Sex addiction?

I want to believe.

Yep, Duchovny’s in rehab for it.  (Married to Tea Leoni, too.) I guess that explains the surprising number of appearances in the Red Shoe Diaries series. Maybe they should have called it The XXX Files. Or maybe he was just getting into character for his role in Californication.

A recent CNN article about sex addiction sounds surprisingly . . . Mormonish. Check this out:

A lot of teenagers develop their sexuality with pornography, and then find that relational sex isn’t as satisfying, Weiss said. Porn gives them a “very strong chemical hit,” and alters ways of thinking about sex, somewhat like the classic “ring the bell, feed the dog” stimulus-response mechanism. Addicts thus learn to become sexually attached to objects, and have trouble getting the same kind of satisfaction from sex in a relationship, he said.

Where’s the line between healthy sexuality and sex addiction, anyway? It seems to me that people raised in the hyper-sensitive Mormon culture are quick to call any sort of porn use a sex addiction. And that makes me wonder.

Granting that sex addiction exists, and is a real problem for some people — how do you tell a real sex addict who needs help, as compared to just an otherwise healthy person who chooses to deviate from the hyper-sensitive baseline of Mormon expectations?

Tis the Season

Pormonism (or, Porn meets Mormonism)

Exponent II magazine recently dedicated an entire volume to the topic of porn addiction. The volume is available for free online, and has a number of different articles on the topic. A good blog discussion is also available at Exponent blog.

I’m glad that the magazine and blog are addressing the topic of porn. It’s an important issue for a lot of people, and it’s one that is often swept under the carpet. This kind of sustained discussion can be a good thing.

I’m less happy with the ultimate product, though. It seems to me that, while it has some real good material, it also has some significant omissions, blind spots, and problems.

About the Visitors’ Center

Growing up Mormon, we’re often told the controlling, mean-spirited, disparaging joke that, “your body is a temple, not a visitors’ center.”

We disagree.

Our bodies are indeed temples, vital links between ourselves and the divine in the universe. But equally importantly, our bodies are visitors’ centers, and this is a cause for celebration. Over time, our bodies have welcomed many different visits from a variety of guests — spouses, lovers, children, friends, self. Though those visits, and the human connections they bring, we have come to better know ourselves, others, and the universe.

This blog celebrates Mormon sexuality, in all its forms. We rejoice at the multiplicity of forms of sexual expression, and condemn no one for their personal, consenting choices. We are not ashamed of our sexuality, and we reject any who would tell us to feel shame over our bodies’ natural role as both temple and visitors’ center. Through our discussions here, we hope to come to better understand the fascinating mix of sexuality and spirituality in our own lives and the lives of our loved ones.

And we welcome you to join us for discussion at our visitors’ center here online.