Intro (00:05):
Today’s episode is with Paul, a former pornography consumer and current team coordinator for the anti-trafficking organization El Pozo de Vida in Mexico City. Paul explains how his initial exposure to pornography at a young age led to an escalation in consumption during his college years impacting his relationships and mental health. He discusses the role of therapy in his recovery [00:00:30] process and the importance of vulnerability in sharing his story, Paul also highlights the connection between pornography and trafficking, emphasizing the need to address the demand for such content. He describes the work of his organization in Mexico, which focuses on prevention, intervention, and restoration for survivors of trafficking. Paul encourages others not to give up and to remember that there’s always hope. With that, let’s jump into the conversation. We hope you enjoy [00:01:00] this episode of Consider Before Consuming.

Fight The New Drug (01:08):
Paul, thank you so much for being here with us today. We’re so excited to get to speak with you. For any of our followers who haven’t seen, we have a video of your story from a couple of years ago that’s so compelling, so we’d encourage anyone to go watch that. We’ll link it in the show notes. But for anyone who hasn’t seen that, can you introduce yourself to us, Paul?

Paul (01:26):
Of course. My name is Paul and I [00:01:30] am a business economics graduate from UCI in California. And I currently work in Mexico City with an anti-trafficking organization and I have a huge interest in film and telling stories. And so yeah, that’s a little bit about myself.

Fight The New Drug (01:48):
Can you tell us a little bit about your decision to move to Mexico?

Paul (01:52):
Of course. So the decision, the story is kind of long, but I’ll synthesize it. I first came to Mexico City in 2015 [00:02:00] as part of a group of college students and we were just coming for spring break to kind of see, we had some connections in the community that had actually come to start this organization in Mexico City that was doing anti-trafficking work. And I had never heard of anti-trafficking or really human trafficking at that point. And so when I came here, there were only a few projects at that time. There was a safe house for underaged human trafficking survivors [00:02:30] as well as a salon in the red light district. And I was really, really impacted by what I saw. However, at that time I was also struggling a lot with pornography. And so it felt like while I was really excited about what they were doing, it also felt like I was partially responsible.

(02:51):
And so I kind of just started donating to the organization and then just kind of forgot about it. And that was the first I came back [00:03:00] in 2019, I finally returned and did a two week trip where I taught some intro to business principles classes and spent more time with girls at the Safe House. And then it started this pattern of where I would start returning every couple years. So during the pandemic in 2021, I visited again for three weeks. And so my joke is that every time I came, it just exponentially grew in terms of time that I was staying. And then I finally decided in 2022 [00:03:30] that I wanted to shoot a documentary about what was happening in Mexico City and the work that this organization was doing. And so I asked for time off from work and I decided to go for the month of June, return to the US for two weeks, the first two weeks of July to do some end of quarter two accounting things.

(03:52):
And then returned back for two months. So from July until September, and when I arrived [00:04:00] in June, a few days after I arrived, I actually contracted Covid and I got really sick and I’m like death store steps. And so I was just quarantined in my host family’s house and I had my Nintendo switch and my thoughts. And so I would play my switch until the battery died and charge it. And I remember thinking that I would rather be sick in Mexico City helping with and working alongside this organization [00:04:30] than I would be super healthy and well off in California. So that’s kind of a little bit of how I got there. So then when I went back for those two weeks, I also turned in my two weeks and then the rest is history.

Fight The New Drug (04:44):
Amazing. That’s amazing. And so obviously a lot of things have happened in your life that have kind of led you to this work. Can we start at the beginning and can you tell us how did you first access pornography?

Paul (04:59):
Of course. Of course. [00:05:00] So I was 13 and my family right after the economic crisis in 2006, 2007, we relocated from Los Angeles to San Diego. And while we were there, my dad was starting his new job and they put us in temporary housing and we were looking for a place to stay. And one of these places while they were kind of scouting it out and talking with who they thought the landlord, I was being a standard teenager, snooping around [00:05:30] in the rooms trying to figure out which one was the one I wanted. And I stumbled into and the house was completely empty except for there was this closet. And I walked into the closet and I saw this stack of magazines on the side and they were covered up with these data sheets. It’s kind of hard to explain, but there’s all this analytic data sheets and they were covering magazines, and so you couldn’t see what the was unless you opened it.

