Telemetry Box

Thank goodness.

Every few months, some public figure comes up with the brilliant idea that porn is bad for women. They worry that teens will never have normal, pleasurable sex if all they watch is gang-bangs, that porn allows misogyny to sustain and replicate itself, and that women learn to be aroused by their own degradation when they see ejaculatory “facials” onscreen.

None of these arguments are exactly wrong. All things considered, the porn industry as it currently exists probably makes real-life sex worse than, say, a porn landscape that only models loving, gentle relationships would. But every time a porn pushback—and the attendant pushback-to-the-pushback—begins, actual facts about the industry and teenage sexual behavior get lost in the ahistorical wailing of activists who aren’t concerned about women’s well-being or sexual fulfillment at all.

There is considerable disagreement over the current state of the porn debate, and whether no one or …

However inconvenient it may be for adults, we need to protect children from hurtful representations of sex and sexuality

Today the Authority for Television on Demand (Atvod) published research telling us children as young as six are accessing hardcore pornography. If we were to apply their study of 45,000 households nationally, that is 44,000 primary school children and 200,000 under-16s accessing adult sexual material; 112,000 boys aged 12-17 had visited one site alone, Pornhub. These figures aren’t even a realistic assessment as mobiles and tablets do not feature in the research. We should be shocked by the scale of the problem before us and galvanised into action. This is not about banning pornography, but protecting children from harmful and often degrading representations of sex and desire.

Atvod suggest forcing porn sites to complete age checks – failure to do so would result in an inability to process payments from UK …

A new citizen petition on the White House website asks the Obama administration to “require porn to be an ‘opt in’ feature with Internet Service Providers rather than a standard feature.” In an effort to collect enough signatures, proponents of this request are heavily promoting it on email lists and social media. Their efforts are misguided and in fact dangerous.

As a person whose livelihood requires using the internet on a regular basis, I have, like many others, encountered content I find objectionable without my actively looking for it. This is the basis of the petition’s request: people who want pornography should be allowed to opt in and get it, but the rest of us—and especially our children—should not have to stumble upon it accidentally, subjecting ourselves to images that cannot be forgotten, and whose effect can be psychologically and spiritually detrimental.

As a parent, I can sympathize with this …

I love learning about what makes relationships work. Carl-and-Ellie-in-Up-GIFIt fascinates me to know that billions of people all over the world are in committed relationships, and every single one of these relationships is absolutely, 100% unique to every other relationship in history. Isn’t that wild?!

There are literally an infinite number of ways to create, maintain, and grow a romantic relationship.

It’s so inspiring to me that there is no secret recipe for creating a truly happy, fulfilling, and loving relationship because it means it’s completely up to you to determine what you want and what works best for you!

One of the most important and complicated elements in most romantic relationships is developing healthy sexuality as individuals and as a couple.

Yes, I mean sexuality, not just sex.

I’ve heard that term “healthy sexuality” come up a lot over the years… but what the heck does that mean? What’s …