it's going to require

very specific data,

very specific empirical evidence

to even get

the conversation started.

And even then,

as you well know,

many people, despite evidence,

will still push back against that.

And that's common

throughout humanity.

But we have to at least

have that data.

Be it psychological

or biological,

the rift between these

two very important fields

could well be one of

the reasons that this issue

has flown under the radar

for so long.

Imagine if the two

very intelligent groups united.

I personally don't see the two

sides needing to be at odds.

At the end of the day, we want to

help individuals that are struggling.

You say it's this.

We say it's that.

At the end of the day,

we want the same outcome.

We want them to have mental health.

We want them to have emotional health.

We want them to have

relational health.

We want them to have success, and stability,

and a sense of well-being within themselves.

And I think there's

multiple ways to get to that.

And I don't see us needing to

be as diametrically opposed

as many times we're being

pitted against each other.

Speaking of

biology versus psychology,

is it fair to ask if this is an

issue of neurochemical dependency

versus moral deficiency?

In essence, are we talking about

addiction versus being a bad person?

When you talk about

addiction of any kind,

the thing that's the most difficult for

people to relate to is the loss of control.

That people who aren't,

who can't relate personally,

look at somebody...

who's in the grips of addiction and say,

"How could you choose

X, Y, Z over your family?

How could you choose

drugs over your kids?

How could you choose

porn over your wife?"

That's very hard for the

average person to relate to.

And yet,

on the flip side,

the person that's struggling with

that addiction in its true form

looks at it and says,

"What choice?"

And I found something in it

that was so repulsive to me,

but yet it was such a dark place

to kind of hide out.

I don't know.

For me, it just...

It got me,

and it would not let go of me.

It was the most shameful thing

that I've ever had to deal with.

Is there a way we can talk about it

then without using the moral card?

Absolutely.

So, it's not just

a moral problem

for people that believe

in morals.

It is a brain problem.

It is an addiction independent

of any moral basis or judgment.

By and large, no, this is not a value-less

person that you're dealing with,

a moral-less person.

It's somebody who has really

strong values and morals

but has become

disconnected from them,

or become distracted from them,

or their obsession

has pulled them away

from a focus in that part of them

that is their healthiest self.

And there is still a part of them

that's screaming and saying,

"Please get me

back to balance.

But I don't know how to get there without

doing the thing that I know to do now

that feels like balanced

and normal."

The person who's spending

his time with pornography, um,

you know, if it's approached

as a moral problem,

then the response is,

uh, for him to feel shame,

and, uh,

you know, if somebody

will just preach to him enough

and really make him understand

how bad he is,

maybe he'll stop.

No, he doesn't stop.

Shame ends up being

a very powerful, um,

a very powerful trigger then.

A very powerful, uh,

thing that propels

the addiction.

Whatever your

perspective may be,

we cannot just pretend that this

pornography issue doesn't exist.

It has very real, very apparent

potential to infiltrate individuals,

relationships, families,

and break down the very nature of

community as it's meant to be.

We are sexual beings.

We always have been and always will be.

It's how we begin to handle

that sexuality now,

or at least try

to understand it,

that will have great

impact on the future.

As we lose the ability

to be intimate,

what we can predict

is a generation of children

that have this inability to

self-regulate themselves emotionally.

An inability to form satisfactory,

close human relationships,

who will then pass it on to their children,

who'll pass it on to their children.

When we say

something is an addiction,

the answer is real easy.

Stop doing it.

The answer here

is not so simple.

These are complex issues

that involve marriages,

involve sexual values,

involve men and women,

involve masculinity and femininity,

involve education,

involve culture and society,

involve sexually

transmitted diseases,

involve libido

and all kinds of things.

If your film can generate

that kind of conversation,

I think it's healthy.

I think that's the ultimate goal,

and that's my ultimate goal.

Because calling it addiction

stops the conversation.

We've walked on the moon.

We can perform

intricate surgeries.

We can write beautiful sonnets.

We can compose music.

We can do all

of these marvelous things.

We can love our children,

our spouse,

experience these powerful,

deep human emotions.

And then we cheapen it

by commoditizing human beings.

We're better than that.

We're much better than that.

Sexuality has a much higher

purpose in humans than that.

The unfortunate thing is that

pornography is ruining and destroying

many families, uh,

and many individuals.

Black and white thinking

when it comes to pornography

is just not a luxury that

we can indulge ourselves in.

That's a scary thing to think about,

when you talk about

how does this impact the formation of

coupleships and family establishment?

And then there's the values

that we carry forth, of

do we see ourselves

as a communal being,

or do see ourselves

as individuals in isolation?

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