Oprah's promoting of pornography; internet porn is cited as the number one reason for divorce in America today

Dear Oprah~
If I had been a young woman instead of an older therapist, I would now view the sex industry as a lucrative and exciting career option. Instead, as a therapist who has to deal with the heartbreak and family wreckage that pornography leaves in its wake, I kept waiting, Oprah, for you to balance your Nov 17th show by bringing up "the other side" of pornography--of how porn images effect a wife or young mother or teenager who has just discovered what their father does at night on the internet.



As a psychotherapist, I deal with the young women who feel betrayed when they find internet porn that includes "just click here" options for child porn as well. Mothers look at their children and back to the children on the internet screen. First they call the lawyer, then they call me. Then I try to find them a support group for the disheartened wives of porn watchers.




I kept waiting for you, Oprah to bring in a therapist who would discuss this addiction that pornography creates, and its crushing effects on families, because, according to the mainstream therapists magazine, "Psychotherapy Networker" it is internet porn that is the leading cause for divorce in America today. Or maybe simply someone on your show could have said that the money gained from choosing this career has a downside that is as psychologically damaging to soul as HIV is to the body.

Libra South Node, Libra Moon

In Evolutionary astrology we look at the South Node with eyes that are biased to see what unfinished business, what blockage, what challenge was not met—either earlier in this life or in a former life. So, we read the South Node negatively. To read the “Venus ruled” Libra negatively can be hard, because there is so much charm and personality there. It’s similar to saying “that nice person at the party/the job/the meeting wasn’t really so nice after all.” Too much niceness, too much ‘trying to make the peace at any price’, too much caring what the other person thinks and feels, can make a person appear like a chameleon. Why is there such a desire to please? What woundedness is under that need?

Enmeshment, co-dependence, and a subtle kind of opportunism and neediness are the worse traits of Libra; no matter if it be the Sun, Moon or South Node. In the South Node position or as the Moon, the emotional nature “remembers” on a cellular level an original closeness and unity that is hoped for now, if not expected. Venus wants good relationships, harmony and beauty. Nothing wrong with that. Justice too, and credit for doing a good job. He/she wants to come up smelling like roses, and sometimes Venus bends the truth or takes radical risks to make their dreams come true.

So what is needed here? A healthy dose of its opposite: Mars. Venus needs the independent, assertiveness of its North Node of Aries to create the balance. And whether you have the South Node or Moon in Libra, there’s too much of a default pattern here of the illusive or manipulative feminine—whether you are male or female, we all have our counter-sexual parts within us, and with Libra, you are going to have to assert, fight, survive, and carry the weight of the paradoxes of life on your shoulders. You need to get assertive. Your soul survival may depend on you not depending too much on other people.

As always there’s a delicate crucial balance needed between the opposites. This is the Libra/Aries, “I-Thou axis”-- the relationship balancing “see-saw” between me and you. There’s great gold or goodness embedded in the South Node Libra, or Libra Moon, but if you’re going to learn from this, take a look at how you “act-out” your relationships in your life, and how you respond to beauty. Are you nourishing yourself with “random acts of beauty” and loving kindness? Good, that’s high Libra. Are you finding new ways to nourish your need for true relationships, or are you distracting or deceiving yourself and others? Libra likes the illusions and beauty of Neptunian fantasies, which are fine, but remember to honor the need for confrontation and assertion in your life. Venus needs Mars. The female and male parts of you are all there inside of you, just asking permission to express itself. “Androgyny” can be seen as a kind of wholeness.
© Elizabeth Spring www.elizabethspring.com

South Node Taurus, Moon in Taurus

The South Node represents what we’ve come into this life with---the gifts, the wounds, the challenges. On the most basic level, the South Node is where we are comfortable because we are familiar with the territory, and with the South Node in Taurus, or with the Moon in Taurus, we know the delights of being comfortable, being sensual and sexual, having a sense of financial and emotional security, and enjoying the things in life that make it worth living. Venus rules Taurus, and this is the part of us that values the ground we stand on, our relationships, beauty, good food and drink, and loyal friends. Nothing wrong with that! And we fear not having enough of those things.


Venus is exalted in Taurus, meaning that the planetary archetype of Venus naturally and comfortably expresses itself through the lens of Taurus, and that “she” expresses a type of “life philosophy” that is rooted in a pragmatic and sensual understanding of life.
That is unless you’ve taken it too far. And this may be the case if your South Node is in Taurus. The South Node always represents the area that we didn’t get quite right in a former life, or earlier in this one, so we are called now to release the down side of these habits and traits. Too much emphasis on Venusian security, sensuality and relationships can hint of a touch of laziness or materiality that doesn’t leave room for the depth, painful truth, or edginess that Soul Work sometimes requires.


Have you been living in a world of denial or attempting a false security that isn’t rooted in deep truth? The South Node in Taurus speaks to the need to move away from the over-dependence on personal resources (“He who dies with the most money wins”) or continual security seeking (“This is my house and I don’t ever want to consider moving for any reason.”)


Too great a concern for the comfortable desires of Venus tends towards materialism, if not laziness, and the antidote is to move towards your Scorpio North Node. This is about a willingness to risk one’s present level of security for a deeper, truer level of security and integrity. This is where the balance is brought in by the Scorpio North Node, which continually wants to know “what’s the emotional bottom line truth here? And what do I need to do about it?”


The Moon in Taurus reflects a “blessed” placement because the Moon relates to not only our emotional style but also our way of nurturing ourselves and others. It reflects something of the positive archetype of the Mother. Taurus nurturing is sweet, as long as mothering doesn’t become “smothering.” The Moon in Taurus has less of the downside of the South Node here, but we still need to be continually mindful of balance!
Elizabeth Spring www.elizabethspring.com

Your Moon Sign and Your South Node: the Differences

Here’s a good question a reader asked—“Why are you writing about the South Node and the Moon together?” And I replied: I’m doing this because they mutually reinforce each other and tell more of the story of the heart.

Yes, they each are different—dare I say “slightly?”—in that the Moon describes your obvious emotional and nurturing style in this life and how you relate to all things “maternal” including your Mother. However, the Moon's Nodes—are the Nodes of the Moon! And the South Node specifically holds the emotional memory of the Soul, so the story goes back further in time. It speaks of the emotional memory (not linear or left-brain memory) that is carried over from life to life. I believe this memory is sometimes called "skandas" in Hinduism, or you could think of it as something embedded in your DNA.

So your Moon is more specific to this life and what you are conscious of, whereas the South Node of the Moon is more of the “unconscious emotional memory.” I find that the overlapping and synthesizing of the two is fascinating…have you considered how your Moon sign and South Node sign reflect something of your conscious and unconscious patterns?

Let's say your South Node is in Scorpio, ruled by Pluto, and your Moon is in Aries ruled by Mars. The ancient story embedded in your psyche may be deeply Plutonian, powerful, and perhaps tragic. And so, in this life your Soul chose to be born with a Mars ruled Aries Moon-- maybe your Soul knew in some mysterious way that now you needed to "survive, to have courage, to start fresh, and to be enthusiastic" rather than brooding.....sounds like a description of a life affirming Aries Moon to me. Maybe that Aries Moon person is somewhat irritable, impulsive, and independent--it might just be that the South Node in Pluto ruled Scorpio reflected a heavy karmic maternal inheritance.

So, it's similar to when Sun sign astrologers say: look at your Rising Sign as well as your Sun sign in reading about yourself because each has a message here--and I would add, that when you are looking at your Moon, look at your South Node sign as well...read both.