August 11, 2026: Why kids are more susceptible than ever before to porn and what parents need to know

From CPR News, this is Colorado Matters. Research finds that kids are being exposed to online pornography more often and at younger ages than ever before, and the effects are often damaging. Don't delude yourself into thinking your child will never experience or be exposed to pornography. It's not possible. A local therapist offers insight and tips for parents. Then, more and more motorcycle riders are dying on Colorado roads. Even when they're doing everything they can to keep themselves safe and somebody else is at fault for their crash, they're still going to lose that battle. These days, it is a higher risk than before because at the end of the day, I think everybody has a part in the numbers going up. What the Colorado State Patrol says is to blame and how one nonprofit founded here is working to help injured bikers and their families.

This is Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRCC. I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. For many parents, one of the most difficult conversations to have with their teens and tweens is about the birds and the bees. But a growing body of research suggests that in today's digital world, that conversation about sex is increasingly more relevant and arguably more urgent. With smartphones and social media literally at their fingertips, experts say that young people are encountering pornography earlier and more often than ever before, and it can lead to developing an addiction. My guest today says it's shaping how they understand relationships, consent, and even their own bodies, and not necessarily in a healthy way. Craig Nippenberg is a licensed clinical social worker and minister in Denver, and he works extensively with families navigating this very complex issue. Craig, welcome to Colorado Matters. Thank you very much. It's great to be here, as always. You have described this issue as a pornography epidemic among young people. What do you mean by that and how widespread is this issue today? Yes. First of all, that's not the first time that term has been used. The Denver Post had an article in 2006 about the porn epidemic. And that's when people had desktop computers and that was the new thing. And since then, it's just exploded currently. And parents really need to understand the scope of the porn industry or the adult entertainment industry. And it's currently at $100 billion worldwide. The U.S. is the biggest producer of it. and also one of the leading countries for consumption of it. Now, in saying that, this is not a judgment on the adult industry, but parents need to be aware that everything in the adult world trickles down to children. Pornography is trickling down faster and faster. I'm seeing more and more kids coming in. Used to be the standard was middle school. But now I'm getting third, fourth graders who parents find out they've been looking at pornography. And statistically, we know that most of it is unintentional. There are some cases where the kids, kids are curious, right? And one friend tells some other friend about something they found online and they look it up, right? But another, it's roughly 58% of kids who view porn in the average age of first exposure. And this is a very conservative statistic. It's hard to track statistics on the whole industry because it's so shady and in the dark web and all of that. but is age 12. But we are seeing some statistics, kids as young as five being exposed. I'm seeing third and fourth graders coming in. And a lot of the times it is unintentional. About 43% of the kids who have run across porn don't tell their parents. So parents are thinking, oh, of course my child will tell me. And 43% won't. They're afraid they'll get in trouble, maybe, or disappoint you. And it's a secret among the friends that they're looking these things up. But you can't escape the reality that your kids are going to be exposed. You said a couple of things. One, as you mentioned, as they say, back in the day.

there was a lot more effort that had to be put into even getting access. And now you can be doing your homework and type in a certain phrase. And I've been amazed. I recall trying to look up an article that I wrote years ago when I lived in Atlanta, and I typed in the word Atlanta Nightlife. And what came up was shocking to me. And I'm thinking, wow, I was just innocently looking up my article that I had written about Atlanta Nightlife. To your point, many times someone, a young person may be online looking for something else and this may pop up. And there's not a lot of context as to why that came up and maybe not even understanding what they're seeing. And what's upsetting for younger children. So normal sexual development for kids. This has been timeless. You know, third and fourth graders might somebody spreads a rumor that your parents have sex and you're like, no, that's not possible. Then my parents don't do that. Or, you know, when I was in third, fourth grade, me and my buddies tried to look up. genitalia words in the dictionary at the school library. We got caught and we had a misrecess. And the funny part being we couldn't figure out what the word was for females because we weren't told those words back in the day. But it was pretty innocent. And if you did see a picture, it was often a static image. That's it. And that would fit. That's very normal for that age group, mid to late elementary school. They're curious. Any family that lives on South Colorado Boulevard, at some point their kids are going to say, well, they're driving along, what shotgun willies? And the parents explain it, and the younger ones will go, that's weird. Why would you do that? Now, as you get to sixth grade and middle school and puberty's marching closer and closer. the curiosity just peaks. And they have more sarcastic words for it. They're constantly talking about it with each other. As a teacher, I remember one time I was teaching a class and I said something about... people were doing it. Well, the kids all started laughing. And I'm like, no, they weren't doing that. That's not it. And you dare never say the number six, nine, and they're just be laughing hysterical. So there's a lot of humor around it, lots of curiosity. But for the younger kids, and they're on the verge of understanding, but if you're exposed to pornography online and seeing all this graphic stuff, Little kids who haven't hit puberty yet have no frame of reference for understanding that. And often it's scary, it's terrifying. About 40% of pornography content shows violence towards women. So now you're seeing violent behavior. They just have no way of comprehending that and can't understand it.

