UCAP

About 1,000 Utahns were told to join the "war on pornography" Saturday at a conference aimed at teaching them how to protect themselves and their children against it or how to get help if they are addicted.

"Internet pornography is the sexual revolution times 1,000," said Patrick Trueman, former chief of the U.S. Department of Justice's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section Criminal Division under President Reagan and President George H.W. Bush.

At the Utah Coalition Against Pornography's ninth annual conference at Little America Hotel, Trueman said porn leads to sex parties and prostitution and "hijacks our brain" to make users never satisfied, always seeking more deviant images.

He urged listeners to lobby politicians to enforce the federal laws that already exist against hotels, cable and satellite companies providing hard-core pornography. And he told parents to use computer filters.

Without one, "you might as well say to your kids, 'Anything goes. We don't love you enough to protect you.'

"What's more damaging to a child, a handgun or a computer?" he rhetorically asked. "A handgun may not be loaded. The computer is loaded; it's loaded to the hilt."

With sessions on repairing relationships harmed by porn, helping teens who view porn and aiding parents in a "digital world," the conference attracted parents, youth church leaders and families. The coalition's board includes Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, the Utah Catholic Diocese, LDS Church members and companies that offer counseling and Internet filters.

"It's one of the big problems affecting the youth in the church" said Peter Barlow, an LDS leader from Draper, who said church leaders urged members to attend the conference. "We need to figure out how to help them."

He attended a session that offered warning signs of teen porn use, including using vulgar and sexual language, extreme religiosity or avoidance of church activities.

"I have little kids," said Amy Horspool, from Plain City. "I figure it's out there, I might as well learn how to protect my family."

Gov. Gary Herbert, another conference speaker, called porn a "growing scourge."

"We view ourselves as a very moral community. ... But we have every evil here in Utah that's found in any inner city in America."

Last year, a study published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives showed Utah had the nation's highest online porn subscription rate per thousand home broadband users, at 5.47, from 2006 to 2008.

"This is a huge problem. It's destroying families," said Jonathan Taylor, who was at a booth promoting the group Sons of Helaman. It provides group therapy to Mormon men struggling with pornography addiction.

The 24-year-old from Riverdale said he is now recovering. Before, he would wake up anticipating and dreading when he would see the graphic images. "I felt out of control. It was dark."

hmay@sltrib.com

Pornography: 'a growing scourge'
By Sarah Jane Weaver
Church News staff writer

More than 1,000 people gathered in downtown Salt Lake City for the 9th annual Conference on Protecting Children and Families From Pornography and Other Harmful Material.
"What can stop this horrible industry from going forth?" asked Pamela J. Atkinson, chairwoman of the Utah Coalition Against Pornography. "Obviously, education comes to mind."

The conference, which was sponsored by UCAP, included several sessions on topics including the sexual exploitation industry, how to create safety in a relationship when trust has been lost, teens and technology, and how to deal with adolescents' pornography use.

"Pornography is a growing scourge," said Utah Governor Gary Herbert, "but it is not just around the nation. We have every evil here in Utah that is found in any inner city in America."

Keynote speaker Patrick A. Trueman asked the capacity crowd in the Little America Hotel's Grand Ballroom to think about who "pornographers" are. "Today it might be the man right next door to you."

Phil Burress, president of Citizens for Community Values, told audience members in his closing address that they can win the war against pornography. "It just takes all of us together, working together."

sarah@desnews.com

© 2010 Deseret News Publishing Company

Porn 'hijacks' sexuality, expert says
By Sarah Jane Weaver
Deseret News
Published: Saturday, April 25, 2009 10:53 p.m. MDT

SANDY — Pornography "hijacks a person's healthy sexuality," said the closing keynote speaker at a conference sponsored by the Utah Coalition Against Pornography on Saturday.

Wendy Maltz, a therapist, educator and lecturer, said pornography "harms people in ways they do not realize," causing problems in their family life, work life and spiritual life.

Offering closing remarks at the eighth annual conference on Protecting Children and Families from Pornography and other Harmful Material, Maltz said research supports a simple premise: "Staying away from pornography is a very smart thing to do."

More than 700 people attended the conference at the South Towne Expo Center, 9575 S. State. Utah's first lady, Mary Kaye Huntsman, welcomed attendees and praised them for wanting to learn more about the issue of pornography and how to deal with it.

In addition to Maltz and the event's opening keynote speaker, Donna Rice Hughes, eight other presenters spoke at the conference.
Maltz, a family and sex therapist and co-author of the book "Porn Trap," said she first noticed pornography becoming a problem for more and more of her clients in the mid- to late 1990s with the introduction of the Internet. She began researching the topic.

