Everyone seems to think porn is a problem only that guys deal with. As a girl, how can I overcome the habit?

You’re right. Whenever the topic of porn is addressed, people often give off the impression that no woman has ever struggled with it. This makes the women who have seen pornography feel like there’s something especially wrong with them.

Decades ago, pornography was almost entirely a male issue. That’s because if a guy wanted to see it, he’d have to drive to an “adult” bookstore or overcome his embarrassment to purchase a risqué plastic-wrapped magazine from a newsstand.  Women simply weren’t interested in going to so much trouble to see nudity.  They were content reading steamy romance novels that involved relational plots.

With the advent of the Internet, everything changed: Instead of going out of your way to see porn, you now need to go out of your way to avoid it! With the greater accessibility of porn through websites, webcams, chat rooms, and so on, more and more women have become ensnared by the habit.

Some women stumbled upon it by accident. Others sought it out because of curiosity. Still others were drawn into it while seeking virtual companionship online. No matter what the case may be, countless women have become hooked on it, and are too ashamed to talk to anyone about it. Whereas it’s taken for granted that millions of men view porn, there’s a significant social stigma about a woman viewing it (as if a woman’s gender made her more guilty)! She thinks, “This is  supposed to be a guy problem. Something must be wrong with me because I’m trapped in this habit.” Such a fear may even keep her from confessing the sin, because she’s afraid of how she might be judged by the priest.

Some feminists propose that the solution is to tear down the walls of gender stereotyping so that women can look at porn just as freely as men, without being judged. However, the solution isn’t to remove the social stigma of women viewing porn. The solution is to rehabilitate the conscience of both men and women so that they realize that the habit should be overcome for the sake of love. Click here to read helpful blogs about how other women have overcome the habit. In the meantime, know that you aren’t alone, and that with God’s help, you can achieve victory over this vice.