Playground Porn

If you don’t want your kids looking at or being shown hardcore pornography in the playground, and I’m guessing it’s not up there on your list of  how to bring up a healthy, well balanced child, there is a radical but simple solution.  I’m feeling quite smug as I’ve worked this one out all by myself.  Can you guess?  Go on, have a go.   How best to prevent children and teens downloading dodgy sites and showing the contents to all their mates?

Don’t give them a smartphone or indeed any pocket-sized device with internet access. There.  Shocking in its simplicity isn’t it?  If you think about it, the rise in the number of underage kids accessing online pornography has rocketed in the past 5 – 8 years, along with the advent of the iphone and all the other copycat androids.  Of course children have had access to computers for much longer than that, and some kids have had laptops which they use in their bedrooms, often late at night, with no parental supervision. Hmmmm.

But think about it for a minute. It’s one thing for a child to take the risk of searching for and viewing pornography on a 12 inch computer screen, within the confines of his or her home.  It’s quite hard to hide what you’re doing if a parent suddenly looms up behind you.  But on a smartphone screen, average size just 4 inches, it’s a whole different ball game.  With an iphone cupped in hand and a few heads crowding round, it becomes a very furtive activity indeed.  Easily disguisable from anyone watching from afar and quickly snapped shut and put in pocket if a hapless adult does suddenly appear alongside.

I simply don’t understand why a child or teenager would need a phone/device with internet access anyway?  Surely the purpose of giving your offspring a mobile phone is so they can contact you or be contacted in an emergency?  The world won’t stop turning if they fail to look at Facebook for a few hours.  Is it because we’re now so addicted to our mobile devices we think our children should be too? Why do they suddenly need to have 24 hour access to the whole universe at their fingertips?  Because that’s what you’re giving them as soon as you let them loose, unsupervised, on the web. 

And on the web you can find out about anything, anything at all. And what is it that kids are naturally most curious about?  Sex.  And when they search for sex related topics what pops up on the browser?  Porn.   And let me enlighten you, porn sure ain’t what it used to be.  If you’ve got some fuzzy memory of a partially clothed twenty-something woman being ‘surprised’ by a ‘plumber’ who’s come to ‘fix the pipes’ and is suddenly finding it ‘very hot in here’, think again.

The videos and images freely available to anyone who cares to conduct a rudimentary search are quite literally beyond belief in their violence (almost always towards women, natch), extremism and graphic, close up, technicolour detail.  For a young, developing brain, these images once viewed, are imprinted there forever.  Children interviewed who  have seen such material, either by accident or design, report symptoms common to PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder), described by the NHS as: “a person (who will) involuntarily and vividly relive the traumatic event in the form of  flashbacks, nightmares or repetitive and distressing images or sensations…and have feelings of isolation, irritability and guilt”. 

But hang on, your child wouldn’t, in a million years want to watch any of this, surely?  Think again.  Here are some stats.  According to an article in this week’s Sunday Times, ‘the average age of first exposure to online pornographic images is six’.  Yes that’s SIX YEARS OLD.  It goes onto say that ‘the largest child consumers of internet porn are the 12 – 17 age group’. What the heck are we exposing our children to?  Forget about non-organic produce, chemicals and pollution, this is a way more serious risk to health.

Now, before you start thinking that this blog is being written by Mary Whitehouse reincarnated (sorry, you have to be of a certain age to know what I’m referencing there!), I’m not of that ilk.  I like to think of myself as a hardened hack; a ‘been there, seen it, got the t-shirt’ journalist of nearly two decades experience who is firmly in touch with reality and certainly not pro-censorship in any way. But this is different.

When my son was just 7, he wandered away from the group of similar aged boys he was playing with at the leisure centre and whispered: “mummy, H says that if you type this into Google you can see a woman having sex with a bike.  What does that mean?” It was at that moment that I truly discovered the meaning of ‘gobsmacked’.  I recollect my jaw literally hanging open for about 5 seconds while I collected my thoughts.  I think I said something along the lines of - well that doesn’t sound very nice and that’s not something we want to see is it?  I then turned to look at H’s mum who was sitting a few seats away and wondered what the heck was the socially correct way to deal with this?

Such was my own dismay and confusion it took me about 20 minutes before I could tell her what her son had said to my son.  She was shocked too of course but said he must have heard that from another, older boy with whom he was playing earlier.  So that’s how it starts folks.

I’ve always discussed, very openly with my own kids how babies are made, what is sex, what is love, what are relationships etc etc as soon as they ask me.  I benefitted from an honest and open relationship with my own mother who imparted to me the mechanics of sex as soon as I was old enough to ask and I realize now how very fortunate I was and try to follow her excellent example.  Yes sometimes the frankness of the conversations with my two make me want to shove my fist into my mouth with cringeworthy embarrassment and I often have to file away some really funny little question or comment in my head to share with Husband later on so we can both have a good giggle.

But discussing pornography?  I never thought I’d have to address and explain that particular issue so early on, but it seems I will, we all will.  Until the internet providers wake up and realize they have a responsibility to prevent young minds being warped, sometimes irretrievably by accessing depraved sexual scenes, I’m afraid it’s up to us.  We do have the power and we can make a difference.  Supervise your kids.  If they’re young, don’t let them on the computer unless you can see exactly what they’re viewing.  If they’re older and not with you for long periods of time, don’t make it easy for them to access the internet or to receive clips sent from friends. 

Children in Syria and other war-torn countries suffer PTSD from witnessing horrific acts of violence.  Do we really, in our comfortable town in this peaceful country want our kids to suffer also?  I don’t think so.