The drive to view pornography, Maltz said, is so strong that people continue to use it in spite of negative consequences.

"What I see pornography as is as a sexual predator," she said. "It actually is a form of sexual abuse. Sexual abuse can be defined as when someone is exploited or dominated through sexual activity or suggestion."

Pornography teaches all the wrong things about sex, Maltz said. It can make a person feel unattractive. Pornographic images in magazines have been airbrushed, she said, and 85 percent of porn stars have had breast implants, for example.
However, healing is possible, Maltz said. "People with these problems can move out of them."

One of the first steps is to create a strong base of motivation. The message people who have a problem with pornography need to hear is that they're not alone, she said. "They need compassion, not shame."

Families also need to open the lines of communication.

"Porn actually makes a man less of a man," Maltz said. "It makes him less attractive. Women want men who aren't into porn. It can render a person powerless to it, and it can compromise values."

Hughes said there is currently a "perfect storm" for pornography proliferation: cyber-savvy kids online, a burgeoning porn industry, sexual predators online and cyber-challenged adults.

"Almost half of parents with kids online are not using any kind of safety rule or software tool," said Hughes, president of Enough is Enough, a nonprofit organization working to make the Internet safer for children and families.
The fastest growing group of pornographic consumers are teenagers, she said.
"It is not just teenage boys. It is teenage girls, too," Hughes said.

People across the nation are banding together to fight pornography, she said.

"We can do this one child at a time, one community at a time, one state at a time," Hughes said.
E-mail: sarah@desnews.com
© 2009 Deseret News Publishing Company | All rights reserved

The scourge of pornography
Deseret News editorial

Published: Friday, April 24, 2009 12:03 a.m. MDT
You probably don't need to attend a conference to know that society is becoming more and more sex-obsessed, with the content of prime-time television shows now saturated and dripping with innuendo and blatant jokes that trivialize what used to be considered private and, to many people, sacred.

But these are the more benign forms of a huge problem — the fringes poking through the mainstream culture. What's hidden below the surface is far worse and far more prevalent than many people believe. You don't have to dig hard to find it. Often, you don't have to dig at all. It will reach up and confront you or, more likely, your children.

The Utah Coalition Against Pornography is holding a conference Saturday at the South Towne Expo Center on how to protect children and families from pornography and other harmful materials. The conference, which begins at 8 a.m., features a number of experts in the field and promises to be a valuable source of information. The public may attend for a $15 registration fee.

How bad is the problem? Not only is pornography a $100 billion a year industry, it is reaching a young and vulnerable audience with minds that are just beginning to develop notions about love, respect and the proper way to treat someone of the opposite sex. Recent surveys show that about 93 percent of American teenagers have access to the Internet. The Web site www.enough.org reports that surveys have found 42 percent of kids ages 10 to 17 have viewed pornography on the Internet during the past year, and that 66 percent of these occurrences were unwanted experiences. Often, these come from simple searches for items related to school projects or while doing other innocent research. Sometimes they come in the form of unsolicited e-mails.

More frightening than that, in one study 48 percent of kids in kindergarten and first grade said they had seen things on the Internet that made them uncomfortable. Filtering programs are not 100 percent successful in blocking such material.

Among older children, a growing practice of sending nude or semi-nude photos either of themselves or others via a cell phone — a practice known as "sexting" — has led to huge problems, including suicides.

The experts say such exposure at an early age can lead to a host of problems. Among other things, kids are conditioned to minimize the need for true affection and to believe that marriage and family life are unattractive and unfulfilling. They risk developing habits or addictive behaviors that are destructive, and they often are exposed to incorrect information that skews their view of the world.

And the problem, although barely hidden beneath the surface, is all around you. It doesn't limit itself to children and teenagers. Many adults are drawn in, as well.

Through the years, Utah's leaders have tried various ways to help people cope with the problem and to bring justice to perpetrators. The state even set up an office dedicated solely to the issue. Unfortunately, skeptics labeled it the "porn czar" and pressured the state to disband it.

But help is still available. Saturday's conference offers a strong example.

© 2009 Deseret News Publishing Company | All rights reserved

Truth and safety
Kids need to know dangers of porn

Tribune Editorial
Salt Lake Tribune
Updated:04/14/2009 05:31:21 PM MDT 

Utah children don't get comprehensive sex education in public schools, and many of them don't get it at home. That deficiency is dangerous, and there is more to be frightened of all the time. Take pornography.

The Utah Coalition Against Pornography would like to see more children do just that: take a healthy dose of sex education that includes lessons on the facts about pornography and its potential effects and the danger of pornography addiction. The coalition is worried, and rightly so, since it has found that a third of Internet users between the ages of 10 and 17 have been exposed unintentionally to sexual material, and more than three-quarters of unintentional exposure to pornography occurred at home.

