The epidemic of porn can’t be overstated. In the past this has largely been considered a male problem, but new evidence suggests that women have become just as snared as men by this dangerous habit.

The fact that women are just as likely as men to use porn is indicative of a systemic problem in our society. Sex is increasingly viewed as just another social interaction having no ramifications, consequences, or responsibilities. It began with men seeking to “conquer” as many women as possible. Not to be outdone by men, the feminist movement convinced women that “anything men can do we can do better,” and with that they skipped off to outdo men in sexual conquests.

Now, both men and women began to see sex as nothing special, just a social interaction to be undertaken at one’s discretion. Sure, “mistakes” will happen, but with a little practice we can become proficient and skilled in this interaction. And while we are practicing we can learn from the “experts” through the use of pornography. Remember, Playboy is just read for the articles. So both men and women make porn use a regular habit, whether for self-pleasure, or for “research” as to how to get the most out of every sexual encounter.

Fast forward a couple of generations and the inevitable result of rampant porn use combined with lax sexual morals is obvious. What was once a problem for men and women has now become a problem for teenage boys and girls. Where once parents were satisfied to look at photographs, kids needed to see videos of sexual acts, now grandkids are uninhibited to the point that sending nude images of themselves via cell phone is an everyday occurrence.

Writing for XXX Church, author and blogger Shellie R. Warren says the epidemic is critical as evidenced by the fact that so many – especially married and virgin females – are making porn and sexting:

“There’s one more category: those who are battling with porn not because they watch it but because they are making it…Personally, I’m willing to bet good money that there are a lot more than that doing sexting and honestly, although there are many teenage boys who foolishly take pictures or videos of sex acts, there aren’t a lot of them sending nude and seminude stuff about themselves. That’s the girls’ department.”

The porn problem isn’t an easy one. It’s not something that is compartmentalized or unrelated to other societal issues. For example, the issue of incest has been connected to pornography. Though a few have become brazen enough in recent years to advocate for decriminalizing incest, most still understand the need for its prohibition.

Part of that need rests in our interest to protect the integrity of marriage and family. Prohibitions against incest protect the purity of people, which then protects their integrity, ultimately protecting both marriage and family. But as advocates seek to redefine both marriage and family there is a concern that incest (along with pedophilia, polyamory, polygamy, and bestiality) will also be redefined into terms appealing to society.

An article at The Public Discourse compares the negative outcome of porn consumption with those of incest and shows them to be the same:

“But note the consequences of pornography produced and consumed on such a massive scale and imported into the homes of millions at the touch of a button:

“- First, there is an erosion of the sexual integrity of young men and women, who have no place to escape the pressures of a sexualized world.

“- Second, use of porn among young people is correlated with early, and risky, sexual activity. Such activity is itself harmful to those engaged in it, to their families, and to the stability or even possibility of their future marriages.

“- And third, porn use destabilizes marital relationships, bringing competition into the home. Indeed, the worry that wives cannot ‘compete’ with what their husbands see online is a frequent complaint of those who are married to porn users.”

In other words, the very rationale for keeping incest illegal is found in warnings against pornography. And yet porn is consumed on a massive scale each and every day. The outcome can only, logically, be the decriminalization of incest due to lack of moral reasoning. If we, as a society, can stomach porn consumption on a massive scale then most certainly we can handle other immoralities like incest. Right?

As the article makes clear, pornography is an equivalent to incest for our generation that will do the exact same thing to our purity, integrity, marriage and family.

“But what should strike us is this: although we would not consider relaxing the taboo on incest, we have allowed our lives to become dominated by something that has precisely the same negative effect on integrity, marriage, and family that incest would. Our adherence to the taboo is wiser than we know. We need to re-appropriate the real reasons underlying that prohibition and wake up to the fact that pornography is our culture’s incest.”

The bottom line here is that unless something changes there won’t be a need to legalize incest because porn will do all the damage to our society legalized incest, polygamy, or anything else would have. But at the same time – our desensitization to sex can lead to an acceptance of sexual ideas that we were certain (50 years ago) were wrong; i.e. incest, same-sex “marriage,” etc. So while porn may be the incest of our generation there is still the very real possibility that incest will be the incest of the next generation unless something changes.