What is sinful about looking at pornography?

[BlueShadow123]

Arousal, desire, attraction. All of these work. “Lust” is a word for all the inordinate sinful sexual desires, not the completely licit desires.

Necessarily, lust and love do not co-exist. Love says “this is my body, given for you.” Lust says “this is your body, taken by me.” The attitude in marital relations ought to be love, not lust. Love can include desire without becoming lust.

I’m sorry, I thought arousal (sexual desire) for someone or something meant the same thing as lust.

Thank you for listing some words like I asked for other than the other posters.

I guess we got this situated then.

 

[BlueShadow123]

You seem to be agitated because we are not agreeing with you - but the burden of proof is on you, not us, because you are going against traditional understanding of the word itself and of the Christian understanding of the word and its context.

I have stepped up to the plate and explained why you are wrong. But it seems that you are tripping up over the word itself. Why do you need a word to use? You’re being argumentative for the sake of it, at least that’s how it looks. You yourself provide the word - excited. Look at your wife, get excited. Passionate. Joyful. Open. Loving.

A couple that is excited, is excited. I don’t see the problem. You are just assuming from nowhere that excited = lust or that relations = lust.

First off, I’m not a guy, second off, I’m not trying to argue. I asked you for some words in comparison. I wasn’t ignoring you. But thats okay, the other person answered what I had asked.

 

[BlueShadow123]

I’m sorry, I thought arousal (sexual desire) for someone or something meant the same thing as lust.

Thank you for listing some words like I asked for other than the other posters.

I guess we got this situated then.

Lust can be arousal desire for somebody or something, its just that its desire for somebody OTHER than your spouse, correct?

 

[fbl9]

Lust can be arousal desire for somebody or something, its just that its desire for somebody OTHER than your spouse, correct?

Close, to being correct.
It is not the same desire one has towards their spouse though. Because it is desired for one’s own personal satisfaction. It is not geared towards any other person’s well being other than the person themself that is doing the desiring.

 

[BlueShadow123]

Close, to being correct.
It is not the same desire one has towards their spouse though. Because it is desired for one’s own personal satisfaction. It is not geared towards any other person’s well being other than the person themself that is doing the desiring.

Well then that would explain rape. Well, it all starts with lust, I’m sure. Then not controlling where your stick goes.

HAHA, i saw somebody else use ‘stick’ as the term. how funny.

 

[fbl9]

Well then that would explain rape. Well, it all starts with lust, I’m sure. Then not controlling where your stick goes.

HAHA, i saw somebody else use ‘stick’ as the term. how funny.

Basically that’s what one is doing when they are imagining an encounter with another person without the other person’s consent/knowledge of these thoughts.
I saw somebody jump off a bridge doesn’t mean it’s right or that i am going to do it either.

 

[BlueShadow123]

Basically that’s what one is doing when they are imagining an encounter with another person without the other person’s consent/knowledge of these thoughts.
I saw somebody jump off a bridge doesn’t mean it’s right or that i am going to do it either.

I think it would be wise not to do what the majority of people do. From my observations they are pretty dumb things to do.

 

[Big_Dummy]

1 John 2:16
For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world.

In Biblical times the word lust, had a meaning closer to covet. Basically, women in those cultures were viewed as property. So, when one looked upon them with lust they were ineffect desiring to own someone elses property.

Today, looking lustfully upon a person, woman has been reduced to sexual desire. It comes down to today to unlawful sexual desire vs lawful sexual desire for one’s wife.

Also, looking at porn tends to feed the flesh rather than the spirit. What do you want to be stronger your spirit in God’s will or your flesh, sin nature which leads to spiritual death?

Also, ask yourself do you want people to treat your Mother or Wife or Daughter as the wonderful, valuable person God made her to be or do you want them to treat her like a sex object for their own pleasure? hint: golden rule here.

 

[Bookcat]

Lust as defined by catholic morals is an inordinate desire for anything for one’s own personal gratification without regards.

I have not been following this thread…so I prob missed alot.

But let me note that yes of course it is sinful to lust after one spouse.

But Lust does need to be defined. It does not mean just “sexual pleasure” or the desire for it per se.