It seems clear that parents aren't keeping up with the times or the technology.

Not only home computers harbor images that children should not see. Cell phones, iPhone, BlackBerries and many other personal digital assistants, or PDAs, laptops that can go anywhere and computers at school and at the homes of friends all offer opportunities for unwitting children to access pornography Web sites.

The fear is that, once they stumble onto such sites, which porn purveyors slyly make astonishingly accessible, they will go back, and the next time it won't be by accident.

The coalition warns that studies show children and teens who post profiles online are more likely to become victims of sexual violence. Teens who regularly visit pornography sites more frequently develop sexually transmitted diseases, unplanned pregnancies and sex addictions. Youngsters exposed to porn can act out sexually with other children.

Researchers say children who aren't monitored and educated about what's appropriate can easily lose their innocence. Their attitudes and actions are shaped by watching sexual images instead of by their parents' values, and their mental and social developments become twisted.

To combat the danger, parents should have rules about how their children use computers and other digital devices. But the truth is, parents can't be everywhere to enforce the rules. The only effective weapon is education. Children and certainly teenagers should understand the dangers; they should feel comfortable talking with parents and other responsible adults about pornography so they will be more likely to report it when they stumble onto a porn site.

The coalition's April 25 conference at the South Towne Expo Center is a good place to start. All the details are available at www.utahcoalition.org
 

Utah Coalition Against Pornography Announces 2009 Conference on Protecting Children and Families from Pornography and Other Harmful Material

Last Update: 4/15 12:28 pm 

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Utah Coalition Against Pornography Announces 2009 Conference on Protecting Children and Families from Pornography and Other Harmful Material

Pamela Atkinson, Chair of the Utah Coalition Against Pornography, announced today the 8th Annual Conference on Protecting Children and Families from Pornography and Other Harmful Material.

"This conference has become recognized for its efforts to protect children and families from pornography and other harmful material," said Atkinson "We are thrilled to announce our conference, with such a distinguished line-up of presenters and topics."

Each year, UCAP unites various organizations that seek to establish and maintain standards of decency in our communities and promote safety for children and families. The focus of the vast array of presentations in this conference will address the issues of pornography and other harmful material that threatens the foundation of stable life for individuals, families, and communities. The purpose of this conference is to educate the citizens about problems related to obscenity, provide resources and help, and teach people what they can do to promote community standards that will safeguard children and families against this problem. This conference serves individuals, parents, spouses, youth leaders, community leaders, ecclesiastical leaders, and community organizations.

"We will be honored to learn from respected individuals from across the country, including M. Deborah Corley, Ph.D., of the Sante Center for Healing; Wendy Maltz, LCSW, DST, author, therapist, educator, and lecturer; Donna Rice Hughes, President of Enough Is Enough; and, Jason Carroll Ph.D., researcher, scholar, and educator, just to name a few," said Atkinson.

The conference will be held on Saturday, April 25, 2009 at the South Towne Expo Center. The conference begins at 8:00am. This half-day event begins with an opening keynote address, 3 hours of break-out sessions (4 in each hour), and a closing keynote address. Information booths are hosted by local and national groups dedicated to the cause. Additional information about the conference can be found on the coalition’s website at www.utahcoalition.org. A brochure can also be downloaded from the site.www.utahcoalition.org. 

ABOUT UCAP: The Utah Coalition Against Pornography (UCAP) is a non-profit 501(c)3 organization, which is comprised of diverse religious, social, and cultural groups offering leadership, education, and resources to organizations seeking to combat the harmful effects of sexually explicit material on individuals, children and families. The main purpose in bringing together these organizations in combating pornography, is to provide resources, information, and hope to the community, individuals, and families.

Utah not necessarily No. 1 in porn consumption
March 3rd, 2009 @ 10:20pm
By John Hollenhorst
SALT LAKE CITY -- A new study out of Harvard University seems to give Utah an unflattering distinction: No. 1 in the nation for pornography consumption. But the study has touched off a lively debate about what it really tells us about Utah residents.

Some are touting the study as evidence that pornography is more popular in conservative, religious communities. But even those who question those interpretations welcome the study because it throws light on what they say is a growing problem across the nation.

The Harvard study used credit card subscription data from a top Internet porn company. It ranked states on a per-capita basis, comparing paid subscriptions with the number of high-speed Internet connections.

