Does porn hijack the brain?

For years I read into the neuroscience of porn addiction and overtime I bought into this idea that porn hijacks the brain. I thought my brain had changed so much that now porn had power over me. But, does porn actually hijack the brain? No, obviously not. I played football last night and I am playing again tonight. I love playing football. I've been playing since I was about 7 years old and the more I have played, the better a player I have become. And over time, my love for playing football has grown. But, has football now hijacked my brain? Again, obviously not. No one would even consider this. However, what has happened with porn addiction is that neuroscientists have seen a correlation between watching porn and wanting to watch more porn. This is real. Transcription factors such as Delta-FosB get involved which basically show that neuroplastic changes take place when someone repeatedly watches porn. These neuroplastic changes result in people developing addicted neural pathways. But, really all this means it that they are going to really really want to watch porn because they have formed new connections in their brain. So, yes it is a lot harder to stop watching porn than it would be to stop playing football. But, in either situation, it is important to know there is never some external force that controls us.

Just as we have created paths in our brain, we can change the paths in our brain. If we want freedom, then it is key to give no more power to porn than it deserves. The power is within our own minds, and our ability to change the way we think, not in anything external of us.