VISUALS OVERLOAD –
June 15, 2022 – Though Martinez-Herbert didn’t quite understand what was going on, the acts she saw for the first time were appealing enough to launch an addiction that today, at age 24, she’s just overcoming.
“It stole my childhood,” she says. “It distorted my view of everything.”
A generation ago, it took some finagling for a child to see verboten X-rated material, filching a magazine from a parent or sneaking peeks at a movie on TV. Now, innocence can disappear with the click of a button or a tap on a cellphone.
Studies have shown the COVID-19 pandemic, with its isolation, mental health stressors and other hardships, has exacerbated dependency on pornography. With one-quarter to one-third of online searches pertaining to sexually explicit materials, consumption has grown to the point of some labeling its prevalence as a “porndemic.”
The Christian community has not been immune, say counselors and pastors in Colorado Springs, who’ve been engaged in the battle against porn addiction.
