Technology is a queer thing. It brings you gifts with one hand, and stabs you in the back with the other.

Technology... is a queer thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other.

We live during a time in which some shoppers shiver all Thanksgiving night only to trample one another to death in a sunrise race through the electronics store to buy gaming consoles that allow them to create avatars of themselves.

Here though, there are no oppressors. No one's forcing you to do this. You willingly tie yourself to these leashes. And you willingly become utterly socially autistic. You no longer pick up on basic human communication clues. You're at a table with three humans, all of whom are looking at you and trying to talk to you, and you're staring at a screen! Searching for strangers in... Dubai!

So the best defense against porn, for every member of our family, is a full life--the kind of life that technology cannot provide on its own. This is why the most important things we will do to prevent porn from taking over our own lives and our children's lives have nothing to do with sex. A home where wisdom and courage come first; where our central spaces are full of satisfying, demanding opportunities for creativity; where we have regular breaks from technology and opportunities for deep rest and refreshment (where devices "sleep" somewhere other than our bedrooms and where both adults and children experience the satisfactions of learning in thick, embodied ways rather than thin, technological ways); where we've learned to manage boredom and where even our car trips are occasions for deep and meaningful conversation--this is the kind of home that can equip all of us with an immune system strong enough to resist pornography's foolishness.

It was one thing to use computers as a tool, quite another to let them do your thinking for you.