Utah came out on top, followed by Alaska, Mississippi and several other states that are generally considered conservative and religiously-oriented:

Utah -- 5.47
Alaska -- 5.03
Mississippi -- 4.30
Hawaii -- 3.61
Oklahoma -- 3.21
Arkansas -- 3.12
No. Dakota -- 3.05
Louisiana -- 3.01
Florida -- 3.01
West Virginia -- 2.94
Pamela Atkinson chairs the Utah Coalition Against Pornography. "I think this study actually confirms what many of us has known for a number of years, that the addiction use of pornography is growing more and more each year," she said.

Atkinson believes Utah's more repressive culture pushes some people to the Internet. "It's because we don't have the adult movie stores as much as they do in other states. And people have come to realize that you can access this material quite easily," she said.

Therapist-researcher Jill Manning thinks the Harvard study itself suggests a different explanation for higher pornography consumption in Utah.

"Well, I think that's a misleading interpretation," Manning said. "There is more consumption in areas where there's a concentration of 15- to 24-year-olds, and just last spring it was reported that Utah has the youngest population in the nation."

Manning says state-to-state variance is actually rather small, and the paid-subscription data may not be truly representative. "Approximately 80 to 90 percent of pornography use online is free, where people are not paying a subscription to use that. So, I think that just focusing on one provider is very misleading and does not give us a sense of the larger issue," she explained.

She does acknowledge that shame and guilt are a special problem for religious people addicted to pornography. "Those strong feelings of shame and guilt can fuel more compulsion with the pornography use," Manning said.

Both Atkinson and Manning say the study will do some good if it focuses attention on a serious problem.

"We have many broken families in this state because one of the spouses became addicted," Atkinson said. "It has a devastating impact, especially on the marital bond. I know of no other issue, aside from sexual abuse, where the very soul of the marriage and trust is so deeply impacted," Manning said.

Both would like to see more studies done to better define the problem.

E-mail: jhollenhorst@ksl.com

The Porn Plague
February 11, 2009

It may not have been the highest profile discussion on Capitol Hill last week. It didn't garner front-page headlines. But, a presentation by community activist Pamela Atkinson to the House GOP caucus addressed a concern that may be more insidiously damaging than any other currently facing Utah.

Atkinson chairs the Utah Coalition Against Pornography.

In Atkinson's words, "Utah has a big problem." She says Internet porn and electronic sex is rapidly ensnaring many people across the state, including children. Texting sexual messages or "sexting" as it is coming to be called is becoming more common among teens.

Furthermore, she cited a Google Trends study that revealed Salt Lake City ranks number 2 in the nation for searches using sex-related words. Ironically, the city also ranks number two for searches involving "family values."

KSL appreciates the effort of Atkinson and her organization to bring this alarming information to the attention of lawmakers and the general public. Awareness, of course, is a vital step in combating this escalating, yet often hidden plague.

While the passage of laws may help, KSL shares Atkinson's belief that the first line of defense is the family where special care must be taken by parents to protect themselves and their children from exposure to all forms of smut.
www.ksl.com

House members hear about dangers of pornography
By Bob Bernick Jr.

Deseret News

Published: Thursday, Feb. 5, 2009 6:27 p.m. MST
Utah House Republicans were given a tutorial Thursday on the dangers of internet pornography.

Pamela Atkinson, better known for her work for the homeless and low-income Utahns, is now co-chair of Utahns Against Pornography, a civic group aimed at educating mostly-parents and adults about the dangers all, especially the young, face in watching pornography on the Internet. She addressed the caucus at the request of Rep. Ron Bigelow, R-West Valley, who has bill to criminalize the viewing of child pornography.

Atkinson spoke at length, throwing handfuls of statistics at the GOP legislators, specifically that while Utah is seen as a conservative, traditional-values state in many ways, its citizens are viewing online pornography in greater percentages than many other states' inhabitants.

She said there is new medical proof that viewing pornography excites/harms parts of the brain. And that women are viewing the material in increasing numbers. Pornography is seen by some experts as a gateway activity, coming before addiction to alcohol, drugs and even "acting out" molestations on children.

Child pornography is especially destructive, said Atkinson. Such pictures are already illegal. But more and more, people are searching it out on the Internet and viewing it, she said.

Atkinson gave a long list of web sites designed to educate and fight pornography. She detailed signs for loved ones to watch for in their spouses and children who may be addicted to porn.

The single best thing any parent or spouse can do, however, is make sure that the home computer is in an open area, not behind closed doors, so a passersby can see what material is being viewed.

Viewing pornography is "devastating," she said. "Molesters and murders have testified that they started viewing pornography. And studies show even viewing a page for 10 to 15 seconds can bring some people back again and again — addicted."

© 2009 Deseret News Publishing Company | All rights reserved