This is how the Catechism of the Catholic Church defines it.

2351 Lust is disordered desire for or inordinate enjoyment of sexual pleasure. Sexual pleasure is morally disordered when sought for itself, isolated from its procreative and unitive purposes.

vatican.va/archive/catechism/p3s2c2a6.htm#II

 

[StevenFrancis]

Is it the looking part or the intention on the part of the looker?

In one case, looking at pornography as such is bad but in the second case, looking as such must be backed-up with a bad intention.

Or is it an amalgam of both?

This is CA, so I’m assuming you’re looking for the actual teaching of the Catholic Church.

**2354 ***Pornography *consists in removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the partners, in order to display them deliberately to third parties. It offends against chastity because it perverts the conjugal act, the intimate giving of spouses to each other. It does grave injury to the dignity of its participants (actors, vendors, the public), since each one becomes an object of base pleasure and illicit profit for others. It immerses all who are involved in the illusion of a fantasy world. It is a grave offense. Civil authorities should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials.

Hope this helps,

Peace,

Steven

 

[PatriceA]

Several posts about “spousal lust” or the lack thereof seem to beg the question, “What about if a married couple were to make videos of themselves…you know…and watched them to get themselves worked up. Sinful?”

I think that scenerio could be considered the sin of lust, especially if that was the only means the couple was using to get themselves ready for the marital act. At the very least it could be quite troubling if the couple needed a video to excite themselves, rather than the mere physical presence of each other.

 

[BlueShadow123]

Well anyways, to get back to the point, pronography is bad to look at because sex is between a married man and woman IN PRIVATE and lusting after them is wrong.
There is your answer.

 

[Seeker2010]

**2354 ***Pornography *consists in removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the partners,

Under this definition, Playboy is not pornography, as it does not depict real or simulated sexual acts, merely beautiful nude women. On the other hand, by this definition a mainstream movie that has a sex scene, regardless of how explicit (or more to the point, how inexplicit) it is, rises to the level of porn.

Interesting.

I do find it extremely concerning that the church is explicitly calling for civil authorities to make rules because they said so. I know it is the position of many members that we should write societies laws based on church dogma, but I did not know it was also the official position of the church. That is frightening, indeed.

 

[John21652]

Well anyways, to get back to the point, pronography is bad to look at because sex is between a married man and woman IN PRIVATE and lusting after them is wrong.
There is your answer.

I think there is a lot more ‘wrong’ with looking at pornography than what you state here. A lot of the posters here have been trying to get to the root meaning of “lust” and you have pointed out that lust can be a legitimate part of a marriage. To a certain extent it can be and should be. In days of old, the Ancient greeks used a mix of words to describe what we today call “love”. There was Eros, for sexual, or passionate love, Philia, for friendship type love, Storge, which referred to affection and love in a permanent relationship and then there was Agape, which described ‘true’, or unconditional love. Today, we use the blanket description “love” to cover any and all types of love. We don’t differentiate between the different forms love can take. A fixation on one type of ‘love’, Eros, or sexuality, is Lust, which is an inordinate desire for sexual relations, just as someone can lust after power, or money. That desire is out of proportion, in excess.

Lust is one of the so called Seven Deadly Sins. In defining Lust, no one has defined ‘Sin’. In terms of Catholicism it means disassociating oneself from God, through deeds and words. So, for Catholics it is easy to mount a case and say pornography dissasociates us from God. But how do you convince a secualr society that pornography is ‘sinful’. The notion of ‘sinful’ presupposes a belief in God. So you go out to the street and yell and scream that pornography is sinful and people will laugh at you. After all, in despite of all the moralising in the world, the pornography industry is a growth industry, so does that tell us that maybe pornography is OK? That it does nothing more than display ‘love’ between human beings? Or, is it the case that pornography causes harm? Harm to the individual, harm to society and by extension, harm to our God given humaness and is therefore offensive to God?

