A family and sex therapist is arguing that increased access to technology has produced side effects, such as addiction to pornography, which has contributed to Jamaica’s falling birth rates and relationship failures.

As such, he is urging the Church to “preach against” the damage and provide “better alternatives”, even as he acknowledges that there are positives in the increased access to technology.

“There is empirical data that suggests that sexual performance, especially in men, they’re prone to have erectile dysfunction because if they’re accustomed to viewing porn, they are aroused by what they see and it gives them an intense excitation, and they’re accustomed to reaching an orgasm through masturbation or whatever,” Dr Sidney McGill argued during a recent virtual forum titled ‘The Evolution of Parenting and Family Structure in Jamaica’ put on by the Jamaica Council of Churches.

“When it comes to having healthy sexual intercourse, having a body in front of them that they’re engaging with they find that it does not excite them as much, and so they have to work much harder to get an erection,” McGill said.

He said that indulgence has led to a disconnect, where individuals are no longer able to appreciate healthy intimate connection with their partners.

“The thing with porn is that it focuses on the genitals and you don’t watch the same porn twice, and so you constantly change again, like we say fast food keeps on changing, and so when it comes to having sex with your partner, which requires focus, longer focus, and it’s just one body that you’re looking at, they lack the discipline,” McGill stated.

“So we really have to look into that and see how we can, as a Church, preach against it, but not just only preach against the damage that it causes, but also [offer] better alternatives; and better alternatives for me have to do with how to relate face to face with the opposite sex in a healthy, holistic way,” he told the forum.

“It doesn’t have to be sex-based; in other words, that you know the goal to have sex with this person, but just normal, clean, healthy relationships… the Church has its work [cut out for it],” McGill declared.

According to the sex therapist, the levels of addiction fed by screens has resulted in less intimacy between partners.

“I’m thinking that there is a decline because of the influence of pornography and it’s accessibility. I think because so much of the extramarital sexual activity begins on the screen, so much of it happens there… I think in families or committed relationships there is a bit less sex, especially for those 45 and up,” McGill stated while pointing out that his observations were anecdotal.

“The young ones, the testosterone tends to rule them, but I think the fertility is more of a bio-psychosocial issue,” he said.

Additionally, McGill argued that technology has disrupted relationships at other levels which are also detrimental to procreation.

“Technology is changing dating and relationship dynamics, online dating apps such as Facebook dating, Tinder, Badoo have influenced how Jamaicans meet partners, leading to more cross-cultural relationships and blended families. When it comes to dating, the social media impact, couples face new challenges such as mistrust due to online interactions [and] exposure to infidelity. Oh, that is a big one, that is how I make my money, because one partner goes onto the other partner’s phone and unearths all sorts of infidelity and it becomes a big hullabaloo and it needs to be resolved,” McGill asserted.

He said while technology helps individuals maintain communication in long distance relationships, “digital jealousy can also strain those bonds”.

“We have this issue with smartphones, and smartphones now have become a limb, we have grown this limb and without this limb we are incapacitated, so we always have to have that limb we call a smartphone,” he added.

However, there is a cocktail of solutions for the “disadvantages and/or the technological pressure that is placed, increasing by the day, on the Jamaican family structure” he said.

“I’m thinking that a mandate for Jamaican institutions is needed to support Jamaican families. I heard the Ministry of Labour and Social Security with an advertisement for mentors. The Ministry of Education needs to be doing that as well. But you know I’m a little bit biased because I’m a Christian, and I’m not apologising; I really think that with what’s going on with technology and how it is invading our lives, whether we want it or not, the Church has to play a greater role,” he declared.

Said McGill: “The Church cannot continue playing church as it has been in the past or they’re going to lose everybody and we’ll have to turn the church into some bowling alley or something else other than church. Church is so vitally necessary now. One of the major functions of the Jamaican church, as I’ve known it for years, is to provide community. The Church has to do a lot more if we’re going to save our society, if our society is going to become whole.”

He said the urgency is even more, given that children have not escaped the damaging effects of explicit sexual content.

“As a counsellor I see so many kids — nine, eight, 10-year-olds — who are passing around porn in class and who have been exposed to sexual activity way before they complete their puberty. So you see, the easy access to information — and it’s not under a lot of control because so much of our parents are way behind and are just ignorant novices when it comes to handling technology and the technological devices. The children know more than them, the children are more technologically savvy than they are, so there are going to be problems,” he warned, adding that some children are clinically depressed and depend on devices to keep them stable.

Chair of the Family Life Commission Dr Rachel Matthews supported the points raised by McGill.

“Honestly, I believe that this decline in fertility is a good opportunity to initiate comprehensive sexual education to teach about relationship skills, conflict resolution; a good segue in implementing strong programmes for boys and men instead of just driving home the point of just procreate,” Matthews said.

Stephanie Christian, family life director at the Archdiocese of Kingston, commenting further said, “Pornography is a huge problem, it is bigger than I think we either know or we want to admit. And it causes many problems that I don’t think we are aware of; the breaking down of marriages as a result of pornography, children being exposed to material that they are not mentally able to handle, and what that does to their whole sexual development”.

“Even this whole thing of young people, how they see relationships and the fact that they’re not necessarily or initially interested in family life the way we know it; yes, I think pornography plays a role in all of that, if for no other reason, the addictive nature of it ,” she said.

According to the Jamaica Population Health Status Report 2000–2022, which was tabled in the Parliament last May, the island continues to face a low birth rate problem with the total number of live births in the country declining sharply over the last 20 years.

It said in 2021 there were 31,276 live births compared to 40,508 in 2010 and 56,134 in 2000. Overall, Jamaica’s crude birth rate, which is the number of annual live births per 1,000 population, declined by 10.2 percentage points from 21.7 per 1,000 population in 2000 to 11.4 per 1,000 population in 2022, the report said further.

It said the population by age showed that in 2019 there were 578,738 Jamaicans under the age of 15 compared to 261,750 Jamaicans over the age of 65. However, between 2000 and 2019 the child population decreased by 31.7 per cent, while the elderly population grew by 32.6 per cent.

The data triggered a warning in September that year from respected former public servant Reginald Budhan, who said if the fall in Jamaica’s birth rate continues unabated, the island’s vision for developed country status “will remain a dream”.

Jamaica has also fallen below the replacement-level fertility rate of 2.1 for the first time and is currently at 1.9. Replacement fertility is the total fertility rate at which women give birth to enough babies to sustain population levels.