 Ted Bundy |
The issue of the damage pornography does to society is being revived on the 20th anniversary of the execution of Ted Bundy, who died in Florida’s electric chair after confessing to the sex-inspired murders of dozens of girls and women.
Focus on the Family chief James Dobson recalled to the Fox News Channel’s Glenn Beck today his interview with Bundy on the eve of the Jan. 24, 1989, execution.
“Ted Bundy confessed to killing 28 women and girls. He probably killed more than 100 over a period of time,” Dobson said.
The interview 20 years ago came about at Bundy’s invitation, because the evangelical leader had served on a federal pornography commission, and Bundy had read its report.
Bundy, Dobson said, “talked about the role pornography had played in his life.”
He said Bundy admitted becoming addicted to porn as a teenager and acting out his fantasies on his victims.
“He never blamed porn. He took the blame for [his actions]. But he said this played a major role,” Dobson said.
A video and transcript of the interview with Bundy has been posted on the PureIntimacy.org website.
The website describes Bundy’s method of operation.
He was a “good-looking, intelligent law student” who “learned to lure women into his car by various forms of deception. He would put a cast on his arm or leg, then walk across a university campus carrying several books.
“When he saw an interesting coed standing or walking alone, he’d ‘accidentally’ drop the books near her. The girl would help him gather them and take them to his car. Then he would entice her or push her into the vehicle where she was taken captive. After he had molested the girl and the rage of passion had passed, she would be killed and Bundy would dump her body in a region where it would not be found for months. This went on for years.”
About his pending death, Bundy said, “I won’t kid you to say it is something I feel I’m in control of or have come to terms with. It’s a moment-by-moment thing. Sometimes I feel very tranquil and other times I don’t feel tranquil at all.”
Dobson said, “For the record, you are guilty of killing many women and girls.”
“That’s true,” Bundy said.
Then he went on to describe his early encounters with softcore porn as a teen, and his discovery of hardcore and violent images.
“The most damaging kind of pornography – and I’m talking from hard, real, personal experience – is that that involves violence and sexual violence. The wedding of those two forces – as I know only too well – brings about behavior that is too terrible to describe,” Bundy said.
He continued, “In the beginning, it fuels this kind of thought process. Then, at a certain time, it is instrumental in crystallizing it, making it into something that is almost a separate entity inside.
“I was dealing with very strong inhibitions against criminal and violent behavior. That had been conditioned and bred into me from my neighborhood, environment, church, and schools,” Bundy said. “I knew it was wrong to think about it, and certainly, to do it was wrong. I was on the edge, and the last vestiges of restraint were being tested constantly, and assailed through the kind of fantasy life that was fueled, largely, by pornography.”
Bundy said there came a point “where I knew I couldn’t control it anymore. The barriers I had learned as a child were not enough to hold me back from seeking out and harming somebody.”
He then killed his first victim.
“Even all these years later, it is difficult to talk about. … It was like coming out of some horrible trance or dream. I can only liken it to (and I don’t want to overdramatize it) being possessed by something so awful and alien… To wake up in the morning and realize what I had done with a clear mind, with all my essential moral and ethical feelings intact, absolutely horrified me,” he said.
He explained further, “Those of us who have been so influenced by violence in the media, particularly pornographic violence, are not some kind of inherent monsters. We are your sons and husbands. We grew up in regular families. Pornography can reach in and snatch a kid out of any house today. It snatched me out of my home 20 or 30 years ago.”
A report from Colrado Springs-based Focus on the Family said Dobson was speaking on the Beck show to explain why Bundy chose a Christian ministry leader for the last interview, when hundreds of reporters were jockeying for the opportunity.
“Bundy wanted to talk about the role media violence and particularly violent, hard-core pornography had played in his years-long killing spree, and he knew the mainstream media wouldn’t report that story,” Dobson said.
Focus on the Family also has posted segments of the interview online.
“There are lots of other kids playing in streets around the country who are going to be dead tomorrow and the next day and the next day and next month, because other young people are reading the kinds of things and seeing the kinds of things that are available in the media today,” Bundy warned.
Daniel Weiss, senior analyst for media and sexuality at Focus on the Family Action, said Bundy’s predictions have come true.
“Porn has moved from the hidden vice of a few to the entertainment of the masses,” he said, “leaving in its wake countless addicted individuals, broken homes, sexual crimes and a nation desensitized.
“As a nation, we can’t seem to give this material up. We defend it as free speech, which it is not. We ignore its connections to crime and politics and human trafficking, and accept at face value the notion put forth by the porn industry – that it is nothing more than harmless adult entertainment.”
Let’s curb the kangaroo court of anonymous sources
Tim Graham