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Great Falls, Va. -- Enough Is Enough® (EIE), a non-partisan organization dedicated to making the Internet safer for children and families, stands behind Ohio efforts to declare pornography a public health crisis. EIE collaborated with Representative Jena Powell's office (Ohio, 80th) in support of House Resolution 180 “to declare that pornography is a public health hazard with statewide and national public health impacts leading to a broad spectrum of individual and societal harms.” If the resolution, which currently has 18 co-sponsors, passes in the Ohio House, Ohio would join at least 13 other states who have passed similar resolutions. EIE partnered with the National Decency Coalition (NDC) in the drafting of the resolution.
“It’s critical that states recognize the detrimental effects pornography has on the social, emotional, and physical well-being of individuals,” said Kathy Hatem, Director of Communications for Enough Is Enough®. “Educating society on pornography’s harms is critical, as is the need for policy change and the enforcement of federal obscenity laws. Pornography leads to the sexual exploitation of children, objectification of women, chemical brain changes, addiction, sexual assault and violence. We must treat the threats posed by pornography like any other epidemic. It’s clear that pornography is not ‘harmless fun’ as some would like to believe.”
Research shows the average age of first exposure to pornography is 11; however, children under 10 now account for 22% of online porn consumption of minors. “We live in a time of a pornography epidemic, where young children are exposed and addicted to pornography thus causing a myriad of problematic sexual activity, low self-esteem, contributing to emotional and physical illnesses, negatively impacting brain development,” said Powell in a Q&A blog with Hatem.
“Pornography encourages the devaluation of individuals, women, men, and children, and correlates in an increased demand for sex trafficking, prostitution, and child sexual abuse. This resolution will declare that we encourage families, churches, and businesses on a local level to promote education, prevention, research, and policy changes to confront the proliferation of pornography and human trafficking,” continued Powell. According to the National Human Trafficking Hotline, Ohio ranks 4th in the nation for the number of reported cases, behind only California, Texas and Florida.
Deviant and extreme Internet pornography has become increasingly more mainstream due to few barriers of entry since 1994 when EIE launched the national Internet safety movement. A shared responsibility between the public, Corporate America and government is necessary to make the Internet safer for children and families.
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