(05:59):
Of course, me being myself [00:06:00] and being curious, I opened one of those magazines and it was pornography at that age. That was the first time that I had seen somebody naked. And so for me, I was both disgusted but also very intrigued. And so I remember I took one of these magazines and I took it with us to the place where we were staying and I was looking at it and then I felt guilty, and so I threw it away, but this was the entry [00:06:30] point. And from there, 2007 was also either 2007 or 2008 was when the iPhone was introduced. And so that completely changed everything in the world as we know it. We could go on for days about a list of all the things that the phone has replaced, and that was also when internet pornography started rising and started growing. And so just as that was happening, [00:07:00] ice was starting high school and I had a separate room in the house downstairs. And so I would use this laptop that we had we were supposed to use for school, but then I would, my curiosity killed the cat and I would just be searching for things. And that’s basically the story of how I first accessed pornography. And then the magazines kind of led me unconsciously into the world of internet pornography and that was kind of [00:07:30] the gateway drug for me. Yeah.

Fight The New Drug (07:32):
Was there a particular point where your porn consumption really escalated?

Paul (07:36):
Absolutely. After high school, I went to college at the University of California in Irvine with the conversation with my parents, decided to pursue electrical engineering even though I did really poorly on my math and physics exams, like the AP courses, and I really think [00:08:00] I wanted to study something film related, but engineering seemed like a better bet. And so I was giving it my all. I had been homeschooled up until high school. And so when I went to high school, it was actually pretty easy for me. I think that may have actually hamstrung me or kind of shot me in the foot. So when I got to college, it was a whole new ball game. I had not seen most of the things I was learning before, so I didn’t have that competitive edge I had before. And so I was giving it the best that I [00:08:30] knew how and I was still not performing at the level that I needed to.

(08:37):
And so I started leaning hard. You don’t have parents, no one’s there to be checking on you, are you doing your work? Are you coping in healthy ways? And so I remember my sophomore year of college, I started consuming heavily because at the same time as my grades were plummeting, my porn consumption was rising. And ironically, [00:09:00] if I had probably just coped in a healthier way and stuck with engineering, I think I probably could have survived. But my answer to coping with all the stress and uncertainty was watching hours of pornography every day. So that just tanked me. I was on academic probation for two months and then I remember getting called into the counselor’s office and they said, you have to change majors or we’re going to kick you out of the [00:09:30] school, and if you want to change into this major that you’re thinking about, we can’t offer the prereq classes that you need here because they’re all impacted. They’re all full, so you have to figure it out during the summer and you have to take these two classes, otherwise we’re kicking you out. And it was a super rude awakening and And that was probably the worst it’s ever been.

(09:51):
There’s a story where I was basically, I came back home from class during the summer at 3:00 PM and I started consuming, [00:10:00] and I didn’t stop consuming until six in the morning and I saw the sun coming up and I was so tired and I felt terrible, but that was my reality at that time.

Fight The New Drug (10:12):
Thank you for sharing that. In what ways, other than just taking your time, in what ways did you notice it impacting your life?

Paul (10:21):
So one thing I’ve always kind of prided myself in is that I think partially because of how I was homeschooled, [00:10:30] I have this really good ability to talk with people. And even though I may not be the most comfortable in social situations, I can find a way to make connections and get people to talk about themselves and read body language. And I’ll oftentimes start telling a story or a joke and then switch topics completely because I’m reading that this person is not interested. For me, relationships and being accepted are something that’s super huge for me. [00:11:00] I noticed over years, I started consuming when I was 13, by the time I was in college at the time of that story, I was probably 20.

(11:11):
By the time I had graduated college, I was still consuming. And I was noticing that my ability to read nonverbal cues was starting to really, really become apparent. On top of that, platonic friendships with girls. I have [00:11:30] two sisters as well as four cousins who are all girls. So I’ve always found it easier to talk with women than it is with men. I find there to be less, I dunno, it is just generally easier to connect. And so for me, I was starting to realize that I would start to have all these intrusive thoughts when I was talking with my female, like, oh, was that glance like a signal? Was that a message? [00:12:00] And I started, I don’t think I realized until a little bit later, but I was basically consuming so much pornography that the themes and the shots and the looks that people would give in pornography, I was starting to overlay that onto my normal life.

(12:18):
So I was starting to realize that that was really happening. I also noticed that my ability to have self-control was decreasing. [00:12:30] So whereas in the past if I consumed or something close my computer and then stop and then go and do something else, my ability to stop was also decreasing. It could turn, one session could turn into this hour long debacle, and I started noticing that I was more depressed, I was more anxious. There was a lot more, I don’t know if existentialism is the right [00:13:00] word, but my mental health was severely decreasing. And that’s just to kind of name a few things. I think if you took a snapshot of me then and you took a snapshot of me, now, my brain would be completely fried in that specific snapshot of time. So it impacted I think every area of my life, especially interally.

