Protect Our Youth

One of the biggest concerns when talking about pornography (if we actually do talk about it) is how the youth of our nation view it. Many battles have been fought against the porn industry since the 60's and some can be seen here http://richardkmiller.com/133/legal-fight-against-pornography We used to be able to prosecute lewd acts and now those same "lewd" acts are showing up on mainstream magazines. Some of the basic problems are talked about in this article. Another blog I found online mentioned that 70% of the porn consumers were between the ages of 12 and 17.

There have been many political battles over the years against the porn industry about trying to prevent teenagers from viewing it. Whether it is firewalls at work or public schools blocking sites there are easy ways around this for the growing tech savvy students of tomorrow. It's quite easy to bypass these things if you know what you are doing with a computer, some systems are even beat by a common public proxy. All it takes for any of these teenagers once they hit the website is click yes to a mandated "Are you older than 18?" question and they are in. What teenager who is looking for porn is going to say no to that question? Plain stupid. Many of the kids these days can do a simple search for the porn on their smartphone and it'll bring it right up. The problem is that the websites that parents can block using parental controls on phones and home internet will block certain shows like family guy and other shows that might be blocked on the same level as pornography. So what this means is that the parent won't get the parental controls because what they might allow their kid to see like a lewd cartoon might also be allowing pornography without even knowing it.

What troubles me more about the industry is the common ideology of not using any protection. If millions of teenagers are viewing porn and none of the videos have the guys wearing condoms then I can just assume that some of these kids are going to think this is the norm. With the STD epidemic going around our country the future generations are going to be STD ridden. Here are some statistics supporting this theory http://www.cdc.gov/std/health-disparities/age.htm. Look at the age groups and how much of a difference there is in the younger population. What will happen in about 20 years if the current porn industry just keeps increasing? This moves into my next point of view about what parents can do to prevent this epidemic.

TALK TO YOUR KIDS ABOUT MORE THAN JUST SEX. This needs to be drilled into the parents today. It is very common for parents to talk to their children during puberty about sex and where babies come from etc etc. What isn't mentioned however is that parents need to also talk to their children about what is out there. All the pornography and all the sexual images that they are bound to come across on the internet. We are in a new age where teens are constantly connected online either through computers or smartphones they are bound to come across sexual images. When I was searching for the picture above for this class my filter wasn't on and it brought up a naked European model along with everything else. The point being the kids need to be warned about sex and about porn and it's effects whether positive or negative the information needs to be put out there so the teens when they turn 18 can make the decision properly. Otherwise curiosity will strike and they'll be watching the porn anyways without the info, they might as well be well informed if they are going to do it.