When someone purchases cigarettes, the box often comes with a Surgeon General’s warning to let the person know that there are potentially serious consequences for using tobacco. Cigarette suppliers are not required by law to follow the guidelines of making sure that the consumer understands the harmful aspects of smoking and using tobacco. However, there are many other harmful and addictive behaviors that people can do without a warning for how damaging they can be.
Research has shown that watching pornography can be addictive. Viewing too much porn can change and rewire the way the brain works in a way that is similar to doing drugs. More people are consuming pornographic material than ever before. The content is more accessible and cheaper than it has ever been. The content is also more hardcore than it has ever been.
In previous years, if you wanted to watch porn, you had to secretly sneak into a room in the back of a video store or head to an adult theater. If you tried to purchase pornographic content, the cashier would ask for your ID to make sure that you are of legal age just like if you were purchasing cigarettes. In today’s technological age, hardcore porn is just one Google search away, with the majority of it being free of charge. With so much pornographic content out there, people have started to question how harmful and addictive porn can be.
Pornography addiction has yet to be officially declared a medical disorder, and is instead considered compulsive behavior. Daily research is forcing analysts to acknowledge porn addiction a medical condition similar to alcohol and drug addictions. However, there is still a segment of people who do not believe that pornography is addictive. Their reasoning is often supported by their political or religious beliefs. Many prominent doctors, such as Victor Cline have spoken out about the harmful effects of porn and how viewing porn regularly can alter people’s sexual appetites, behavior, and values. Porn can lead people down a path to deviancy.
The Origins Of Smoking Dangers
Back in the 1960s, people did not believe that smoking cigarettes was harmful. It took many years to change the perception of tobacco addiction. Surgeon General Leroy E. Burney notified the US Public Health Service that there is a correlation between lung cancer and smoking. Science helped prove that smoking cigarettes was indeed harmful, and this fact can no longer be ignored. Burney also noted from his findings that using tobacco is a habituation and not an addiction. This was based on the fact that the addictive features of nicotine were not completely understood yet, and the true definition of addiction was not clear.
While Burney’s report acknowledged that cigarette smoking is a health hazard in the United States that requires immediate and appropriate action, it didn’t list a solution on how to deal with the problem. No one was really sure how to proceed with the information. No one wanted to be judgmental concerning another person’s lifestyle. Eventually, the politicians decided to ban cigarette advertising on radio and television. It took multiple decades before there was significant change to this issue. Before the advertising ban, cigarette companies used slogans to try to increase sales and fight against the growing backlash concerning smoking’s negative health effects.
A Frank Statement
A Frank Statement was a famous ad campaign ran by tobacco companies to combat the warning by Burney that smoking cigarettes is harmful. The campaign wanted to create doubt about how harmful smoking is without actually denying it. Some of the statements noted include that there is no substantial proof that smoking directly causes lung cancer and that the authorities are not sure what the actual cause is.
Porn Is A New Form Of Tobacco
The same strategy that was used in the fight against tobacco now applies in the fight against viewing porn. There are now frank statements being used to justify watching porn, such as porn is a natural way for you to release your sexual urges and that watching porn can enhance your sex life. Regardless of these frank statements, more research continues to come out showing that watching porn on a daily basis has a negative impact on your physical and mental health.