Now, how would you say this has evolved? I mean, we're talking about the fact that young people are getting exposure earlier and they have more easy access to images or videos. How has this evolved? Well, there was somebody who wrote an article back, gosh, the 90s, I don't remember the name of researcher of 2000s, which is pornography is affordable. It's readily available, and it's fairly anonymous. Even though you're not anonymous when you're online, and kids need to understand that and parents need to understand that. So those three components, and then you throw in smartphones, constant access. Kids are doing all their schoolwork on the computers. Most of them can't get anything on their school computers, but they have their laptops at home. I had a parent, the sixth grader, who... They discovered he had taken his laptop into his bedroom when he wasn't allowed to. And they discovered he had looked at some sites. And I looked at him. I said, well, he's right on schedule age-wise. This is about the age when you're curious and you want to know more. But the amount of what they can see. and what the content is, that never really existed. And when you talked back in the day, we'd look at my mother's J.C. Penny's catalogs that had women in bras. Or if you could get a National Geographic, you might find Toplis. That was it. There was, it wasn't everywhere. Yeah. That's hilarious. Now, how did this get on your radar? What are you seeing as a therapist? Just more and more students and younger ones being exposed. And then also this group of mostly young men. teenagers, college-age kids, young 20s, that's kind of one of my specialty areas. Sort of the failure to launch kids is the term they use. They're still at home, gaming, and they spend a lot of time looking at pornography. And over time, viewing it, watching it becomes more and more frequent, and the intensity of what they're seeing becomes more frequent. And there's this generation of young men who are being satisfied electronically. but not forming relationships. So one of the symptoms for heavy users is they get socially isolated. They're just at home on the computer all the time looking at this stuff. They're more isolated. They have higher rates of depression. They also have higher rates of sexual dysfunction when in a real relationship because they're so used to the screen being that which motivates their pleasure and aren't really able to relate to a real person. So it's all very objectified in porn. Now, in terms of normal sexual development for the parents out there, if you have middle school, there's puberty age. For boys, a lot of times, it's about seeing parts, body parts. And they talk among themselves about body parts. Very objectified.

For females, it's often the boy bands and objectifying, you know, like the teens that would be feigning for Elvis back in the day and just in love with a star. They don't even know this person, right? Somewhere in high school, what's supposed to happen is you go from objectifying to subject relationship. Like, I'm dating a real person. With emotions? They're kind, they're caring. We share our deepest thoughts and feelings with each other. That's a real subjective relationship. And that gets delayed because of the porn. Everything is objective. That person is there for my gratification online. There's no connection, no emotions, no emotional. And sexuality in teaching your kids, sexuality is about a deep emotional relationship and commitment with another person that happens to have those extra benefits that are quite pleasurable. And the human brain is very much wired for it. Not just we use people so we can feel pleasure. And we should note that this issue of youth exposure, broadly speaking, has even come up at the state capital among Colorado lawmakers. A bill was proposed in 2025 to tighten legal limits on children's exposure to sexual content and increased penalties for anyone who violated that. But the measure never made it out of committee. What are your thoughts about the idea of employing legislation to help with this? I didn't know that, and that's a fabulous idea. I also think... You know, age verification is a hotly debated thing for all content online. Some people want age verification. Others think it's disrupting their freedom. They have to put in their IDs. But I think as a parent myself, and given what's out there now, and my kids are older, so we didn't have to deal with nearly as what's out there now, but that sites have to be age verified. Because now the kids, it says, are you 18 or 21 or over? What do curious kids do? Yes. How does one verify your age? You would have to have some kind of ID to put in driver's license, whatever. There's different ways it could be done, and I think that makes sense to keep children away from sites that are going to be overwhelming to them and take them on a path of destruction. Our guest today is Craig Nippenberg, a licensed clinical social worker and minister in Denver. When we come back, what makes the adolescent brain more vulnerable than adults? I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. This is Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRC. Welcome back to Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRCC. I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. Today we're talking about how parents can help their children develop healthy sexual development in a world saturated with online adult content. Experts say that young people are encountering pornography earlier and more often than ever before. Craig Nippenberg is a licensed clinical social worker and minister in Denver. Craig, you often say you are the product.

