JOHN GALLAGHER
SPORTS EDITOR
Packed to standing room only, the Gentile Gallery hosted Fight the New Drug at 9 p.m. Wednesday, part of the Gift of Human Sexuality Symposium.
Fight the New Drug founder and CEO Clay Olsen delivered an impactful presentation on the destruction pornography leaves in its wake.
Olsen outlined the trifold danger of pornography. He said, “A tidal wave of pornography is approaching our shores. It affects our brains, our hearts, and our world.”
“As exposure occurs,” summarized Olsen, “the sexual template changes … The effects of porn on the brain are pretty depressing. But the brain can heal. That’s an important message to hear.”
Pornography can also kill the body’s capacity for love, said Olsen. “What we consume changes our interests. This affects what we love as well.”
The fact that the content of pornography has darkened and become increasingly violent worries Fight the New Drug, Olsen said, as the connections between pornography and human trafficking are made evermore evident.
Said Olsen, “More women than we would like to believe are forced against their will to participate in pornography. This issue,” he said, “is more in our face than ever before.”
“We can do better,” stressed Olsen. “We should and we need to do better. If we stand idly by, this cycle gets worse.” He concluded, to applause, that “it’s not just about what we’re fighting against. It’s about what we’re fighting for.”
He finished, “We fight for love.”
The positive message of the talk reasoned with those in attendance. “I loved how he admitted that porn is very different than it was before the Internet,” said Alex Quinones, sophomore theology and catechetics major. “It helps parents understand that it’s a different struggle today than it was 20 years ago.”
On behalf of Fight the New Drug, Olsen invited all of campus to become the change the world needs. “The difference between what we are and what we can be,” he said, “means everything for future generations.”