Written by: Brian Shillingburg, Founder& Coach, 9th Inning Project
For more than 25 years, I worked in schools as a teacher, a leader, and a mentor. And during that time, I saw things I was not trained to see.
I watched innocence disappear too early. I watched anxiety take root in kids who could not yet name what they were feeling but felt it all the same.
What educators are carrying today is often invisible.
Quiet.
Heavy.
And far beyond what we are equipped to address alone.
The Problem: Porn Exposure Happens Early and Shapes Kids Quietly
Pornography addiction rarely begins in adulthood. It begins in childhoodRobb, M.B., & Mann, S. (2023). Teens and pornography. San Francisco, CA: Common Sense.Copy . So what does early porn exposure do to kids?
Research consistently shows that many kids are exposed to pornography years before their brains are equipped to process it. What often begins as curiosity quickly becomes confusion, overstimulation, and secrecy.
The developing brain is not prepared for what pornography delivers. Repeated exposure floods the brain’s reward system with dopamine while overstimulating the amygdala, the part of the brain responsible for fear and emotional response. Over time, this interferes with the development of the prefrontal cortex, the region responsible for impulse control, emotional regulation, and decision making. [Reference note: adolescent brain development, dopamine response, and pornography exposure]
This is not abstract science to me. I watched the effects of this neurological overload play out in real time through behavior, anxiety, emotional volatility, and an inability to slow down long enough to think.
As a middle school leader for nearly a decade, I saw it every day. Students struggled to regulate emotions, manage stress, and think through consequences. Middle school is already a vulnerable season of development. Adding hyper-stimulating sexual content overwhelms minds that were never designed to process it.
Then COVID accelerated everything.
Isolation increased. Screen time exploded. Supervision fractured under the weight of survival.
And the effects followed students back into our classrooms.
The Reality in Schools: Access Is Easy and Safeguards Are Not Enough
Pornography was not an occasional issue at school.
It was daily.
Even before COVID, students were accessing pornography on school campuses, sometimes in libraries and sometimes during class. I remember asking myself how this was possible. Were there not filters in place?
One lunchtime conversation answered that question.
A student I mentored walked into my office, opened a browser, downloaded a simple extension, and bypassed the district firewall in minutes.
That moment shattered the illusion of institutional protection.
Firewalls are easily defeated. VPNs are common. Filters provide comfort for adults, but kids know how to get around them.
And over time, the issue did not stop at what students were watching.
It escalated into what they were sharing and who paid the price.
When Students Become the Content
Some of the most devastating cases involved students sharing intimate images of themselves.
As a principal, we regularly handled situations where students, often girls, shared photos with someone they trusted. When relationships changed or immaturity took over, those images spread.
Again.
And again.
And again.
I watched students collapse under humiliation. Depression followed. School transfers became necessary. Entire social worlds disappeared overnight.
Those images rarely disappeared.
At one point, we discovered older students compiling entire banks of photos organized by grade and class. In the age of disappearing messages and anonymous accounts, accountability became nearly impossible. Screenshots were denied. Responsibility was always deflected.
As privacy protections increased, administrators lost access to student devices without parental consent, further limiting our ability to intervene.
Social Media Made Porn Exposure Worse
Social media became a weapon.
Fake accounts were created to harass, humiliate, and circulate images anonymously. Posts were flagged. Accounts were shut down. New ones appeared the next day.
I watched young people, especially young women, carry lifelong consequences from what began as a single mistake.
One case still haunts me.
A middle school girl had intimate photos shared without her consent. Her world collapsed. Coming from a broken home, she internalized the shame. Within six months, she was couch surfing, using drugs, and being trafficked.
She was fourteen years old.
The Myth: “Just Lock Down the Phone” to Prevent Porn Exposure
Many parents believe that restricting a child’s device solves the problem.
I understand that instinct. I have had it myself.
But the truth is sobering. Monitoring one device does not equal protection.
Students regularly used friends’ phones to create secret accounts, access pornography, or continue harmful online relationships.
In one case, a parent was actively monitoring their child’s technology. When access was restricted, a predator continued grooming their thirteen-year-old daughter through another student’s phone.
The only reason we were able to intervene was because a peer spoke up.
Our kids are often just a few clicks away from spaces designed to exploit curiosity, loneliness, and innocence.
When access is easy, brains are vulnerable, and adults stay silent, the damage compounds. Silence does not have to be the ending.
The Solution: Presence, Delay, and Honest Conversation
After twenty-five years in education, I’ve learned that pretending this problem does not exist guarantees that kids face it alone.
As educators, we carried this quietly, managing crises behind closed doors while still being expected to teach, lead, and protect.
As parents and caregivers, our role is not to create a perfectly sealed digital bubble. That bubble does not exist.
Our role is to stay present by talking early, delaying access when possible, and removing secrecy before it hardens into a habit.
I have long appreciated the phrase “wait before 8th.” Delaying social media is not a punishment. It is protection. Childhood does not need an audience.
I also believe deeply in the idea of a family phone. Technology should be introduced gradually, used openly, and grounded in trust. Screens stay visible. Devices do not live behind closed doors. Headphones do not isolate.