What does that mean in the context of the porn industry and digital platforms? And this is for anything we're online buying. We like to think that we're out there hunting for something. We're shopping. We're going to find a product online. We're going to buy it, right? We're getting the product. But really, especially in this industry, we, the person shopping is the product. They're going after you. They want to know what you're looking at, and so they can send you more and send you more money and make more money. It's all about making revenues. That's how it's $100 billion. It's they want to get you on and then track where you're going so they can feed you more extreme stuff. plant cookies on your computer so it pops up, you name it. They want your business. Now, what's really frightening with that is, I know Roblox, I think it had something like 65,000 complaints of child exploitation, so images of children who are naked, and TikTok and Instagram, they've been known to put, they embed a link. to only fans, which is a very popular pornography site. And it's bedded into the link through TikTok or Instagram. So if parents look at the browsing history, it doesn't show up. So they think their child is up on TikTok, look at it in puppy videos, and they could be online on a porn site. So they just keep finding ways, the industry finds ways to target as many people as possible. And in that sense, you're the product and you could also be a victim. Well, would you say algorithms and data mining are shaping what young people see and how often they see it? Well, and that's how it works. And it's no different than I had to get some knee braces a while back. I had a knee replacement. And next thing, you know, I'm getting all kinds of ads for everything for old people that you can imagine. My back's fine. I don't need a back support. But the algorithms pick up on what's your shop and they're buying, and then they're going to throw as much related to that as possible. And to be honest, I've done a lot of deep dives on TikTok. researching self-harm, all sorts of different things that the teens are struggling with. And when I get on logged in the first time, I put my age, I was like 64 and a male. Well, and I put, for my interest, I want camping, a workout, and outdoor sports or something. And like eight of the ten videos were young teen women in bikinis because I'm a male. Wow. So they automatically assume This is what you're looking for. So the kid goes online. They find a couple sites. And the next thing you know, they're getting more sites sent to them and connecting to other sites. And it just takes you down a deep hole. Well, we're going to get into tips for parents. But I want to continue on when you talk a lot about what happens neurologically when young people are exposed to pornography. What makes the adolescent brain more vulnerable to these patterns than adults? Well, that and just how the system, how our brains work that makes us so easily addicted to lots of different things. Dopamine. And so the neurotransmitter dopamine is produced in the midbrain. And dopamine activates things, tells you to get movement. So when you get up in the morning, your dopamine levels go up so you can get motivated and start.