Fight The New Drug (13:30):
[00:13:30] Yeah. And you had been seeing a therapist. Is there a certain point that you started addressing pornography and therapy, and how did addressing that impact the other things you were working through as well?

Paul (13:42):
So in 2018, I started seeing a therapist. My dad had actually been the one who recommended it to me. He had gotten laid off from a job, and as part of his severance package, they gave him therapy sessions. And when he went, [00:14:00] he felt that it was so beneficial, and he was like, you guys have to start going. And I was very resistant at first, but then I started noticing that I was in a relationship at this time, and I realized that I was projecting a lot of my insecurities based upon a past relationship in which I had done a lot of shady things onto her, even though this was a completely new relationship. So for me, I was like, I need to start going to therapy. So when I started going, [00:14:30] they have a little questionnaire you fill out and they ask you, what are three things that you want to work on?

(14:36):
And so I was talking about help with making difficult decisions in life and finding purpose for what I want to do with my life, and also pornography. I have this bad habit of viewing pornography and don’t want to have this problem anymore. And it was very interesting how she didn’t start with pornography. So a lot [00:15:00] of it was just talking about coping mechanisms and talking about life-giving activities and how can you incorporate things into your life that energize you and that make you happy so that when you’re done doing those activities, you net positive. And then from there, then we got into more heavy duty concepts. We talked about grounding exercises, we talked about breathing, and then we started doing maybe some EMDR therapy and then [00:15:30] visiting childhood hurts. And it was insane how this combination of all these different things started to help me rewire my brain.

(15:44):
I’m reading this book called Atomic Habits right now, but it’s ironic because a lot of the things that they talk about in this book, it’s by, I think James Clear is his name, were things that I was unconsciously doing during this time with therapy. Whereas if there’s a bad habit you have [00:16:00] and you don’t want to do it anymore, you need to make it difficult to do or invisible. And if there is a habit that’s good that you want to do, you need to make it very easy for you to do very accessible. And I think that played a huge part. And so when we’re talking about how these other things I was working through impacted my relationship with pornography, it was all positive, but not in the way that I thought it would be. It wasn’t just like, oh, I’ve had [00:16:30] a eureka moment and now I’m not going to watch porn anymore.

(16:33):
It was this very laborious process because for me, it was like if you think about your mind, and it’s like there’s a flow chart of decisions you can make. For me, at that point when I wasn’t healthy, every road led to pornography. It was like, how am I feeling? I’m anxious, okay, boring. How am I feeling? I’m depressed, pornography, I feel lonely. I’m bored. I’m hungry. I just woke up and [00:17:00] my habit is to look at my phone. So it was just like I had to go through all these different things, but it was so incredibly helpful because then the roads that were leading to pornography were getting rewired. So it was like, oh, am anxious. Okay, I’m going to do some breathing and maybe I’m going to go play basketball. I’m lonely. Okay, I’m going to call one of my friends, or I’m going to initiate hanging out with somebody. Right now [00:17:30] I feel uncertain about the future. Maybe I need to create something. Maybe I should write about how I’m feeling. And so in a nutshell, that’s kind of what therapy helped me with.

Fight The New Drug (17:44):
We often talk about how research shows that people who consume porn frequently are more likely to objectify other people. And you kind of talked about this briefly in mentioning how your interactions with your female friends changed, but was there [00:18:00] a time that you realized that was something you’d been doing?

Paul (18:04):
Yeah, absolutely. So I think at a subconscious level, when I was at my least healthy, I knew that I was objectifying people. I would be driving down the street in Orange County in California, and then I would have these really intrusive thoughts. As I’m driving, I see someone running, and then I’m just thinking, oh, I wonder what this person is like. But I don’t think it really clicked and hit [00:18:30] home for me until, so I was working and helping to grand open these restaurants, and as I was, it was like this popular chain of restaurants. And we would go to this program in order to learn how to be these certified people who could train at these grand openings of restaurants. And I was at one of these grand openings of these restaurants, and there was this guy [00:19:00] there who was really kind of strange, and I’ll elaborate, but basically, even though we’re in a very closed environment and we’re all in the back of the house and we’re assembling all these food items, there’s still a lot of space even though we’re just jam packed in there, like sardines, there’s us, there’s the trainees and everybody.

(19:23):
You’re not really rubbing shoulders with people and just in a sardine can. But this guy would always try and force [00:19:30] contact with me in the store. And I was only there for a week, but the previous week, actually, sorry, I was there for two weeks. He was only there for the second week. But in the time leading up to that second week where he was there, I was talking a lot with certain of the other female trainers, and I was asking them for advice because it’s how I am about how to manage certain things in my own store and how to deal with interpersonal relations and dealing with conflict. And this guy [00:20:00] rumors spread. And even though I had told people I had a girlfriend, she was on my screensaver and everything, there was this rumor that spread and people were like, oh, Paul is interested in other guys.

