Director, Commonwealth Policy Center

In a column on his website titled “Bad News, Indeed – Playboy Opened the Floodgates and Now the Culture is Drowning,” Christian theologian and former Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Albert Mohler laments the recent announcement that the adult men's magazine would no longer feature nude photos of women in its monthly issues. To reiterate, let me rephrase: Albert Mohler is sad about Playboy magazine's decision not to feature nude photos of women anymore. Before anyone begins questioning Mohler's sanity, here is the real reason for his sorrow. The magazine's decision to discontinue the photos is because access to pornography is so widespread today that Playboy can't keep up anymore. Or, as Playboy CEO Scott Flanders phrased it, “You’re just one click away from every sex act imaginable for free. And it’s just passé at this juncture.” What this basically means is that what once would have been a great triumph for those wishing to stem the tide of pornography now instead serves as a warning call against what is possibly a greater epidemic than many of us even imagined. Anyone with internet access – and that includes teenagers and children with access to smartphones – can now readily call up the types of images that might even make Hugh Hefner blush with shame. Mohler writes that “Any morally sane person must recognize that as horrifyingly bad news, indeed.” The “morally sane” must now fight harder than ever to stop the scourge of pornography and its damaging effects. The battle may seem lost, but the war is far from over.