doing things, right? Now, it crosses over the olympic system, which is where our feelings come from, the area for desire and novelty. It is one of the most primary systems in our brains, and lots of animals have it. So when we see something we desire, so I'll ask you, Shander, Imagine I had a box of, I've just brought in this box of Belgium chocolates for you. You've never had them before. And I said my buddy fully brought them back from Belgium for you. Now instantly, just to look in your eyes right now, your dopamine levels went up because obviously you desire chocolate. Now the fact that it's a new one, a novel. That increases your dopamine levels even more. And when the dopamine levels go up, they target your prefrontal cortex and it says, pay attention to that. Focus on that. So let's say I give you one of the chocolates. And it's not very good. And you think, well, that's no better than a Hershey's kiss or whatever. That doesn't really do me. You won't activate the pleasure centers are throughout the brain, but you won't get any pleasure of them. And your desire for it and the novelty of it. is gone, and you're like, no, I don't need anymore, no, thank you. But let's say I give it to you, and you can just, the texture, it's melting in your mouth, the smell of it. Now, after it's gone, what are you thinking about? I'd like another one. May I have another one, please? Right? And so that's the basic system, and that's prehistoric to humans, because if we were out searching, hunter-gatherers, and we found some new red berries. And Shandra and I are there, and I look at her, I said, well, you try it first, see if you die. And let's say you don't, and you're like, this is delicious. Now, humans desire food. sweets, the berries have a lot of carbs in a small amount, and we're going to focus on it, and we're going to have more. It allowed us to survive. But we're constantly in our modern world being inundated with our desires and new things. So if you imagine chocolate, and now we apply that same system to sexuality, it's a very powerful desire for humans. We often like new ways and new adventures with it, hopefully in the context of a healthy relationship. And if it brings us pleasure, we focus even more. And satisfaction in that area increases your dopamine levels 15 times their baseline. It just explodes your brain with great joy and pleasure. And it's about the same amount of dopamine as you get from using marijuana or cocaine. It's right up there. So it's this really intense experience. Now, the makers of pornography know, well, if we serve them this, after a while they're going to get kind of bored of it because our brains habituate and we get desensitized to it and it's not given us the same thrill anymore. So even those Belgium chocolates you love so much, after a while of eating them, you might start thinking about, I want something different, I want something new, I want to find something else that's going to give me the bus.

So many children who start out are teens looking at pornography. It's... Pretty simple stuff, and they get aroused and satisfied. But then that's really not enough anymore. Same with alcohol, drugs. You have to have more. You've got to get a higher buzz out of it. Is this particularly high for teenagers in terms of where their brain development is? The vulnerability for them, it's incredibly high because the brain has massive changes are taking place, one of which is your normal dopamine levels fall in half. So the brain is redesigning the prefrontal cortex. And that's why teenagers are spacey. They have a hard time paying attention. Their impulse control drops in every area. They get disorganized. And it's becoming an adult brain that can truly multitask and take on many different things. But their brains, because of the loodoming levels, they're very vulnerable to impulse control problems. They can't stop themselves. They are also wired up emotionally. And when the hormones kick in at puberty, they become very intense. And teenagers experience double the emotion that a younger child or an adult would feel in the same situation. So they're very emotional. They don't make good decisions. They're very impulsive. Now you apply that to pornography. They get started in it. They went newer stuff, newer stuff. immediate gratification, more intense things. And then the brain, the brain as you go through adolescence, the idea is use it or lose it. So if you stop your foreign languages or different studies, your brain's not going to really wire up to continue doing that. If your brain's being wired up by constant immediate gratification, right? Brain is going to wire up that way, that it wants immediate gratification. It wants short attention spans, shorter periods. The average time people spend on a panography site before switching is 10 minutes. So then we want to move on to the next thing. and think about the kids with their smartphones that constantly scrolling, you look at something, you've got to have something new. So the brain then sort of gets wired up that way, and that's what you get used to. Then you're kind of stuck, and you really don't know how to get out of that box with porn and start real relationships, real subjective relationships with other people. When does youth cross the line into addiction, especially for teens? So there's different definitions of addiction in the diagnostic manuals. The most common are your drug and alcohol addictions. But we know that humans can be very addictive for lots of things. And in terms of the pornography, the big signs is what I mentioned earlier about increased time use, isolation from others, plunging grades because we're in the bedroom not doing homework. We're looking at porn. And then the classic of any addiction is you need more.

You have to have more to get the same bus. You have to have more intensity to achieve satisfaction. And that's the same with alcohol or drugs, the sports gambling that's so popular, even with kids now we're doing it. And then you just can't stop. And it becomes harder and more difficult to stop and to get off the porn. There are some online support groups for men who are trying to stop looking at porn. So it's a very difficult thing to stop. I've worked with several young men where it took a whole lot of therapy and lots of backsliding to be able to help them stop the porn and actually get in a real relationship. And again, you're referring to adults. So imagine being young and forming who you are in your value system. What about distorting body image and gender roles and attitudes toward consent? There's a lot of violence against women in the industry. It's very misogynistic, so it's very male dominant and body image. And so we know for females, they're constantly exposed to reminders of their bodies and just modern culture and then often developing eating disorders because of that. For males, one of the hardest things is their self-perception related to their... size of their manhood. Because most porn videos has male actors who are probably in the top 5% worldwide in size. So you're now seventh grader, eighth grader. You've got, you know, you're going through puberty and you're kind of looking at yours compared to what they're seeing and feeling like I'll never measure up to that. So they have this distorted image of what the male... is supposed to be in terms of size. There's also obviously just overall body types and then how women are supposed to just fall for men instantly. 80% of pornography is non-consensual clips. So we're not talking about consensual relationships, real subjective relationships where both people give consent and they're not using drugs or alcohol. Most of it is non-consensual. So they're now seeing that this is what's normal. So it's changing their perception of what's normal. Also their perception of women, that in a lot of the porn, the women says, no, no, at first, but then is just ready to go. And it's like they constantly want it. Now, does that depict real sexual relationships? For real married people or couples? No, it does not. But for a young person watching it, that's what they're seeing. The sad part and the other part that's sort of stored is you're trying to teach your kids values related to human sexuality and relationships. They're subjective, they're consensual. We know that 40% of the entertainers...

