President of SCOP discusses WRAP Week, Wi-Fi filter

Every Notre Dame student has asked themselves at least once: What is the best thing I can do for my university? How change the status quo here? The answer for me is simple: Place a filter on the Wi-Fi network at the world’s pre-eminent Catholic University.

Over the years, Students for Child-Oriented Policy (SCOP) has focused on changing the culture at Notre Dame by promoting marriage, family, and integrity. While maintaining these core principles, our club has shifted its focus to a unique opportunity. We are well within the grasp of implementing a porn filter at Notre Dame, which, in turn, would inevitably lead to a massive tide of Catholic universities following suit. This isn’t just about Notre Dame; this is about all American Catholic institutions.

Notre Dame has been the unfortunate recipient of negative publicity, including controversial flip-flopping on contraceptive insurance and the decision to award Joe Biden with the Laetare medal. SCOP believes Notre Dame has an amazing opportunity to change this narrative. By implementing a Wi-Fi filter, Notre Dame will lead the way in addressing the harmful effects of pornography, including its connection to addiction, child sexual abuse, divorce, male fertility problems, and the acceptance, normalization and sexualization of cruelty towards women.

Why do we think a push for a pornography filter is the best thing a student can do with their time? Because our culture desperately needs us to fight this fight, and it is winnable. Let’s face it: On a number of issues, students can complain to the administration but not make much progress. But with a petition of over 1,000 signatures and a team of effective student leaders, SCOP has the ability to make a serious and permanent change to our internet service. We have the ability to help every one of our brothers and sisters at Notre Dame who need that tiny bit of help in order to break out of their addiction. What is more powerful than Notre Dame turning to that student and telling them, “We are with you in your struggle and are here to help”?

Pornography is not an issue that is pleasant to talk about. But we see it as a vital issue for the health and wellbeing of our society and are committed to combating it. Pornography attacks the dignity of the human person, damages relationships, and feeds sexual assault. If we want to overcome these evils, we must confront the poisonous effect of pornography.

WRAP Week

That is why SCOP participates in White Ribbon Against Pornography (WRAP) Week, a national campaign created by the National Center on Sexual Exploitation. We first brought WRAP Week to Notre Dame in 2016 as a way to raise awareness about the harms of pornography, one of our five pillars (the other four are marriage, education, adoption, and the harms of drugs).

This year, WRAP Week events included distributing white ribbons in recognition of our cause, conducting a prayer service, and hosting lectures and small group discussions. The prayer service gave students an opportunity to pray for authentic love. The seminar-style events allowed people to ask discuss with each other and our speakers how pornography impacts our relationships and our culture. We also hope that many people will read the men’s and women’s letters requesting a filter recently published in The Observer to continue the discussion about the impact of pornography on our campus and our culture.

We would like to express our thanks for all the hard work from the members and friends of SCOP. Thank you to our co-sponsors, and those who came to our talks. We hope that through these events and efforts, more people will realize that we all must see how damaging pornography is, and we must take action.

To sign the petition to filter Notre Dame’s Wi-Fi, go to bit.ly/ndpornfilter. SCOP will also be collecting signatures for this petition Friday, October 26 in both SDH and NDH during lunch.

James Martinson is the President of Students for Child-Oriented Policy and can be contacted at jmartins@nd.edu.