(20:19):
And so this guy apparently heard that rumor. And so he started forcing contact with me in really uncomfortable ways where he’d bump into me and always make eye contact with me, and [00:20:30] I would always glare at him and not encourage it. But then one day, as I was taking out the trash, you have to go through this very small corridor to go out, throw out the trash and come back in. And the way that the store was structured when you reenter, nobody can see that, that little passageway. And he started coming down the opposite side. And then when he came down the opposite side, he came up to me and then he groped me. And so I was super [00:21:00] shocked. I didn’t know what to do, so I threw his hands off me and I was like, get your hands off me. And he was like, whoa, sorry. I got the wrong idea. But the thing that creeped me out the most was this look that he gave me while he assaulted me. And the entire rest of the trip, I was just really kind of confused and I didn’t know what to do with it. I was like, do I report it? But this specific chain was, I was in a minority group in terms of the [00:21:30] ethnic representation. And so for me, I was like, no one will believe me.

(21:36):
It just doesn’t make any sense. Why would I say anything? And I actually ended up going home, and I only told a handful of people. I told my sister, everybody was very encouraging and very, that was not okay, but I didn’t talk about it in therapy until several years later. And when I did, as I was talking to my therapist, I said, I think the thing that really, [00:22:00] there was so many things wrong and uncomfortable about that, but I think the thing that weirded me out the most was that when he looked at me, I recognized that look, because that’s the same look that I have when I’m viewing pornography. Because when he looked at me, he wasn’t looking into my soul or seeing me as who I was. He was looking at me, I was a piece of meat. I was an object to be used to be consumed. And that freaked me out, but I realized [00:22:30] that is exactly how I view pornography. And so yeah, that was the time that I realized, and I think that was a really loud wake up call for me because I was like, not to demonize the guy, he’s human, but for me, I was like, I never want to be so hooked on to this drug that I can’t see people as human and that I just want to [00:23:00] exact what I want from them.

Fight The New Drug (23:02):
Yeah. I’m so sorry that happened to you, and thank you for sharing that with us. And I think it’s really powerful that you were able to also gain that insight through therapy and processing that and kind of acknowledge how your own consumption was affecting you as well, kind of leading out of that struggle and into recovery that you are experiencing now. When did you start sharing about your struggles [00:23:30] with pornography, and what was that experience like for you?

Paul (23:33):
To be honest, I was always hoping that my problem would magically go away and that I could tell people about it in hindsight and be like, yeah, you used to be, and I’m not. And so I could be this hero to people, but that did not happen because there was a lot of healing that had to happen, and a lot of that had to come from transparency. And so [00:24:00] I’ve been part of communities that are very legalistic and that it just becomes very moral, and that has never worked out for me. And so for a long time in my life, I just wore two masks. I was one person to a certain group of people and one person by myself. And I think I started sharing about my struggles in 2019, I think is when it’s either 20. Yeah, it’s definitely 2019, [00:24:30] sorry. In 2019, I started writing.

(24:33):
So I had started writing many, many years ago, but I blog. And so I started writing, but I started writing about pornography and I stopped being vague. I started sharing personal experience that I had, and it was incredibly embarrassing for me because people think you’re a certain person and then you live with this lie in your head that if people knew who I was, this is a theme that I think has [00:25:00] been repeated on the podcast many times. People knew who I was, people knew what I was doing, they would shun me, they would hate me. And it was this really strange thing where I started writing Instagram, little story things about my experiences, and then I started writing blog posts about it, staring about my experience. And the ironic thing was it felt like I was putting the carriage in front of a horse because I wasn’t done yet.

(25:28):
I wasn’t completely healed [00:25:30] and all good, but I started talking about it. And I think that really changed my own recovery journey. I think so many of us wish that we could just recover magically without having to say anything. And I’m not saying that you need to, but for me personally, I think it was a huge part in my recovery because then what happened was a strange thing where all of a sudden I was getting these random responses to these stories from people who I hardly [00:26:00] knew anymore. That’s how social media works. It’s like, I haven’t talked to this person in person for 10 years, but we’re friends. And they’re like, Hey, thanks for sharing that. I struggle with that too, and it means a lot to me that you would talk about it. And I was like, wow, this is not to elevate myself either, because for me, I was just terrified of even talking about it.