Female entertainers in porn start into it before the age of 18. So these are children, by law, their children, and they're already in the industry. About 40% are trafficked into it. They're forced into the industry. And when I do lectures for high school students on this topic, one of the things I really emphasize is you have to think about what your values are. Do you believe it's okay to have people forced in the porn industry for everyone's satisfaction? If you think that's wrong, don't use it. Don't consume it. You're aiding and abetting in that whole industry. There's also a lot of drugs related to the entertainers and the whole industry in itself. So it just warps any sort of values that you would hold dear, that you'd want for your own kids, right? or for your grandkids, in my case, it's pretty overwhelming from a value standpoint. Craig Nippenberg is a licensed clinical social worker and minister with Nippenberg Patterson Langley and Associates in Denver. He's talking about more young people having access to online pornography and how parents can help guide them towards healthy sexual development in a digital world. When we come back, he offers tips for parents. I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. This is Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRCC. Welcome back to Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRCC. I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. Today we're talking about how parents can help their children develop healthy sexual development in a world saturated with online adult content. And would families need to know about the risks and realities? My guest is Craig Nippenberg, a licensed clinical social worker and minister in Denver who works extensively with families and adolescents navigating these issues. Craig, how should parents be responding to this issue? Well, first, I would tell parents, understand what's out there and do some research on your own. Just, you know, you can pull stuff up on the Internet about the statistics of the industry. You just really want to understand how big it is in the direction it's headed in. Right now, the new growing categories are AI pornography, which has generated images, or sometimes teens have put classmates' faces on nude bodies and posted them. It's also going towards virtual reality. So if your kids have the virtual reality headsets where they're playing tennis or whatever, racing a car, those are going to be the new growth areas. And so you're always trying to keep up with what's out there and what's coming next. Then the other thing, and I've always recommended this to parents, is you want to talk early on. Don't wait until they're older to have the birds and the bees talk because chances are they're... They'll have already known it long before you sit down with them. You want to normalize. Reproduction is an easy one for little ones. You can watch videos of salmon swimming upstream and laying eggs and the male comes over and does his part.

You can see all of that. And you want to talk to kids in a healthy way about it. Yes, reproduction is life, and that's how we have babies and how you were born, and you can explain things, and talk about loving, caring relationships, and how if you and your partner love to kiss, it makes you feel close, you love to hug, let the kids see that. That's all fun. And so you're paving it early. You're really starting it early, not waiting until, okay, it's puberty. I used to teach puberty class for fifth graders. And don't wait till that. You know, the school's kind of their standard time when they do it. But you want to make this normal and really talk about it's a beautiful thing, that human sexuality is a beautiful thing and it's wonderful. And you teach some things as they mature a little bit more and ask their questions. Then at some point, so all parents right now, and they have classes, most of schools have classes, but you want to help your kids with media awareness, teaching kids about what's on the media, what AI is, what fake things are, how to spot fake news. They offer classes, but students need to understand what's out there. As part of that, you need to have a discussion with them that sometimes they might see pictures or videos of people without clothes on you could start with and people doing things together that you're not going to understand. And if you see those, those are for adults only, people who are over 18 by law, come and talk to mom and dad about it and we'll explain to you or help brainstorm. Who could they ask about that? And I've had many parents call me up to ask me to explain it to their kids and figure out what was going on and where that was coming from. So it's really prepping them that don't be in denial that they're not going to see it. They are. And so you want to prep them on that. Are you seeing my mom face over here? I know. Like, oh, no. Yeah, no, I'm a dad and been down that road. It's always something. And this conversation should also explore and cover consent, mutual respect. Consent's a big one, respecting others' boundaries. It needs to be mutual decision-making. You also, with your puberty-age kids, you want to talk to them about hormonal urges, how your hormones are changing, and they create these incredibly, in this case, sexual urges. And one has to learn to handle those and not let them get the best of you. And that sexually doesn't involve violence. They have found, I believe it's a Switzerland study. that boys who were, younger boys, were regular pornography users, had two to five times the rate of violence towards women. So...

