Here is an Infographic based on the results of our Erotic Literature Survey (you can still fill it out if you missed it, we’ll use the results in future posts). I’ll be writing a post giving my thoughts on the subject this week, but thought I’d post this just as a bit of a preview.
I wonder if church-attenders are being honest, or if they think they *should* feel damaged, and so they report it? Or if non-attenders don’t want to look prudish, so they report the opposite?
Ideally, rather than asking people to self-report “damage” you could ask about the specific behaviors/feelings that fit the definition of “damage” you’re trying to identify. Some possible questions:
– Do you think your spouse is better/same/worse in bed than the average man/woman?
– How many sexual partners have you had? Do you wish you had more/same/fewer before you were married?
– How often do you fantasize about another person, real or imaginary, when you have sex with your spouse?
Folks are always going to be biased. That does not taint the overall study ideas.
Thank you for your service to married couples.
Your friend — Jerry
Interesting results. A couple that stood out to me.
I find it interesting that a little over half of your respondents report positive experiences with erotica. It seems that Christians — especially those with “conservative” sexual values — tend to not want to accept that some people feel that there are positive things from consumption of erotica. I’m not sure what it means, but I find it interesting.
The strong correlation between activity in church and feeling damaged from erotica reminded me of the study published by Grub et al last year (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-013-0257-z#page-1 ). Recognizing that all of this is just correlational, what does this mean? Is there something in being religious that makes a person more susceptible to the harm of porn/erotica? Is there something about being religious that makes us better able to discern the harm? Is there something about being religious that makes us more likely to imagine harms that are not really there?
Interesting stuff. Makes one think….
Good questions. I will attempt to discern the answers in my follow up post.
I think what you are seeing is that for those who are actively living their faith that sexual intimacy has a bigger spiritual aspect to it (or that part of it is more important to them). What they experience from erotic literature is so damaging to the spiritual side that any supposed benefit in the other areas is effectively canceled out or made irrelevant. A couple that doesn’t have a strong spiritual dimension to their intimate life or doesn’t put as much value on that side of it isn’t going to experience that.
Well said.
Interesting possibility. Perhaps it would be worth exploring, though I have no idea how to “measure” the spiritual components of the sexual relationship.
I too wonder if some of my fellow Christian’s are toeing the party line on this issue: “I feel guilty or damaged because I should.” Questions that mesh religion and sex are always difficult to get honest answers on. And if there is a problem, you can’t effectively deal with it until you honestly define it.
These are some pretty interesting results from the survey. I took that survey. Glad I could be a part of the number gathering. Looking forward to the discussion that comes from it in the future.
So many people have grown up in church with shaming attitudes about sex. They typically teach girls especially that: sex is bad, dirty and wrong and that good girls don’t do it. They NEVER TEACH ALL THE SEX POSITIVE MESSAGES about sex. This often leaves a woman negatively conditioned for life from fully embracing and enjoying her sexuality. Typically about 90% of the women today wear white nylon panties with no lace embracing that good girl virginal persona. You are no longer a virgin, stop acting like on. Embrace color and lacy trim.
I have a young minister friend who had a beautiful young wife also raised in the church. Like most men he wanted her to wear lacy frilly lingerie. She refused continuing to wear white cotton granny panties and her reason for refusing: “only slutty women wear that stuff, I am not a slut so therefore I am not going to wear it.
So sad, that is not what God wants for our lives.
J
I’d like to know where that 90% stat came from…
John,
I would love to know where you get that statistic. It’s difficult to tell if you’re implying that you have personal knowledge of the color of many women’s panties (which would make me wonder how you got that knowledge) or if you are listing a survey/scientific study.
When was the last time you went shopping for women’s underwear? From my experience, the majority of women’s underwear is colored. I would estimate that most of it is still nylon, but cotton and cotton blends are quite common as well.
