The Los Angeles Times is out today with a truly important article that should be a real eye-opener for parents of teenagers–especially teenage boys. In “Just the Facts Now,” reporter Shawn Hubler argues that pornography is now an almost universal teenage interest, seen by many teens as “just part of the culture.” He quotes Mike Clark, a “peach-fuzzed Orange County 16-year-old,” who related his excitement in discovering internet porn. “I mean, the minute they tell you that stuff is out there, you’re like, ‘Really? It is?’” It is.

Pornography, once peddled only in darkened back alleys, is now a great American success story. In the span of a few short years, the scourge of pornography has been transformed from a vice to a commodity–one more line of merchandise on the shelf, and on the screen.

Pornography represents one of the most perverse distortions of human sexuality, offering sexual images and erotic enticements for an all-too-willing consumer society to use as a substitute for genuine sexuality and the accountability of marriage. Most Christians are by now aware that pornography represents a vast industry in America, combining print, digital, video, and other products in a seemingly endless array of sexual “products.”

America’s slide into a truly pornographic culture is now almost complete. California-based CKE Restaurants, Inc. has launched a series of advertisements for its Carl’s Jr. restaurants that features Hugh Hefner, the founder of Playboy Enterprises–and he’s not just selling hamburgers. The advertisements are further evidence of the nation’s descent into moral degeneracy.

Pornography, once peddled only in darkened back alleys, is now a great American success story. In the span of a few short years, the scourge of pornography has been transformed from a vice to a commodity–one more line of merchandise on the shelf, and on the screen.