watching that is going to create it. And so you're always having value-based discussions. You know, we value other people and subjective relationships. So when your kids and your kids are at that age now where they may come home and say, oh, so-and-so is so hot. Are they so beautiful? Oh, she's all this and that. And when I used to respond to my kids, I'd be like, oh, are they kind? Do you enjoy being with them? Do they make you happy? And how do they treat you? Yeah, how do they treat you? Are you, and anything related to physical intimacy, again, consensual, and it should be enjoyable for both people. What about digital tools like MM Guardian, Bark, NetNanny? Should parents be taking steps to proactively use these parental control apps to block their kids from accessing sites, or is that not the real issue? I'd tell you about three or four years ago, Wall Street Journal had a great parent reporter, and she would do a lot of different stuff on how to protect your kids on the Internet with all those different things you just mentioned. And one month, several years ago, she said, I'm not going to do it anymore because it doesn't work. And no parent can keep up with protecting their kids from stuff online. Your best solution is don't let them on. Like, I'm a big believer in no smartphones to your 16 or 17. Nobody younger should have one. I really feel very strongly about that. A lot of countries around the world are changing their laws about that so that below 17 doesn't have access to the social media and all the stuff that's on there. And the other area that, you know, you might monitor to catch your kids, but the kids, another way pornography struggle down, it's quite trending now. for middle schoolers, high schoolers to request naked pictures of their friends. And... That's going to be through private messaging, which is called dark social. It's not out there you can track it. It's just between the users. Now, you as a parent might get a hold of it one day and look at it. But the kids, I think it's about 30% of kids have requested nudes from someone, about 26% sent nudes to someone. The shocking one was about of the ones who sent their naked photos, 46% of those. got shared without their permission. That means the kid who got it forwarded it on to their friends. Not fun. And that's the other thing you have to talk to kids about 18 this age of consent in terms of pornography. We don't take pictures of people and send them to somebody else. If you ever get a naked picture of a child, someone under 18, don't download it.

don't save it, tell mom and dad, we'll delete it, or if need be take action. There is quite a bit of bullying that can happen in this arena, body shaming, classmates, right? If parents take away just one thing from this conversation, what should it be? Don't delude yourself into thinking your child will never experience or be exposed to pornography. It's not possible. And some of your kids will look for it. And you'll be mortified. But then you've got to take a deep breath and realize, okay, this is the world we're living in now. This is the new normal. And the curiosity around it, that's wired in our brains. That's never going to go away. And you're just hoping you can find out before it goes too far and then talk to them about values, healthy limits. Maybe we need to get rid of the devices, no more devices in the bedroom. We're not going to do the smartphone. We are going to get involved, maybe contacting your congressperson. Maybe it's not giving the cell phone until we're older. Maybe it's supporting age verification. So parents could do things. But don't... Don't be foolish. Don't believe that's not your child. Well, this conversation definitely brought me back to my teen years where I found that the kids whose parents were the most restrictive, they just worked harder at covering up their tracks. And kids will do that. And so you just want to, the more advanced planning you can do this, the better and helping them be aware of things and to come to mom or dad to talk about it. And then as they mature, you have your talks, you know, with puberty, and you get into sexuality and consent and safety and health care. This is definitely a health care issue. The pandemic, just like the sports gambling is becoming one, just like the gaming. These are health issues. This affects children's health. Thanks so much for sharing your insights with us today. Thank you very much. It was great visiting with you. Craig Nippenberg is a licensed clinical social worker and minister with Nippenberg, Patterson, Langley, and Associates in Denver. He joined us to talk about more young people having access to online pornography and how parents can help guide them towards healthy sexual development in a digital world. I'm Shandra Thomas Woodfield. You're with Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRCC. This is Colorado Matters on CPR News and KRCC. I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. Motorcyclists across the state are mourning the death of a well-known cyclist, known to many as Apache John, who died in a crash on August 4th in Nevada. Meantime, the State Patrol released dash cam video this week showing a motorcycle is crashing when he rode between two lanes of moving cars. That's called lane splitting and it's illegal in Colorado. It's not to be confused with lane filtering, which allows riders to move between cars if they're stopped. These are yet more examples of a growing trend of motorcycle crashes on the rise here in Colorado.

