Is porn the problem, or is it just a lack of moderation?

Caleb, I think you have raised important points, and I agree with some. But your arguments can be used also against people struggling with many kinds of addictions (alcoholics, food addicts, ....). None of the foras working towards helping people with these problems are advocating the banning or prohibition of alcohol or sugary food, they are just trying to help people who have a problem with it. I think NoFap stands the same way. I can try to give you some examples from personal experience.

A friend of mine who got me into smoking has never ever been addicted. He still smokes (after 22 years), maybe once or twice a month, after a heavy dinner or something, and also when he is on holiday (and he tells me sometimes after having a fantastic sex). He has associated smoking with having fun and special occasions. He never smokes because of boredom, loneliness, stress or unhappiness. Myself, on the other hand, I got hooked into smoking very easily, I was chain smoking for 10+ years. Then I quit for three years and thought I can be a party smoker like my friend. The first couple of months, I managed just like him, one or two cigarettes per week. On the third month or so, I have a stressful time at school, and without even noticing it I have fallen back to smoking more than a pack per day. The 10 years of heavy smoking to deal with my loneliness, heartbreaks, frustrations, stress, unhappiness have indeed programmed me, and I can't play with fire so to say anymore. So I quite again and have never smoked since then. It has been almost 8 years since I quit, but I still sometimes have dreams of just sipping my tea and smoking. I wish I could be able to smoke once in a while, after a heavy meal, with a nice glass of wine, but I can't risk it. So I will never argue smoking be prohibited, but for me and people like me who have trained themselves for years in associating smoking with dealing with things/feelings they don't like, the only way is to quit.

The same with porn. I have friends who watch it once in a while, and they watch it to have fun. They sometimes watch it with their partners. They have fun, and they forget about it for some time. They never had ED, or any other issues. For them, porn is associated with fun. While for me, porn was never fun. I don't remember watching porn when I was extremely happy. It has always been in the wee hours of the night when I felt lonely, when I was stressed and didn't know how to handle it, when I was horny and frustrated because I didn't have a partner to have sex with, you name it, every condition was associated with not feeling good one way or another. I also started watching porn years before I had a real physical sex with a woman (I think around 6 years or so). So I can't fool myself that I can just try to moderate myself now, just like the smoking, I would have to let it go. I wish I could watch porn once in a while, enjoy it, masturbate and have a mind blowing orgasm comparable to a real sex.

So in short, for many people (of course, there will always be exceptions) once you have passed a threshold and you have become addicted, moderation is no more an option, and quitting is the only way. For the lucky ones who for one way or another has never become addicted (didn't start porn very early, hadn't have long dry spells that they filled up with porn instead real sex, have not associated loneliness or any other bad feeling to porn and masturbation but rather only having fun, etc...), then, who the fuck am I to say "you shouldn't do that". Let them have their fun! The ethical/moral/exploitation issue is something else, and I think most people are here not because of that, but to solve their own issues.

 

Specifically, I was using hyper-palatable foods for my comparison. It goes beyond refined sugar. That is just splitting hairs, though Doesn't really matter. But Google it sometime if you get bored. Neat stuff.

Slippery slope fallacy Regardless, this whole line of thinking hinges on porn being banned, which I don't think it ever will be. I cannot comments on all of the many possible what-if's involved with that.

I am missing where the complication arises... Nudism and porn are different things. Are you wondering whether -- in the hypothetical no-porn apocalyptic future -- nudism would be banned? They share similarities but are fundamentally different.

 

No clue. I personally am not looking to ban porn, so am probably the wrong one to ask. I am looking to deescalate my own issues which porn was not helping, so am personally avoiding it. But I don't put much effort into it otherwise

I assume similarly to an alcoholic who is tempted by a nearby bar or how someone trying to give up marijuana handles being at a Phish concert With any addiction, it is about avoiding triggers until you are able to effectively deal with them. Or so I assume. Might get better feedback from other members on that, though.

 

I have been only a couple of times at a nude beach, and I was not excited at all. The people there are not selected and lined up to excite you. You can't open them up in several tabs and look at them engaging in different styles of sex from softcore to extreme hardcore.

And even if you get excited, what is wrong with that? Even if you get excited and masturbate while looking at them, I see nothing wrong in that either. The sexual drive is one of the most important instincts in life, coming only second to survival instinct that makes sure we are well fed and not thirsty and out of danger. Why would one want to fight that? Even if you are religious, getting against sex is actually getting against God, who made an integral part of who we are.

I want to get excited and get horny when I look at attractive women even when I am well into my 80s/90s, if I make it that far. The day I see a beautiful girl wearing a mini skirt on the street and I don't get any rush of horniness in me, I consider my self dead.

 

Caleb, I am not sure here in the Newbies section is an appropriate place to bring up those sorts of scenarios. It may have been left alone originally to avoid focusing on it, as a lot of folks here struggle with sexual addiction.

You may have noticed other forum posts may abbreviate porn as P, masturbation as M, etc. (the top-level post in this forum has a link to the glossary, if you are interested)

As for your specific question... as with most of what has been discussed in the thread, it is largely based on personal choices and comfort levels. Different strokes for different folks, so to speak.

Have a great weekend!

 

Not a mod. Just sharing info that I saw when I first joined

 

Here let me quote regarding porn fom my guide, read it, learn it, and try understand it

PORN

As ancient as it look, porn has been on the world for long time, nude drawing, painting, sculpting, litorica, its has been part of human needs.

