Should Pornography Be Banned To Protect Children?

[nutshell]

I voted "some should be banned." Reasoning: While I am against censorship, I do believe child pornography should be banned (thankfully, it is).

If you're straight up asking about legal pornography then I say NO, it should not be banned. Why? As I state above, I am against censorship (even if I don't like the message).

 

[Tigress]

Should all pornography be banned to protect children from viewing it? If so, why? If not, why not?

Should some kinds of pornography be banned to protect children from viewing it? If so, why? If not, why not?

No, and no. Children don't need to be 'protected' from porn, it's just something they don't need to be viewing because it simply isn't relevant to them in general. That said, I certainly think that some types of porn (depicting extreme violence, etc.) are incredibly tasteless, but if all parties involved are consenting, I'm afraid I can't say that I would have it banned.

Edit to add: Of course child pornography should be banned, as nutshell mentioned, but the concern of the O.P. was protecting children, so I just took this to mean pornography depicting consenting adults.

 

[EiNsTeiN]

Yep, now you're getting it.

I'll teach him that as long as he lives in my house, he doesn't get to look at it. I expect he'd still find it on the internet (I know I did), but if he gets caught, he gets punished. That simple. Once a kid's grown up and moved out, they aren't my business anymore.

Well, that goes beyond my knowledge of parenthood!

I'd prefere to raise him up knowing this is wrong rather than letting him know that he can't do it now, but he just gotta wait for another 10 years!

I agree. You gotta be sad to like porn. Means your so rubbish at it, you need to see fake stuff coz you can't get the real stuff...

(im guessing this wasn't what you were saying?)

Pretty much not what I said..
But yeah, people see fake stuff cuz they can't have real stuff

But noway....REAL stuff rocks

I am undecided on this one. All child pornography should be banned, but as for adults for adults, that would be a personal decision. I certainly don't look at the stuff, but if someone does, it doesn't actually hurt anyone. Parents are usually pretty good about hiding their stuff (at least until the child starts to snoop).
If a person is single and there are no children around they should be able to look at whatever they want. If it is a parent who has children, s/he should hide it away in a good place or lock it up so his or her children cannot get to it.

Well, as for children, they must not get access to any sexual material, whether pornograghy, or their parents candoms!
As for adults, it's a personal opinion however...I personally don't think pornography is moral, so I'm just with banning it for children and adults as well!

To be realistic too, I don't think it's good to ban anything for adults...they are ADULTS, and responsible for their actions anyways..

I voted "some should be banned." Reasoning: While I am against censorship, I do believe child pornography should be banned (thankfully, it is).

If you're straight up asking about legal pornography then I say NO, it should not be banned. Why? As I state above, I am against censorship (even if I don't like the message).

I'm against censorship too...But I won't watch a scene including porn stuff...My ethics just prevent me from so...But yeah, I hate censored stuff, makes me feel those people don't really respect my age!

 

[Panda]

Nope as has been said before in the thread, if it is legal to do without a camera then it should be legal with a camera. Child porn is just sick and twisted and people who make children do such acts should be locked up for a long time.

 

[EiNsTeiN]

Nope as has been said before in the thread, if it is legal to do without a camera then it should be legal with a camera. Child porn is just sick and twisted and people who make children do such acts should be locked up for a long time.

I don't think the thread is talking about child porn...I think it's talking about porn in general being viewed by children

 

[EiNsTeiN]

No, and no. Children don't need to be 'protected' from porn, it's just something they don't need to be viewing because it simply isn't relevant to them in general. That said, I certainly think that some types of porn (depicting extreme violence, etc.) are incredibly tasteless, but if all parties involved are consenting, I'm afraid I can't say that I would have it banned.

Edit to add: Of course child pornography should be banned, as nutshell mentioned, but the concern of the O.P. was protecting children, so I just took this to mean pornography depicting consenting adults.

So, is it ok with you if your child watches porn?...even tasteless ones?

 

[Mathematician]

The first person to stand between me and La Erotica gets a bullet shot in their eye. Nah, not really.

But I'm absolutely opposed to banning porn. Children can be protected by setting the television and internet options appropriately. There is technology available that does a good job blocking out 98% of what's out there, and if they're discovering the other 2% it's either a freak accident or they're purposely looking up the stuff -- in which case a nice, collective discussion is in order.