In fact, in 2024, the state recorded 165 fatal crashes, marking the highest number ever recorded in the state at the time, and 2026 so far has marked the deadliest start to a year since 2017. Here's what state trooper Sergeant Ivan Alvarado had to say about it when we spoke last October. Even when they're doing everything they can to keep themselves safe and somebody else is at fault for their crash, they're still going to lose that battle. Even though the riders, the motorcycles out there only account for 3% of the traffic, of the motorist, when it comes to fatalities, they account for a quarter of all fatalities. So that is a huge number. And again, I'm going to repeat because they have a bigger battle to lose. And in reality, we are looking these days that people are driving distracted, that people are driving too fast. And, you know, we're trying to do everything we can not only through messaging, but also enforcement. But that's also something that riders need to be aware of. That these days... It is a bigger risk to share the road with all other vehicles. It's not something that we're saying you shouldn't go out there and ride. No, we want you to enjoy your motorcycle. We want you to, you know, enjoy the fun that comes with it. But we want you to be aware that these days it is a higher risk than before because a lot of drivers out there in their cars are driving with their cell phones, driving with the burger, being distracted by passengers and everything else. Colorado State Trooper Sergeant Ivan Alvarado speaking with me last October about fatal motorcycle crashes on the rise here in Colorado. One organization based and founded here is working to do its part to help. Lori Montoya is the founder and president of the Lakewood-based nonprofit Biker Down Foundation, which helps injured motorcyclists and their families recover after an accident or death. We spoke last October. Tell us what exactly is Biker Down and how did it get started? Biker Down was founded in 2011 after tragically watching several of my friends go down and watching what they went through with recovery. As many people that listening will know, bikers are one of the most generous and giving individuals to the community as far as charities. But when it comes to recovery after an accident, they were kind of out there by themselves. And I watched this person lose her job, not have the proper insurance. And I just watched a lot of things that happened. And I said, who do I call?

You know, it was my first reaction. And everyone looked at me like a deer in headlights and said, well, I don't understand. I said, you mean to tell me there's no organization out there that helps injured motorcycle riders after recovery. We ride for every dog, cat, mouse, vet, toy, kid, cancer, you name it. We will do a ride for you. But there's nothing out there for us. So a biker down was founded. And originally I wanted to water your plants and check your mail. But after about a year of listening. to what the bikers really required and what they were going through, we very quickly changed our mission statement to focus more on the family's need because, as I'm sure you know, when someone's in the hospital, there's 12 people taking care of them. So we do a variety of services. And what I find interesting is that you help bikers physically, but also rally up support to support them financially and emotionally too. Well, I always tell people that certainly we will try to possibly help with the utility bill, but in this economy, there's no such thing as a $500 or $800 mortgage. So it's really difficult. I really don't want to give the listeners the wrong impression. We don't have a tremendous amount of funds to write big checks. But what we do do, as an example, is we'll talk about financial strategies. So as an example, when someone does a help request with Biker Down, we will do an intensive onboarding, meaning I'm going to ask what the writer does for work. What kind of benefits do they have? Do they have short-term disability? What kind of insurance do they? have? Do they have a house payment? Do they have a car payment? So as an example with them saying, yes, we have a house payment, I will recommend that the family call the mortgage company and ask for what they call a temporary hardship. And many times a mortgage company, because they don't want to take your house, they will move two or three payments on the back end of your mortgage. If they won't do that, there are times that they might waive the interests and things like that so that you can keep your nose above water. Same with car payments. I reached out to you regarding this interview because I have noticed an increase in coverage of motorcycle accidents recently, including many in which the motorcyclist died. What do you want to say about that? Well, what I want to say is, first of all, my prayers go out to anyone who's experienced it. There is. a big difference between having someone that has a health issue and you get time for closure you get time to say goodbye you get time to make peace with it it doesn't make the loss any easier But what happens in many of these fatalities is, you know, you kiss a loved one goodbye. They go off for a beautiful ride on a Saturday afternoon and they don't come home. So what people are experiencing is just life changing for them. And it's very sad. And we spend a tremendous amount of time with the family members while they're in the middle of their immediate grief because there's so many things that they need to do. So I personally.