(26:25):
But I think there was a moment where I realized I’m already [00:26:30] waist deep into this. I might as well just jump into the water and just start really talking about it. And around the same time, I think before I started writing and sharing about it, I did find my some random chance considered before consuming on my Spotify. It was recommended to me. And I don’t know how, there’s so many podcasts. I don’t know how it showed up, but it showed up and I was like, what is this? It’s about drugs or something. And they’re like, we are [00:27:00] a podcast that talks educating about the harmful effects of pornography. And I was like, what? And so I started listening to the podcast and it really encouraged me. I was hearing all these people, academics, celebrities, people talk about this in a very non shame based way.

(27:17):
And so this combined with therapy, I was like, you know what? I’m going to start talking about this because if me talking about it allows certain people to not feel alone or by themselves or isolated, then [00:27:30] that’s worth it. What I’ve done has already been done, and I have to be at peace with the choices I’ve made. And so why should I just let all this struggle and sadness and anxiety and everything I struggled through for so many years go to waste? If this can help somebody, if this can encourage someone, then if just one person knows they’re not alone, that’s worth it to me. And it’s ironic too because as I started to share, [00:28:00] the recovery process exponentially increased. And I’m going to explain why I think that is. And I think it’s because when we’re with our friends, when we’re on social media, we have this perception of who we are.

(28:13):
And when our friends are like, oh, I like hanging out with you, you’re cool. We feel a certain way. But at three in the morning when no one’s awake, and it’s just us and we’re with our thoughts, there’s all this space for these negative thoughts to enter our head. And one of those is if people [00:28:30] knew who you were, they wouldn’t want to be friends with you and you would be alone. And the crazy thing is that as you share, as you’re vulnerable, I heard it said that vulnerability is handing somebody a knife and turning around. They have the opportunity to stab you in the back, but you’re trusting that they won’t. And I think for me, what I really learned is that as I was being vulnerable, I no longer had those thoughts at three in the morning [00:29:00] about who, if people knew who I was, they wouldn’t be friends with me.

(29:03):
Because guess what? My close circle knew. And after the blog, everybody knew who’s reading the blog. And after I was posting Instagram stories, everyone who followed me on Instagram knew, right? So it was like, yeah, this was the deepest, darkest secret I held for so many years. But now people know so negative, what can people, and so I think, yeah, so many of us are waiting for the panacea to fix our problems, and we’ll never have to say anything [00:29:30] about, we can just talk about it in hindsight. But I think a huge part of recovery is actually about talking about it in the present.

Fight The New Drug (29:40):
That’s so said, and I just want to recommend you on sharing so vulnerably, I mean, even here with us today, I think hopefully anyone who’s listening to this will experience something similar to what you experienced when you first started listening to the podcast as well. There’s so much power and the ability to break down the stigma often associated [00:30:00] with this topic and break down the shame really does open a lot of space for healing, and that has led you into the life you’re in now. Tell us a little bit about the work that you’re doing in Mexico.

Paul (30:12):
So I work with an organization called El Pozo de Vida, which means the well of life. They’re about 13 and a half years old right now. They started as just one safe house for underaged human trafficking survivors in Mexico City. And from that [00:30:30] time, they’ve grown into nine different projects. We work in the areas of prevention, intervention and restoration, or reintegration of our beneficiaries into the world. And our prevention projects are awesome. You guys are doing amazing prevention work as well. I love the work that Python, the new drug does, but we work with [00:31:00] children who are going to schools. So we believe education is key, much like you guys do. We have a campaign that’s going to launch next year about digital violence because we’re not really adapting as a society as well to the dangers of the digital world as we could be. But this project goes into the schools and educates students and parents.

(31:22):
And the goal is to kind of turn kids into activists about common modalities that lead into human trafficking [00:31:30] because we believe that the more people we’re educated, the less people going to get tricked. We also have a project that goes to migration centers. We’ve noticed that people who are migrating are also especially vulnerable to being victims of victims of trafficking. We have another project that specifically works with children who are in a situation of begging, which is a huge issue in Mexico City. And then our fourth and final prevention project is actually a prevention project with men. And so this is going to [00:32:00] sound really crazy, but we literally go into red light zones and we camp out by the door of a brothel, and then we talk with the consumers that are there. So we set up a little mobile coffee cart, and we talk to them about misconceptions about women who are working in a situation of prostitution or people who are being trafficked.