The porn discussion is a rather pointless one. I guess you could make an argument about the television since the airwaves are technically limited [at least at the time. Boy it should be wonderful to see private property blown out of the water for this one], but the internet and print are not. Aside from that, what constitutes porn and what doesn't? Your singular definition? I'm not trying to sound mean.

Hmm, I answered "no," assuming child porn was being excluded from the discussion.

 

[McBell]

Should all pornography be banned to protect children from viewing it? If so, why? If not, why not?

No.
The problem isn't porn.
The problem is the parents.

Should some kinds of pornography be banned to protect children from viewing it? If so, why? If not, why not?

No.
Again, the problem isn't porn.
The problem is the parents.

However porn staring/depicting children should be banned.
However, who gets to decide what is and what isn't porn?
I remember not to long ago that there was a big stink over a Baby Talk Magazine cover that depicted an infant nursing.
There were many who jumped up and down screaming that it was porn.

Click here to see the cover

Now to me, this is NOT porn.

 

[Zephyr]

I'm against censorship too...But I won't watch a scene including porn stuff...My ethics just prevent me from so...But yeah, I hate censored stuff, makes me feel those people don't really respect my age!

Against censorship, but want to ban porn :areyoucra. Are you serious?

 

[Mathematician]

Nude babies, heh. Guess my mother has a whole ring of child porn.

 

[exl2398]

A blanket ban on porn would never fly. People would make more of it. Banning makes things really intriguing and thus more popular.

I think parents should take the responsibility of keeping an eye on their kids instead of expecting the law to do it for them.

 

[Valjean]

Protect children? Protect children from what?

The question presupposes that there is something about pornography that would be harmful to children. The very fact that no-one has questioned the premise of the thread title could be construed as symptomatic of a sexual psychopathology -- caused,in part, by a lack of exposure to sex and nudity (ie: pornography) as children.

Perhaps pornography is good for children, and should be encouraged.
Consider:

In many tribal cultures nudity and sexuality is treated casually and matter-of-factly. In these societies you won't find damaged children. If you distributed a handful of Playboy magazines to a group of adolescent boys they actually would "just read the articles."
In the Netherlands any child can buy a pornographic magazine. They're right there on the rack with the newsmagazines.
I never noticed that the Dutch were any more depraved or warped than anyone else.

The fact that we find pornography salacious and titillating is not a Natural reaction. It is a warped reaction caused by our parents "protecting" us from it as children, thereby unwittingly transforming it into something fascinating and forbidden.
Our titillation with sex and nudity is artificial and entirely cultural. What our great grandparents' considered salacious, a bare leg, for example, wouldn't raise an eyebrow today. Yet I'll bet grandpap would have been quick to slap his hand over little Johnnie's eyes -- to "protect" him -- had a fall or errant breeze exposed a bit of feminine leg down on Main St.

Have you ever been to Hawaii? Were you greeted at the airport by a colorfully dressed native lady draping a lei over your head?
If you'd chosen the island of Yap for your South-Sea vacation you'd also have been leid (?) by a native lady at the airport -- but she would have been topless. Toplessness is normal on Yap. But, as the tourist brochures warn, don't even think of wearing shorts there. Bare your thighs in public and the shocked citizens of Yap will quickly usher their kids indoors, to "protect" them from this gross indecency. Some might even pull out their cell-phones to report this public lewdness the authorities.

Sunstone's question, of course, hinges on how one defines pornography.
I would certainly want to restrict any exploitative pornography -- or any exploitative non-pornographic activity, for that matter. And there is evidence that scenes of violence, anger and abuse actually can be intrinsically harmful -- unlike nudity and sex, yet there is little pressure to shield these from callow eyes.

 

[Pardus]

As Seyonrni

 

[EiNsTeiN]

Against censorship, but want to ban porn :areyoucra. Are you serious?

Ban if FOR CHILDREN

And for adults if PURE porn, not just a scene in a movie or something

 

[EiNsTeiN]

Protect children? Protect children from what?

The question presupposes that there is something about pornography that would be harmful to children. The very fact that no-one has questioned the premise of the thread title could be construed as symptomatic of a sexual psychopathology -- caused,in part, by a lack of exposure to sex and nudity (ie: pornography) as children.