Not discounting you efforts at all, just pointing out this to those that are interested in the results: A big qualifier here that would be both difficult and tedious to both define for Jay Dee and discern on the part of participants is what is “erotica.” A love scene in network television show is not hard core porn. I realize we are not talking about visual media here, but the comparison bears out. Is Peter Paul Rubens as damaging as Robert Mapplethorpe. Would you feel as damaged by Lady Chatterley’s Lover as by 50 Shades and would it be in the same way? I’m not pleading cases here or defending anything, just wondering how are respondents defining erotica as they consider what to tick off or how to comment.
Personally I see no issue with erotica. But I can see I suppose why some would. If there are insecurities in either spouse it could be an issue. I suggest reading them together. Erotica really helped my wife express herself in ways she didn’t know she would like or want to without me pressuring her. I enjoy only reading them with her or having her read them to me but we are both very comfortable and confident in our sexuality. We know that lost books are slightly unrealistic at times but still can add a very nice demention to almost a emotional form of foreplay. If someone has an issue with the spiritual negative aspects of erotica then I would ask how is this sight any different? Cause it’s non-fiction? Christian based. Reading very descriptive sexual situations it problems could cause people to lust, covet what they aren’t getting for instance, be angry, resent or simply compare their spouses. I also would add that people who have had multiple partners might be less subjective to the potential downside of erotica that I’m hearing on here simply due to being jealous or insecure or unfulfilled by their spouse.
I think the concern goes far beyond insecurities. I’m extremely comfortable in my sexuality and not the least bit insecure…but I see reading erotica equal to watching porn or having an affair. It would be a betrayal of our marriage bed.
So, I, personally, reject your premise that it only has to do with insecurity. I think it’s more about following God’s plan for sexuality.
As for the difference between this site and porn…well, I’ll address that tomorrow.
In a similar vein, Ricky, Dr. Schnarch (for those that are familiar with his work) has described the “harm” due to porn/erotica use to “emotional fusion” and “lack of differentiation”. We assign “meaning” to our spouse’s porn/erotica use (like Jay Dee suggests that it is equivalent to adultery), then, when we discover our spouses use, we perceive “harm” based on that assigned meaning. The idea is that, we will get a different result if we assign a different meaning to these kind of activities.
Clearly the same thing can be said of something like outright adultery, and adultery is clearly condemned in both the OT and the NT. I guess in my mind, the key idea really isn’t about whether porn or erotica is “harmful”, but whether it is condemned by God. Many who lump porn/erotica in with adultery will read that conclusion into scriptures like Matt 5:28. In my own mind, I have sometimes wondered, too, if this blanket condemnation of porn/erotica is justified, or if God allows for couple’s use of erotica like you describe here or if God allows for “therapeutic” use of erotica the way some (secular) therapists will suggest it in “treating” something like hyposexual desire disorder. I don’t really know. I will be interested in Jay Dee’s further treatment of the topic should he decide to pursue it.
I suppose then where I struggle with this being wrong is where do we cross the line? It’s ok to go into unbelievable descriptive details pertaining to peoples personal lives on here regarding sex and everything that goes with the positive and negatives of either being satisfied by your spouse or unsatisfied. I would argue that a page like this causes lust, resentment, jealously, anger and thoughts of frustration simply by hearing what others may be having or capable of that they are not. Whether it’s emotional or physical. Now I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with this page but it is simply no different then gaining knowledge reading and researching sex or simply reading a book that opens your mind to new ideas or simply just for enjoyment. If my wife reads things on here for instance, that spark a change of open-mindedness or belief regarding other people personal experiences HOW is reading a story fictional or non about sexual encounters ANY different?? I’m not claiming to be right but I do think we over think so much stuff. If you and your wife are ok with something that does not involve physically bringing someone else to your bedroom I’m failing to see how it’s a bad thing.
I agree, it’s possible for this site to cause those issues. Actually, I’ve been thinking about that for the past week and plan to write a post on the topic. In the end, I think a big part of it is intent. While intent doesn’t account for everything, it definitely plays a role.
I already wrote some on this in today’s post, so I don’t want to rehash that too much. It will be up shortly.
Man I post on here all the time and only maybe a third of the time get my posts ever show up how frustrating…
Well, you never put in an email address, so they all get held for moderation…sometimes it takes me a bit to wade through them all. Sorry.
I see. My bad.
No problem.