PORNOGRAPHY AND VEWIING TH SAME IN THE LINE OF WORK

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An early bump.

-- ZAROVE (ZAROFF3@JUNO.COM), January 07, 2005

Answers

I was in a discussion last night with a mate of mine, and this issue arose in the coruse of the ocnversation.

The Mate is Catholic, and went to confession, and we discussed the "Examination of ocnceince", which I also own in a Prayer book and have read.

On it, it mentions the veiwing of Pornographic material as a sin. ( barring, of coruse, accedental exposeure, such as emails sent to one form Porogrpahers attemotign to sell there wares, or a brief glimpse of it in someoen elses possession as you pass by, if this was not your inent.)

I, however, have veiwed Pornographic mateials, in the lien of my work, and will int he future.

when I was a rpeorter, I saw Pornoiphraphy on the scene of a few stpries. not many, dayton tennessee is pretty clean a place, but once there was a chld Porn ring that was covred, this beign the most disturnign example of what I was exposed to, and a few others where it was at the scene of a crime, or else in the possession of someone I had to do a story on, or else beign sold, were I was allowed to examien the mateirals to see what they cntained for the sake of my rpeort.

so, I have viwed Pornography, in these instances, if I whee Catholci and if I went to confesion, wodil I need to confess these thigns as a sin?

The reasn I ask is because, even though I vewied said mateirals, I did not willfully veiw them out of intent of lust, but only due to work. Granted, I chose the lien fo work and agreed to do the sotry, and hus volunteered myself in some nstances to veiw the matieral, but he intend was to write an article and gain informaiton, NOT to veiw pornogrpahy itsself.

so is this a sin, and if so, what of others who must view the matierla for the sake of there work?

which brings me to wy in the futire I sall the same mateials vewi.

I am enterign Psyclogy now, and am in cllage.

as a result, I will have to veiw Porogrpahy in a diffeent way thana s a rpeorter. for as a reporter I emrely examoed what eswas bign eiwed or sold. ss a psyclogist, I wll be expected to examien the matielras to better identify the midnset of those who maaftur it, find why it is compellign and adictive, and examien the effects it has on others. part of my stids in deviant sexuality will invole pornogrpahy use and its efects, and thus I shall once mroe be exposed tot he matierlas. Albeit n a sterile nevironemnt.

woudl this, too , be a sin to avoid?

sorry for the nature of the queation, but it is of import to me to see the views expressed here.

-- ZAROVE (ZAROFF3@JUNO.COM), January 07, 2005.


Porn is dangerous as a drug is dangerous - there is a certain amount of pyschological toxicity in the images regardless of one's moral status because of the way men and especially our imagination is hard- wired.

But you are right that there is a difference between "seeing" (passive) and "looking" (active). If you see porn images there is less a danger than if you go looking for them.

Now, if this is your line of work - such as a police detective surfing the web to find predators, or an undercover cop breaking up porn rings... you may have to seek the images out.

So the risk comes in the form of how to desensitize yourself so arousal doesn't occur.

Half the damage of porn is the body's reaction... when a person gets instant gratification from something - no matter what this something is - it can be habit forming and create a powerful urge to repeat it and increase the dose... The other half is the moral/imagination problem that those images provoke changes in attitudes towards women as well as build up an arsenal of provocatory images to be used against us by the devil and flesh.

Now doctors have to see people in various states of nudity...they do so by focusing on the organ to be cured and thus refuse to "look" at the person in a sexual way. If your job demands the same of you, you may want to focus on the faces of the models - their eyes, while obviously seeing their lack of dress, you don't analyse body parts and organs.

Praying for their salvation and health helps too - instead of provoking fantasies and gratification, if you think "Man, that gal is someone's daughter...if my daughter degraded herself like that what would I do?" or "that is horribly unhygenic...Lord I hope she doesn't get AIDS.."

Since the goal of porn is to de-humanize sex, to make it purely animal, your goal ought to be to restore humanity to the victims, those models - if only in your own mind. Pray for them, pity them, many women who give themselves over to that lifestyle do so out of deep seated problems and many die young of STDs and substance abuse or violence.

-- Joe (joestong@yahoo.com), January 07, 2005.


ZAROVE,

The sin of viewing pornography is that it results in lust. Based on your description, it doesn't sound like that's the case with you. You haven't sought out the porn and didn't not dwell on it and allow the images to produce the lustful thoughts. I wouldn't worry about it. If it does, at some point, result in lust, then pray and ask God to cleanse your thoughts and not allow lust to get a foothold in you. If it ever leads to a sin problem, then, and only then, would I consider changing jobs.

David

P.S. By the way, I am curious about something, and have never wanted to offend you by asking, but is there a particular reason for the typing/spelling errors in your posts? You always post intelligent contributions, but they are challenging to read at times. When you just mentioned that you are a reporter, my curiosity about your posts for someone in your professional made me wonder. Do you have a physical disability that makes typing a challenge? I have a friend with celebral palsy who types similarly - it's so much effort to type with the stick in his mouth, that it's often too much trouble to go back and fix little errors as long as he knows he's getting the point across, and he can't use voice recognition anymore either due to his condition. Sorry if this is too personal of a question, you can ignore if you'd like.

-- non-Catholic Christian (no@spam.com), January 07, 2005.


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