In my opinion, pornography objectifies human beings as sex objects. There is a lot of literature and philosophical material to support this view. In objectifying the person as a sex object, we then disavow the different aspects of a relationship that were once recognised by the ancient Greeks as forming love. In the process a signal is sent to others that unless you are objectively defined as sexually desirable, you are something less than normal. Pornography encourages us to even think of ourselves as sex objects, whose existence is defined by how another can gratify their urges on us. That is a tremendously demeaning view of human nature and what it means to be a person. Someone here wrote that we are ‘animals’ and have an urge to breed. Surely, our rationality, our humaness is much more than an urge to breed? Pornography is certainly encouraging people to behave like animals, because their behaviour is like that of animals; shameless, instinct driven, often dangerous and certainly hedonistic, like that of monkeys in the jungle who use sex as a social bargaining tool. So with the rise and rise of pornography, aren’t we sacrificing something which made humans apart and above the animals? Like dignity?

 

[John21652]

Under this definition, Playboy is not pornography, as it does not depict real or simulated sexual acts, merely beautiful nude women. On the other hand, by this definition a mainstream movie that has a sex scene, regardless of how explicit (or more to the point, how inexplicit) it is, rises to the level of porn.

Interesting.

I do find it extremely concerning that the church is explicitly calling for civil authorities to make rules because they said so. I know it is the position of many members that we should write societies laws based on church dogma, but I did not know it was also the official position of the church. That is frightening, indeed.

Well well, look who turned up, the supreme CAF hedonist himself.

I see you are off to a good start by only using a fraction of the quote given by StevenFrancis. The full quote he gave says this -

**2354 *Pornography consists in removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the partners, in order to display them deliberately to third parties. It offends against chastity because it perverts the conjugal act, the intimate giving of spouses to each other. It does grave injury to the dignity of its participants (actors, vendors, the public), since each one becomes an object of base pleasure and illicit profit for others. It immerses all who are involved in the illusion of a fantasy world. It is a grave offense. Civil authorities *** should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials.

The use of the word “should” shows that contrary to what you wrote, the Church is not “…explicitly calling for civil authorities to make rules because they said so.” The word "should expresses a probability, or an expectation of something. It is not a demand. Contrast the word “should” with the word “shall”.

You “should” also know that many secular groups are also decrying the use and spread of pornographic material. The women’s lobby is in the middle of a debate over how pornography is objectifying women and actually giving men even more power over women. Rather ironic, isn’t it. They demanded freedom of expression and greater sexual freedoms. Now it seems it isn’t quite working out the way they thought it “should”! You “should” have a think about all of that before you really start dishing up your hedonistic justifications for your particular lifestyle.

 

[BlueShadow123]

I think there is a lot more ‘wrong’ with looking at pornography than what you state here. A lot of the posters here have been trying to get to the root meaning of “lust” and you have pointed out that lust can be a legitimate part of a marriage. To a certain extent it can be and should be. In days of old, the Ancient greeks used a mix of words to describe what we today call “love”. There was Eros, for sexual, or passionate love, Philia, for friendship type love, Storge, which referred to affection and love in a permanent relationship and then there was Agape, which described ‘true’, or unconditional love. Today, we use the blanket description “love” to cover any and all types of love. We don’t differentiate between the different forms love can take. A fixation on one type of ‘love’, Eros, or sexuality, is Lust, which is an inordinate desire for sexual relations, just as someone can lust after power, or money. That desire is out of proportion, in excess.

Lust is one of the so called Seven Deadly Sins. In defining Lust, no one has defined ‘Sin’. In terms of Catholicism it means disassociating oneself from God, through deeds and words. So, for Catholics it is easy to mount a case and say pornography dissasociates us from God. But how do you convince a secualr society that pornography is ‘sinful’. The notion of ‘sinful’ presupposes a belief in God. So you go out to the street and yell and scream that pornography is sinful and people will laugh at you. After all, in despite of all the moralising in the world, the pornography industry is a growth industry, so does that tell us that maybe pornography is OK? That it does nothing more than display ‘love’ between human beings? Or, is it the case that pornography causes harm? Harm to the individual, harm to society and by extension, harm to our God given humaness and is therefore offensive to God?