(32:22):
It’s an incredible project because there are so many misconceptions about human trafficking. Another thing that we also deal with in [00:32:30] Mexico is machismo or in English toxic masculinity, which is also a problem in the United States and worldwide. So there’s a lot of misconceptions about, oh, they must really love sex a lot, or they must make a lot of money, or all these things. And so our job is just to, we also go into the schools and educate about toxic masculinity and healthy masculinity, but specifically in these conversations with these consumers or potential consumers, we ask a lot of questions and have a lot of [00:33:00] uncomfortable conversations. So one of our questions is, we’ll ask these potential Johns like, oh, if it was up to you, how many sexual encounters would you want to have in a day? And they puff up their chest and they’re like, oh yeah, I’d love to have, I think three would be good.

(33:19):
I’d be super macho. And then we’re like, okay, what if I told you that some of these women, they have to have 35 every [00:33:30] day? What would you say to that? And they’re like, we ask them, could you do that? And they’re like, oh, no, absolutely not. There’s no way. And then, oh, they must make a lot of money. And then we break down the economics of, and then we talk about, did you know that there’s this misconception that Johns are helping some of these women? And we’re like, did you know that most of, or a lot of the women that we’ve seen in the time that we’ve worked there, that we’ve talked with, they have actually [00:34:00] been trafficked at some point or are currently being trafficked. They are being held there against their will. What would you say? You’d be like, no, no, that can’t be.

(34:08):
And so it is one of my, I love all the projects, but I find this project to be super important and very in line with also just I believe the prevention work that we really have to do because having these uncomfortable conversations and addressing these misconceptions is key to addressing the demand. We have. My shirt [00:34:30] right here says, stop the demand. It’s an old Python drug shirt. And I think if we don’t address the demand you guys are doing, we’ll always be many steps behind where we need to be. And especially with the increase of the internet and everything, we really have to really address that. We have a few intervention projects. One is a community center in the Red Light District, and then we also have this project called the Block Party, which goes into red light zones and kind of interrupts the commercial [00:35:00] sex trade for a night.

(35:01):
Once every month we have a party for the women and just, it’s pretty awesome, pretty neat. And then our restoration projects, we have a safe house, like I was talking about for the underage human trafficking survivors. The goal there is to double as a rehabilitation arm. So they receive full medical, psychological care, emotional care. It is just trying to get them off of whatever drugs that they might be on and to help [00:35:30] them become healthy again. But it also works as a witness protection arm. And so the government does these raids when they hear about underage human trafficking, and they disperse them between these 12 different safe houses in Mexico City. And ours happens to be one of ’em. And so that’s really awesome. And then we have a transition house for girls who age out of the safe house, and this is for them to have resources to go to school to pursue higher trade school [00:36:00] or start working.

(36:03):
And the whole goal is to equip them so that they’re able to reintegrate into society. And we also have our final restoration project, which is called Uni Yu, which means freedom in the original MasTec, which is the language, the indigenous language here. And these are women that have come from the community center and who have basically told us, we don’t want to be working here anymore. Can you help us? And many [00:36:30] years ago, we decided to start this jewelry project. And so they make jewelry, they receive a fair wage, they play a part in the production, the marketing, the design. We just actually recently launched our 2023 line, so it was awesome. But yeah, that’s a little bit about what the work that we do here in Mexico. My actual job is I host teams that come and visit from the United States and abroad. So my job is to have conversations like the one we’re having right now [00:37:00] as part of my daily job, and then I get to show people Mexico City, but also the work that we’re doing and how they can take what they learn here and apply it to their own social context.

Fight The New Drug (37:10):
Amazing work. It’s so important to have such thorough aftercare built in place when you’re doing this work with survivors. So we commend you on your work. How has spending time with these girls in safe houses and in doing this work you’re doing helped you understand the connections between pornography and trafficking?

Paul (37:29):
What I’ve realized [00:37:30] is that pornography at the heart of it, it teaches us, it grooms us to objectify people. And so instead of seeing people as human beings and people who we shared respect and who have dreams and aspirations of their own, who have their own desires and their own likes and dislikes, we start to see everyone as a potential object that we can act upon just on a daily basis. And so instead [00:38:00] of seeing people as they’re walking down the street and wondering, oh, I wonder what this person’s story is, I wonder where they work and what they’re doing. We’re just, at least for me personally, I was just walking by internally rating people and wondering if this fantasy in my head played out how it would go with this person. And in the safe house, a huge deal here in Mexico is this concept of this quinceanera, which is celebrating your [00:38:30] 15th birthday, and it’s like this coming of age ceremony, and it’s this huge big deal.

