The body of research showing that pornography can cause deep and enduring harm to individuals and society has been growing in recent years. Studies show it increases loneliness and isolation, fuels sexist attitudes and sexual violence, inspires risky sexual behavior, and contributes to a lack of marital satisfaction, along with a host of other negative outcomes.
As Richard Harris, executive director of the Christian nonprofit Truth & Liberty Coalition said, “Pornography is one of the tools that is literally destroying the souls of the American people.”
And yet, acceptance of porn use as normal abounds, particularly within the sexually licentious atmosphere of Hollywood, where it is often dismissed as harmless or defended as empowering.
There are some celebrities, however, who are standing against the porn-acceptance tide.
Here are seven who are warning their fans about the evil impact of porn on our culture.
Russell Brand
Russell Brand has become known for a search for truth that has prompted him to embrace a number of more conservative ideas. One that’s rarely talked about, however, is his journey out of porn addiction. In 2015, the comedian began to openly discuss his struggle, saying, “There’s a general feeling, isn’t there? In your core, if you look at pornography, this isn’t what’s the best thing for me to do, this isn’t the best use of my time now.”
In a video addressing the damage pornography has wreaked on his own psychology, Brand acknowledged that while we’re all biologically programmed to have a sex drive, pornography warps that healthy interest. “Pornography reduces the spectacle of sex to a kind of extracted physical act,” Brand said in one video where he admits that he was obsessed with porn as a teenager.
Brand went on to address the vast proliferation of explicit images and video that aren’t just accessible online, but that frequently pop up even when a user isn’t looking for them. “This cloud of pornographic information and even soft cultural smog is making it impossible for us to relate to our own sexuality, our own psychology,” the comedian pointed out. “So if you’re constantly bombarded with great waves of filth, it’s really difficult to remain connected to truth. Try to have an idea of what you want from loving relationships, and what you want from sexuality … Because once that biological drive to procreate is connected to the culture of objectification, it’s a very hard equation to break.”
Terry Crews
Like Brand, Terry Crews has been refreshingly honest about the damage porn use caused in his life. The actor and “America’s Got Talent” host has called his past addiction an “intimacy killer” that hurt his wife and created a metaphorical brick wall between them.
Today, he boldly speaks out against the porn industry. “Being on the internet allows you to keep it a secret. Before you had to go search it out, go look for it, go to a strip club where somebody would see me,” he said in a series of videos he posted to Facebook in 2016, adding, “But this is a secret–they don’t have to see you at all. You can be all alone, and it will be just yours. But I’m trying to tell you that makes it all the more insidious and all the more we have to root it out and call it what it is.”
Crews concluded, “My issue was and is with pornography is that it changes the way you think about people. People become objects. People become body parts. They become things to be used rather than people to be loved.”
Billie Eilish
In a December interview with Howard Stern chart-topping singer Billie Eilish admitted that she has battled porn addiction since she was 11 years old and it has damaged her ability to form healthy relationships.
“As a woman, I think porn is a disgrace, and I used to watch a lot of porn, to be honest,” she said, adding, “I started watching porn when I was like 11. I didn’t understand why it was a bad thing. I thought that’s how you learned how to have sex.”
The Grammy winner’s description of the impact porn had on her psyche dovetails perfectly with research showing how harmful explicit sexual material is to adolescents. In her case, it even led to sleep issues. “I think that I had sleep paralysis and these night terrors and nightmares because of it. I think that’s how it started because I would just watch abusive BDSM and that’s what I thought was attractive,” Eilish said.
She went on to reveal that her porn habit soon grew so bad she was only interested in material that was violent, and it warped her perception of sex, her own body, and led her to engage in behavior that made her feel worthless.
“I didn’t think it was attractive. And I was a virgin, I had never done anything, and it led to problems,” she revealed. “The first few times I, you know, had sex, I was not saying no to things that were not good. It’s because I thought that that’s what I was supposed to be attracted to. I’m so angry that porn is so loved, and I’m so angry at myself for thinking that it was okay.”
Josh Radner
Josh Radner, best known for the hit sitcom “How I Met Your Mother,” is one of the few celebrities that has spoken out against porn, but done so with a clinical understanding of the neurological impact of explicit images on the brain. He has also pointed out how the ubiquitous and extreme nature of today’s online pornography cannot compare to the Playboy magazines of yesteryear.
“People make the argument that pornography has always been around – like it’s some kind of sturdy, time-honored tradition – but it’s a baseless argument,” he said in an exclusive interview with the anti-porn non-profit, Fight the New Drug. “It has never been around the way it is today, with the instant availability and variety and barbarity of it all. Internet pornography is this crazy experiment unleashed on the human psyche.”
Radner then explained how such material sends bodies and brains on a “wildly untested chemical roller coaster,” that is often akin to drug addiction. And like drug addiction, getting off porn can be incredibly difficult for severe addicts.
Like with any drug I think there are people whose circuitry is not vulnerable to the addiction, and many others who aren’t so fortunate. Because it’s all so new and has exploded so fast, research is only now beginning to come out. Reports of chronic porn watchers detoxing off porn mirrors classic drug withdrawal – shakes, sweating, insomnia, depression, inability to focus, suicidal ideation, etc.
Radner went on to offer harsh words for psychologists and other self-styled experts who minimize the danger of porn: “There are those who say there’s no such thing as pornography addiction and that watching porn is harmless. History will not be kind to those people. They’ll be the doctors from the fifties in the cigarette ads.”
Jenna Jamison
Best known as a porn actress herself, Jamison might seem like an unlikely anti-porn crusader. But who better than someone who worked in the industry for decades to blow the whistle on the it’s dark secrets?
In her autobiography, Jameson shared that she was groomed into pornography by an adult boyfriend and his father when she was just 16 years old. For that reason, she says she encourages parents to “stay involved in [their] kids’ lives and question everything.”
The 46-year-old has also pulled the curtain back on Hollywood’s complicity with the porn industry, particularly its targeting of children. “The reason why Hollywood has been so incredibly silent on child sex trafficking,” Jameson has argued, “is not only do they partake, they are covering for the big league hitters.”
Orlando Bloom
A-lister Orlando Bloom is another star who discovered the power of porn to warp a person’s perception when he decided to wean himself off of watching it.
In a March 2020 interview with The U.K.’s Sunday Times, he said that deciding to take a break from looking at explicit material taught him that “porn is super-disruptive to your sex life, to your libido.” He also discovered that it was impeding his ability to build relationships with real women.
“They’ve done the studies, they can’t find any kids who don’t watch it. When you watch multiple people at multiple times in one evening, how is your actual real-life partner going to match up?” he said. “It’s just so destructive.”
Emma Thompson
Oscar-winner Emma Thompson made her feelings about porn quite clear in a 2014 interview with The Daily Mail, saying that such “internet slime” has poisoned the minds of a generation of boys.
The ‘Saving Mr. Banks’ star pointed out that the reason so many once-innocent young Disney actresses like Miley Cyrus go over to the dirty side is because they know that sex sells. “[Cyrus] made the choice of going hyper-sexual for a reason, and we’re all responsible for that, because that’s what we buy, and that’s what we click on. Those quick clicks are dangerous,” Thompson said.
She collaborated on a documentary that was never released on the dangers of pornography because she was personally concerned about the harm online porn does to young men, in particular. “[They] cannot function sexually because they’ve lost the use of their imagination,” she said.