In my opinion, pornography objectifies human beings as sex objects. There is a lot of literature and philosophical material to support this view. In objectifying the person as a sex object, we then disavow the different aspects of a relationship that were once recognised by the ancient Greeks as forming love. In the process a signal is sent to others that unless you are objectively defined as sexually desirable, you are something less than normal. Pornography encourages us to even think of ourselves as sex objects, whose existence is defined by how another can gratify their urges on us. That is a tremendously demeaning view of human nature and what it means to be a person. Someone here wrote that we are ‘animals’ and have an urge to breed. Surely, our rationality, our humaness is much more than an urge to breed? Pornography is certainly encouraging people to behave like animals, because their behaviour is like that of animals; shameless, instinct driven, often dangerous and certainly hedonistic, like that of monkeys in the jungle who use sex as a social bargaining tool. So with the rise and rise of pornography, aren’t we sacrificing something which made humans apart and above the animals? Like dignity?

No kidding. and if you were following my last posts I used the wrong word. Lust turned out to be something different. Oh, and btw, if there is no God, then humans are animals which means getting excited or aroused is normal. Its part of instinct and nature.

 

[Seeker2010]

I see you are off to a good start by only using a fraction of the quote given by StevenFrancis.

I quoted the relevant part. The part where the church defined pornography as displaying real or simulated sex acts to third parties. As you may have guessed, I personally have no problem with that, indeed I personally know (and admire) many people in the adult industry, but that is neither here nor there. The point I was trying to make is that by the churches own definition, Playboy is NOT porn, which I find rather interesting, as Hugh Hefner seems to be Public Enemy numero uno on this board.

The word "should expresses a probability, or an expectation of something. It is not a demand. Contrast the word “should” with the word “shall”.

So you are suggesting that the church is not telling civil authorities what they ‘should’ do? Then why instruct thusly? After all, ‘Civil authorities should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials.’ seems pretty straightforward to me, no?

You “should” also know that many secular groups are also decrying the use and spread of pornographic material.

Don’t care. Freedom to publish whatever you want to publish is (almost) absolute. True, you cannot knowingly publish false defamatory material, and ‘obscenity’ (whatever that means) has been ruled as unprotected (though I repeat my objection that I see no exception for that in the constitution), but regardless pornography (at least the conventional stuff that I THINK we’re both talking about) has specifically been ruled as protected speech. As it should be.

You “should” have a think about all of that before you really start dishing up your hedonistic justifications for your particular lifestyle.

And you should stop obsessing about my lifestyle vis-a-vis my participation here. My participation in this particular thread is about my desire to live in a free society, and my endorsement of pornography as it applies to freedom. Truth is, I don’t use it that much, and probably wouldn’t really notice if it went away. But I still object to it being banned, for there is no legitimate reason to do so, and I object to ANYTHING being banned for which there exists no legitimate reason.

 

[Abu]

Seeker2010
I do find it extremely concerning that the church is explicitly calling for civil authorities to make rules because they said so.
I object to ANYTHING being banned for which there exists no legitimate reason.

In a society with freedom of speech, it is legitimate for the Catholic Church to call for policies which She knows will benefit society – endorsing some and rejecting others. A true democracy will welcome that. It should be of great concern if any attempt is made to curtail that freedom.

The question as to what is a legitimate reason requires the use of reason from cause to effect which depends on the Natural Moral Law and the full revelation given to mankind by its Creator.
The Catholic Church built Western civilization and the Catholic stress on individualism was foreign to many cultures; as Jeremy Waldron, in God, Locke and Equality, 2002, affirms, Locke built his thesis on the doctrine concerning morality; “returning to the standpoint of St Thomas and the Scholastics.” (The Catholic Church And the Counter-Faith, Philip Trower, Family Publications, 2006, p 74).

 

[bluelake]

Is it the looking part or the intention on the part of the looker?

In one case, looking at pornography as such is bad but in the second case, looking as such must be backed-up with a bad intention.

Or is it an amalgam of both?

Have you thought about the people who pose in this disgusting manner?
I don’t understand how anyone can ask such a question.
Porn is a disgusting activity, by those who read it and those who provide it.
It was once against the law.
I think we need to pray about this.

bluelake

 

[John21652]

I quoted the relevant part.

