: do not give in to evil but proceed ever more boldly against it :

What I’m concerned about . . .

I’m concerned about a lot of things these days.

On thing I’m very concerned about is the “pornographization” of our culture, particularly youth culture, in which sex is stripped of all its mystery, sacredness, scarcity. The scarcity of anything leads to its being more valued. The lack of scarcity leads to it being less valued.

Sex (and things sexual) would be a lot more exciting if it were a lot more scarce. It’s a paradox that many people don’t understand. But, being a married man, I’m in a situation where sex is not de facto scarce, not de facto, rare. I think that married people quickly realize that once sex is not scarce, intimacy still is. In a world where time is very scarce, and time is what is needed to bond emotionally with another human being, intimacy is scarce and therefore highly valued and needed in marriage.

Sex is part of the intimacy equation. I’m afraid that popular culture is castrating sex from it’s vital center. It’s turning it into merely a physical activity, and divorcing it from the context which makes it fulfilling - intimacy. Intimacy requires trust, and trust requires commitment. And commitment, well, that requires exclusivity. Monogamy. It’s the way to intimacy and intimacy is the way to fulfillment.

As in all things which truly fulfill, one learn the needs of another, and one gives to another, filling that need. Ones needs are met, not because one seeks it, but because one is seeking the good of ones partner, and that frees ones partner to seek one’s good. Pornography lies. It divorces sex from commitment and intimacy, then acts out fulfillment from such. It’s a lie. It’s emptiness. And it builds nothing.

There was a Wall Street Journal article today that talked about the fatherless-ness of our culture. Boys are growing up without role model fathers, but they are craving it and not getting it.

Recently, I watched a short documentary recently about teen pornography addition in the UK. What struck me as shocking is that in every teen they studied there was no father in the home, only a mother. I don’t know if there’s any connection btw. pornography consumption and single parent homes (though it wouldn’t surprise me if there was come connection, if only that there would likely be less potential supervision in such a home), just that it struck me that not one child had a father in his life. The one boy they reviewed who was doing the best at overcoming his pornography problem was one who had formed a good relationship with his minister, who served as a surrogate father. But where are the fathers? Why have fathers disappeared?

I’m concerned about other things, but I think these other things (debt loading, living beyond means, apathy, video-game cultures, instant gratification seeking, the glorification of addictive games and gambling, etc.) are often anchored in the failure of a culture to establish an environment wherein appropriate values are generationally transmitted and gratifications are encouraged to be deferred so that they may be enhanced at appropriate times.

Being a libertarian (or, more accurately, a minarchist), I’m fairly sure that banning vices is not the way to go. But allowing the consequences of such to be eliminated through welfare programs certainly allows for life to not teach lessons it should. People need to be free to act, and they need to be free to experience the consequences of such action.  Only then can social evolution occur and behaviors that lead to ruin be cast off.  Robbing people who make good decisions to eliminate the natural consequences of those who make bad decisions leads to perverse incentives.

June 15, 2008 | Filed Under Culture, Family, Politics, Religion 

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