In the seventies and eighties, pornography was working its way up to becoming several hundred million dollar industry. from Playboy, to Hustler, to 8 mm reel films that would arrive in plain brown wrappers, it was mainly an industry that preyed upon men, and resulted in damage not only to themselves, but their families as well. Then came VHS videos.. by 1984, a VCR once considered a stats symbol was now relatively inexpensive, and the industry grew even more. In 1996, I was listening to a segment on a Montreal radio station, and he was citing some figures about how, between 1990 and 1996 , pornography had grown to a nearly 3 billion dollar a year industry (US figures), and this was when the internet was in its infancy. Here are some interesting statistics that claim that porn revenues are worth more than those of Microsoft, Google and Apple combined!. They also cite some horrifying numbers about addictions and real life consequences resulting from Porn. These statistics look only at the problem in the United States. It claims that porn is now generating 13 BILLION a year in the US alone, which does not account for Germany, the UK , France, South Korea, China & Japan, which if included, make Pornography a 97 billion dollar business worldwide.
It doesn't take a great leap of the imagination to figure out that men cannot account for all of this increase, though looking at porn is now considered acceptable in many circles. These numbers must lead us to the conclusion that that the industry has found a new niche market: women.
The targeting of women by pornographers has been approached differently than their assault on men given the different ways their brains work. Men and women respond to different stimuli. For men it is mostly visual, while with women it is relational. Women were targeted first by the trashy magazines one sees at the checkout counters at any supermarket , pharmacy or convenience store. They were also reached through the media, by means of the soap opera, which became more and more overtly sexual as time went on. The tell-all scandal talk shows also fed into it, feeding into the stimulation through fantasy many women sought. With the advent of the Internet, everything changed. While men would be drawn to raunchy videos, women would favour the world of chatrooms and webcams.
Sheila Wray Gregoire is a Belleville, Ontario based author, columnist and blogger. She posted the story of a girl's life with porn on her Blog "to Love, Honour and Vacuum" this morning which deals with young women caught up in pornography addiction, and how they escaped. Jessica Harris is founder a Ministry called "Beggar's Daughter", whose mission it is to help young women escape from pornography addiction Jessica tells her full story here.
There is a way out. male or female, if you are involved with pornography and can't escape, speak to a Christian friend about it. We will not judge you. We too have our stories, as we are are all sinners, and we recognize that we too are nothing more than beggars telling other beggars where to find the bread of life.
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