Overcoming the **** Problem
New documentary wisely shines a light on personal stories, rather than just the 'experts' When filmmaker Sean Finnegan first considered doing a documentary on the problem of ****ography, he knew he didn’t want to merely cite facts and figures interwoven with sound bites from experts. He thought the best way to tell this story was to, well, tell a story – and in the case of Out of the Darkness, now available on DVD, he found a powerful one in former **** actress Shelley Lubben, who now runs a ministry helping others to escape the sex industry and find hope and healing in Christ.
“Stories matter,” says Finnegan. “Most of the work done on ****ography revolves around the issues of free speech and legislation, or the science behind addiction. But films are not essays or treatises. Films, like novels and poems and plays, are here to tell stories. And that is enough. If that is done well, we will, as Conrad said, gain a glimpse into the truth for which we forgot to ask.
“What stories can do for us is put faces on their topics. No matter how intense the debate around ****ography becomes, the debate is really about human beings.”
Finnegan aims his camera at four such humans, including two who have come out of the darkness themselves, Lubben (don't worry; this website is safe) and recovered sex addict Mark Houck. Finnegan also interviews family therapist Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons and sexual revolution historian Dr. Judith Reisman, who are much more than mere “talking heads” here; Fitzgibbons and Reisman also tell stories, including one Reisman shares about a daughter who was raped. While Lubben and Houck focus more on their personal testimonies, the other two describe the culture and societal breakdown that got America into this mess – and yes, it’s presented as chiefly an American problem. After all, almost 90 percent of all **** sites originate in the U.S.
Reisman gives some fascinating background about how Dr. Albert Kinsey’s post-WWII sex research – including the infamous “Kinsey Reports” – sparked America’s sexual revolution. She disputes Kinsey’s “science” as fraudulent, but says academia, the media, and the general population accepted it as true, including the notion that we’re all just basically sexual animals, so why not just go for it? Fitzgibbons adds that many of us have embraced what he calls a “sexual utilitarian philosophy,” resulting in a breakdown of the family, a collapse of morality, and on a personal level, profound loneliness, sadness, and narcissism. It’s all a recipe for the **** industry to flourish.
But most compelling are the stories from Lubben and Houck. The latter tells how he grew up a “normal” guy, but how, shortly after his father died when he was just 11, he became a loner. He discovered his first Playboy as a pre-teen and got hooked on the magazines, and later on Internet ****, to the point where he was spending up to four hours a day on his habit. Houck struggled with his addiction for 16 years before finally realizing how destructive it was and making the decision to break free. He did so mainly by recommitting to his Christian faith, and while that story isn’t told in great detail here, Houck makes it clear that his disciplined pursuit of righteousness that made the difference – more than his decision to simply avoid the temptation. It was the pursuit of the good more than the mere fleeing of the bad that helped him win the battle.
rest with vid preview:
http://tinyurl.com/89dkutn
