Half of all Christian men hooked on porn? Oh, come on…

Half of all Christian men hooked on porn? Oh, come on…

Okay, this is just irresponsible.

ChristiaNet, billing itself as “the world’s most visited Christian website” recently offered a web-based survey asking visitors to answer “eleven questions about their personal sexual conduct.” A press release from ChistiaNet trumpeted the results.

After receiving 1,000 results, ChristaNet asked Second Glance Ministries to help evaluate the responses:

“The poll results indicate that 50% of all Christian men and 20% of all Christian women are addicted to pornography.”

Further:

  • 60% of the women have significant struggles with lust
  • 40% of the women committed sexual sin in the past year
  • 20% of church-going women struggle with looking at pornography on an ongoing basis

This is nuts. These survey results are not scientific data. I don’t believe for a second that one of every two Christian men are addicted to porn, and I certainly don’t buy the assertion that one of every five Christian women are hooked either.

What you have here is a Christian website using the flaky results of an online poll to trumpet their domain name via a press release with controversial data, and thereby smearing Christians and Christianity in the process. Here’s one the thing you have to know about any online poll: the respondents are self-selecting.

Take a large sample of randomly selected people and I’d be more likely to admit the results are useful and worth interpreting. But when you offer up a sexual survey to website visitors (who may or may not be Christian–however you define the term) you have no control over your sample selection. Randomness disappears and you wind up having data not about Christians in general, but about the kind of people who would fill out a sexuality survey online.

George Barna would be livid.

Speaking of Barna, how about some data from a real sociologist who conducts surveys with scientific precision. Note the following:

“People’s views on morally acceptable behavior are deeply impacted by their worldview. Upon comparing the perspectives of those who have a biblical worldview with those who do not … less than one-half of one percent of those with a biblical worldview said voluntary exposure to pornography was morally acceptable (compared to 39% of other adults).” [Source: “A Biblical Worldview Has a Radical Effect on a Person’s Life“]

“One of the key indicators of the changing values of Americans relates to the nation’s comfort with pornography. Half of all adults stated that watching a movie with explicit sexual behavior is morally acceptable. That view was shared by three out of ten born again adults. In like fashion, more than four out of ten adults (43%) claimed that reading magazines with explicit sexual pictures and nudity is morally acceptable. Half as many of the born again adults embraced that perspective (21%).” [Source: “Practical Outcomes Replace Biblical Principles As the Moral Standard“]

Watching a movie with explicit sexual behavior is morally acceptable

     49%: all adults
     44%: mainline
     33%: not-mainline
     33%: regularly attend church
     29%: born again

Reading a magazine with nudity or explicit sexual pictures is morally acceptable

     43%: all adults
     42%: mainline
     25%: not-mainline
     26%: regularly attend church
     21%: born again

 [Source: “Practical Outcomes Replace Biblical Principles As the Moral Standard“]

Now, I’ll be among the first in line to say that the Church is not what she should be, and that there are probably many attending church to whom Christ will say, “Depart from me, I do not know you.” I’ll grant that pornography usage and sexual sin is a going concern in any church. But I simply cannot square Barna’s findings with ChristiaNet’s. To me, it simply looks like ChristiaNet asked some salacious questions and is using the results for press without really questioning the nature of the survey sample.

Sorry for the rant. I just hate it when stats and numbers are bent with agendas, or when they’re not presented with a fuller context.

Rich.


[tags]BlogRodent, Christianity, religion, Evangelical, porn, pornography, lust, sin, demographics, statistics, survey, poll, bad-statistics, integrity, integrity-on-the-internet[/tags]

9 thoughts on “Half of all Christian men hooked on porn? Oh, come on…

  1. Jim

    Sitting here, from my vantage point of more than three decades within the faith, I can believe there to be some truth to the findings. Polls are polls, of course, and no great rock on which to rest; but it’s also fact that society’s moral ethics, at large, have greatly changed since I first stepped into “old-time holiness”. When you boil it all down, though, Rich, it becomes a matter of who defines the Book, just what “is” a Christian, and humanity being humanity. Clinton, a “good Baptist”, supposedly needed someone to explain to him exactly what constituted “sex”. If I laid out for you what my bunch declared, way back in the beginning,what was necessary to achieve sanctity, I would hear the immediate screams of “legality!”. I’m certainly not meaning here to justify pornography, just stating that all who count themselves believers will have to one day account to Him, not me. I hear your amazement, brother, but it does seem to be where we are as a church in this country. Peace…..

  2. Merina

    I have been visiting Christianet. I have found the most judgmental and legalistic group, with a great degree of pride thrown in. Criticism of all major ministries on TV, their definition of who is really saved — saying 90% who access their site are not — but for the 10% who are, (themselves) just consider it good evangelism. It’s haughty. I read responses that are applauded, and now voted for, with fear and trembling. I’m now looking for a place to deprogram myself. The letter kills, and it was a faith killer. The arguing, finger pointing, dividing of the word, was disturbing. Penecostals, catholics, “charismaniacs” are out. I don’t believe 50% are addicted to porn either.

  3. old bear

    If you are looking at the naughty-naughty! on the internet, you know who you are and so does God. There are many people going to church today who will never enter into Heaven, and that leaves only one other place. If you sincerely pray to God for help and forgiveness He will help you with this addiction! old bear

  4. Tim

    Wow…

    Wake up, my friends. I ran a poll through the campus post office boxes at my Christian College a few years ago. The poll went into random boxes. I only received slightly more than a hundred responses. So, accuracy could be off. However. The findings of people who view porn that very week at a Christian college were at 30%. I’m not commenting to share a bunch of statistics. It doesn’t matter whether or not you believe 50% of Christian men struggle with viewing porn. Your figures from Barna state that roughly 20% of born again believers think it’s okay to be entertained by magazines or movies that contain porn. I bet you very few of the 50% of Christian men viewing porn would agree with Barna’s 20%. It’s not that they think it’s acceptable to view porn. It just so happens to be the very thing they wished they didn’t do. It’s a sad reality, my friends. I know. I’m there. Accepting such a statistic is not as important as understanding that sexual sin remains a significant obstacle for followers of Jesus to be fully committed to him. So, those who don’t struggle, are needed to firmly and lovingly reach out to those who do struggles. Yes, my friends Christians are even called to minister to one another–not only the unbeliever. Blessings.

  5. Angela

    I don’t know about the numbers, but I know that the number of Christians who are hooked on such things is very high, and for anyone to believe that God’s people don’t struggle with such things is a person who is living w/ “rose colored glasses on” such I was not too long ago.

    Thankfully, we have an all forgiving, loving and understanding God who looks at our hearts and motives because good men and women (the best of them) can and indeed do get caught up.

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