Thoughts on Pornography and the Degration of Women

This evening I went to The Village church in Denton, TX. The lesson was on the creation of Man and Women, but if you’ve ever listened to Matt Chandler, everything remotely related to the scripture will be brought up. One of those things that was brought up tonight was something I’ve never blogged on: pornography.

To understand my thoughts on this subject, we must start in Genesis. Specifically we’re only looking at two verses, Genesis Chapter 1 verses 26 and 27. These verses read:


At first glance, these two verses appear to just tell the basic story of creation of humans. While on the surface that is correct, we must look a little deeper into the meaning. If you are a Christian then you undoubtedly believe that God is perfect. Therefore, to be made in the image of God automatically gives beings made in this image self worth. Human worth is not dependent on possessions, achievements, attractiveness, or any other worldly materials but rather on the fact that each person is made in God’s image and shares His characteristics.
So, I can hear you asking, how is this related to pornography? Great question. When you watch porn you go from having the ability to appreciate a fellow human being made in God’s image to treating the human being as a product not made in His image and used for consumption. Indeed you are essentially stripping the self-worth from that human.

For this to make the most sense, you must read Genesis Chapter 1 up to verse 26. Before God created human beings, he created other things such as plants, trees, and animals made for consumption. These things God did not make in His image because plants and animals cannot reflect characteristics of God such as love, patience, forgiveness, kindness, and faithfulness. Therefore, when you consume pornography, you are treating the human as not someone with self-worth made in the image of God, but rather a product. This does not stop with pornography however. In fact, the same analogy applies to, and in my opinion intensifies, when talking about strip clubs, “massage parlors”, prostitution, and human trafficking.

When watching porn, hiring a prostitute, or going to a strip club, you are literally stripping that persons’ worth and degrading them. There is no little girl or boy that grows up wanting to be a stripper or a porn star. Indeed there is an innate sense of self-worth that comes from being made in God’s image that drives us towards other professions. It is only during the most desperate times do people choose to go down this path because they feel they have no other options. Wouldn’t it be a great world if there was so little demand for adult-entertainment that strip clubs and prostitutes could not make money? How about instead of pushing these people down and declaring they have no self worth by consuming them we actually were to bring them up and recognize the divine image in each person?

But, Austin, it’s just entertainment, after all, being a student of the free market, do you not support a voluntary transaction of services? Indeed I am very free-market oriented, boarder-line libertarian. However, I believe the consumption of pornography, prostitution, and the like can easily have the “coolidge effect”  which could lead to infidelity, paying prostitutes, and even just looking at all women lustfully. These things are bad enough, but when you combine infidelity into the married home, you are clearly asking for disaster. Man is suppose to project the image of God and lead his family to also project the image of God and show His grace. However, by choosing to treat people as products for consumption rather than recognizing their divine characteristics, you are not aligning yourself under God which you must do in order to lead your family to project His greatness. In the end, this infidelity can split a family causing children to not only not know their biological father, but also not know their Father in Heaven, as there is no man to be the head of the household.

Also – just a quick note… while I mostly wrote this post from a male-accusation perspective, women are not immune here. BYU reports that 33.3% of pornography website visitors are women. I will let someone else write from that perspective though…

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