Even on bible, you can found some of erotic story. So how should we see porn ? Is it bad or its is good ? Then answer will be neither bad or good, depending how you look and use it, its can help or bring destruction.

Take wine for example, in little dose its can help increase your health, however in larger dose its will ruin your liver and send you to early grave. But not every wine worth to be drink, also not every type of porn should we watch, because what we see, is what we learn, example if you look on rape porn, so does its teach you how to rape someone.

As minor we probably been taugh that porn is bad and forbidden for us to watch because we still underage and realy have lack understanding about what is right and what is wrong, however as adult nobody taugh us what kind of porn we should look, and what kind of fetish forbidden for us to see, we just walk into pandora box without know what we dealing, so does we trapped inside new world without know how to escape from it. Also being adult in body doesnt mean also adult in mind, there lots of adult that have child mind inside their soul.Its about our understanding what is right and what is wrong, when and where porn shall be used.

Its our nature to feel attracted to each other body, a male may be so interested to look on female body so does female who also feel curious to look on male genital. If we not feel atracted to each other, we will never exist today because nobody procreate.

Here some of the sign you mind is not adult yet :
1. Going into different fetish which really break moral code or dont have any use for your life. for example lets say mother/sister/wife gangbang fetish, as incest it not already bad enough, now you want allow your mind to accept that your mother/sister/wife private hole should be shared with your friend or some stranger, its realy corrupt your soul in almost every way. In real life i dont think this kind of fetish have any benefit at all, unless you want start family prostitution business with your relative as employee. And there still lot of fetish i dare not to talk about from bsdm to beastility. Try to think that porn fetish like this same like mixed wine with gasoline, you know its dangerous and may cause death, yet you still drink it, because you curious what is taste like. Stupid right ? If you already know , then next time dont do it again.

2. Use porn excessively, dont know where and when to look at it. For example watching porn while we are in work place,or school, or church. If porn = alcohol, you always sober everytime and everywhere. And nobody likes if you always in "drunk" state, everyday.

3. Watching porn alone without have legal patner beside you, now here the things,if you watch with your legal patner / spouse its okay, because after you getting turned on, you can practice and have fun together . Unfortunately you watch it alone , and now getting horny without have somebody help you release it, and there we go the "Legendary Prince of Fap" is born. So next time you alone want to watch porn in your room, ask yourself how old i am " Do i should continue to be the Legendary Prince of Fap for the rest of my age ?" If the answer "yes", please continue what you do, and dont foget share it on twitter :XD

4. Using porn as brotherhood community, not only you guys include as part of your life style, its also become the ways you connect with your friend, ohh crapp, now this even more worse then previous. A group of alcoholic people will always gather to get drunk together, now imagine a group of chronic porn user, i bet they will be creating fapping tournament in the future , ways to go my friend

5. Mix porn with reality, for example you just met beautifull girl, in the park on sunny days, however rather go on and say hello and start polite "Conversation" , you just stare her breast and thigh coldly from a far, because right now , you mind wander replay some of hardcore scene,with current condition like that that, its will be amazing perhaps miracle,if you have any "girl friend" at all, unless she was desperate enough or also share same hobby together. Cant say no more .........

6. Apply your valuable porn knowledge and skill into wrong people, well if you realy gifted at cunnilingus its will be great if you apply it to your girlfriend however, because you so pathetic and cant get any, you ended pay random female, to apply it. God know after all the hard work you give to her you ended get STD on your tongue. Conggrats mate you just graduate with flying colour, to bad they dont have anything like love, emotion or trust to give except "sexual disease", dont forget to come again next month, especially after you just get your pay check

I dont judge i also dont blame, so if you feel you already done just 1 from 6 point above this, then its time for you to stop porn immediatelly, because clearly you mind is not adult yet, not later, not tomorrow, but today !!!!

However if right now you dont break any rule from 1-6, then feel free to enjoy porn with your legal patner, because clearly you are responsible adult person who have "Adult" minds. Now if this world have lots people like this, surely sexual crime will drop to its lower, and more importanly less young people getting free AIDS everyday

 

I am from Indonesia, and never take any "English" course, so yes the grammar will be messy,if you can tidy up , i can only offer "my thanks" as payment ^^

 

Porn is something everyone enjoys, that is the reason it's a billion dollar industry today. For example, you go to the fish market. You will feel you are about to die because of the horrible smell around. What happens when you stay in that smell for over 50 years. It's become your oxygen. You don't smell it anymore. Another example of a smoker, if you stand next to a smoker for the first time, you'll start coughing, after some days, it will become your oxygen. I don't know if you recall the past or not. Porn has become normal to you. For most other people, at this stage they want more. The switch to hardcore porn or lesbian porn, things like that.

You have the self control to not move beyond pictures and not to spend more than 1 hour on it. People don't have that control. They go nuts on this thing because it comes with a great gift, pleasure. The more you do it with more intensity, the more pleasure.

Just think about it. Would a normal person be having sex 5 times a week ? You can't call it a substitute for sex. You might not feel the effects that I feel because everybody is different. I recall an example of sweets or something earlier. So here is my analogy: If you eat one large cone of ice cream five times daily, what is it gonna happen to you? You might become diabetic, you might gain weight. It's because your intake is of excess quantity. Just like you have to maintain a balanced diet, similarly you must maintain a balanced sex life. 5 times a week is not normal.

[QUOTE=" (I'm probably grossing out Sexytime by saying these things.)" [/QUOTE]
hahahahhaahaaha. I'm sorry about what I said earlier. I just wanted to get some attention.