Perhaps pornography is good for children, and should be encouraged.
Consider:

In many tribal cultures nudity and sexuality is treated casually and matter-of-factly. In these societies you won't find damaged children. If you distributed a handful of Playboy magazines to a group of adolescent boys they actually would "just read the articles."
In the Netherlands any child can buy a pornographic magazine. They're right there on the rack with the newsmagazines.
I never noticed that the Dutch were any more depraved or warped than anyone else.

The fact that we find pornography salacious and titillating is not a Natural reaction. It is a warped reaction caused by our parents "protecting" us from it as children, thereby unwittingly transforming it into something fascinating and forbidden.
Our titillation with sex and nudity is artificial and entirely cultural. What our great grandparents' considered salacious, a bare leg, for example, wouldn't raise an eyebrow today. Yet I'll bet grandpap would have been quick to slap his hand over little Johnnie's eyes -- to "protect" him -- had a fall or errant breeze exposed a bit of feminine leg down on Main St.

Have you ever been to Hawaii? Were you greeted at the airport by a colorfully dressed native lady draping a lei over your head?
If you'd chosen the island of Yap for your South-Sea vacation you'd also have been leid (?) by a native lady at the airport -- but she would have been topless. Toplessness is normal on Yap. But, as the tourist brochures warn, don't even think of wearing shorts there. Bare your thighs in public and the shocked citizens of Yap will quickly usher their kids indoors, to "protect" them from this gross indecency. Some might even pull out their cell-phones to report this public lewdness the authorities.

Sunstone's question, of course, hinges on how one defines pornography.
I would certainly want to restrict any exploitative pornography -- or any exploitative non-pornographic activity, for that matter. And there is evidence that scenes of violence, anger and abuse actually can be intrinsically harmful -- unlike nudity and sex, yet there is little pressure to shield these from callow eyes.

I totally disagree..
Is there an exploitive pornography, and a non-exploitive pornography?!
Well thats new to me!

 

[Mike182]

no, the responsibility here lies with the parents.

 

[BucephalusBB]

In the Netherlands any child can buy a pornographic magazine. They're right there on the rack with the newsmagazines.
I never noticed that the Dutch were any more depraved or warped than anyone else.

So far I am doing nice thanks
My first magazin was found somehwere and I was about 10 to12 I guess. I managaed to do fine so far though.

May I add btw that all the adult magazins are on the top of the magazins. No kid can reach that high. Even I have to stand on my toes so once in a while .
They can ask adults to have one though..

 

[mingmty]

The problem isn't a naked body, not even pictures of sexual intercourse, the problem is that since the creation of the Internet all kind of sick pictures can be found by mistake quite easily and a child can confuse this abominations as being something normal if he is used to see it online.

I remember that when I was a child, in my curiosity, I used to see the pictures of a book of sexual education; this pictures where hand drawn and some of them where quite explicit, but that's ok, what I find worrying is the amount of bestiality and other sick stuff that is online now days; like some adds that come with spyware where girls are shown being severely humiliated.

This is not natural, is the production of disturbed minds, and is entering at full speed to our main-stream culture.

I say ban everything, and I mean everything, but straight sex pornography. That should be enough for anyone.

I would certainly want to restrict any exploitative pornography -- or any exploitative non-pornographic activity, for that matter. And there is evidence that scenes of violence, anger and abuse actually can be intrinsically harmful -- unlike nudity and sex, yet there is little pressure to shield these from callow eyes.

Completely agree.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Pornography is one of the oldest "art forms" Stone age people made stone and wooden porn dolls.
Romans decorated their public rooms with it.
Victorians had a massive trade in it.

If anything we had pushed it to the back of our lives, till the advent of the web made it universal again.

We have made great strides clamping down on Child porn.... but there is little chance we will ever get adult porn banned in all countries, so there is no way it will ever be removed from the web.

Just as children use to get hold of smutty books and magazines, they get hold of porn on the web. There is no indicators that they any more than previous generations, ever damaged by this.

Until we can discuss sexual matters as openly as we do other issues, Porn may have a slight educational value for adolescents; how ever distorted that might be.

 

[Yerda]

If we wanted to ban things to protect children I think a better place to start is the automobile. I wonder how that would sit with the right-wing puritans.