What is healthy does not need to hide.
Why I Am Speaking Now
In 2023, at the height of my career, I was arrested for solicitation of a prostitute.
That moment marked the public collapse of a life that had been quietly unraveling for decades.
The charge did not appear overnight. It was the result of a thirty-year addiction to pornography, an addiction that escalated from secrecy, to fantasy, to behavior.
I lost everything.
My career.
My reputation.
The trust of people I loved.
Through deep accountability, healing, and restoration, I have come to one undeniable conclusion: if we want to break the chains of addiction, we must confront where those chains are first forged.
For years, I dismissed pornography as harmless. A rite of passage. Something boys would outgrow.
That lie cost me dearly.
Pornography is not neutral for developing minds. It distorts how kids understand intimacy, emotion, and connection. It shapes expectations long before kids have the maturity to question what they are seeing.
The patterns I lived out in adulthood began quietly, early, and unchecked.
The Call to Action: Anticipate Porn Exposure
Our kids deserve more than silence.
They deserve adults willing to speak honestly, set boundaries courageously, and engage early before secrecy takes hold.
You do not have to be perfect.
You do not have all the answers.
But you do have to stay present.
Ask questions.
Delay access.
Create space for honesty.
Because when adults stay engaged, secrecy loses its power.
And when secrecy loses its power, so does addiction.
I cannot change my past, but I can devote my future to protecting others from walking the same road.
What I hope comes from sharing this is not shame, but awareness. When adults stay informed, connected, and willing to have hard conversations, silence loses its grip.
And when silence loses its grip, kids gain something far more powerful. Protection, understanding, and a chance to grow up whole.
Book a youth presentation at your school
Research suggests that school staff and administrators see pornography as a serious issue that affects their school’s cultural climate surrounding sexual violence and that education programs on porn help them feel more confident in addressing the issue and preventing sexual harassment.Maas, M. K., Gal, T., Cary, K. M., & Greer, K. (2022). Popular culture and pornography education to improve the efficacy of secondary school staff response to student sexual harassment., 1-23. doi:10.1080/15546128.2022.2076757Copy
Fight the New Drug’s age-appropriate and engaging presentations highlight research from respected academic institutions that demonstrates the significant impacts of porn consumption on individuals, relationships, and society. We take a three-dimensional approach to raising awareness on the harmful effects of pornography in society, so in addition to creating tools and resources for our global supporter base to share, we also love getting face-to-face with people in their schools and cities to provide research-backed information on this important issue.
As a non-legislative and non-religious organization, our goal is to ensure we deliver age-appropriate, key information backed by science and personal accounts to each audience so they are equipped to make informed decisions regarding pornography. All of our tailored presentations, whether it’s a school, community, parent, or conference presentation, will provide attendees with comprehensive, age-relevant information about:
- How porn impacts the brain
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We offer presentations customized for each audience, aligning with our mission as a non-religious and non-legislative organization educating with science, facts, and personal accounts. We can provide engaging, empowering, and educational presentations for these types of audiences:
- Middle School/Junior High
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We empower your students to make educated decisions to better equip them to love themselves, have healthy relationships, and make a positive difference in the world.
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Your Support Matters Now More Than Ever
Most kids today are exposed to porn by the age of 12. By the time they’re teenagers, 75% of boys and 70% of girls have already viewed itRobb, M.B., & Mann, S. (2023). Teens and pornography. San Francisco, CA: Common Sense.Copy —often before they’ve had a single healthy conversation about it.
Even more concerning: over half of boys and nearly 40% of girls believe porn is a realistic depiction of sexMartellozzo, E., Monaghan, A., Adler, J. R., Davidson, J., Leyva, R., & Horvath, M. A. H. (2016). “I wasn’t sure it was normal to watch it”: A quantitative and qualitative examination of the impact of online pornography on the values, attitudes, beliefs and behaviours of children and young people. Middlesex University, NSPCC, & Office of the Children’s Commissioner.Copy . And among teens who have seen porn, more than 79% of teens use it to learn how to have sexRobb, M.B., & Mann, S. (2023). Teens and pornography. San Francisco, CA: Common Sense.Copy . That means millions of young people are getting sex ed from violent, degrading content, which becomes their baseline understanding of intimacy. Out of the most popular porn, 33%-88% of videos contain physical aggression and nonconsensual violence-related themesFritz, N., Malic, V., Paul, B., & Zhou, Y. (2020). A descriptive analysis of the types, targets, and relative frequency of aggression in mainstream pornography. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 49(8), 3041-3053. doi:10.1007/s10508-020-01773-0Copy Bridges et al., 2010, “Aggression and Sexual Behavior in Best-Selling Pornography Videos: A Content Analysis,” Violence Against Women.Copy .
From increasing rates of loneliness, depression, and self-doubt, to distorted views of sex, reduced relationship satisfaction, and riskier sexual behavior among teens, porn is impacting individuals, relationships, and society worldwideFight the New Drug. (2024, May). Get the Facts (Series of web articles). Fight the New Drug.Copy .
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