(38:34):
It can be as and as lavish as weddings, and it’s like this huge party. And a lot of these girls, they range at the safe house between the ages of 11 and 17. And I did not remember how young 11 was until I got here, but 11 is, I don’t even know what to say. It is just so young. And [00:39:00] so a lot of these girls, they never got to celebrate. Some of the older ones were being trafficked at that time, so they didn’t even get to celebrate. And so one of the things that we do here is we’ll have these late or sometimes on time quinceaneras, and it’s like we’re all at the safe house. We have a party, they have the whole dress, we do a whole thing. The girls do a choreography, we do gifts, we do food. It is just like a whole [00:39:30] thing.

(39:31):
And I remember I’ve gone to several of these now, and as I’ve been going through therapy, I’ve been trying to recover my ability to cry because I lost that sometime in my trauma. And I remember one time I was there, the quinceanera, and I was just, my eyes were filling with water. And because I was looking at all these girls and I was like, these girls are doing what girls their age are supposed to be doing. They’re [00:40:00] celebrating, they’re playing, they’re thinking about being a kid and what they want to be when they grow up. And I remember just feeling so sad and kind of frustrated, kind of angry maybe, or maybe internally reflecting. And I was like, how could anyone or myself at any point have viewed these girls as anything but girls to do this? Just to be having fun and [00:40:30] celebrating life?

(40:32):
And I think that for me has this huge, huge, just a wake up to wow because to the dangers of pornography, because if you’re consuming hours per year or, I don’t know, it just depends, right? You start to internalize some of these things that you are seeing. An example I love to use is during the pandemic [00:41:00] Call of Duty, which is this game, they released this battle royale concept. And in this concept, you’re going around, you’re trying to be the last team standing, but if you use a sniper rifle, other people can see you because there’s a little glint that you’ll notice. And I was driving one day, so I’d been playing hours with my friends because it was the pandemic. And one day I was driving and I looked at this bridge, this overpass, and I saw a glint, [00:41:30] and I was driving at 60 miles per, but I twitched a little bit, almost twitched the car or the steering wheel.

(41:40):
And I remember thinking to myself, it’s just, this is real life. This is not a game. I’m not playing. But I remember this instance. Help me to, I kind of portray in my mind what I feel like pornography does to our brains because we start to see all these themes. [00:42:00] No means yes, everybody who’s looking at you is aroused or whatever. Everybody, everybody is a potential. And we start to overlay that upon our lives. And I think something that spending time with the girls at the Safe house and then also at the block parties will interact with women who are there, who are working. And as I interact with them and as I’m serving them food and inviting them [00:42:30] to come, and as we’re doing the raffle and as we’re singing Happy Birthday to them, a lot of these women, they’ve never had anybody sing Happy Birthday. It’s like this whole mind shift of, wow, this is what it’s like to look at people as people and not as objects. So yeah, I think there’s a huge connection between pornography and trafficking. And it’s not to bring any shame, and it’s not to make anyone feel guilty. And it’s not to say [00:43:00] like, oh, you watch pornography, then you’re going to be a part of trafficking. That’s not what I’m saying at all. But I think there is a lot more correlation than we would like to hope that there is.

Fight The New Drug (43:11):
Speaking to the message on your shirt, stop the demand, what does it look like to change the culture in a way that could decrease trafficking?

Paul (43:19):
I think that collectively we have to increase our bravery to have uncomfortable conversations. [00:43:30] I think for most of my life, the biggest mistakes I’ve made have been me not wanting to have an uncomfortable conversation, and then therefore, I dunno, just doing something that is against my values is what have you. And when we’re talking about our culture and society as a whole, there’s a lot of things that we accept as normal because we’ve seen it in the movies. It’s just a common [00:44:00] occurrence. We don’t really question some problematic thought processes that we have, whether it’s about people. We could talk about toxic masculinity, we could talk about mental health. We could talk about, just to dive in really quickly, very surface of toxic masculinity and mental health. I mean, for the longest time in my life, I thought seeking help seeking therapy [00:44:30] is what someone as a last resort.

(44:33):
And so I would have times when I was super anxious, my boss was being a jerk, and my relationship was crumbling and everything. I was in crisis, and I was like, I could use therapy. I don’t know. I’ve never been, but I think I could. And then a day would pass, and then some certain things would kind of resolve as things do in life. And I would think, oh, then obviously I don’t need therapy anymore. I’m good. And that’s a very toxically masculine. [00:45:00] It’s not just toxically masculine as a society, I think we kind of put this stigma on mental health and seeking help, but I believe that if we were more willing to be vulnerable and to realize that I had a friend say that going to therapy is getting a PhD, but in yourself, a master’s degree in yourself. And so I think that’s really key.