been through it where I've you know, thrown a cold soda to, to a loved one, and they went off and never made it home. So I know personally the empathy that is required to help someone navigate how to get up every morning, put one foot in front of the other, and just how to learn how to breathe in and out again. So it takes a very, I'm not trying to pat myself on the back, but I think it takes someone with a tremendous amount of empathy that can give them comfort, gain. their trust, but at the same time also try to motivate them to do the things that they need to do. So it's quite challenging. So it sounds like you saw a need and you decided to step in and feel that. Walk us through the support that you provide. First thing that we would always do is ask anybody to go to bikerdown.org and fill out a help request. That's our number one requirement. That gives me the basic information so that I can. reach out to them, schedule a time that is good with their schedule, and they know that I'm going to be responding. It's very difficult to call someone out of the blue and the first inclination is, well, what do you want? And what I want to do is help you with recovery? Most of the time, as we're doing that intake, when we find out about insurance, we also ask about what happened in the accident. Was it a left turn? Did someone hit you? Was it a hit and run? Those will tell me where to guide that. family as an example if they were hit by car then we want to pray that that driver has good insurance we also want to know what kind of insurance that you have on your bike to make sure that you are covered so that you can focus more on recovery i am a huge proponent of getting a true motorcycle attorney motorcycle Injury law is very different and it's very specialized. 85% of the injuries sustained by a motorcycle rider are worse than a driver with six airbags. What I also do is, like I said, I want to know your history, your background, just how bad is it going to be? So we go through all of that. Now we realize that they need to do some sort of fundraiser. I really recommend people not use GoFundMe.

Not that it's not a good service, but they charge higher fees. So if they want to do a fundraiser online, they're welcome to do it through Biker Down. We absorb the credit card fees or we ask the donors to donate the fees. If they're getting out of the hospital and they're in between surgeries, the hospitals nowadays do not just let you. you know, kick back at the hospital in between surgeries. Many times they will send you home. Sometimes you're non-weight-bearing. These are not glamorous items. You need a portable toilet. You need a hospital bed. You need a wheelchair, a toilet seat riser, a slide. Whatever you do, I keep a 20 by 20 storage bin here in Lakewood filled with medical equipment that we will loan to you free of charge. So there's a variety of things that we can do to help. you on top of the emotional and, you know, empathy that we give to the family. Your organization Biker Down Foundation also offers a peer support network because, as you've noted, recovery isn't just physical, it's emotional too. Bikers helping bikers, riders helping riders. You know, we have a really good social media network. In the event of a fatality, we have a group called Healing Through Loss. And that was something that I experienced when I went through my tragic loss. And when I went, you know, 18 years ago to. find someone to talk to, it was a different type of grief that those people were going through. And I just wanted to have a group where people that had, so as an example, you're a father and you've lost your son on a motorcycle. You're really grieving or you're a mother. I want you to be able to come once a quarter or twice a year to a type of an event where you can sit down with other parents and share the same grief. nobody can really understand what one is going through when they've experienced that kind of loss. Same for friends. When we have healing through loss, they're very close friends that need to sit down with other people that can understand. the tragedy of sadly a motorcycle accident. So we also do it for wives and everybody's at different stages of grief and that really helps them know that they can put one foot in front of the other, that they can breathe in and out, that they will be able to navigate this recovery with the loss of a spouse that won't be there to see their children being raised. So it's very impactful. Lori, thanks so much for sharing your insights with us. Thank you. Lori Montoya is the founder and president of the Lakewood-based nonprofit Biker Down Foundation, which helps injured motorcyclists in their families after an accident or death. Thanks for joining us today. I'm Shandra Thomas Whitfield. This is CPR News and KRC.