No. you pnly quoted that part which would suit your point. You do this regularly.

The part where the church defined pornography as displaying real or simulated sex acts to third parties. As you may have guessed, I personally have no problem with that, indeed I personally know (and admire) many people in the adult industry, but that is neither here nor there.

Oh, but it is either here or there. The whole point is that the sex industry objectifies people, makes sex into a commodity to be bought, sold, or bartered over and the same for human bodies. Your admiration for the people in the pornography industry is based on what? Pray, do tell. I’m dieing to know how you could possibly admire those who sell themselves so shamelessly in public. And how could you possibly admire those who are so reckless and irresponsible as to place at high risk their colleagues and who work in an industry in which the people themselves state is is a destructive, drug infested, abusive and sexually diseased industry which causes severe negative secondary effects on female and male adult industry workers as well as the general public.. And let’s not forget that child sexploitationis part of the pornography industry.

The point I was trying to make is that by the churches own definition, Playboy is NOT porn, which I find rather interesting, as Hugh Hefner seems to be Public Enemy numero uno on this board.

I thought Obama was!!

So you are suggesting that the church is not telling civil authorities what they ‘should’ do? Then why instruct thusly? After all, ‘Civil authorities should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials.’ seems pretty straightforward to me, no?

Your exact original statement used the term “explicitly”-

I do find it extremely concerning that the church is explicitly calling for civil authorities to make rules…

The Church guides, teaches and instructs its members on matters of morality. It hardly befits a Priest of the Church to go marching into the offices of ‘civil authorities’ to have laws changed. Voters get laws changed, not Priests. If you can provide explicit evidence that the Church is telling civil authorities what to do, please do so. Then I’ll know who to send a congratulatory email to, thanking them for standing up for human decency and dignity in a world where both are in decline.

Don’t care.

That’s your whole trouble, Seeker, you don’t care. Your moral turpitude is pretty sad. Go have a look at the Seven Deadly Sins and then follow the link to Acedia.

Freedom to publish whatever you want to publish is (almost) absolute. True, you cannot knowingly publish false defamatory material, and ‘obscenity’ (whatever that means) has been ruled as unprotected (though I repeat my objection that I see no exception for that in the constitution), but regardless pornography (at least the conventional stuff that I THINK we’re both talking about) has specifically been ruled as protected speech. As it should be.

There is no such thing as ‘absolute’ freedom in any civil society. As for pornography, it does not get the protection you think it does. In California it has some protection according to Case Law, but not according to Statute. The Supreme Court in Ginsberg v. New York: 1978 ruled that minors must be protected from pornography. In Miller v. California: 1973 the Supreme Court decided that communities should decide what constitutes pornography. Again, as you picked, “obscenity” is not protected. All it will take is for someone, or some group, to make a challenge to pornography and to cite its ills. j

And you should stop obsessing about my lifestyle vis-a-vis my participation here.

You still haven’t answered my original question, which is why do you persist on CAF? I, for one don’t give a hang about your lifestyle, except that you come onto CAF and ram it down the throats of other people. In the process, you denigrate the Church and those who uphold its values. Those values obviously conflict, even contradict, your own values, so why do you persist? Unless, of course, you recognise your own great moral vacuum and you are searching for something else. I sure hope so.

My participation in this particular thread is about my desire to live in a free society, and my endorsement of pornography as it applies to freedom. Truth is, I don’t use it that much, and probably wouldn’t really notice if it went away. But I still object to it being banned, for there is no legitimate reason to do so, and I object to ANYTHING being banned for which there exists no legitimate reason.

There can be no freedom without constraints. If you want a very simple little example of that, go look up the covenant your very own original Pilgrims drew up and signed almost as soon as they got off the Mayflower. Without such covenants, there can be no ‘civil society’. Once established, societies enable laws to protect the functioning of that civil society just as it enables laws to enable the prosperity and happiness of its citizens. It is the case that demonstrable harm emanates from pornography and as such there is a good case for its banning. And banning it, by your own admission, wouldn’t harm your freedom one iota.