(45:28):
And so we have to question [00:45:30] a lot of these things that we’ve been taught and what we believe. And one of my favorite artists, I think puts it really well. His name is Andy Mineo. He has a song called Nobody’s Coming. And in his song, he talks about how he’s been waiting. I’m going to paraphrase and hopefully not butcher it, but he says he’s been waiting for someone to come and save the day for someone to be brave enough to make a change. And there’s this [00:46:00] line where he is like, maybe if nothing changes before I’m gone, then I’ll have nobody else to blame it on except himself. And he is like, maybe I am the answer to the prayers that I’ve been praying and take that as you will. But I think it’s a great illustration of how so many of us are waiting. We look at our society specifically when we’re talking about human trafficking, and we’re like, well, someone will come and fix [00:46:30] that. Someone will come and address that. Maybe we just have to wait for a critical mass. But if we don’t do anything, I think a lot of times the ball is in each of our own personal courts. We have to be part of the solution. If we’re not part of the solution, then we can’t really complain when nothing changes because we all have the power to make a difference in that. And so I think just those uncomfortable conversations and really digging into some of [00:47:00] those very deep beliefs that we have is a great start to, and being vulnerable,

Fight The New Drug (47:07):
We all can do something about this. And I think, I hope everyone listening hears your words and feels encouraged to start small. Even just having one conversation, educating yourself and having one conversation with a friend, a family member, and just seeing what can happen. Is there anything else we haven’t talked about yet that you would like to share with us? Paul,

Paul (47:28):
It’s been said many times on [00:47:30] the podcast already, but you’re not alone and you are not a bad person because you’re struggling with this, and our recovery is nonlinear. I’m literally just repeating the main themes of considering consuming, but your recovery is nonlinear, and you’re not defined by your behavior. Yeah, just don’t [00:48:00] give up. I think a lot of times we think we would love for that magical pill to happen where we could talk about things in hindsight and be these experts who don’t have to talk about how we’re dealing with it now. But I think that if you’re brave enough, there’s a lot of healing that can happen by talking about it now. And you never know who you might accidentally encourage because of your willingness to be vulnerable. And yeah, just be encouraged. Don’t give up. [00:48:30] And there’s always hope. There’s always, always hope. And the people who love and care about you, they love and care about you for who you are and who you are is not what you, so just don’t give up and keep fighting.

Fight The New Drug (48:49):
That is so beautifully said, Paul. Thank you so much for making some time for us today and for sharing your story so vulnerably to help others, but also for the amazing work that you’re [00:49:00] doing in Mexico City. And keep in touch, we’d love to hear more about what you’re doing.

Paul (49:05):
Of course. Thank you so much for the time. It’s been an honor.

Outro (49:12):
Thanks for joining us on this episode of Consider Before Consuming. Consider Before Consuming is brought to you by Fight the New Drug. Fight The New Drug is a non-religious and a non-legislative organization that exists to provide individuals the opportunity to make an informed decision regarding pornography [00:49:30] by raising awareness on its harmful effects, using only science, facts and personal accounts. Check out the episode notes for resources mentioned in this episode. If you find this podcast helpful, please consider subscribing and leaving a review. Consider Before Consuming is made possible by listeners like you. If you’d like to support consider before Consuming, you can make a one-time or recurring donation of any amount at ftnd.org/support. [00:50:00] That’s F-T-N-D.O-R-G/SUPPORT. Thanks again for listening. We invite you to increase your self-awareness, look both ways, check your blind spots and consider before consuming.

Promos (50:19):
Did you know studies show that most young people today have been exposed to porn by age 13? As porn becomes increasingly normalized, education on its well-documented [00:50:30] harms becomes increasingly important. Fight the new drugs age appropriate and engaging live presentation program highlights research from respected academic institutions that demonstrate the significant impacts pornography can have on individuals, relationships, and society. Since 2011, fight the New Drug has delivered over 1800 live presentations to over 1 million individuals worldwide. In order to help them make an informed decision regarding [00:51:00] pornography, change the conversation about pornography by bringing Fight the New Drug to your next school, company, or community event. For more information, visit ftd.org/live. That’s F-T-N-D.O-R-G/LIVE. Looking for a way to spread awareness on the harms of porn. Why not rep the movement in one of our conversations starting tees. [00:51:30] With over 20 tees and various designs and phrases, you’re bound to find something that speaks to you and will spark conversations with others. Plus, because we’re a 501C3 nonprofit, there are no taxes on your purchase and 100% of the proceed from your purchase help to mobilize this movement, get your gear today at ftd.org/shop. That’s F-T-N-D.O-R-G/SHOP.